By Kymberly Martin
Key space for management programs.
The Good Guys has opened an innovative learning space located near its Support Centre in Melbourne’s northern suburbs. ‘The Refinery’ Leadership and Learning Centre is designed to create experiential programs that leverage live environments like a ‘mock’ store, point-of-sale and concierge desk and full functioning test kitchens.
The centre also includes different sized work spaces, auditorium seating, a chill-out zone and outdoor inspired café to nurture creativity, collaboration and innovation.
“Our vision is to develop and deliver a number of innovative programs for our employees such as a Sales Floor Leader and C.R.E.A.T.E. (Contacting Customers, Relationship Building, Exploring Needs, Art of the Demonstration, Total Solution Recommendation, Ensuring the Sale) Academy, a VM (Visual Marketing) Academy, Cooking Academy, Strength workshops and leadership development programs, with more projects in the pipeline,” The Good Guys chief people officer Jamie Ehrhardt (pictured above) said.
The key part of this multipurpose space is a new management training program, called Ignite that claims to set the benchmark for retail management training and development in Australia. The aim of the program is to inspire both new and existing store managers in an intensive leadership and induction program designed specifically to extract key leadership qualities and set store managers up for success from day one.
“As we transition through corporatisation we are promoting and recruiting new leaders at a pace we have never seen before,” she said.
To achieve this The Good Guys has overhauled learning and development by investing heavily to turn induction “on its head” – moving away from traditional training methods which primarily focused on technical skills and processes, towards more emphasis on experiential learning, high pressure test situations and exaggerated practice.
“Through Ignite we communicate culture, enthusiasm and the vision of ‘great’, Ehrhardt said. “We recognise that so many fundamental leadership skills can only be learnt by ‘doing’ so we utilise experiential activities in all of our workshops.
“We have made this investment to future-proof our business, to build our talent bench and strengthen our employee value proposition. We are committed to being a true learning organisation where our employees are provided with opportunities to learn, grow and develop and are encourages to learn organically on an on-going basis in order to deliver remarkable results and become the best versions of themselves,” she said.
