The client
The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) is an international University based on the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia. It was founded as “a beacon for peace, hope, and reconciliation and shall serve the people of the Kingdom and benefit all the peoples of the world.”
The University is one piece of a much wider national strategy called Vision 2030. This sets out national ambitions to play an important role globally and in the Arab World. The KAUST vision includes broad economic and societal benefits and growing as an international centre of expertise, with a strong emphasis on sustainable technology and the environment.
KAUST has around 12,000 employees, with over 300 world-renowned academic staff and 300 professional support staff.
The Challenge
KAUST is an intensively creative environment with leading academics from universities around the world, including MIT, Harvard, Yale, and Cambridge. The research faculty are at the heart of KAUST and enjoy the benefit of world-class facilities. To stay at the forefront of academic research they need to continue to attract and retain leaders from around the world.
Added to the challenges of building a world-class faculty, KAUST exists as an autonomous campus with all the complexity of servicing and supporting a growing community within a challenging physical environment. This means running all the physical infrastructure as well as community services such as schools, leisure facilities, social events, and health provision.
KAUST is seeking to deliver maximum impact from this funding and boost its long-term future by securing commercial partnerships and investments. The key challenge is achieving these above aims within the context of competition from other global universities.
With these challenges in mind, and having trusted Pearn Kandola to deliver 1:1 assessments and coaching for several years, KAUST asked Pearn Kandola to develop a series of leadership development programmes to identify talented future senior leaders and provide personal development support to each leader.
The Solution
Pearn Kandola created a series of Executive Development Programmes (EDP), targeted at high-performing senior leaders across KAUST. These offer a “springboard” to support those who are considered to have the potential for broadening or deepening their impact, either within their current roles or supporting those who show the aptitude to succeed within high-level leadership roles.
The EDP is anchored to the KAUST Leadership Framework – the KAUST Leadership Principles. Participants can identify their strengths and development priorities against the principles and discover strategies for increasing their capability and impact as leaders. This delivers long-term success both for the individual and for KAUST. The EDP includes:
- Pre-work involving online personality profiling, a self-reflection workbook, and a 360o survey.
- A three-day off-site development centre.
- A development action plan with ongoing support from line manager and HR.
- Ongoing group activities.
- Optional follow on 1:1 executive coaching.
After completing pre-work, participants attend a two-day event. Here, they are observed in a variety of leadership simulation exercises and receive feedback from a dedicated Pearn Kandola coach, using the KAUST Leadership Framework. They also take part in leadership skills workshops, have time for self-reflection, and professional coaching, and create a future action and development plan to support their long-term leadership growth at KAUST.
Participants leave the EDP with a detailed report of personal feedback and suggestions on how to take their development forward. An Executive Summary of participants’ reports is shared with their line manager or VP for ongoing support, and the Head of Talent Management to ensure that they receive the best possible development assistance.
The EDP also provides valuable talent management information, enabling KAUST and individuals to make the best possible decisions to support career choices and development opportunities for its leaders.
The Outcomes
Some examples of participant feedback:
The fact that it was tailored specifically for KAUST was the key. Everything and everyone is in line with the current status of KAUST and everything around. All leadership principles are from KAUST, so it’s clear the direction we must focus on during the exercises.
The organization and planning were impeccable. Very clear and very professional. The actors were absolutely brilliant and the different exercises really focused on key elements of leadership.
The combination of group sessions, workshops, individual sessions, and immediate feedback, made this course the best development course I’ve ever had at KAUST. Extremely useful. I hope all KAUST leadership goes through similar sessions in the very near future. This should be a requirement for all aspiring leaders at KAUST. Thank you very much for the opportunity!
The alignment of the scenarios to the realities of KAUST. The acting was extraordinary. The clarity of the feedback so quickly was very helpful. The interaction with colleagues was also helpful.
