POLIFILM Management Academy – more than just a standard training programme
Interview with Paul Beaver, CEO of POLIFILM PROTECTION and co-founder of the POLIFILM Management Academy.
The POLIFILM Management Academy is the training programme for the next generation of leaders within the POLIFILM Group. It is training the managers of tomorrow. In this interview, POLIFILM PROTECTION‘s CEO and co-founder of the Management Academy, Paul Beaver, reveals why the programme was launched, why mentoring plays such an important role in it and what defines a good mentor.
What was POLIFILMs motivation to implement the Management Academy?
The Management Academy programme is so important as management potential needs to be constantly developed. Human resources are critical to a growing business such as ours, talent needs to be recognised and given an opportunity to flourish. With the right amount of structure, direction, motivation, and encouragement, a win-win outcome is inevitable. Mutual gain prevails, talents are developed and internal and external stakeholders to the business benefit from this incredibly positive development.
With the right amount of structure, direction, motivation, and encouragement, a win-win outcome is inevitable.
Paul BeaverCEO POLIFILM PROTECTION
Key element of the POLIFILM Management Academy is that every participant has his or her individual mentor. You are one of them. What´s your role?
As a mentor in the POLIFILM PROTECTION Management Academy, it has been my pleasure to help guide and support our candidates to structure and build a programme which will, in time, allow them to develop and flourish into the next generation of managerial resources. Investing in people is thoroughly rewarding, more so when talent is recognised and opportunities are presented, the payback for the employer is immeasurable when such candidates develop personally and professionally. Enriching peoples lives with opportunities and ultimately reward, is so well received.
You sound so passionate about it. Do you have similar experiences?
Personally, I embarked on a similar scheme in my very early working days, some key lessons in my business life were learnt at that point in my career. Simple do’ and don’ts were cemented early on, structure was recognised, rules were given and working practices explained. However, even more than that, I could clearly see that people and the company itself, were investing in me. That made me personally motivated, keen to repay with my development and dedication. So much so, that I have never forgotten the value I took from such an experience, now I can pass those same opportunities to our young colleagues who now take their first steps on our Management Academy programme.
So, the main idea is that experienced managers share their success secrets with the future managers, isn´t it?
Für das Mentoring gibt es kein Regelwerk und keine Anleitung. Es geht vielmehr darum, zuzuhören, zu diskutieren und zu verstehen.
Paul BeaverCEO POLIFILM PROTECTION
Mentoring is not all about passing on your experience as a well established leader or manager, its not all about sharing experiences from the past or showing how you have been successful. Rather, I feel the first things to do is listen, to try and understand the point at which the candidate is in their experience and career, where they feel they are strong and where they need to develop, and an important consideration is to know where they want to be later in their working life. Also, to clearly explain where you, or the company, envisage their potential and how you see where their potential could develop to.
Once you have all this, the Management Academy can build a programme which will enable them to achieve their personal goals and also those of the company, in relation to their journey in the Management Academy.
What characterized a good mentor in your opinion?
For me, mentoring doesn’t come with a rule book or a ‘how to’ guide. It is more about listening, discussing, and understanding. The more you discuss and work with an individual, the more you understand. With depth of understanding, you can create a workable path to move forward.
Who needs mentoring?
Everyone needs mentoring in one way or another, the input could be big or small. As humans, we learn new things everyday so none of us should ever shut off to the opportunity to listen and learn, learning is taking information and processing it into a new way of thinking, that information can often come from a mentor, even if sometimes we don’t realise it at the time.
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