We’ve won an Award!

The World Institute for Action Learning (WIAL) announced that Emerging World are the winners of the 2021 WIAL Innovation Award.

For Emerging World, the biggest challenge we have faced in the last 18 months, has been to take our in-person learning approach, in which leaders are immersed in new cultures and concepts, into a 100% virtual space. So, we are delighted to have won an award that recognises our unique application of WIAL Action Learning.

Our innovation was the use of Action Learning at scale in a virtual setting on cross-sector projects where corporate leaders supported non-profits on their challenges. The award was made for two particularly distinctive contributions within this model during this year.

One of those was Leading for Purpose, a senior executive development programme focused on Authentic Leadership & Purpose for US technology company, Salesforce. This programme saw 150 leaders from around the globe using action learning to support 28 different social-purpose driven organisations.

‘Our partnership with Emerging World on our in-person leadership programs has been really successful. But our challenge here was to recreate that magic virtually and at scale. By working with Emerging World and using Action Learning we were able to provide 150 of our senior leaders with powerful, intimate learning experiences with high developmental potential connected to Purpose. The experiences also enabled us to support 28 different social purpose organizations during a time of challenge and great uncertainty’. Jesse Sostrin, Global Head of People Leadership Development | Salesforce.

Matthew Farmer, CEO and founder of Emerging World said “I am extremely proud that Emerging World is the winner of the 2021 WIAL Innovation Award. The award recognises all stakeholders involved in these innovative virtual leadership development programs. It endorses the hard work that we have done at Emerging World to make virtual immersive Action Learning a success this year, as well as the foresight of Salesforce to apply these learning approaches to important areas of leadership.”

The award also acknowledges the non-profit partner organisations that have been served through this work and the WIAL coaches that have applied their Action Learning coaching skills to make these programs such a success.

“As a non-profit organization, we were challenged with ‘how do we show up as an authentic social justice organization’. We wanted to ensure that our young people felt a sense of belonging. Emerging World helped to create a safe space for us to really consider this problem and develop some awesome solutions” Jeannine Gant, President and CEO, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Metropolitan Detroit

The World Institute for Action Learning (WIAL) has more than five hundred coaches in over forty countries, representing more than thirty WIAL country affiliates. The 2021 WIAL Innovation Award recognised Emerging World’s best-in-class use of Action Learning to achieve breakthrough results, develop leaders, build high-performance teams, embed a coaching mindset and change organisational culture.