Empowering others can offer solutions you may never have considered

Black & Decker are a company who realised that by empowering their employees they could improve their current processes. Stocking a multitude of different products, Black & Decker’s sales staff must have a wide knowledge that covers their offerings. A two-week training period could get them to a reasonable standard where they had a basic knowledge.

Rob Sharpe, director of sales, gave out simple video cameras and free editing software to employees, so they could document their challenges, product features, and effective sales solutions. This meant that informative and consumable content was being created that future trainees could use in their day-to-day work. Using videos in this way became standard practice and reduced the necessary training period to one week.

By giving their employees the agency to involve themselves in the training process, Black & Decker achieved the dual successes of stimulating engagement and making their operations more efficient. This demonstrates that empowering others can often be a great way to utilise the skillsets available.

How could you empower others effectively to improve your current processes?