Leadership Development
Dr. Martens
Developing Leaders Programme

Dr. Martens original boots in red

Leadership Development. Dr. Martens. Developing Leaders Programme. The challenge. The Developing Leaders Programme was an expansion of a successful initiative (Manager Essentials Programme) for first-time managers at HQ, the previous year. Due to this programme’s success, Dr. Martens wanted to expand and develop it for a more senior level of management with the Developing Leaders Programme. As well as adapting it to meet the needs of operational management, including junior and senior managers, in retail shops. This programme needed to support and align with the company’s values through the DM Way Leadership Framework whilst addressing the distinct challenges of each group, across EMEA and the Americas. Dr. Martens’ desire for an ‘always-on’ leadership development initiative was key in the development, to make sure it aligned with their values and culture. The programme’s objectives were rooted in empowering managers to inspire their teams, cultivate strong connections, and drive impactful results. 100+ HQ and retail based The solution. Implementation involved close collaboration between PeopleUnboxed and Dr. Martens Global Learning & Development team, Head of Talent and Retail Leadership Heads to build a bespoke solution that met the needs of each target group and embedded the DM Way Leadership Framework. We conducted detailed assessments of leadership capabilities required for each target group. Distinct programmes were designed for: Retail Managers, Corporate Managers and Leaders and Retail Leaders. With cohorts spanning EMEA and the Americas, the content and delivery approach were adapted to meet the specific cultural and regional contexts and leadership challenges. Mid-programme, Dr. Martens underwent senior leadership changes. This required agile adjustments to the content to reflect evolving business objectives and leadership messaging. Real-time updates ensured the programme remained relevant and impactful. An immersive blended journey of six 2-hour virtual sessions, spaced across three weeks, was created. This was complemented by workbooks, microlearning, and individual coaching calls (mid, end and post programme). We also introduced a reflection and commitment session to deepen peer-to-peer discussions. Participants also gained access to our full eLearning suite, accessible at any time, allowing learners to revisit key concepts and explore new topics, ensuring continuous growth beyond the live sessions. The results. “Dr. Martens has partnered with PeopleUnboxed for 4 years now. Their deep understanding of our business needs and organisational culture has allowed them to design and deliver effective training programmes to enhance capability across DM’s. PeopleUnboxed demonstrate an impressive level of expertise and commitment to our success, ensuring that each learning initiative not only aligns with our strategic objectives, but also adds value to our people and their career development. PeopleUnboxed bring true value and ROI. From our management development courses, to our personal effectiveness webinars that are open to all employees, we see consistently positive feedback. Our longest-running programme, Manager Essentials, has a 4.8/5 rating with participants sharing that the training has made a positive difference to how they work. Our newest programmes, Retail Manager and Retail Leader, have an NPS of 100 and 90 respectively. PeopleUnboxed have also supported with the activation of our brand-new behavioural framework, The DM Way, by designing and delivering training to enhance our people’s understanding of each element of the model. The PeopleUnboxed team are an excellent team of facilitators and consistently lead engaging and insightful sessions, making complex concepts easy to understand while keeping the entire audience actively involved and motivated. PeopleUnboxed are truly collaborative and take the time to build strong relationships with our Global L&D team, and all of our people, to understand the unique challenges and opportunities within our organisation. Their responsiveness, flexibility, and proactive communication have made them a trusted extension of our team, and we look forward to continuing our successful partnership for years to come.” Global Learning & Development Lead “The courses give us a chance to apply real problems that we have in the workplace and work through them with others that might have similar problems and great advice. I truly feel like every course I’ve walked away more knowledgeable and prepared to be a better manager ” Learner “The communication styles was key as it allowed me to deal with conflict and deal with the difficult conversations and be confident dealing with it and have a much better relationship. It has been super useful to interact with all the different regions and listen and help each other and form new relationships and have contact we never had before. I have taken something from every session. It is great to speak about challenges with my peers and help solve problems” Learner “The coaching and prioritising really helped me. I am delegating more which means I am now coaching and delegating to my team, and I have seen the development within my team. I used to do everything myself but now I have a team I utilise, and it works. I have adapted and learned they are all different and I have to adapt my approach and find out what they need. I now have a greater understanding of how people communicate and adapt for their style.” Learner Previous Next How can we support you with leadership development? Click here to find out more

Leadership Development
Tesco
Strategic Business Partnering Programme

2 people stood looking at each other, they are wearing a Tesco uniform.

