Development Centres

Development centres are similar to assessment centres in the sense that a range techniques are used to assess strengths and weaknesses of teams or individuals against job and role specifications. Interviews, ‘real-play’, role-play and psychometrics or ability tests are the kind of tools used over a one or two day period to form a comprehensive assessment package which is designed to culminate the creation of a tailored and accurate development plan.

Success lies in correctly assessing an individual's capabilities against the key competencies and performance criteria of the current or prospective role. This involves the creative design or adaptation of a competency framework and the development of a set of tasks and activities that accurately model those which are essential to job performance.

Development centres are firmly grounded in the coaching and development ethos and carefully constructed to link into and support the client's development and appraisal initiatives.

Technical skills can also be assessed in this way but it is often interpersonal and team competencies that determine an individual's success within a role. Development centres are especially useful for revealing an individual's strengths and weaknesses in this area.

The key benefits of running a development centre is that it provides a structured and meaningful framework both for individual and team development.

Microcentres - Development Centres for individuals

These are often used within a coaching programme for the purposes of the initial needs assessment or to model specific developmental experiences. These involves the participant taking part in a range of activities which may include completing psychometric assessments and engaging in real play.Microcentres are designed to challenge personal limits and reveal development needs against a role competency specification. Microcentres can also be used at the end of an individual coaching programme to assess progress against specific behavioural objectives.

Lauriate have developed a set of 'off the shelf' microcentres which target a set developmental experiences which are useful to many individuals across a wide range of organisational settings. These are particularly useful for senior managers and executives who have outgrown standard development initiatives

Using professional actors and coaches we can provide microcentre developmental experiences and de-briefing in the following areas:-

• Staying cool under pressure
• Managing the difficult customer
• Confronting the big bad bully
• Business development - closing the 'big one'
• Giving performance feedback - the 'underachiever'
• Giving bad news - redundancy