Continued and impressive growth at the Cornwall-based clothing business has meant an increase in recruitment into more senior leadership positions. Seasalt’s Leading People programme ensures leaders connect regularly with each other, collaborating on a range of leadership workshops designed to enhance workplace experiences for everyone.

Seasalt’s HR Director, John Govier, commented, "We’re successful because of our people. A growing business like ours continually needs great team members led by equally understanding, creative, and supportive leaders.  We are really pleased that The Learning Programme of Excellence recognition from the LPI highlights the work we have been doing and will continue to do with our people in the future to ensure they have all the resources they need to continue to be truly authentic leaders."

Creating a leadership climate
Throughout 2018, the Leading People programme gathered a community of 32 senior leaders each month, modelling executive board meetings; five full-day leadership workshops took place. These five modules targeted emotional intelligence, future talent, employee engagement, coaching, and high performance.

Each module was spaced to enable leaders to allow for reflection and to discuss their experiences with peers, with many going on to showcase their learning in their teams. This, combined with a leadership and management toolkit and resource platform available for the whole business to access, has enabled the conversation of leadership to flow throughout the business. 

Measuring Impact
As the inaugural in-house programme of its kind at Seasalt, a more observational approach to measuring impact has been taken initially. This means that executive leaders have been able to monitor the performance of their leaders and provide feedback via regular performance catch ups.

A new engagement strategy was implemented at the same time across the business and has allowed Seasalt to track leaders against their teams’ engagement score. As this strategy evolves, those leaders will have the opportunity to see live data and track whether their actions are having impact themselves.  Pulse surveys and 360 reviews next year will also give the business a clearer view of high-performing leaders and identify those that need further development.

CEO of the LPI, Edmund Monk, says, "Learning programmes are now crucial weapons in the fight to attract and retain talent, so it’s important to recognise those programmes that stand out as being particularly effective. Seasalt Cornwall’s Leading People programme is an example of a learning programme that is state of the art, innovative, and absolutely in line with the high standards demanded by modern and digitally enabled leaders."

Future Plans
Endorsement from the LPI highlights the high standard in learning design and delivery for this programme, enabling Seasalt to look at how it advances its offer to a wider audience. The programme will continue to be delivered to all advancing and joining leaders at Seasalt and also be offered to other businesses in the UK’s southwest, driving leadership capability across the region.