Case Study 1

The Client

A private school

 

The problem

The school was experiencing issues with communication and collaboration amongst staff members as part of their innovation and development plans.

 

Why Novellus

The headteacher had heard Nippin speaking at one of his previous workshops and wanted to bring his perspective on listening and learning to the staff.

Our approach

We studied the internal communication within the school to understand patterns in conversation amongst the staff. We agreed to design a four-part workshop series over four consecutive weeks (1.5 hours each) to create curious conversations between staff members.

We ran the workshop with all the department heads in the school to help them understand and reflect on their own conversation style.

 

The solution

The idea that the change was not being imposed on them, and rather problems were discussed with them created a lot of interaction and discussions in the workshops. At the end of the fourth session, the staff were thinking and listening to each other and wanting more of these workshops to be facilitated at a wider level in the school.

 

The long term impact

According to the headteacher “the long-term impact won’t be seen in the adaptation of a particular technique, or a change of a particular practice. The long-lasting effects will be in a change of culture, a culture in which we listen more carefully and think more deeply about the important issues in education and how to improve outcomes for every child.”

 

 

Nippin and his team worked with a group of our middle managers on how to make the best use of their meeting time, how to get away from a series of problems that have instant solutions to looking at issues more deeply and carefully.