Forging leaders in the steel industry

Succession planning is helping major steel suppliers ASD Metal Services to strengthen its management team and build tomorrow’s leaders. Report by Erika Lucas.

Leading steel company ASD Metal Services is developing its future leaders through an innovative learning and development programme that leads to a CMI management qualification.

ASD is the largest independent steel stockholder in Europe and North America and employs around 1,200 people across 38 UK sites.  It supplies the steel used in everything from architectural and construction projects to road signs and lorry trailers and has a turnover of £280m.

The business has been through enormous change in recent years, having been bought and sold several times – and is now part of the publicly-listed Klockner & Co SE Group.  It has recently undergone a major restructure, which has seen it move towards a system where a team of regional and general managers oversee critical parts of the business.

Succession planning is high on ASD’s agenda for a number of reasons.  The steel industry has found it hard to shake off its ‘grubby’ industrial image and as a result, struggles to recruit high calibre graduates and attract new talent. It is also a highly specialised industry. Managers require detailed product knowledge and technical expertise, which takes time, and a significant investment in training, to build.

Against this backdrop, ‘growing your own’ talent makes good commercial sense – and also demonstrates to shareholders that the business is investing in its human resources and making plans to secure its future.

The business worked closely with a number of external suppliers to put together an innovative two-year ‘Emerging Leaders’ programme.

The first stage is a two-day outward-bound programme, held at Eskdale, to kick-start the team-building process and help managers move on from the feedback from the assessment centre. Over the following year, they take part in a series of 12 workshops covering key aspects of management and closely linked to the competencies required for NVQ Level 4 and 5 qualifications in management.

In between workshops, managers are divided into action-centred learning groups where they help each other deal with job-related issues through peer coaching, and work together to relate what they have learnt in the formal sessions to their day-to-day experience in the workplace.

In the subsequent year, the group work closely with training providers McKechnies, a CMI approved centre, on accreditation of their learning and experience. Debbie Reed, programme director at McKechnies, says: “Many of the candidates are changing their management practices as a direct result of working to the National Standards in Management and Leadership and being assessed against them - especially in the area of creativity and innovation.

“It is really gratifying to see how all the component parts of the programme are being brought together through the achievement of a management qualification.”

This is an extract of a feature in the July issue of Professional Manager.

Further information
For further information about CMI qualifications, approved centres and how to become an approved centre, call 01536 207453, e-mail qualifications@managers.org.uk or visit www.managers.org.uk

For information about the Chartered Manager programme call 01536 207429, e-mail cmgr@managers.org.uk or visit www.managers.org.uk/cmgr.

Information about talent management, succession planning and other topics referenced in this case study are available in CMI’s online ManagementDirect service, including e-learning, podcasts, checklists, articles and reading lists* – www.managers.org.uk/managementdirect.

An executive summary of CMI’s report on talent management, entitled Talent Management: Maximising Talent for Business Performance (November 2007), is available at www.managers.org.uk/researchreports (also available via ManagementDirect)

For further information about the National Occupational Standards for Management and Leadership visit www.management-standards.org

*ManagementDirect’s reading list includes: Clever by Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones; Reinventing Talent Management by Willaim A Schiemann; and Top Talent by Sylvia Ann Hewlett. All listed titles can be borrowed from CMI.

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