When Fiona Irvine, Head of People and Culture at Sitryx, needed support for their rapidly growing leadership team, she knew that Cheryl would be the ideal person to help.
Sitryx is a biopharmaceutical company focused on regulating cell metabolism to develop first-in-class disease modifying therapeutics in immuno-oncology and immuno-inflammation. Founded in 2018 by a team of world-leading scientists from the United States and Europe, based in Oxford, Sitryx has a pipeline of projects at multiple stages of drug discovery.
The background
The Sitryx team has doubled to 50 in the past year. They had to make sure that, amidst rapid growth and fast paced recruitment, they worked on their organisation design to make sure they had robust structures in place and the right levels of management support for new starters – and for the managers themselves.
As is common in their industry, when companies scale quickly you’re catapulting people into leadership roles. They’re highly capable technically and scientifically, but they often haven’t had any people management experience or training.
They had the potential to be great managers and would become so in time, but Sitryx wanted to give them the support straightaway, to help them to recognise their own leadership behaviours and to understand how their leadership style may need to adapt to others’ styles.
Also, many were new to the organisation themselves, so they weren’t familiar with Sitryx’s culture and values and how that would influence their leadership.
The brief
Sitryx had identified that leadership capability was an area they needed to focus on, and they wanted to be an organisation that invested in leadership development. Their priority was for their leaders to feel confident in their leadership capabilities, and they wanted their teams to have confidence in their leaders too.
The organisation’s core values are all about trust and collaboration, encouraging a growth mindset with transparency and openness.
Sitryx wanted to shift the culture from a traditional directive style of management to a mature leadership style where they developed confident, capable leaders who would bring out the best in their teams.
How the developing leaders programme helped
Cheryl delivered her Developing Leaders programme with 12 emerging and existing leaders and Sitryx saw huge benefits from their leaders taking part of the programme.
Because the programme ran over six months, the HR sponsor could see the leaders develop through the process, and they found it really useful having time to try things out and discuss their experiences in between each module.
On an individual level, they noticed people’s confidence growing, and saw a significant increase in self-awareness, with the leaders knowing their strengths as well as the areas they needed to be mindful of regarding how they interacted with their teams.
As well as learning to critically evaluate their own styles of behaviour and leadership, the programme also gave them the skills to be more empathetic in situations, using a situational approach to deal with various tasks and issues that cropped up.
This growth and more mindful approach also resulted in more transparency, where they were more willing to talk about vulnerabilities and worries whereas, with the previous culture, they might have felt that if they showed any doubt, or asked for advice, it might be perceived as them not being the right person for the job.
The group enjoyed a heightened level of psychological safety, and the trust within their peer group meant they felt comfortable openly sharing their own ideas and concerns and listening to others. They could test out leadership styles on people in their peer group who had similar traits to their team members.
Cheryl also provided 1:1 coaching alongside the group sessions, which was so popular Sitryx extended it. It was really effective for Cheryl to get to know the group in the sessions and then tailor her support to give a tailored, personal touch to each individual, helping them to unblock any issues.
Reflect, embed, evolve
Throughout the six-month programme, it was important for Cheryl to check in regularly, to stay agile, get feedback from the group and adapt to their energy and evolving needs while retaining the overall objectives.
As Cheryl observes, “To be really effective, you can’t rigidly stick to your original plan. You’ll always need to iterate and adjust to the pace of the team’s development and to whatever changes might happen along the way.”
Tangible results
Sitryx had tangible results that Cheryl’s leadership programme had been successful and effective – the first engagement survey they did after the programme finished was, “Do you have confidence in your manager and do you find them approachable?”
The results showed quite a dramatic upturn compared to last year.
They are delighted to see that their carefully chosen development of their leaders is giving their teams confidence that they are developing people in the right way and that their organisation treats people the right way. They’re getting great feedback internally, with people saying just that.
Staff retention levels are really healthy too. Through their rapid growth, Sitryx was careful to keep their friendly, family environment, making sure they maintained the culture and kept the valued members of the team they’ve invested a lot in recruiting and onboarding.
Everyone who took part in the programme is still there, and highly engaged and motivated.
Project efficiency
The leadership development has also meant that projects are being managed a lot more efficiently. There’s more autonomy; more certainty in decision making. The leaders might not have all the answers but they know how to get them, how to improve things, and how to get things done more quickly and effectively without having to escalate most issues.
The programme’s HR sponsor and the rest of the leadership team are receiving excellent feedback about how projects are where they need to be, and they’ve noticed that they’re not having to get so involved in the day to day, now their leaders are more confident and more comfortable taking on more responsibility and being more resourceful.
This has helpfully freed up time and space for the leadership team to concentrate on strategy.
Tailor made
Cheryl often gets potential clients asking for an off the shelf programme, but she believe that a leadership development programme needs to be tailored to the unique dynamics, culture and personalities of a particular team, and shaped to add value to that particular organisation.
It’s an essential part of the process to pin down what the organisation is looking to achieve, and how they’re going to measure that, as the investment needs to be justified to the board.
As the HR sponsor commented, “Cheryl was personally invested in our success. She took the time to really get to know us and our needs, and delivered a bespoke programme tailored to meet our objectives. I think that’s why it hit the mark so well and was so successful.”
Feedback after the programme
Sitryx did a survey after each programme session and the feedback was always overwhelmingly positive on every question.
They loved that Cheryl switched up the environment, using a mix of teaching methods which kept the training fresh, stimulating and engaging.
People hadn’t expected management training to get into deep thinking, analysing yourself and your own core values. It was a revelation that that was the key to being an authentic leader.
Follow up
Sitryx has engaged Cheryl to return for a follow-up session with the leaders, who are delighted to hear she’ll be coming back.
They’re committed to keeping the momentum going and these follow-up sessions with Cheryl to regularly check in will enable them to see how the leaders are feeling, embed and reinforce the learnings and define what further support they might need.
Accountability is a powerful motivator for continued success.
Working with Cheryl
Developing the programme was a very collaborative process. The HR sponsor had been through numerous training courses and leadership development initiatives in her career, which were all structured, directive and calibrated to work a certain way.
She immediately appreciated how different Cheryl’s approach was, asking all the right questions to get people to articulate what they mean by confidence and leadership, what leadership and confidence meant to the team, what their objectives were and what they wanted to get out of it the programme. Cheryl really listened to the answers and took everything on board.
Sitryx knew they wanted to incorporate diversity and inclusion, and to champion female leadership, and Cheryl advised on the best way to do that. She was flexible and was happy to adapt the programme structure to deliver everything they wanted it to.
Advice for other organisations
The HR sponsor at Sitryx encourages anyone to dive in and talk to Cheryl! She found the Leadership Development programme to be an excellent return on investment and a big success.
She highly recommends Cheryl as a facilitator for her engaging, stimulating style and for her advanced level of tailoring.
Cheryl makes sure the organisation’s investment shines through and is a pleasure to work with.