Commission
Commission
Leaders are brought into bigger roles the way a plant brings equipment into service: in gates, under real load, and signed off before handover.
Commission is a 20 week leadership programme for managers in manufacturing, engineering, distribution, and mining groups. It is built for organisations that fill leadership roles from within, run many business units across several countries, and need their managers to lead well on the floor, not only in the meeting room.
Leaders learn by leading. In a crew of five managers from other units or countries, they fix a real problem in a unit none of them run. Each step is a gate, and a gate is only passed when the sponsor signs off the evidence. While each leader stretches, a named second from their own team steps up into part of their role.
Tell us where your managers get stuck between learning and doing. We will show you how one intake would run in your group.
Pilot offer: open to the first 3 organisations.Commission starts before week 1 and continues after week 20. Seven stages take an intake from the talent calibration that nominates the leaders to the one that reviews the bench they built. Each stage has a clear owner and a clear output.
Unit heads and the talent team nominate leaders against agreed criteria. Each nominee proposes a second, and the home manager agrees the pairing.
Talent team, unit heads, home managersWordsburg interviews unit heads, screens their case nominations, takes baselines, forms crews, and sets up labs and Shift Notes in each language.
Wordsburg, unit heads, country HRSponsors, leaders, and seconds meet. Crews receive their case brief, agree a crew charter, and book the first rotation.
Sponsors, leaders, seconds, crew coachesTen labs, weekly casework with the host crew, two site rotations, coaching, and five gate reviews signed by the sponsor.
Crews, host crews, seconds, sponsorsCertification panel. Leader Records are completed, seconds are rated, and leaders who meet all five criteria are certified.
Sponsors, Wordsburg assessor, talent teamEvery fix is checked at day 90. Crews meet once a month for three months, and each second's next step is followed up.
Host units, crews, home managersThe Bench Strength Map and impact report go to the talent review. Certified leaders become sponsors or mentors for the next intake.
Talent team, leadership teamThe loop closes at stage 7: the same calibration that reviews this intake nominates the next one, and this intake's graduates help run it.
A leader stepping up leaves a gap behind them, and a leader who has only ever worked in one unit leads from one point of view. Commission fixes both at once: leaders stretch on a real problem in another unit, while the person behind them stretches at home.
65% of front line supervisors got the role for individual performance or years in a front line job.
23% have never had any supervisor training. Those trained in the past year were 79% more likely to be engaged.
At least 70% of the variance in team engagement is accounted for by the manager. A weak bench shows up on the floor.
Sources: HR Dive, reporting Gallup, January 2026 · Gallup
Yes. Many groups already run a management development programme with good content. Commission can become its applied phase: leaders take the programme's tools into a live case and prove them at the gates.
They finish the gates they can with their crew, and their second's plan is reviewed with the new manager. They can complete the remaining gates in the next intake.
The client owns its case data and results. Wordsburg owns the method, the rubric, and the tools, and licenses them to the client. After the first intake, the client's own facilitators can be certified to run later intakes with Wordsburg support.
A project is judged only on its result. Commission is judged on the result and on how each leader led, and it builds a successor behind every participant. The case is the training ground, not the product.
Yes, through the Floor intake: 10 weeks, three gates, one site, in the site language, with no travel.
| Question | A typical leadership programme | Commission |
|---|---|---|
| Where does the learning happen? | In workshops, with case studies from other companies | On a live problem in the group's own operations, with labs to support it |
| How is progress judged? | Attendance and a feedback survey | Five gate reviews, signed by a sponsor against agreed evidence |
| What happens to the leader's team? | It waits until the leader comes back | A named second steps up, which builds the bench |
| What does the business get? | Trained people | Trained people, ready successors, and fixed problems with measured results |
Every part of Commission is there for a reason. These are the choices that make it work, what each one asks of the client, and why it is worth it.
Each crew works a live problem the business already measures. The labs give the tools, the case gives the practice.
No leader works on a problem in their own unit. The case belongs to a host unit and its head.
Five leaders, no two from the same unit, with at least three functions and, in the Group intake, three countries.
Progress is shown by evidence and signed off by a sponsor, not by completing sessions.
Every fix is tried on one shift before it goes live on all of them.
Each leader names a successor from their own team, who leads a growing part of the home team.
About 3 hours a week, set around shifts, with a 2 minute Shift Note each Monday in each leader's language.
The Five Gates follow the stages of real commissioning, from the first walkdown to handover. Each gate has two leadership labs, builds one set of leadership skills, moves the crew's case forward, gives the second a bigger share of the home team, and ends with a review the sponsor signs.
Each crew mixes leaders from different business units or countries, and takes a live case owned by a unit none of them run. Fresh eyes find what the host has stopped seeing, and every leader learns to lead without formal authority. The crew spends two short rotations on the host site.
Schematic, not to scale. Example crew, fictional.
Unit heads nominate two or three cases in Discovery. Wordsburg screens them against these tests, and the sponsor confirms the final one.
Each participant nominates a second, a high potential from their own team. While the leader works the crew case, the second takes a growing, planned share of leading the home team, with the leader as their coach. The programme builds succession on purpose, not as a side effect.