Leadership Development. Tesco. Strategic Business Partnering Programme. The challenge. Tesco identified a significant need to elevate the skills and effectiveness of its Business Partnering roles across the business. Through a comprehensive discovery phase, both externally across the industry and internally within Tesco, it became evident that business partners were getting too involved in the detail and needed to build their confidence in challenging stakeholders. They also needed to adopt more strategic behaviours to drive better outcomes. The aim was to create a tailored offering that would introduce key partnering skills and behaviours, ensuring partners were set up for success. The Strategic Business Partnering Programme was designed to provide foundational skills that would enable participants to better support the business, framed within the Tesco ‘Me, Us, and It’ model. 100+ HQ based The solution. PeopleUnboxed conducted a discovery phase to identify key skills gaps and then to design a comprehensive, targeted solution that addressed these gaps. The content was framed with the “Me, Us, and It” model and aligning it with Tesco’s core “Win Together” behaviours, we ensured the programme would be both relevant and impactful from the start. The main element of the programme took the form of a two-day in-person course, which introduced the essential skills for effective strategic partnering at a foundational level, and allowed ample time to practise applying their skills in a safe environment. The programme launched as a pilot across four of Tesco’s teams. This pilot phase allowed us to gather crucial feedback and make iterative improvements before a full rollout across the organisation. A key component was the inclusion of a post-course online partnering toolkit which enabled delegates to access resources. Embedding actions into participants’ personal development plans (PDPs), growth continued beyond the classroom, while collaboration with course buddies provided ongoing support. In addition to the in-person sessions, participants were given access to an online partnering toolkit with additional resources such as workbooks, online tools, and a peer-led forum. The results. “Working with the PeopleUnboxed team on the Strategic Business Partnering session has been an incredibly positive experience. I provided the skills and focus areas for the session, and the team expertly applied relevant models, tools and theories to bring it to life. They were responsive, collaborative and dedicated to creating a value-added experience for our Partners. The seamless integration of our business behaviours and values into the learning ensured the session was both impactful and aligned with our needs. The quick turnaround to meet our business requirements was impressive, and the feedback from our workforce has been overwhelmingly positive and I have observed some great longer-term impacts to our colleague’s working behaviours and confidence, seeing a more strategic mindset that adds real value to our business. Thank you PeopleUnboxed, it was a pleasure working with you.” Global Learning & Development Lead “One of the best, if not the best session I’ve been on in my 10+ years at Tesco.” “I found the role-plays and practice sessions incredibly valuable.” “The post-course content is something I still refer to, months later.” Learners Previous Next How can we support you with leadership development? Click here to find out more

Learning Technology
RED Construction
BentoBot

3 people stood in a group wearing hard hats and high-vis jackets with RED construction logos on the back. There is text overlaid stating: "Shortlisted" with a Learning Awards logo stating "Innovation in Learning Award (Platform) 2025 Finalist"

