TEAM DEVELOPMENT AT ROBECO – A HERO’S JOURNEY

The Hero’s Journey

Robeco’s Portfolio Implementation (PI) team was created in 2012 by clustering and harmonizing implementation and supporting activities across the asset classes within the Investments domain, with the objective of increasing both the efficiency and quality of these activities. In this Spotlight article, Judith van IJserloo, head of PI, explains how the department has further increased its effectiveness by embarking on a year-long team-development journey together – the Hero’s Journey.

“The forging together of the different teams and individuals that were combined into one department in April 2012, has been on the agenda since the very start,” says Judith. “To this end, we organized several team-building activities in 2012 and 2013, with the Management Drives methodology as one of the tools. These activities definitely helped us to increase our efficiency and effectiveness. Also based on the positive feedback from our internal clients, the portfolio managers, we had the feeling that we were performing rather well as a department. But deep down, I knew we could do even better, that we could achieve much more.

 "The human factor"

“At Robeco we are very much focused on content and less so on the human factor. However, if you are well aware of each other’s strengths, talents and personalities, and if there is enough mutual trust to give each other feedback and hold one another accountable, you become much moreeffective, both individually and as a team. I decided to discuss my thoughts with HR and ask for support, which resulted in the involvement of Erna ter Weele, a consultant who had already facilitated various organizational-development programs at Robeco.”

"Slow down in order to accelerate"

One of the main lessons of this last year has been perfectly summarized in something Erna said: if you want to accelerate, you sometimes have to slow down first. With the focus on results and the competitive spirit of most people in PI – not to mention Robeco as a whole – this is not exactly our most natural mindset. It's something we really have to learn.

For more information click here and read more on how this team handled the following topics: ”Letting go of control", "Lencioni test“ ”Self-directing teams“, ”Point guards", ”Making decisions", ”Interacting without prejudice", ”Different perceptions", ”Use each other’s qualities… but how?