invitation
Catalyst
Welcome to Catalyst.
Catalyst is our new development programme supporting our high-potential talent. You have been invited to join this programme as one of our top performers, who we see as a potential future leader within the firm, and we want to help give you the support and opportunity to excel in your career with us.
Hear more from Fiona about the programme and why we are launching this and then read on to discover more about the programme.
Overview and structure
Catalyst brings together our two existing programmes, Elevate and Pathway to Empowerment. Both programmes were designed to support high-potential underrepresented talent, and taking onboard feedback from previous participants and our employees, we are re-launching as one programme to better support participants and provide a more tailored approach.
This is a development programme but not as you know it. With the kick-off and final “next steps” module being compulsory, plus a compulsory module for fee-earners, you will then be able to pick an additional 3 (fee-earners) or 4 (CCS/Support) modules to make up your personalised ‘Catalyst Passport’ that suits your own specific development areas
Read on to learn more about what you can expect from Catalyst.
Modules you can choose from
There are nine modules within the programme for you to choose from, created to drive leadership qualities, respond to specific learning requirements of our high potential, under-represented talent and contribute towards the creation of a high-performance culture. The below shows an overview of the compulsory and voluntary modules you can choose from, click on each module to learn more about the content that will be covered and help decide which modules would be most beneficial for you.
Compulsory
Voluntary
Module 1
Introduction (kick-off session)
60 minutes
This introduction will provide an overview of the modules and key areas of focus that will be covered in the programme, alongside an outline of the objectives and structure from the programme lead and senior sponsor.
While our inclusion strategy attempts to reduce the adverse impact of the systemic issues which have historically held back under-represented talent, we know that it takes more than this to enable effective progression for all talent. We understand under-represented talent may have felt they had to show up in a certain way, or developed beliefs that success is only achievable through actions that felt inauthentic and unsustainable. This programme aims to address these barriers and beliefs that may exist. Importantly it's not about changing who people are, it's about creating the space to lead in a way that's authentic and impactful by both acknowledging and reducing some of the burden many may feel it takes to succeed and progress through the firm.
During this session we will be discussing expectations and goals for the programme and inviting participants to share your aspirations and what you hope to gain. You’ll also get to meet your fellow participants and begin to build your network from across service lines.
Module 1
Introduction, kick-off session
Module 2
Great to exceptional
Module 3
Confidence with (a) difference
Module 4
One-firm: Building sustainable value propositions
(compulsory for fee-earners)
Module 5
Energy and resilience
Module 6
Leadership on your terms
Module 7
Harnessing your emotional intelligence for effective leadership
Module 8
Embracing diversity and inclusion when leading high-performance teams
Module 9
Forward focus: crafting your future success
2.5 hours
This module focuses on cultivating a high-performance culture and developing leadership capabilities specific to your individual strengths and needs of your business area.
You will delve into the dynamics and psychology of high-performing teams and the role of leaders in modelling and managing high performance and the barriers they encounter when attempting this.
You will learn the importance of fostering a growth mindset and reframing perceptions of failure to build a culture of high challenge and support, whilst honing your team communication.
What can you expect from the session?
The session will focus on key psychological models and frameworks for building high performing teams, as well as the challenges individuals and team members can face in being consistently high performing. We’ll also look at the importance of communicating the definition of high performance in your business area and gaining alignment between the expectations and team member motivations and anticipated outcomes.
Why would this module be relevant to you?
Would you like to use psychology to learn how you can lead your teams from great to exceptional performance?
Are you interested in finding out how cultural and social factors might shape our processing of success and failure?
Would you benefit from developing strategies to more effectively communicate your team’s contributions, commitment and effectiveness, ensuring that efforts are recognised and valued consistently?
Are you ready to explore the factors that may impact perceptions of high performance, and develop your skills in navigating these challenges?
Module 2
Great to exceptional
2.5 hours
In this session we address the individual challenges that might be faced by you when asserting yourself and your unique perspectives. We explore universal barriers that many individuals encounter that can impact the sense of belonging and/or confidence in the workplace.
