Legacy, Luxury and Lift-Off
Business Context
A global luxury retailer with a strong focus on innovation and international growth.
Economic conditions meant they needed to actively manage costs to preserve margins, and the Finance team had to be seen to lead from the front.
The Challenge
The Finance team had received a benchmarking report highlighting a large gap to ‘best-in-class’ standards.
Overwhelmed by the scale of change and with progress stalled, they needed clarity, structure, and renewed motivation.
The Transformation Guide Approach
Paul Cook partnered with the Finance leadership team to assess the Finance change programme, evaluate the team’s readiness for transformation, and provide clear direction to help them become a world-class function.
Over three days, I conducted a our Change Compass exercise that combined a review of programme documentation and working practices, one-to-one sessions with team members, and application of my Transformation Toolkit to pinpoint improvements.
I provided personal feedback to help each member construct a simple improvement plan, and led a group workshop to simplify reporting, governance, and ways of working ensuring the team left with clarity, confidence, and actionable steps to accelerate change.
Outcomes
In just a few days, we succesfully:
Refocused programme vision with clarity on what to stop, start, and change
Simplified project definitions and introduced a prioritisation process introduced
Set up each team member with simple personal development ideas to build their transformation skills, with ongoing mentoring offered
Energised the team and helped them to get over the sense of overwhelm and focus on delivering change
Key Lessons
For this client, the breakthrough came when they prioritised and focussed on key areas where they fell short of benchmarks, rather than trying o fix everything at one.
As Paul puts it:
“Transformation isn’t about fixing everything. It’s about knowing what’s worth carrying forward - and having the courage to leave some things behind.”
If your organisation is wrestling with similar questions of priority and focus, The Transformation Guide can help.
Explore The Change Compass - a rapid that creates clarity and alignment, giving your team the confidence to lead transformation themselves.