When Playmobil (Brandstätter Group-Malta)
management and the Human Resources department committed
a year to DATT training across all levels of its 700 employees,
Mario Schembri was skeptical. Then Schembri, a section leader
in Playmobil-Malta's Injection Department, sought his team's
best thinking about new packaging of plastic material. Dissatisfied
with their poor response, he proposed using PMI and got
markedly better results. One employee, thinking of the Interesting
points, came up with an idea Schembri called brilliant.
Similar responses have come from the Printing
and the Mould-Making Departments. Frans Lia, section leader
in Printing, finds employees more conscious of their own
judgment, evaluating situations and looking into them more
deeply since thinking skills training. Instead of just agreeing
or disagreeing, they consider other alternatives.
The company-wide immersion in Edward de Bono's
Direct Attention Thinking Tools (DATT) was only a part of
Brandstätter Group-Malta's bold initiative to continually
improve their world famous product line for children by
helping each employee fulfill his or her potential. The
initiative is a ten-year effort to develop a thriving corporate
culture based on shared values while balancing organizational
goals with individual growth. The success of the immersion
rested heavily on the Human Resources Department, led by
Mrs. Antoinette Caruana.
Sandra Azzopardi and Noel Borg, of Playmobil's
Human Resources Department, faced many skeptics as they
taught thinking skills throughout the company. "Unlike other
training that is normally expected by employees," they report,
"training in thinking [was] not so familiar. Thinking is
personal, . . . and [employees can] become defensive when
challenged to . . . change the way they think. Many walked
into the training room thinking 'This is a waste of time.'"
Playmobil Managing Director Helga Ellul thought
differently. She saw the de Bono thinking methods as means
for contributing to the development process of the group's
whole culture - as glue for connecting a number of initiatives
introduced in the company over the past decade.
Mrs. Ellul was introduced to the de Bono
thinking tools by Anthony Rizzo (now a Six Hats Certified
Instructor), who heard Master Trainer Susan Mackie's presentation
of the Lonmin Mines use of de Bono's methods at the Third
International Conference on Creative Thinking. K,Rizzo,
who is responsible for the Brandstätter Brainmobil Suggestion
Scheme (explore this fascinating program on Playmobil's
website noted below), saw the potential for generating more
creative ideas by training Playmobil employees to use thinking
skills.
Mackie conducted pilot DATT training for the
first group of Playmobil employees, then certified Azzopardi
and Borg and helped them develop implementation strategies
for company-wide training and applications. When employees
encountered Dr. de Bono's theories and began to use the
tools in their initial workshops, they gained more empathy
for each other and greater confidence in their own thinking,
regardless of previous academic achievement, report Azzopardi
and Borg:
"Bringing together people from different
departments and grades ranging from executives to operators
makes it possible to participants to understand and appreciate
each other's roles and responsibilities. This has helped
us achieve our organizational objectives.
Following initial training, we helped
managers and leading teams of three different departments
- Printing, Injection, and Human Resources - formulate a
sequence of tools for conducting seminars or 'thinking sessions'
in their departments. They used the sessions to communicate
annual department objectives to all employees and generate
a list of action steps toward these objectives.
This gave us the chance to experience the
effectiveness of the tools applied to real company issues.
We must say that the action steps set during these seminars
are still being used as guidelines for achieving this year's
departmental objectives."
Convinced of the value of de Bono thinking
tools, the Brandstätter Group has committed to the longevity
of this ambitious training and implementation program. Several
initiatives have been taken to keep the process thriving:
| 1. Logo - The THINK KIT logo was
created to help employees identify with the thinking
program.
2. Maltese Manual - A course manual in the Maltese
language was published and distributed, with both
APTT's and Dr. de Bono's permission, to all company
employees.
3. Blue Hat Bulletin - The company magazine now
features a regular bulletin to update readers on the
thinking processes and other information regarding
thinking.
4. Charts - Charts of all the thinking tools have
been posted in all departments.
5. Training Room - The company's training room
layout has been changed to create an exceptional atmosphere
during training.
6. Brainmobil Suggestion Scheme Enhancers - The
"Grow an Idea" card has been designed to help employees
structure their thinking about suggestions. It encourages
them to generate different alternatives (APC) and
evaluate each idea (PMI) before forwarding it to evaluators.
In addition, several employees participate in monthly
meetings to generate creative ideas on specific focus
areas. This initiative has resulted in a 100% increase
in the number of suggestions.
7. Champions - Individuals from all departments
are now being identified for designation as "Champions"
of the thinking process. Their role will be to
- promote use of the tools in employees' work
life
- trigger thinking
- pass on further knowledge about constructive
or creative thinking
- look for ways thinking tools can be integrated
in all existing initiatives in the company in order
to simplify and challenge the way things are done.
|
Playmobil management thinks these tools
are too good to be kept inside company walls. They've sent
their certified corporate trainers out to share information
about Edward de Bono's creative thinking methods with local
shop stewards of the General Workers Union and with thousands
of 8-year-old students.
Our thanks and admiration go to Sandra
Azzopardi and Noel Borg, certified corporate trainers in
Playmobil-Malta's Human Resources Dept., for the key role
they have played in this initiative, and especially for
preparing the superb report from which this article was
written.
See http://www.playmobilmalta.com
for more about this company and to explore the Brainmobil
Suggestion Scheme online.
(Click here to
go to other Powerful Results and what others have said.)
(Click here to
go to two interviews with Dr. Edward de Bono.)
