Apr 17, 2025
The Situation
For Bank at Etihad in Jordan, empowerment is everything. That is why they work with individuals, entrepreneurs, local and global businesses, and the next generation of female leaders, so they can succeed in the way they want to. It will always be their goal to help people shape their future.
To further strengthen their services, teamwork, training, collaboration, and partnership they wanted their people to know more about how to design and facilitate convenings. The bank believes that their staff needs to know how learning happens, how to design to ensure it, how to facilitate so all who have gathered feel honoured and respected for what they bring, and how to maximize impact from the work they do.
The Journey
To ensure the best return on investment for the bank, GLP did the following:
- Personalized the design. A needs assessment was conducted to determine the best training to ensure the maximum impact for the bank’s internal and external work and services. It was determined that the foundations of a learning-centered approach was best suited for their needs at this time.
- Ensured a careful participant selection. To maximize the potential champions of the approach in this first group of graduates, a cohort of 21 learners was selected across bank departments. This included Human Resources, Marketing, Operations, Customer Experience, Learning + Development, Wealth Management, and Branch Managers. These individuals were seen as having a growth mindset, keen to learn and strengthen their practices, having deep loyalty and commitment to the values of the bank, and having many years of service ahead of them. One non-staff person was invited as well. This person was seen as a priority partner and trainer for the bank, and holding much influence in how training is offered for staff.
- Designed a rich learning journey. To maximize the transfer of the new learning immediately into the staff’s day-to-day work to encourage long term behavior change, a learning journey was created. The following elements were included: 4-day in-person training, micro-learning (for 2 months post training), 1-1 online mentoring (post training), a follow up online gathering (6 weeks post training), and piloting of at least 10 newly designed workshops (within the first 4 months post training).
- Deepened learning by doing. Adult learners need to try, test, experiment, compare, and practice new content to learn it. As such, each learner was invited to draft a new workshop during the course to practice using the models, principles, and practices they were learning. As well, they taught a select portion of the workshop to their peers and received input on both their draft design and facilitation. It’s a rare gift to receive peer feedback, and it was a profound experience for everyone. This feedback and the 1-1 mentoring would further help each person refine and finish their draft workshop to be able to pilot it in the real world. The topic of these designs included:
- Connecting the bank’s values with the overall strategy
- Living into our brand
- Effective leadership
- A new policy
- A new product
- The Future Is Now – Exploring AI at Work
- Checked leadership support. For sustainable organizational change to occur there must be buy-in. Even more important, leadership needs to show their support through their budget decisions, what accountability systems are put in place post training, and what they champion and affirm in the day-to-day activities. In this case, the bank budgeted for this quality training, participated in ongoing dialogue to map out a vision for change, and celebrated all attempts to implement the new learning post training. As well, select managers were among the learners to ensure they learned the models, language, and way of working so they could support and encourage the change at the bank.
- Used a principle-based approach. Being principle-based in all it does, is a serious commitment for GLP. This is also true for the Bank al Etihad. As such, the collaboration between these two companies was a great fit. There was not only a deep understanding of WHAT would be important to teach, but HOW.
- Offered two levels of certification. GLP understands the importance of certifying staff as a way to respect the investment of learning and the effort that behaviour change demands. The two levels of certification are: Certified Dialogue Education Practitioner (CDEP) and Certified Dialogue Education Teacher (CDET). Presently, one person has been selected to work toward CDET certification, and was mentored in this course. More mentoring is expected in the future to ensure more certified staff and internal leadership for the approach.
- Used a collaborative process. GLP knows the value of working WITH rather than FOR the client. From the first conversations about a possible course, to drafting helpful interview questions, to finalizing the course content, to determining relevant workshop topics for the group to develop, … the bank was involved through the entire process. This ensured a highly relevant and practical learning journey that was transformative for all who participated.
The Impact
The following was the desired change we articulated, as a result of this collaboration:
- Have a shared language and approach to designing and facilitating learning events
- Feel more confident to develop and facilitate trainings and other learning events
- Work more intentionally in planning, designing, and facilitating learning events and other gatherings
- Increase their support and encouragement of each other in this area
- Work more intentionally to be a learning-centered organization and be clearer about how this connects to the bank’s values
- More easily share input and feedback with each other on learning designs.
Although it is only weeks after the training, this cohort is already:
- Committed to collectively working in a new way
- Using much of the language and approach learned
- Revising and reworking previously designed workshops, trainings, and learning programs to ensure a learning-centered approach
- Experiencing increased joy in their work
- Finding ways to invite in all voices who have gathered to learn or work
- Keen to learn more about this approach and way of working. Yes, there are already plans in the making for the next training at the bank and for Jordan!
By all accounts, this learning journey catapulted Bank al Etihad to becoming a learning-centered bank, focused on ensuring meaningful and respectful encounters with all they meet, work with, serve, and engage.
The Foundations of Dialogue Education course offered by Global Learning Partners was one of the most impactful learning experiences I’ve ever had. It opened my eyes to a completely new way of thinking about learning—one that emphasizes intentional design and structured training to create more meaningful outcomes for learners. This course fundamentally shifted my perspective on how to maximize learning for real change.
Rula Nabulsi, Manager | Learning & Development, Human Resources Department, Bank al Etihad
