"The journey has been supported fully by The Colour Works and I strongly believe that without their support we would not have embedded the principles and benefits of Insights Discovery to the level we have."
Miles Kenchington, Corporate Learning & Development Lead
In 2007, The Colour Works were referred to Cornwall Council by an external consultant and delivered an experiential workshop to the Services for Children, Young People & Families. Following the success and immediate impact this workshop had, word spread and the Insights Colour Model gathered traction within the council. Being able to introduce a model that is memorable, easy to understand and more importantly becomes part of everyday working life meant that it fast became the tool of choice and used to build better relationships, support improved teamwork, leadership and organisational culture. With a workforce of 5000 delivering services to over half a million local people either directly with council employees or other Cornwall owned companies, the council required a long-term sustainable solution that supported personal development of its employees, encouraged better self-awareness and increased levels of effective communication between council employees, partners and customers
As part of Cornwall Council’s wish to change the ways it worked both inside and outside the organisation, a transformational change programme was identified to be implemented which included using Insights Discovery as an integral part of team and individual behaviour development. To enable a cost-effective approach to the delivery of Insights Discovery to the volume of employees the organisation wanted to impact, Cornwall Council partnered with The Colour Works to support this journey and two members of staff completed the Insights Discovery accreditation programme to enable the council to facilitate workshops and delivery in-house.
To enable Cornwall Council to create a more cost-effective way of embedding Insights Discovery, Miles Kenchington and Cathy Harris from Learning and Development attended an Insights Discovery Accreditation in 2016 and became in-house practitioners of the colour model. This allowed them to increase delivery capability and capacity internally, leading to more teams being able to experience Insights Discovery. Being able to deliver themselves also put the council in control of the wider delivery plan without the reliance on external consultants. However, safe in the knowledge that they were still fully supported by The Colour Works with a dedicated account manager on hand to support with questions, workshop design and delivery and onward learning through a series of client practitioner development days provided by The Colour Works directly. Miles and Cathy have collectively introduced the Colour Model to more than 2,200 people across the council. They are passionate and knowledgeable about the model and tailor it to address many people related matters including emotional intelligence, communication, teamworking, management, leadership, conflict, sales and resilience.
Teams who have attended workshops with Miles and Cathy gain a deeper insight into themselves and others, resulting in better, more collaborative partnerships across the service. There have been tangible results for both individuals and team. Feedback has remained continually high with overall satisfaction levels from participants exceeding 95%. The delivery has been provided to a diverse range of teams from across the whole of the council including a cohort of the elected members.