What can you expect from the session?
This module creates a safe and honest space for evaluating how your self-concept of identity (who you really think you are and what evidence do you have for this) manifests (both positively and negatively) in your everyday perceptions of yourself as a high potential, high performing contributor in your role. Additionally, it helps participants acknowledge what might be holding them back in the face of others’ perceptions of them and how they can positively address this.
Why would this module be relevant to you?
Are you interested in developing strategies that can enhance your feeling of belonging and confidence within your team environment?
Could you benefit from exploring approaches that develop how you communicate your ideas, viewpoints and decision-making with confidence?
Would you like to enhance how you evaluate the influences on your professional experiences, and further understand the relationship between your social identities and your workplace interactions?
Would you welcome the opportunity to be supported in exercising greater agency over how you connect and project at work?
Would you like to explore strategies to enhance your self-belief and reduce self-doubt, especially in high impact decision making scenarios?
Module 3
Confidence with (a) difference
2.5 hours
This practical module focuses on the critical aspects of aligning value propositions with client needs and tailoring service offerings to drive firmwide strategies and achieve results.
The session will emphasise the importance of cross-functional collaboration (firm-first approach) and co-creation with clients and other teams to develop innovative and sustainable value propositions. We will also practice and enhance influencing skills and focus on cultivating strong client relationships.
What can you expect from the session?
The session will focus on four core areas:
Understanding the firm-first approach: exploring the benefits of a firm-first approach through cross-functional collaboration, creating a unified client experience and identifying areas to enhance efficiency and profitability.
Identifying client needs and opportunities: developing techniques for understanding and analysing client needs across various business areas and service lines to identify and unlock new market opportunities for integrated service delivery.
Building collaborative relationships: looking at everything from building strategies for effective communication, developing personal brand and developing skills and confidence in articulating value propositions that focus on solving client challenges
Developing integrated solutions: exploring ways to leverage expertise and perspective from different business areas to develop integrated and tailored solutions for clients.
Why would this module be relevant to you?
Would you like to enhance your understanding of how to deliver strategic and tailored solutions to your clients?
Could you benefit from enhancing your confidence and self-belief when building new relationships, especially with those who are from different backgrounds to your own?
Would you like to develop strategies to help you build your personal brand and profile, whilst staying authentic to your true identity?
Would you value guidance on leveraging your networks and contacts to elevate your ideas and actions from operational tasks to a more strategic, commercial level?
Module 4
One-firm: Building sustainable value propositions
2.5 hours
This session is designed to empower you with the knowledge and strategies needed to nurture personal well-being, build and foster resilience to thrive and maintain consistent high performance within demanding work environments.
What can you expect from the session?
This module will look at understanding the importance of self-leadership in maintaining wellbeing and high performance, alongside setting boundaries and managing workload. We’ll also explore the concept of personal energy management, how you can identify energy peaks and troughs and utilise techniques to optimise energy levels and maintain a sustainable high-performance mindset.
During this session, we will also focus on stress recognition and mitigation and help you to build resilience. We’ll spend time on recognising signs of overload, in both yourself and those around you, as well as building strategies to mitigate stress in demanding work environments. We’ll help you understand the components of personal and professional resilience, and developing strategies to navigate challenges, setbacks and adversity.
Why would this module be relevant to you?
Would you be interested in learning more about your own wellbeing and how this relates to high performance?
Would you like to build a greater understanding of your own personal energy patterns, including your “energy drains” and how you can amplify these to enable you to be your best self at work?
Do you need support in balancing your workload with any significant personal responsibilities, which may be related to your social identity, to enable you to thrive at work?
Could you benefit from tools to establish and enhance your sense of belonging at work, enabling you to foster a deeper sense of belonging for those under-represented colleagues who are more junior?
Do you sometimes find it hard to manage stress and overload and would like to equip yourself with tools to mitigate this?
Module 5
Energy and resilience
2.5 hours
This session will empower you to navigate the complexities of your sense of place within our various organisational cultures and work settings. We'll work on cultivating your authentic leadership style and embracing feelings of difference and/or otherness to thrive as an impactful and effective leader.
