Stefan Ivanov and his son Maxim built a rowing boat in their garage in Sofia, with no experience in rowing, boat building or sailing, and rowed it across the Atlantic. It took them 105 days, through four tropical storms and a hurricane. They called the boat NEVEREST: never rest until you reach your Everest.
It is the kind of story people remember for years. Cargotec’s HR team in Bulgaria wanted its people to do more than remember it: to take it apart, argue about it, and build on it together.
Inspiration, then practice
Rositsa Bachvarova, Cargotec’s country HR manager in Bulgaria, designed a blended program around one idea: a keynote gives people the picture, and the practice comes from talking it through with the colleagues they work with. So the NEVEREST keynote would open the program, and everyone would then get the space to discuss it and turn it into techniques they could use at work.
Rather than a long workshop for a few, she chose to reach everyone: short sessions on many dates, so every person could find a time. And she knew how it had to reach management:
“Not a subscription to a system, but a program with a purpose.”
She was right about what management buys: a purpose, not a tool. What made the purpose reach everyone was what sat underneath it. Most development reaches people in pieces: a training for managers here, a workshop for one team there, one initiative and one group at a time. Cargotec ran one priority through the whole country office instead, from a keynote to practice, on dates everyone could choose.
A blended program, step by step
Over three months, the program moved from inspiration to practice:
- The NEVEREST keynote: Stefan and Maxim Ivanov’s crossing, for everyone.
- An online introduction for all staff: the topic, and how the sessions would run.
- Three one-hour sessions on resilience, each on several dates people chose.
- A catch-up week, so that nobody missed out.
Each session took one model of resilience and put it to work:
Seligman’s three Ps of resilience
How we explain a setback to ourselves: as permanent or temporary, as touching everything or one area, as all our fault or not. The explanation shapes how quickly people recover.
Loehr’s four pillars of mental toughness
Emotional flexibility, responsiveness, strength and resilience: mental toughness as something people train, like a muscle, not a trait some are born with. Teams tested everyday habits, such as setting boundaries, against the four.
Kobasa’s three Cs of hardiness
Why some people stay healthy under heavy stress: commitment, a sense of control, and seeing change as a challenge rather than a threat.
Each person got an invitation for every session and could move to another date if the first didn’t suit them. Whoever joined a date formed small groups on the spot, answered on their own first, then had to agree as a group, with no trainer in the room:
A colleague decides not to check work email after 8 PM, to protect their time and energy and do their best during work hours. Which of Loehr’s four pillars of mental toughness does setting a boundary like this build most?
- Emotional flexibility
- Emotional responsiveness
- Emotional strengthDesislavaKalinRadost
- Emotional resilienceViktor
Resilience, in practice
The program ran while the company was practicing resilience itself. Cargotec was separating into what are today Hiab and Kalmar, and in the middle of the program everyone moved to new email addresses. Rositsa and the AhaPlay team kept the program on course: every account updated, direct links to any date, and a catch-up week in December for anyone who had missed a session.
More than 200 people took part, across the whole country office.
What people took from it
The people who came through it kept coming back to the same words:
- “The first one was really interesting and fun.”
- “Thank you for the interesting games and challenges.”
- “Thank you very much for the nice and helpful trainings we had this year, and looking forward to seeing the next meetings.”
Back to the boat
Stefan and Maxim’s crossing worked as a story because it was never one heroic moment. It was 105 days of small decisions, in bad weather, with no one coming to row for them.
That was the point of the program too. The keynote gave Cargotec’s people the picture. The sessions that followed gave them the practice, together, in groups of colleagues, at a time when the company itself was changing course.
What we learned
Cargotec’s program showed us how to turn a moment of inspiration into practice for a whole organization. Five principles came out of it, and each one shapes how ExecuteOS works today.
1Follow inspiration with practice, while it’s fresh
A great keynote changes how people feel for a few days. What changes how they act is practicing the idea, soon, with the people they work with. At Cargotec the sessions followed the keynote within weeks.
In ExecuteOS: a message from the top becomes short sessions every team works through, while it is still fresh.
2Reach everyone, not a few
Short sessions without a facilitator can run on many dates, so everyone finds a time. That is how more than 200 people took part.
In ExecuteOS: the same sessions for every team, as often as needed.
3One priority for everyone, not one initiative at a time
Management funds a purpose it can name. Development that arrives in isolated pieces, one group and one initiative at a time, never changes what is normal for everyone. Cargotec connected inspiration and practice into one program for the whole office.
In ExecuteOS: not another tool, but the infrastructure for executing priorities: whatever the priority, it reaches every team the same way.
4Make taking part effortless
In a company that is changing, access is part of the program. Accounts that work, direct links to any date and a catch-up week decide who takes part.
In ExecuteOS: access is checked before the first session, and a catch-up week is planned from the start.
5Plan the reinforcement
Three sessions gave people a shared language for resilience and techniques to try. Making them habits takes reinforcement over months.
In ExecuteOS: a check again after the sessions, and the sessions brought back where they are needed.