People development in general, and leadership development in particular, have become big business.

There are many service providers, ranging from the big league business schools (normally attached to universities) with every conceivable resource at their disposal, through to solo practitioners (ranging from qualified, competent and experienced niche specialists who make meaningful contributions, to those who base their teachings on the last book they read).

Within the broader gambit of leadership development, coaching has become a core focus area. And while there are many competent coaches around, there are far more who don’t have much backing them in the line of either qualification or credentials.

Where do we fit in?

Stef du Plessis and Associates is a team of well qualified, competent and experienced people development practitioners who teach leadership philosophies and management skills.

We are not the biggest. We don’t claim to be the best. And we are by no means the answer to all of your people development or leadership development needs. In fact, we do not even claim to cater for the full spectrum of needs when it comes to leadership development. But we do offer viable solutions to a number of the challenges facing business today.

We have been doing this for a long time. We stick to our core business: growing exceptional people at all levels. We have worked for industry leaders worldwide. Most of our clients contract our services for extended periods of time, and some have been employing our services for as long as a decade.

We work with leaders at all levels – from the workshop floor to the boardroom. Our programmes are tried and tested. They are academically sound, yet practical. Our associates are all experienced facilitators, holding at least a masters degree in behavioral sciences or leadership, while many hold PhD’s. Some are recognized leaders in their field, and a few are published authors. There are also two professors on our team. We have run some of the biggest people development programmes ever undertaken in Southern Africa – all with measurable results. In fact, one of our interventions in particular has had such an impact on the community in which it took place that it got the attention of South African President Thabo Mbeki himself – to the extent that he visited the project for a full day so that he could experience first hand the nation-building potential of our programme.

We partner with our clients, working with them in both the design and implementation phases of their people development initiatives. We do not reinvent the wheel, nor do we brush aside all that the client has done towards people development in the past. Rather, we build on what the client already has in place, and we work in close contact with other service providers employed by the client.

We support the initiative through workshops, distance learning, and one-on-one coaching. Programmes are either presented by our associates, or under license by in-house trainers (supported by train-the-trainer programmes run by our own facilitators).

Upon conclusion of a programme, we enable our client organizations to take long term ownership of their leadership development through license agreements which allow them to run maintenance programmes.

We make no exaggerated claims. Our track record speaks for itself: our clients consistently earn an excellent return on their investment when contracting our services.

Our Philosophy

To state the blatantly obvious, we subscribe to the notion that business is about people. We believe that personal effectiveness and leadership can be taught. And it is our view that it had better be taught if organizations wish to make the most of their resources.

We believe that the leaders’ role is to create a culture within which their people can pursue the strategic objectives of the organization. To this end the leader must influence their people towards independent behavior. This is accomplished through mentorship.

But effective mentorship can only take place in an environment where employees see their leaders as worthy role models. Leaders are measured through their behavior – which becomes the showcase for both their competency and their character. We conclude that leadership is not a role that the leader plays in isolation – their behavior as leaders have to be congruent with the rest of their life.

Therefore, the real test of a leader is to have the courage to live a life of significance... to behave in a manner where there is congruency between what they think, what they say, and what they do. In all of their life roles... including how they behave as leaders.

Our programmes have been built on this philosophy. To start, we help people at all levels to take responsibility for their own behavior, and to develop the capacity to change. We help leaders to become leaders of the self: thus becoming effective role models. Next, we teach management skills, thus enabling the leader to become an effective mentor.

This, we believe, will influence employees at all levels to become independent of their leaders in the pursuit of their common goals.

Our Approach

It is our objective to help you to create a better environment for all of your stakeholders, and to improve your bottom line. We do this by growing your people at all levels – helping them to cash in on change, take responsibility, and become more productive, by teaching them to consistently behave in a manner congruent with the achievement of your strategic objectives.

As a very broad overview, we would typically employ the following phases:

Phase 1 – Cracking the corporate culture code

• We need to start by creating an understanding of corporate culture. Employees at all levels need to realize that organizational culture is the single most critical factor impacting on results. By helping them to understand how their individual behavior impacts on the culture within the organization, they become aware of the fact that they are individually responsible for overall results.
• Next, we determine the current prevailing culture within your organization – which is really only the sum total of the individual behavior of all employees.
• Then we help you to define what the culture should ideally be like, as a prerequisite to achieving your stated strategic objectives... and we “translate” this ideal culture into required behaviors.

Phase 2 – Building capacity for change

Now we build the capacity among employees at all levels to change their behavior – so that they behave in a manner congruent with the ideal culture. Click here for more information.

Phase 3 – Leadership development for supervisors and managers

Finally, we develop leaders at all levels, thus ensuring that they are able to sustain the new behavior patterns of their people. To this end, there are two parts to our leadership development programme, namely a workshop-based course for supervisors and managers, and a coaching programme for senior managers and executives. Click here for more information.

Phase 4 - Coaching for senior managers and executives

We do not subscribe to the standard practice of allocating a single coach to each coachee. In our view, this approach is flawed, since it is based on the premise that the coach is a guru, who has competence in all of the vast myriad of developmental areas. Whilst we do not doubt that such a coach may indeed exist, we believe that they are very few and far between.

We follow an approach where we start with candidate evaluation to identify developmental areas. This can take various forms: self-assessment; assessment by superiors, peers and subordinates; consultation, or evaluation through observation. Once we have a development profile for the candidate, we then allocate a different specialist coach to work with each coachee in each of their developmental areas.

This way, the coachee enjoys the benefit of in-depth development in those areas where they need to grow their own competence, rather than the blanket approach that is generally followed.

Where we do not have a coach available for a specific developmental need, we will advise on viable alternatives for the development of the competence in question.

Who we’ve worked for, and what we did for them...

We have worked with governments, educational institutions, and companies from all sectors and of all sizes. We have extensive experience both with commercial and industrial enterprises. As an indication of our diverse client base, listed are a few past clients.

• South African Airways – One of the world’s leading airlines
• Royal Livingston Hotel, Zambia; Sabi-Sabi Game Reserve and Zimbali Lodge, South Africa – All world class resorts
• Avis – A global leader in vehicle rental
• Office of the Premier, Gauteng Provincial Government – the biggest and most developed metropolitan area on the African continent
• Bidvest – Conglomerate of diverse group of companies, employing some 60,000 people globally
• Iscor – World’s largest steel producer

Each and every programme we run is customized. Click here for an overview of some of the programmes we’ve run in recent years.

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