Ferring Scales Leadership Dev To Every Level Of Its Sales Force
How Ferring Uses Innovative Tech To Scale Leadership Development To Every Level Of Its Sales Force
How can a mid-sized biopharmaceutical company scale leadership development to every level of its sales force without sacrificing quality? That's the challenge Ferring Pharmaceuticals set out to solve.
Led by director of commercial leadership development Rob Daniel, Ferring partnered with LEADx to build a program rooted in three elements: micro-learning delivered in the flow of work, personalized nudges, and a "flipped classroom" approach to group coaching.
1. Three distinct curriculums for three distinct audiences.
Daniel identified three key buckets of leaders to develop, from current leaders down to aspiring individual contributors. Rather than a one-size-fits-all pathway, each audience gets a curriculum focused on behaviors they can apply on the job today.
Current Leader Program (CLP)
First-line and second-line leaders. Focus: maintaining and improving already high engagement scores.
Management Development Program (MDP)
Employees on track to become district managers with a formal IDP and a desire to lead.
Intro to Leadership Program (ILP)
Individual contributors exploring leadership as a future path, plus valuable self-leadership habits.
2. A "flipped classroom" approach keeps the focus on application.
The cadence works like this: one weekly micro-learning or application exercise per week for three weeks, followed by a cohort-based group coaching session. Each month targets a different capability, so learners hit key concepts and apply them on the job before wrapping up together.
In the group coaching session, learners wrap up that month's learning with each other and a seasoned expert. Cohorts share what they learned, how they applied it, what questions came up, and what challenges they faced. The live session also establishes a clear finish line for the self-paced components.
3. Purposeful tech enables on-the-job application and practice.
What makes Ferring's program effective is how they use tech. They didn't just offer a catalog and hope the sales force would tune in — and they didn't force busy sales leaders to set aside two or three days for in-person sessions. Instead, they leveraged tech to stay focused on the top goal: behavior change.
Hyper-personalized nudges
Nudges prompt leaders to practice what they've learned. A leader developing Trust might receive: "A foundation of Trust is keeping your commitments, both big and small. This week, be mindful — do you return calls when you say you will? Do you show up for events you've said yes to?" Nudges have a cumulative effect on habit-building, and continue even after the series ends.
Micro-learning delivered in the flow of work
"Micro-learning helps bring the learner to the training, rather than the training to the learner," Daniel said. Bite-size videos, reflection sheets, micro-coaching exercises, book summaries, and podcasts — the Ferring sales force can engage with content in cars, on planes, or between customer meetings, without cutting out of the schedule for a two- or three-day course.
Live, expert-led group coaching sessions
Capping each month with live group coaching motivates learners to complete the preceding exercises so they can keep up with the conversation. It also ensures that employees at every level get monthly access to an expert coach and to live peer learning.
The blended approach of nudges, micro-learning, and group coaching ensures the learning is constantly being reinforced and applied in a variety of engaging ways.
"In your next 1:1, practice reflecting back what you hear before responding. Try: 'What I hear you saying is…' Notice how it changes the conversation."
"Review your top 5 strengths today. Pick one and name a way you'll deliberately apply it in a meeting this week."
Scaling Behavior Change at Every Level of the Sales Force
By training current sales leaders around behaviors tied to engagement, Ferring is set to uphold their thriving culture. And by scaling such in-depth offerings all the way to the individual contributor level, Ferring is building a pipeline of diverse leaders. As behavior starts to improve, the impact will be immediate — and the competitive advantage one, two, or five years down the line will be exciting to watch.