What can you expect from this session?
During this module, we will look at building confidence, developing personal brand strategies and curating your authentic leadership style.
We will explore the concept of Insider/Outsider dynamics within organisations and understand the impact on leadership experiences and opportunities, helping with the reframe of negative self-perceptions to build confidence in your leadership capabilities.
The module will look at how to grow and evolve your networks, supporters and advocates in a hybrid world. You’ll develop your answers to the following questions: What do people say about you when you aren’t in the room? What do you want them to say? How do you use your brand strategies and networks to align these two answers?
We will also reflect on personal narratives, experiences and role models to identify your strengths, values and unique perspectives that contribute to your identity as a leader. You will develop skills and techniques to lead authentically, making your difference and contribution with impact.
Why might this module be relevant to you?
Are you interested in developing your networking skills and making the most of your personal branding for leadership success?
Could you benefit from exploring different approaches that enhance your unique qualities to shine as a leader?
Are you ready to challenge perceptions of what effective leadership looks like, including how to create meaningful pathways for others to follow?
Would you value learning leadership techniques that emphasise authenticity and explore how you can succeed whilst staying true to your identity?
Module 6
Leadership on your terms
2.5 hours
The session will highlight the positive impact of emotional intelligence and empathy on leadership effectiveness, team dynamics, and organisational success. You will learn how to leverage emotional intelligence to create a more inclusive, supportive, and high-performing organisational culture.
What can you expect from this session?
We will focus on exploring the concept of emotional intelligence - the ability to recognise, understand, and use emotions in yourself and others. We will focus on how enhancing and utilising emotional intelligence can empower you to navigate and overcome the distinct challenges you may encounter in the workplace. Throughout the session we will explore the components of emotional intelligence and help you understand the impact on leadership effectiveness. We will also help you develop strategies for managing emotions in yourself and identifying them in others to help you to gain self-awareness and insight into different emotional intelligence levels.
The session will also look at empathy, focusing on helping you to learn how to cultivate empathy and a deeper understanding of your own, and others’ experiences and how to address the challenges faced by under-represented people. Through real-world examples we’ll illustrate how emotional intelligence and empathy positively impacts career development, specifically focussed on under-represented talent development and through doing so enhance your own emotional intelligence.
Why might this module be relevant to you?
Are you interested in developing strategies that cultivate greater emotional intelligence in your own responses and your interactions with colleagues?
Could you benefit from enhanced self-awareness, including awareness of potential unhelpful stereotypes that you may unconsciously conform to?
Would you benefit from learning how to recognise emotions in yourself and others to make you a more effective leader?
Would you like to develop tools to enhance your empathy and increase your awareness of others’ diverse perspectives and potential barriers, to help you navigate these more effectively and respectfully?
Would you like to understand how your unique background and experiences can contribute to your leadership style, that enhances collaboration within your team?
Module 7
Harnessing your emotional intelligence for effective leadership
2.5 hours
This session is designed to empower you to lead in ways that embrace inclusivity, nurture different perspectives and minority voices, ultimately fostering a culture of respect, belonging, and high performance within the organisation.
What can you expect from the session?
This module will focus on helping you develop inclusive leadership behaviours through cultivating an equitable mindset, and how you can create and foster a culture of mutual respect and belonging. We will be discussing the importance of creating a culture that embraces diversity and fosters inclusion and equity for high-performance teams, helping you to develop an understanding of different perspectives and enabling you to recognise and address biases – your own and those of others.
We will be exploring different strategies for promoting inclusive leadership and decision making, as well developing tools and techniques that will help you, as leaders, to build diverse and inclusive teams. Through case studies and real-world examples, we will look at how to apply the learnings and best practice strategies for promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion within teams and across the firm.
Why might this module be relevant to you?
Would you like to develop awareness of your own biases and blind spots, and could you be more proactive in your efforts to be a better ally to those from other under-represented communities?
