Developing future talent for global mining company

Client need

Develop and deliver a global capability program that would enable leaders to make practical and measurable changes in:

• Build greater self-awareness and an understanding of the coach mindset
• Flex your coaching style to different people and conversations
• Make activities and leadership routines which rely on coaching skills more meaningful and engaging
• Empower others to commit to and solve their own problems
• Use everyday conversations to embed our values and behaviors

Solution

The learning and application was staggered with 90-minute learning bursts across a 6-week period. This gave the participants an opportunity to experiment learning between sessions.

Sessions were structured with small groups which serves as a platform to share and discuss challenges with peers, while guided by a professional coach.

As the learning was not location bound, this provided participants with the opportunity to share learning and network across diverse regions and functions

Results

Over 20 Pod group sessions with over 150 leaders during a 6-week journey.

Participants outcomes:

• 9.1 out of 10 for overall Leader as Coach experience
• 9 out of 10 likely to recommend experience
• 8.9 out of 10 found the group Pod sessions to be interactive and engaging

“The facilitator made everyone comfortable to share and engage. The responsibility on performing better as a coach immediately on the individual which makes you feel more engaged. No one will do it for you.”

“Loved the interaction and openness. The facilitator was wonderful and really engaging, which I find makes my experience very real and valuable. Love the varying levels of attendees also as offers a diverse perspective”.

BTS partnered with a multinational bio-pharmaceutical company to create a scalable and accessible virtual version of its in-person assessment center administered to talent with the potential to ascend to critical, senior leadership roles. Central to the design was giving high-potential talent the opportunity to experience a “day-in-the-life” of a senior leader at the company.  

To deliver on that, BTS worked closely with the company to develop a multi-component Virtual Individual Assessment (VIA) experience that included a business case pre-read, written business challenges, role-play exercises, and a debrief interview. Since 2019, around 30 unique VIA experiences for critical roles that span all functions of their business have been developed.  

The partnership has proven very successful, providing data on high-potential talent’s current performance in the capabilities critical to success in those senior leadership roles. The assessments also provided insights on targeted talent planning and development initiatives to close the capability gaps at both group and individual levels. In 2022 alone, 500 participants worldwide engaged in one of these experiences, resulting in a 41% promotion rate, compared to a 14% promotion rate for non-participants.

Client need

A $6 billion federal contracting company in the U.S. needed to build a future-focused leadership bench capable of executing its strategy to deliver on growth and extend their position of industry leadership. While the company has a successful history, they recognized an opportunity to invest in critical capabilities that would ensure their continued success in a rapidly changing environment. The CEO and the leadership team were looking for an innovative approach to accelerate their leaders’ ability to lead and influence others, while simultaneously strengthen their capabilities to make data-driven decisions in critical moments.

The development journey they took with BTS began by grounding these high potential leaders in the capabilities and behaviors that create executive presence and influence as measured by the Bates ExPI^TM leadership model, while connecting it to the business-critical themes of strategic thinking, entrepreneurial thinking, and innovation. The Leader Lab integrated experience enabled their leaders to develop and practice strategy execution, while flexing key elements of executive presence. As the leaders worked through the journey together, they were able to practice collective leadership based on collaboration and trust, a key goal for the enterprise.

Solution

The development journey was spread over two dynamic and fast-paced development sessions.  The audience was 50+ high-potential and cross-functional leaders, who manage some of the company’s largest, multi-million-dollar client relationships.

Building the capabilities of executive presence

Participants started by going through the ExPI^TM assessment, combined with virtual coaching calls and debriefs, to understand their strengths and opportunities to lead effectively. They then attended a 3-day classroom-based program. The first two days focused on strategy, entrepreneurship, and innovation, taught by a local university’s business program. On day three, BTS facilitators highlighted behavioral elements of leadership presence and influence. Post-program the leaders took the practical, tangible learnings back to practice in the business and build their skills.

