Verizon Leadership Academy
Challenge/Opportunity
Verizon retained Bishop-McCann to help them develop their 2017 Leadership Academy. This academy was designed to transform 1,500 leaders in every retail store around the entire country. Retail is changing rapidly, and Verizon asked us to help prepare their leaders for the future.
Response/Solution
Our creative services department started by developing a theme and brand that communicated the idea that every employee’s contribution “matters” and that individual success will lead to collective success. Umatter #befearless became the thread for the entire experience. With the people at the heart of this training movement, we were positioned to create the experience that would transform the retail world.
Bishop-McCann created a unique general session room. Overcoming many venue challenges—including nine foot ceilings, a wall of windows, and large columns in the middle of the room—our production team designed and built a custom environment. The team transformed the existing, antiquated meeting space into a modern, digitally oriented general session room. Walls were painted Verizon grey, custom branded clings covered the windows, and 14 LCD monitors were installed around the perimeter of the room and on the columns. A custom stage was positioned at the front of the room, and a massive 8 by 36 foot LED wall served as the focal point. Bishop-McCann designed custom, extra-wide digital content for the LED screen, including scenic backgrounds, motion graphics, and presentation backgrounds. All screens were synced to provide an immersive, branded learning environment for Verizon Academy attendees. A full audio system and lighting package were installed in the room to complete the transformation.
Three tracks were created to help facilitate this retail transformation: “Engage,” “Enable,” and “Empower.” In each track, there were immersive training experiences that captivated the audiences and changed the way they thought about the business. The team built actual Verizon stores in meeting rooms to help facilitate the immersive training.
Our speaker and entertainment department identified the perfect speaker to drive home the message of fearless leadership. Carey Lohrenz was the first female fighter pilot, and she wowed the audience with an incredible and life-changing message.
Outcome/Result
Bishop-McCann completed five weeks of training for the retail leadership. At the end of these five weeks, the client decided to do 20 more weeks of training to reach all leaders at every level. The impact to the business has been transformative. We identified three things that each retail leader would need to implement in their store to pay for the training, and they did that and more. Verizon is now set to lead the new digital retail experience.
