Case Study
Improving collaboration and productivity within teams, integrating new managers into an existing team
Medela is the #1 breast pump brand and one of the leading companies in medical vacuum technologies. A family-owned company with a global presence in Europe, America and Asia. Medela has 21 locations worldwide, production and warehouse facilities in Switzerland, USA and China.
Founded in 1961 by Olle Larsson, his son Michael Larsson serves as Chairman of the Board of Directors since 2001. Annette Brüls is the CEO of the company since 2018.
Medela
The Challenge
In the past, hiring similar people who were a super fit for the company culture, was the standard. Similarity definitely keeps a company in harmony, but sometimes it also meant there was a lack of vision and diversity in the company’s approaches. In the meantime, Medela knew that having inclusive and diverse teams was important and questioning your hiring process sometimes is necessary to become better.
The Solution
Medela has created 3 strategic Pillars of “Medela Cares” – People, Society and Planet. In alignment with the United Nations Global Compact, Medela Cares focuses on where they, as a company, can have the greatest impact in line with their business priorities. The global topics of Human Rights, Labour, Environment and Anti-Corruption are also embedded within the three pillars of their commitment.
Medela uses the PPA firstly, for development. After a screening call, managers send the Thomas PPA assessment, which takes 6-8 minutes for the assessment taker to complete. Once the candidate has completed the assessment, the recruiter downloads and compares the results. The candidate is then integrated into a Thomas Team Report.
Since the use of the assessments, we have many more people in the company who know themselves and their team members better. We can now help new teams reach their full potential together, in a quicker way.
At Medela, HR Managers predominantly use the PPA for personal and leadership development. PPAs are used to generate Team Reports for Team Assimilation workshops. Medela has also introduced the HPTI Assessment to support development and new management decisions and are now examining the possibility of introducing the 360° assessment.
During 2021, Thomas trained most of the HR Managers and recruiters within the company and started to regularly run Team Assimilation Workshops. Medela is able to easily manage all the assessments within their accounts due to this large number of certified team members.
The Results
As a result of the introduction of Thomas Assessments, in 2018, Medela has been able to improve the collaboration and productivity within teams. They have also been able to better integrate new managers into an existing team. Furthermore, Medela is in a better position to help leaders lead with more self-awareness, better understanding of their own behaviour, and their areas of strength and limitations. As a consequence of their higher self-awareness and knowledge of the personality factors, the leaders at Medela have likewise been able to better understand the characteristics and motivation of their own team members.
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