Leader Lab: tapping the power of business acumen

In the next phase of the learning journey, participants attended a live, classroom-based Leader Lab. This customized experience included a three-day business simulation. Together in teams, leaders assumed different positions from their day-to-day roles, grappling with tradeoffs similar to those they would encounter in real life and practicing making decisions in a safe learning environment. This experience was designed to inspire leaders to adopt enterprise-wide thinking and strengthen their decision-making capabilities. The Leader Lab experience included:

• Two rounds of simulation dedicated to executing their team’s strategy by running their ‘business’ in a dynamic market where unexpected moments force the team to make quick decisions.
• Observation-based assessment of individuals on each team, based on behaviors core to executive presence and communication
• Introduction to an intuitive yet powerful approach for applying data-driven decision making
• Practice delivering persuasive presentations in small groups with peer and expert feedback

To reinforce behavioral change resulting from the sessions, participating executives committed to simple actions that would facilitate accountability and help leaders carry learnings back to their teams. Facilitators continuously provided feedback, encouraging leaders to collaborate across the enterprise and invest more time in getting to know one another.

Results

The collaborative spirit generated in the session was highly visible and contagious – just the kind of mindset and energy the company needed to move its culture forward to achieve new growth. Both sessions were ranked highly by participants, garnering a Net Promoter Score (NPS) of 82 and 93, respectively.

Following these development efforts, the company’s high potential leaders advanced their ability to work together more collaboratively, and problem solve at a peer level, reducing the need to escalate issues and increasing the speed of execution. This is reducing risk and increasing work efficiency. It has also improved their ability to lead and manage their multi-million dollar-client portfolios as they apply their new leadership skills with their teams and their client partners, reinforcing the longer-term sustainability of that revenue.

Client need

A large U.S.-based health insurance federation operating at the center of a complex national ecosystem, covering tens of millions of Americans, had already made a serious investment in enterprise AI. Leadership was not experimenting at the edges. They were leaning in.

Capability and commitment existed across the organization, but unevenly. Some teams were already pushing boundaries. Others hadn't yet found their footing. Most of the gains had come in personal productivity. Valuable, but the core work itself had not yet fundamentally changed. The opportunity was to go deeper, to move from AI-assisted individuals to AI-reinvented workflows.

Across the health insurance landscape, pressure was intensifying. Medicaid and government program contracts were becoming more competitive. Bid cycles were faster and more analytics-driven. Clinical evidence was evolving rapidly. Regulatory scrutiny was high. Security risks were constant. AI was no longer a future conversation. It was a present expectation.

Inside the organization, world-class experts were still constrained by manual processes.

The Medical Policy team was synthesizing evidence across hundreds of policies, working to keep pace with FDA approvals and evolving clinical guidelines. The work required rigor and judgment, and it also demanded repetitive synthesis that consumed days when it needed to take hours.

Market intelligence teams were reviewing competitor RFPs manually in markets where competitive pressure was tightening and millions of covered lives were at stake over the next several years. The opportunity was significant, but so was the risk of falling behind in insight and speed.

Actuarial and security teams faced similar friction. Highly trained professionals were spending valuable time stitching together data, transforming files, and correlating inputs across systems.

Leadership understood that AI licenses alone would not create advantage. To compete in an increasingly analytics-driven insurance environment, expertise had to scale. Insight had to move faster. Teams needed to reinvent how core work happened.

Solution

BTS partnered with the organization to move from AI access to AI application.

Through a series of focused design sprints, intact teams worked on their highest-value workflows using our GROUNDING → EXPERIMENT → BUILD → AMPLIFY methodology. The structure was simple and disciplined. Set context. Experiment quickly. Build against real work. Create a path to scale.

Participants brought their own work into the room. Medical policy frameworks. RFP responses. Threat intelligence reports. Actuarial data pipelines.

No generic demos. No abstract hypotheticals.

The turning point came when AI began working on their actual content.

Research syntheses that previously took days began structuring themselves in minutes. Competitive RFP analysis that once required manual review surfaced patterns instantly. Data transformation workflows streamlined in real time.

Skepticism shifted to possibility.

We positioned AI as augmentation, not replacement. In a sector defined by professional expertise and accountability, that framing was critical. The goal was to elevate expert judgment, not automate it away.

