Release the performance trapped inside your organization.

How much more could your organization achieve with the people and resources it already has? What would change if teams could see problems earlier, solve them faster and spread what they learn?

Creating more value together is a skill that teams and leaders can develop. Maria Mentzer has spent years developing and honing a proven recipe for building it, drawing on operating-leadership experience and hands-on delivery of hundreds of two-day Model Line Workshops.

In this energetic, story-driven session, Maria shows how leaders help release performance through everyday work. Teams tackle problems that matter to them, test changes and see immediate results. Leaders develop alongside them, practicing how to create the conditions for improvement and coach their teams through it.

The experience builds skill, belonging and visible progress. People get hooked and want to keep going. As that practice spreads, the gains compound across the organization.

Building on the research of her colleague Steve Spear, Maria connects the leader’s daily behavior with an organization’s ability to learn, innovate and deliver. She shares lessons from work that has helped teams move from average performance to industry-leading results.

Expect humor, candid stories and a chance to examine your own leadership habits. You’ll identify one barrier holding your team back and choose a practical change in how you lead, support or coach improvement.

Format

Interactive keynote or leadership conference presentation, adaptable to 30–45 minutes.

Audience

Executives, business-unit and functional leaders, operations leaders, and managers responsible for team performance and leadership development.

Participants will

• Recognize how leadership behavior can help or hinder a team’s ability to create more value.
• Explain how teams and leaders develop skill and intrinsic motivation through meaningful practice.
• Choose one change in how they lead, support or coach improvement.

Examples and emphasis can be tailored to the audience and industry.

What would make your most skeptical team member ask to come back for more improvement practice? What would make their leader want to join them?

Maria Mentzer has spent years developing and honing a proven recipe for exactly that. Through hundreds of two-day Model Line Workshops across industries and business functions, she has made improvement ridiculously easy to enter and such a valuable experience that people get hooked.

Teams solve problems that matter to them and see immediate results. Leaders develop alongside them, practicing how to help. Growing skill, belonging and visible progress build the intrinsic motivation to keep going. With continued practice, value-creating behaviors become habits, learning spreads and the gains compound.

In this energetic, story-driven session, Maria shares what makes that experience work, including the preparation and support that make “just show up to practice” possible. She connects her practical recipe with the research of her colleague Steve Spear and draws on real engagements to show how much performance organizations can release from the people they already have.

Expect humor, a familiar skeptic and a chance to examine your own approach. You’ll identify one barrier that makes improvement difficult in your organization and choose a change that makes practice easier, more meaningful and worth coming back for.

Format

Interactive keynote or conference presentation, adaptable to 30–45 minutes.

Audience

Leaders, continuous improvement and operational excellence practitioners, transformation leads, and anyone responsible for helping teams improve how they work.

Participants will

• Identify a barrier that makes improvement difficult to start or sustain.
• Explain how meaningful practice builds skill and intrinsic motivation in teams and leaders together.
• Choose one practical change that helps people participate, create value and want to keep improving.