blog: Become a Future Leader
Tuesday 25th October 2022
I began my Future Leaders journey last September, courtesy of ITP’s parent company Royal HaskoningDHV. It's a 16-month programme designed to equip those with 3 to 8 years’ professional experience, with the knowledge and skills needed to transition into senior management roles in the future. While many organisations offer similar leadership programmes, Future Leaders is one of the most comprehensive I've seen with up to 50 staff taking part each year.
Development Areas
There are four overarching development areas: leadership, transformation, business skills and personal development. The first three are delivered through a series of half-day workshops and the final one involves 1-2-1 support from an external Coach to create and implement a Professional Development Plan. This will reflect your personal goals, whether that's becoming the next CEO, a software guru or to polish your public speaking skills, it’s entirely driven by you.
Throughout the programme, there are regular meetings with your Manager to assist your leadership journey, helping to identify and unlock opportunities to deliver on your Professional Development Plan goals. You also choose a Mentor – who is internal to the business – with whom you can discuss any ideas you have or challenges you need help to overcome in your daily work or to support your development aspirations. Your Mentor can be a shining light or a shoulder to cry on, or both at different times.
The Power of Peer Learning
Ultimately, you are on your journey with a cohort of other awesome people and the experience is one that is certainly best shared. With this in mind, peer learning is an integral element that has been embedded in the programme.
There are various group activities and your peer groups evolve over time, so you get exposure to new people and new ideas. In the final months of the programme, we work together as a peer group to complete a strategic assignment aligned to a real-world challenge the business is facing. We collectively present the findings, proposed strategy and recommendations to Royal HaskoningDHV’s Executive Council, our manager and mentor.
My Reflections
Before taking part in Future Leaders, I would say that my leadership skills had developed organically from my own experiences of being led by others and from the leadership roles that I have grown into. One of the key benefits of the programme is a space for personal reflection and for critical thinking on my own leadership style and approach whilst enabling me to self-identify my own strengths and weaknesses.
Overall, this has enabled me to level-up my game and given me the clarity to persist with certain standards in situations where you may come under pressure to relax them. This applies across so many dimensions including giving feedback, sustaining the trust of colleagues and creating truly inclusive environments.
A further benefit is the exposure the programme gives you within ITP and Royal HaskoningDHV, and the networking opportunities it creates. Being a Future Leader definitely provides a level of recognition that I found to be helpful when engaging more widely throughout the company.
I would definitely recommend other colleagues to join the programme. While the application process is fairly involved, the rewards are totally worth it once you’re on the programme. I’d also say that if you don’t get on at the first time of trying, don’t let this put you off from applying again. I am really excited to put the skills I have developed into practice over the coming years and pushing myself to achieve even more.
If you're interested in joining ITP and continuing your professional development, visit Working at ITP to find out more about our philosophy and current vacancies.