Every gate ends with a 60 minute review. The crew shows evidence, the sponsor and a Wordsburg assessor check each item, and the gate is passed, passed with open items to close, or sent back for rework. This is an example, with fictional content.
| Check | Evidence shown | Status |
|---|---|---|
| The fix is running on every shift, not only the day shift | Shift logs, weeks 10 to 13 | Met |
| Scrap rate is tracked daily on the line board | Line board photos and data | Met |
| The host crew raised and solved at least one problem themselves | Two crew led fixes recorded | Met |
| Each leader led one shift briefing in the host unit | Four of five held | Open item |
| Each second has led the home team meeting at least three times | Home managers' notes | Met |
| Risks to quality and safety reviewed with the site safety lead | Signed risk note | Met |
| The measure is moving toward target | Scrap down from 4.1% to 2.9%, target 2.5% | Open item |
All checks met. The crew moves to the next gate.
Most checks met. Named items are closed within two weeks and checked by the coach.
Key checks not met. The crew repeats the work and is reviewed again within three weeks.
Who reviews: the sponsor chairs; a Wordsburg assessor scores the evidence; the crew coach attends but does not score. Each leader also gets two minutes of individual feedback after every review.
The Commission Leadership Rubric describes what good looks like in plain, observable terms. Leaders are rated at Gate 1 and Gate 5 by the Wordsburg assessor and the sponsor, using evidence from the case, not opinion. Seconds are rated on the same rubric, scaled to their role.
| Behaviour | 1 · Emerging | 3 · Capable | 5 · Role model |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sees the workGate 1 | Relies on reports and what managers say | Walks the floor, asks open questions, and checks the data | Sees what others have stopped seeing, and helps the host crew see it too |
| Decides wellGate 2 | Waits for full information, or decides alone | Weighs options with the data available and tests before committing | Makes sound calls under uncertainty and explains the trade offs clearly |
| Leads without authorityGates 1 to 3 | Pushes their own view, or defers to rank | Builds agreement across units and cultures | Gets people who do not report to them to own the change |
| Leads change on the floorGate 3 | Announces the change and moves on | Briefs every shift, handles pushback, tracks progress daily | Turns resisters into contributors, and the change holds on every shift |
| Develops othersGates 3 and 5 | Does the work for people | Delegates with support, and coaches the second regularly | The second and the host crew can run things without them |
| Makes it lastGate 5 | The result fades when they step away | Hands over with an owner, a routine, and a measure | The fix holds at day 90 and the host improves it further |
Levels 2 and 4 sit between the descriptions. Raters agree a score together; where they differ by more than one level, a second assessor reviews the evidence.
The labs are where leaders learn the tools they then use on the case. Every lab follows the same 60 minute format, so leaders know what to expect and the time goes into practice, not presentation. What they commit to in the lab shows up as evidence at the next gate review.
About 3 hours a week, set around shifts and time zones. Crews meet virtually across countries, so nobody leaves their site except for the two rotations. Each lab runs in two time slots, so leaders on early and late shifts can both attend.
Plus two site rotations of two days, three 1:1 coaching sessions per leader, and five gate reviews of 60 minutes.
Targets and baselines are set with the sponsors before the intake starts. Individual records go only to the person, their manager, and talent reviews.
Every crew case, its measure, the target, the result at Gate 4, and whether it held 90 days after handover.
Gate review results and observer ratings on six leadership behaviours, at Gate 1 and Gate 5, for each leader and each second.
For each unit, how many successors are ready now, ready in a year, or ready in two years, before and after the intake.
Certification is recorded in the Leader Record and shared with talent reviews. Leaders who miss a criterion can complete it in the next intake.
Every intake runs on the Five Gates, gate reviews, and the three registers. They differ in who takes part, how far the crews travel, and who chairs the reviews.
Commission starts at talent calibration and reports back at the next one, so the bench it builds feeds real succession decisions.
A programme that changes real operations has to protect them. These are the questions sponsors, safety leads, and HR teams ask first.
| Concern | How Commission handles it |
|---|---|
| Changes affect safety or quality | Every fix goes through the host's normal approvals. The site safety lead signs off before the dry run and before go live. Nothing changes on more than one shift until the dry run is reviewed. |
| The home team suffers while the leader is away | The leader is away only for two 2 day rotations. The second's share is agreed in writing, the home manager checks in every two weeks, and the leader stays accountable for results. |
| The second is overloaded | The share rises slowly, up to about 40% by Gate 4, and the home manager can pause it at any time. Seconds have their own labs and can step back without penalty. |
| The host unit feels judged by outsiders | The unit head chooses the case and chairs every review. The host crew leads the fix, and results are credited to the host unit. |
| Language or culture gets in the way | Labs run in English for Group intakes and in the local language for Country and Floor intakes. Shift Notes go out in each leader's language, and rotations have an interpreter when needed. |
| Travel costs too much | Only two short rotations per crew. Country and Floor intakes need little or no cross border travel. All other work is virtual. |
| The case does not reach its target | Leaders are assessed on how they led, not only on the number. A crew that made sound decisions and handed over the lessons can still pass. |
| Data and people records | Case data stays in the client's systems. Individual ratings go only to the person, their manager, and talent reviews. Group reports show cohorts, not names. |
Tell us where your managers get stuck between learning and doing. We will show you how one intake would run in your group.
Pilot offer: open to the first 3 organisations.