Learning Technology. RED Construction. BentoBot. The challenge. RED Construction aimed to improve the quality, consistency and effectiveness of their compliance training across the business. With employees from a range of career backgrounds and varying levels of experience, ensuring that everyone adheres to essential safety protocols, industry standards, and legal requirements is critical. However, the company faced challenges with traditional compliance training methods, which were often viewed as tick-box exercises: time-consuming, monotonous, and difficult to track for engagement and retention. Recognising the need to move away from a tick-box approach, RED Construction sought a platform that could make compliance training flexible and engaging, while also fitting into their workforce’s demanding schedules. They aimed to improve knowledge retention and foster a learning culture that prioritised safety and compliance without overwhelming their teams. BentoBot was chosen to meet these objectives, with its focus on micro-learning and gamification to make compliance training more accessible and impactful. 100 + Remote workers The solution. The strategy focused on delivering mandatory compliance content in bite-sized chunks through a mobile app, making it easy for learners to access training without interrupting their daily tasks. BentoBot was seamlessly integrated into RED’s learning systems, enabling employees to complete compliance modules in just five minutes per day. The platform’s spaced repetition approach ensured that key compliance information was regularly revisited, helping employees retain the content long-term. BentoBot’s five-minute learning sessions were ideal for embedding compliance knowledge without taking workers away from their tasks for extended periods. The platform also leveraged AI-driven adaptive learning to target knowledge gaps, ensuring that employees were continuously improving and reinforcing their understanding of key compliance areas. RED Construction worked closely with BentoBot’s development team to tailor the content to their specific industry needs. RED was able to modify off-the-shelf compliance courses to reflect the latest industry regulations and specific site practices. Gamified elements such as badges, streaks, leaderboards, avatars, and a learner passport were incorporated, allowing employees to track their progress, personalise their experience and create a more enjoyable learning journey. The strategy also included comprehensive engagement with RED’s leadership team to drive platform adoption. By involving site managers and senior leaders in the implementation process, RED ensured top-down commitment to using BentoBot as a core element of their compliance training programme. Regular check-ins, feedback loops, and user data analysis allowed for continuous refinement of both the platform and the content it delivered. The results. “BentoBot has been a game changer for RED Construction Group. As a rapidly growing construction company, BentoBot fitted perfectly with our culture and our agile mentality. Daily bitesize learning has ensured our teams are compliant and retain the knowledge through the use of spaced repetition. The ability to modify the available courses to be more specific to our industry has helped increase engagement and ensure relevancy. BentoBot also allows RED to create our own courses and thanks to the successful implementation and engagement, conversations are being had with senior leaders to create courses covering inductions, our values and behaviours, industry regulations, processes and materials. It is immensely satisfying to hear the positive conversations around BentoBot from senior leaders and employees, from seeing behavioural changes to implementing the platform in other areas of the business.” Training Lead “It doesn’t take much time out of my day and is in bite-size learning chunks.” Learner “Easy to access, easy to navigate and short and sweet. Sinks in because the learning is repetitive.” Learner “Easily accessible and convenient working around work commitments.” Learner Previous Next Learn how BentoBot can power up your performance Click here to find out more

Leadership Development
Entain
Elevate Development Programme

Person wearing hedphones around their neck and looking down at mobile. There is text overlaid stating: "Shortlisted" with a Learning Awards logo stating "Learning Culture of the Year 2025 Finalist"