Would you like to understand and practice techniques in how to create a culture that embraces diversity and fosters inclusion and equity for high-performance teams?
Could you build on your understanding of the diverse journeys and challenges of colleagues from similar or other under-represented backgrounds, and how this awareness enhances interactions with them?
Would you like to understand more about microaggressions and triggers, and how they can influence decision making, performance and leadership?
Would you like to develop tools to help you better navigate difficult conversations as an inclusive leader?
Module 8
Embracing diversity and inclusion when leading high-performance teams
2.5 hours plus 1.5hrs networking in-person in 8 Finsbury Circus
This final module, which will be held in-person, is designed to empower you, our graduating participants to take proactive control of your career journey. We aim to develop your growth mindset by focusing on self-awareness, goal setting, and leadership transition, providing tools for maximising strengths, setting stretching career goals, and navigating ambiguity, whilst addressing the unique challenges faced.
What can you expect from this session?
In our final session together, you will explore how to realise growth opportunities and map your path to success (your own and others) within the firm. We’ll focus on getting to know yourselves better, so that you can identify your strengths and skills and how to leverage them to enhance your career. You’ll develop an understanding of internal and external barriers to being recognised for high-performance and how to overcome these, alongside learning coaching tools tips and guidance for setting clear goals and tailoring measurable KPIs to track your success.
Together we’ll explore the shift from Manager to Leader, emphasising the importance of visionary thinking, strategic decision-making, horizon scanning, navigating yourself and others through ambiguity and change and being an inspiration to others. And we will equip you with tools and knowledge to create and cultivate opportunities for stretch projects and broader projects within the firm/your team.
We’ll also spend time networking as a cohort of graduating participants and with senior leaders from across the firm. You’ll celebrate your successes, build inspiring plans for the future and deepen the networks you have built throughout the programme.
Why might this module be relevant to you?
Do you feel that there are barriers to you being able to build internal networks and find advocates that can enhance and support your career development?
Do you feel that a lower sense of self-belief impacts your ability to self-advocate?
Are you able to create clear achievable actions and goals and put into practice things you have learnt?
Have you developed survival or coping strategies that are holding you back from developing your career outside of BAU?
Module 9
Forward focus: crafting your future success
Building communities of support and connection
As part of the programme, and continuing beyond, we’re introducing peer group communities designed to support your development journey. These groups will offer a space for meaningful connection, shared experiences, and reflection. You’ll be able to explore programme content together, exchange tools and insights, and offer feedback in a trusted environment.
This initiative is shaped by feedback from previous development programmes, where peer support was consistently highlighted as a key driver of growth and impact. You’ll have the option to join a community that reflects your identity and lived experience, or to participate in an open group.
LGBTQIA+
Social
mobility
Ethnic
identity
Gender identity
Your peer network will:
Meet every two months for an hour
Be initially convened by a senior internal champion, with future sessions self-led by Catalyst participants
Use programme modules as a springboard for discussion and shared learning
Offer a space to provide feedback and shape the ongoing development of the programme
Help you build lasting connections with fellow high performers across the firm
Open group
Completion of programme
Your final module will be held in person at 8 Finsbury Circus, and will be followed by a celebration event giving everyone the opportunity to celebrate their successes over the programme, and network with senior leaders from across the firm.
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Introduction
Overview and structure
Modules
Building communities
Completing the programme
Your
invitation
to
Catalyst
LGBTQIA+
Gender identity
Social
mobility
Ethnic
identity
Disability / neurodiverse/ long-term condition
Open group
There are nine modules within the programme for you to choose from, created to drive leadership qualities, respond to specific learning requirements of our high potential, under-represented talent and contribute towards the creation of a high-performance culture. The below shows an overview of the compulsory and voluntary modules you can choose from, click on each module to learn more about the content that will be covered and help decide which modules would be most beneficial for you.
LGBTQIA+
Gender identity
Social
mobility
Ethnic
identity
Disability
Open group
RSVP
Disability / neurodiverse/ long-term condition
RSVP
Disability / neurodiversity / long-term condition