CLIENT RESULTS · LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT CASE STUDY
Global medtech company · ~$8B annual revenue · 20,000+ employees · complex matrixed environment
Build the bench. Make the growth observable.
~$8B
Annual revenue
20,000+
Employees globally
6 months
Of private development
Built-in
Sponsor advisory throughout
Strengthen the leadership bench without generic training.
Inside a newly built in-house creative organization, leadership capability mattered immediately. The sponsoring leader wanted to prepare strong internal talent to operate at the next level of complexity.
The operating environment:
• Multiple stakeholders, none of them optional
• Competing priorities across the matrix
• Decision rights nobody had written down
• Work that crossed organizational boundaries
We want to invest in you.
"There's no real cascading of KPIs or common ways that we measure and talk about things or common dashboards."
Chief Customer Officer · Global fintech software company
4 capabilities, rewritten as behavior another person could observe.
We did not build a leadership curriculum. Generic programs teach concepts: delegation, executive presence, prioritization, accountability, communication. Close Cohen translated each of those into something a sponsor could actually see happen in the work.
Difficult to measure:
"Get better at executive presence"
Observable:
"State a clear point of view in the meeting"
Four capabilities. Written so the organization could see them.
01
OWNERSHIP
NOT: Improve delegation.
INSTEAD: Define who decides, who executes, and who is informed, and hold the line.
02
OPERATING RHYTHM
NOT: Get better at prioritization and time management.
INSTEAD: Build weekly priorities, protected focus time, and a system for inbound work.
03
PRECISION
NOT: Develop stronger executive presence.
INSTEAD: Write concise updates. Contribute selectively. State a clear point of view.
04
OUTCOME OWNERSHIP
NOT: Show more initiative.
INSTEAD: Spot gaps before they escalate. Close loops without being asked.
Private coaching built around live work.
Every session ended in a specific commitment and a next action.
Not hypothetical exercises. Not a leadership case study. Not a worksheet completed between workshops. Every session worked on what was actually happening that week.
The stakeholder who would not move.
Real name, real meeting
The meeting later that week.
Prepared, not rehearsed
The decision that kept coming back.
Closed, not revisited
The work that needed an owner.
Named in the room
The update nobody was reading.
Rewritten to one point
The sponsor did not wait six months for a report.
The engagement included dedicated sponsor advisory time throughout. Behavior change has to work in context, and eventually be visible to other people.
01
Real situation
From this week's work
02
Specific decision
Made in session
03
Observable commitment
Written as behavior
04
Next action
Dated and owned
05
The sponsor sees it
Advisory built in
Close Cohen recommended six months rather than the shorter engagement initially contemplated.
From development goal to observable change
Ownership
Starting goal
Make decision rights and responsibility explicit.
Observed change
[Pending sponsor-validated example]
Operating Rhythm
Starting goal
Build a stronger system for priorities, focus, and inbound work.
Observed change
[Pending concrete before/after example]
Precision
Starting goal
Communicate more concisely, with a clearer point of view.
Observed change
[Pending something caught, driven, or closed]
Outcome Ownership
Starting goal
Close loops and anticipate gaps without waiting for direction.
Observed change
[Pending something caught, driven, or closed]
Pending sponsor validation. Leader-level outcomes and sponsor feedback are not yet documented.
We said what this engagement was not, in writing, first.
Naming the boundary is what made everything inside it credible. This was not a program the organization could have bought off a shelf, and it was not an intervention aimed at a performance problem.
A leadership curriculum
Concepts taught on a schedule, disconnected from the stakeholders and decisions actually in front of the leader.
Remedial coaching
Nothing about this engagement was performance management. The sponsor framed it as investment, and we kept it there.
Leadership development should leave evidence.
Not another leader who has completed executive coaching. Leaders who behave differently when the work turns ambiguous: they clarify ownership, protect the right priorities, communicate the point, and close the loop.
Who needs to operate at the next level before their title catches up?
Close Cohen builds private leadership development around the actual work, stakeholders, and operating environment your leaders face, and writes the goal so a sponsor can tell, without asking, whether it happened.
See how Close Cohen works with leadership teams across the full engagement.
Reviewed by Laura Close, Founder — Close Cohen Career Consulting.
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