Leadership Development. Entain.Elevate Leadership Development Programme. The challenge. Entain’s journey to building a thriving learning culture began with a realisation: while previous training investments were substantial, they were not translating into sustainable, everyday practices. Leadership recognised the need to create an environment where learning happened naturally during daily work. Additionally, faced with a complex acquisition, the need for adaptable, emotionally intelligent leaders became urgent. PeopleUnboxed partnered with Entain to design the Elevate Leadership Development Programme, focused on emotional intelligence, adaptability, and psychological safety. It emphasised making learning an everyday practice and ensuring inclusivity through participation, so all employees, from area managers to store-level staff, had opportunities to grow and apply learnings in real-time, but also inspire their teams to do the same. 100+ HQ based The solution. An early key decision was the hands-on, personalised approach to designing the programme. PeopleUnboxed conducted a ‘Day in the Life of’ activity by visiting Entain stores and engaging directly with staff. Participants were divided into regional cohorts to help localise the learning while fostering strong team dynamics. The Senior Leadership Team (SLT) completed the same training as regional managers, first, to gain an understanding of the programme content and demonstrate their commitment to fostering a learning culture. Each session required reflection and presenting how previous learnings were applied, ensuring that they put theory into action within their daily roles and reinforced continuous learning. One of the innovative strategies was the introduction of action learning sets, which are peer-led groups that facilitate ongoing reflection and collaboration among employees.  The ProfilesUnboxed tool was utilised to shape project groups based on individual strengths, ensuring diverse perspectives and approaches to projects. . The programme also placed a strong emphasis on psychological safety, encouraging leaders to create an environment where employees felt comfortable sharing ideas and expressing concerns. Key areas of focus included emotional intelligence, adaptability, psychological safety, and effective communication. Training also covered various leadership styles, communication techniques, and stakeholder management, enabling leaders to influence and engage their teams effectively.  The programme integrated real-world scenarios and challenges faced by participants, allowing them to apply their learning immediately and reinforce knowledge retention.  The results. “The Elevate leadership programme has been a game-changer for our retail operations field teams. Over the past year, the face-to-face, experiential sessions delivered by PeopleUnboxed have significantly impacted our business. We’ve seen a 12% decrease in labour turnover and a noticeable boost in team engagement, with an increase of 10 points for those who received the training and 13 to 17 points for the teams they lead. The programme’s focus on interactive learning has ensured strong knowledge retention, covering crucial topics such as leadership styles, communication, influence, and stakeholder management. Our leaders have reported that the training has helped them perform at a higher level, lead their teams more effectively, and tackle challenges that may have previously held them back. Understanding themselves and their teams better has enhanced their ability to confidently lead and drive meaningful results.” Senior Learning & Development Business Partner The Elevate programme has helped give the team a common language – if you joined our team meetings the training comes out in how we speak. In turn that has helped the entire team have a deeper personal and group understanding which has seen everyone be more open to growth. There have been some massive light bulb moments where people have finally understood why they do and feel what they do. The biggest overall way or working change has been producing the Game Guide – this is a home for all of the different elements of the Elevate programme, so everything is in one place. It’s more than just a reference point, it’s a practical structure for ‘how we play’ in our region. The ProfilesUnboxed colours are used when we need people to work on a group project – we use them to make sure we have a mix of colours and thinking in the group, so each topic is approached from different viewpoints/angles to get to a better overall outcome. Saboteurs have been invaluable in exploring how people are feeling and reacting in real life practical situations. This helped the team either step back from emotion or empathise more – so we become more rounded in our decision making and importantly understood why we’re thinking and feeling what we were. Overall, we’ve become more self-aware which has driven greater psychological safety. The Elevate programme acts like a compass – it helps point everyone in the same direction. Regional Director Previous Next How can we support you with leadership development? Click here to find out more

Organisational Culture
Riverstone
Respecting Individuality

2 people, with linked arms, walking down a street. One of them is holding a lead with a dog.

Organisational Culture. Riverstone.Respecting Individuality. The challenge. At Riverstone bringing their beliefs to life, is the key to ensuring they make sure people can live the life they want to live. One part of this, is their mission of ‘Respecting Individuality’, which covers: Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, Unconscious Bias, Cultural Intelligence, challenging ourselves and others and creating an inclusive work environment. They wanted to increase the focus internally on EDI, specifically with training sessions, helping the team to explore their unconscious biases and learn how to work effectively and be comfortable in diversity. The sessions were to be split into 2: Goal for the Leadership team: To establish their biases and be able to self-check and hold each other, and their teams, accountable if their biases are impacting decisions or conversations. Goal for the wider team: To increase self-awareness of own biases and be able to hold other colleagues accountable. We were tasked with bringing their objective of ‘Respecting Individuality’ to life. 100+ Nationwide The solution. Design and delivery of two courses focussed on unconscious bias and EDI, with an aim to enable team members to make decisions and hold conversations, with their own biases or those of others recognised, appreciated and/or mitigated to truly respect individuality. These courses were aligned with the key messaging and branding of Riverstone. The first people who attended the training were the members of the Exec Team, as to fully impact the culture, the leadership team need to pave the way for business success. Each course was interactive throughout, utilising breakout sessions and polls, and centred around thought provoking discussion and facilitation to maximise learner engagement. To support the embedding of this training and maximise the behavioural change, supporting pre and post work was provided. Part of the training was built into the recruitment and onboarding of staff, to establish the correct culture and behaviour early in the journey. The results. “PeopleUnboxed have delivered Respecting Individuality workshops for the entire organisation at Riverstone, their ability to create psychological safety within the training space and act as a catalyst enabling our teams to openly discuss their differences and unconscious biases then translate these into everyday change, set us up for success. As an entire organisation we are now having challenging conversations about our behaviours, processes and systems, identifying strengths and opportunities for change that contribute to a culture that is truly inclusive – had we not had support from PeopleUnboxed, these conversations would not have been as easy or as productive as they have, they have helped us understand the collective responsibility we all have to speaking up and taking ownership for EDI – that is a true testament to their impact as a training company being felt beyond the four walls of the training room.” Learning Manager “Our trainer was great, kind, and knowledgeable. Topics were relevant and introduced respectfully but in a way that got the team talking. Love what your organization does and the impactful knowledge you’re sharing with businesses!” Learner Previous Next How can we support you with organisational culture? Click here to find out more