Some teams left with working prototypes. Others left with detailed blueprints aligned to enterprise privacy and security requirements. The IT Team took away a re-prioritized set of additional tools to incorporate into a HIPAA-compliant environment. Every team left with a redesigned workflow.

Results

In five days, more than 100 leaders advanced 30 priority use cases tied directly to operational performance and competitive growth.

Early outcomes included:

• Significant reduction in manual research synthesis and data preparation
• Faster, more structured competitive intelligence to support high-stakes bids
• Clear implementation pathways aligned to security and regulatory constraints
• A scalable model for continued AI-enabled workflow reinvention

Just as important was the mindset shift.

Participants stopped viewing AI as a tool sitting outside their work and began treating it as embedded infrastructure for how work gets done.

“This showed immediate relevance to our work.”

“Now I understand what’s actually possible for my team.”

“We just accomplished in two hours what used to take us two months.”

In a U.S. health insurance market where insight, speed, and precision directly influence who wins and who grows, the organization moved decisively from AI access to AI advantage.

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Client need

Safety in the transportation industry has often been treated as a set of rules to follow and boxes to check. But one Spanish railway organization saw an opportunity to redefine safety as something far greater, a core value embedded into the culture of their company at every level.

This bold vision demanded more than compliance. It required a cultural transformation to challenge outdated behaviors, inspire teams, and empower leaders to embrace and model a safety-first mindset. For years, the organization had been working to foster a culture that prioritized protection over profit, setting new behavioral standards across the industry.

To accelerate this shift, the organization partnered with BTS to design a leadership development program that dismantled old practices and equipped leaders with the tools, insights, and behaviors needed to bring their vision to life.

• Deconstruct existing mindsets to enable cohesive change.
• Identify barriers preventing progress.
• Equip leaders with practical behavioral knowledge and tools.

Solution

BTS partnered with the organization to design a leadership journey that would reshape not just processes but perspectives, fostering a workplace where physical and psychological safety were paramount. Over eight months, the project team conducted interviews with leaders and focus groups to uncover critical behavioral insights and tailor the program to the organization’s unique needs.

Participants explored essential themes, including:

• Embedding safety into daily decision-making.
• Cultivating greater awareness of safety risks.
• Understanding the influence of their leadership on safety outcomes.
• Leading by example to set a cultural standard.
• Building trust, commitment, and open communication within their teams.

The program unfolded in three distinct phases to drive lasting behavioral change:

1. Workshop preparation
   Participants began with a self-assessment to uncover personal “safety blind spots” and mind traps. This phase, delivered through a custom online platform, helped leaders reflect on their current practices and prepare for the transformational journey ahead.

3. Safety workshop
   The one-day, immersive workshop was designed to spark deep conversations about safety culture, challenge ingrained mindsets, and equip participants with actionable strategies for change. Leaders engaged in real-world scenarios to explore the implications of their decisions and practice new behaviors. The day concluded with collaborative debrief sessions, leaving participants with practical tools to implement their insights immediately.
4. Implementation in action
   To sustain momentum, the post-workshop phase extended over six months, offering six targeted activities. These activities reinforced key lessons, encouraged team collaboration, and provided ongoing support for integrating safety-first behaviors into daily routines.

The leadership program was delivered to 1500 participants over 66 workshops in seven locations across Spain.

Results

To measure results, the project team created a resource map evaluating progress.  

Average completion rate of Activities One–Three: 57 percent. (One: 78.21%; Two: 53. 01%; Three: 40.57%)

A post-workshop survey was sent to participants, reporting on the following metrics:

• Average satisfaction — 4.7/5.
• Trainer’s evaluation — 4.9/5.
• NPS — 82 percent.
• “Saw improvement in safety alignment” — 93 percent.
• “Integrated safety tools in daily roles” — 82 percent.
• “Identified new initiatives for improving safety” — 77 percent.
• “Mitigated team/peer mind traps” — 93 percent.
• “More aware of risk in daily roles” — 98 percent.
• “Identified a normalized risk to work on” — 92 percent.

Testimonials

• “Many of the methodologies and tools not only help to improve safety but can also be used to improve operational or organizational processes.”

