Ceylinco Life grooms its future leaders in succession planning initiative

Life insurance leader Ceylinco Life has embarked on a programme of leadership training and assessment of senior management as part of the company’s succession planning agenda.

A group of 24 senior executives at Deputy General Manager (DGM), Assistant General Manager (AGM) and Senior Manager level joined the company’s directors recently in the first of these programmes, conducted by the well-known corporate trainer Doug Adams.

The Ceylinco Life senior management team that participated in the leadership training programme

Comprising of individual interviews with the trainer/assessor, a three-day residential training session, one-to-one counselling sessions, execution of tasks set, and a second three-day training session and evaluation, the programme was intended to expose senior managers to leadership challenges and prepare them for future leadership of the company.

The programme covered five leadership practices – Model the way; Inspire a shared vision; Challenge the process; Enable others to act; and Encouraging hearts. Participants faced a 360o evaluation based on feedback from self-evaluation, superiors, peers and subordinates. Each participant was also subjected to a DISC (Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, Conscientiousness) personal assessment, the company said.

“We have always encouraged our employees to push their professional boundaries and explore their potential because we believe that a company is only as good as its people,” Ceylinco Life Managing Director/CEO R. Renganathan said. “Ceylinco Life rose to market leadership in just 16 years, and has maintained its position at the helm for 12 years consecutively, and we believe in constantly grooming the next generation of leaders to take the company forward.”

As part of their training, the participants were broken into four groups and challenged to plan and execute four corporate social responsibility projects of their choosing, and using the experience, to make individual presentations assessing the areas in which each participant needs to improve.

Adjudged Sri Lanka’s Best Life Insurer in 2016 for the third consecutive year by World Finance, Ceylinco Life commenced operations in January 1988 and has close to a million lives covered by active policies. The company is acknowledged as the benchmark for innovation in the local insurance industry for its work in product research and development, customer service, professional development and corporate social responsibility.