The 4Ps of Candid Conversations

eLearning

The “Four Ps” model can help us to plan for a difficult or candid conversation so that both parties find it beneficial.

Learning Outcomes

  • Learn how to plan for a difficult or candid conversation so that both parties find it beneficial
  • Understand how to use the 4Ps to deliver a difficult message
  • Consider how this can help manage under-performance in a structured manner

Assertive Disagreement

eLearning

When you disagree with someone, it is often best to be direct and clear, as it avoids an unfortunate misunderstanding. People can shy away from disagreement as it can sometimes feel confrontational. The assertive approach introduced in this module helps you to express your disagreement in a professional, constructive manner.

Learning Outcomes

  • Learn what assertiveness is
  • Learn a process to put your case across without getting emotional
  • Provide context for how to use the model in a real-world environment

Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument

eLearning

Because no two individuals have exactly the same expectations and desires, conflict is a natural part of our interactions with others. This self-test assessment will tell you more about your predominant style of handling conflict and what this means.

Learning Outcomes

  • Provide a starting point for your development
  • Identify your conflict handling style
  • Learn about the five conflict handling modes

AID Feedback Model

eLearning

Providing feedback that encourages open dialogue and communication enhances your credibility as both a teammate and as a leader. AID is a simple feedback model that can be used for positive moments and those that need corrective action.

Learning Outcomes

  • Learn a simple model for providing feedback
  • Identify your own role in each of the stages
  • Discover the benefits of creating a feedback culture

Action-Centred Leadership

eLearning

Good managers and leaders should have full command of the three main areas of the Action-Centred Leadership model and should use each of the elements according to the situation.

Learning Outcomes

  • Discover John Adair’s action-centred leadership model
  • Learn how to adapt the model for your own work situation
  • Investigate the danger of becoming out of balance

Question Types

eLearning

Asking the right question is at the heart of effective communication and information exchange. Using the right questions can improve a whole range of communication skills; the information we receive back (the answer) will depend very much on the type of question we ask.

Learning Outcomes

  • Learn why asking the right question is at the heart of effective communication and information exchange
  • Discover why the right questions in a particular situation can improve a whole range of communication skills

Dr. Mehrabian’s Communication Model

eLearning

We are always communicating, even when we are not speaking. Other factors communicate what we really think and feel, which can be explained by looking at Albert Mehrabian’s communication model.

Learning Outcomes

  • Learn the impact of mixed messages when communicating
  • Understand that communication is a blend of words, body language and tone

Situational Leadership

eLearning

Leaders need to tailor their approach based on the person they are coaching, their experience at the task and their level of enthusiasm for completing it.

The ability to adapt your leadership style to cater to different tasks and your people’s needs is called situational leadership.

Learning Outcomes

  • Understand Hersey and Blanchard’s situational leadership model
  • Recognise directive and supportive behaviours
  • Understand the four leadership styles in line with situational leadership
  • Understand the development levels of team members, based on competence and commitment
  • Become confident with flexing your leadership style to the individual and the situation