Cultivating a sprints service offering for a large reinsurance firm
The Challenge
Ninety Innovation was approached by a leading global reinsurance firm looking to enhance its Agile Centre of Excellence. Their goal was to build an internal pool of expert facilitators who could offer innovation services across the organization. These facilitators needed to specialize in an idea development approach based on the Google Sprints methodology, aligned with the company’s existing agile processes.
By offering this service internally, the Centre aimed to elevate its profile while helping other teams accelerate decision-making and reduce the lag time between idea generation and execution.
The Approach
As Head of Training at Ninety, I designed and delivered a trainer-led, interactive 4-day program at the reinsurer’s Paris headquarters. The program was structured around three key objectives:
Upskilling the Team: Teaching the Sprints methodology, ensuring it was aligned with the company’s existing processes and tailored to fit the business context.
Cultivating Facilitation Skills: Training participants in essential facilitation techniques, including session planning, creating an optimal environment for innovation, and fostering cross-functional collaboration.
Building the Value Proposition: Guiding the participants in defining the value proposition for the new service offering, ensuring it would resonate across the organization.
My approach emphasized learning by doing. I encouraged participants to actively engage in discussions and hands-on activities throughout the training. To enhance relevance, I embedded a real use case into the sessions, allowing participants to apply their learnings directly to their own work. By the end of the program, they left with tangible outputs that could be immediately implemented and shared.
The Results
The sprints offering has been fully integrated into the company’s operations, complete with its own dedicated SharePoint site.
The program achieved an NPS score of 75.
“An inspiring session with powerful ideas”
“Emily is an outstanding facilitator and trainer. In just three days, she delivered a well-paced, engaging session that significantly broadened our knowledge and shifted our mindsets. Each concept was brought to life with hands-on exercises that reinforced the material.”