• “It has put us in front of the mirror of how we are today in terms of safety culture, opening our eyes to our development areas. Very participative and practical.”

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Over the years, BTS has expanded its global footprint through thoughtful acquisitions and collaborations, bringing new creative capabilities and local expertise into the fold. From digital design studios to leadership consultancies across Europe, Asia, and the Americas, we’ve built a community that blends shared values with local perspective. That diversity has become one of our greatest strengths, shaping how we design and deliver learning that feels deeply personal everywhere we work.

Whether someone is in a leadership journey in Singapore, a coaching program in São Paulo, or a strategy workshop in Stockholm, the goal is always the same: to make the experience feel like it was made just for them.

Many of those experiences live on Momenta, BTS’s digital experience platform, powering journeys like Coaching, Multipliers, and other core programs.

As those experiences grew, so did the need for nuance. Every journey had to feel local, not just sound translated. Tone, humor, and cultural context have always been central to the BTS approach, and as demand expanded across formats and regions, our translation model was ready for its next evolution.

In early 2024, the team began exploring how AI could help. Rather than treating technology as the destination, we saw it as a catalyst, a way to rethink translation and deliver richer, more customized client experiences at scale. That curiosity sparked one of BTS’s most ambitious AI-first experiments, led by our Global Product Enablement Function team in partnership with our global network of linguists and translators.

Shifting to AI-first

The next step was finding the right place to experiment. Enter Phrase, a cloud-based translation management platform that quickly became our test lab. Phrase brings every part of the translation process into one place, from machine translation engines to human review, terminology management, and workflow tracking. It gives our linguists, designers, and project teams a shared space to collaborate, test ideas, and learn.

Over the next few months, two key discoveries reshaped how we think about translation, and ultimately, how we work.

Key discovery 1: Making AI a teammate

We began with a clear goal: make translation faster and more consistent. Using Phrase, AI handled the first drafts while our linguists refined them. Quickly, we realized there was potential for AI-value that went far beyond speed.  

With AI completing the first 80% of the work in a fraction of the time, our linguists could focus on what matters most: nuance, tone, and cultural resonance. The relationship evolved from oversight to collaboration, AI structured and scaled, humans shaped and elevated.

The result was more than efficiency. It was better work, created by people and technology learning to amplify each other.

Key discovery 2: Turning a roadblock into a redesign

Next came a design challenge. Phrase, like most translation tools, struggled with text embedded in graphics, a hallmark of many BTS learning experiences. Instead of forcing the tool to adapt, we changed how we created.

We began designing with translation in mind: simplifying visuals, reducing text, and using modular components that could flex across languages. The constraint sparked better design, easier to scale, more consistent, and more inclusive for every audience.

Key discovery 3: Integrating systems for scale

With people, AI, and design in sync, the last barrier was process. Managing translations between Phrase and Momenta still required manual effort.

To fix that, we built an API integration linking the two platforms. Now, files move automatically, progress is tracked in real time, and everything stays connected.

That integration turned our workflow into a unified ecosystem, fast, transparent, and ready to scale globally.

Business impact

Just 18 months ago, our translation reviews lived in double-column Word docs. Today, we work in a fully connected, AI-first ecosystem. Each project feeds the next, refining prompts, tone profiles, and design patterns, so our translation process keeps getting faster, smarter, and more aligned with BTS’s voice.

Speed and quality. Translation cycles that once took months now wrap up in weeks, cutting turnaround times by over 40%. Phrase’s tools and AI-powered workflows accelerate production while maintaining quality through expert-approved reuse, glossaries, and automated quality checks. Even complex formats like videos and animations are localized faster, with AI supporting linguists at every step.

Smarter workflows. The integration between Momenta and Phrase automates project transfers and tracking, saving an estimated 2.5 hours per project. Teams across language, digital, and project management now collaborate in one streamlined environment.

Human focus. Our linguists remain the engine of quality and innovation. With AI managing repetitive tasks, they focus on nuance and meaning, and go further by creating specialized GPTs, training databases, and testing translation engines to continually raise the bar.