Microsoft partnered with London Business School to create the Public Sector Course, aimed at training its public sector sales team in essential skills and knowledge to adapt to a 'cloud-first, mobile-first' strategy. The course has successfully trained over 1,500 employees, achieving high completion and satisfaction rates, while enabling scalable, online learning across their global workforce. This initiative supports Microsoft's goal of enhancing customer engagement through improved interpersonal skills and business acumen in their sales force.

1. 1
Microsoft and
London Business School
Driving Customer Engagement:
A Digital Solution
The Public Sector Course

2. 2
Executive summary
It’s 2016 and Microsoft faces a challenge
Additional challenges are the acquisition and
development of soft skills, and delivering this
kind of professional development at scale.
Microsoft partners with London Business School
to design and deliver an innovative, online
learning solution.
What they sell
How they sell
Who they sell to
The result is The
Public Sector Course.
The company’s new strategy prioritises
front-end mobile products and services with
cloud-based back-end.
To engage customers and optimise sales,
its public sector sales force must accordingly
embrace a shift in knowledge and approach.
To sustain and drive this business
transformation in the public sector, Microsoft
needs its sales team to adapt to significant
changes in:

3. 3
Executive summary: Impact
The Public Sector Course has already trained some
1,500 Microsoft employees
In addition to knowledge and skills acquisition that aligns to strategic business goals,
Microsoft reports that its sale employees:
Apply the
knowledge
acquired to
close deals
The Public Sector Course ranks today among Microsoft’s highest ever
in completion rate, relevancy and overall satisfaction.
Have acquired
nuanced
interpersonal
skills
Are building
strong relations
with customers
Exchange ideas
across a globally
dispersed, diverse
cohort

4. 4
The challenge: Building knowledge,
developing skills, delivering at scale.
In 2016 Microsoft is making the transition to a “Cloud First, Mobile First”
business model. This shift translates into a number of training challenges for the company’s
public sector sales force:
Microsoft needs to find a solution that delivers the business acumen, the differentiated soft skills
and the wide-scale applicability to drive knowledge and capability uptake across its entire public
sector sales team.
The hunt begins for a learning partner that can rise to this challenge.
Acquiring new
knowledge and skills
that align to new
products and services.
Mastering a raft of
collaborative, interpersonal
and relationship-building
skills to engage better with
public sector customers.
Delivering the training
at scale to
a 30,000-strong
global workforce.

5. 5

6. Partnering with London Business School
Microsoft is looking for a partner with the deep expertise and experience
to deliver the specialist knowledge and skills their employees needed.
A partner with the innovative vision and the flexibility to help them design a scalable
solution to these learning needs.
London Business School is chosen by Microsoft to lead the professional development
of its public sector sales force.
London Business School offers:
Deep expertise and
understanding of the
issues Microsoft
is facing
1. 2. 3. 4.
Faculty experts
in public sector
A global approach A reputation for
world-class
innovation
and excellence

7. 7
A lot of our faculty are involved
very much on a hands-on basis,
in the public sector. And this
enables them to understand
and deal with the issues that
Microsoft’s people face all
the time.
Professor Sir Andrew Liekerman
Dean, London Business School

8. 8
An alternative to the classroom approach
With more than 30,000 diverse and geographically dispersed
employees in its global public sector and technical sales cadre,
Microsoft needs a learning solution that can scale to meet
its objectives.
The traditional classroom
approach will not be an option.

9. 9
“I was surrounded by people who
made leadership inspiring. There
was no fluff. I got the tools, the
methodology and the framework.
I immediately stepped back from my
projects and became a full-time CEO
– concentrating on creating
a sense of purpose, listening to
people, explaining my ambition.”
Frank Jensen
CEO, Søren Jensen

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The Public Sector Course
Together, Microsoft and London Business School create The Public Sector Course:
a customised programme, tailoring a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) model
for Microsoft’s public sellers specifically.
The programme platform is co-designed by Intrepid Learning to deliver social and collaborative
interaction possibilities as well as the global scalability that Microsoft needs. Specifically, the
programme aims to empower participants to build trust and credibility with customers.
For the first time in the company’s history, public sector sales training is delivered 100% online.
Microsoft can now upskill their sellers regardless of where they were in the world.
And it does this:
Across 150+
countries
Reaching 1000s
of participants
simultaneously
Enabling them to
engage with the
content and with
each other

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A seven-week learning journey
Delivered via an online 7-week MOOC modality, with content rolled
out weekly, The Public Sector Course is built on:
¢¢ An intuitive interface for learning
¢¢ Video lectures
¢¢ Online discussion forums curated by faculty
¢¢ Gamification through badging and leadership boards
¢¢ Social features including “liking”, sharing, bookmarking,
and asset-level feedback
¢¢ Exploration of key themes: macroeconomics, public sector finance,
stakeholder management, innovation, value proposition and digital transformation.
¢¢ Case studies with specific relevance to Microsoft customers
¢¢ Applied learning via missions: guided real-world assignments directly tied to the job
¢¢ Peer review of final assignments
An innovative, intuitive and user-friendly experience that delivers the flexibility
of “any time – anywhere” learning.
And the deep expertise of London Business School’s renowned faculty.

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Faculty expertise, discussion
forums, “missions” that directed
the learning back into the
business – and we even had
senior Microsoft stakeholders
sharing insights that were in
line with what our faculty were
saying over the seven weeks
of learning.
Sarah Curshen
Client Director
London Business School

13. 13
“I was surrounded by people who
made leadership inspiring. There
was no fluff. I got the tools, the
methodology and the framework.
I immediately stepped back from my
projects and became a full-time CEO
– concentrating on creating
a sense of purpose, listening to
people, explaining my ambition.”
Frank Jensen
CEO, Søren Jensen
Personal impact

14. 14
Business impact
Microsoft’s public sector sales team measures all training
through course evaluations, during and after training.
The impact to date has been highly significant:
¢¢ 1500 public sector sales professionals trained to date
¢¢ 75% completion rate – one of the highest completion
rates at Microsoft
¢¢ One of highest satisfaction rates the company has seen
¢¢ One of the highest relevancy scores in terms of applicability of content
¢¢ A significant proportion of participants using final assignment
to engage clients and close deals
¢¢ Internal relations boosted with international employee interchange
extending from Britain to Oman to Bahrain to Mexico

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At Microsoft, our culture and mind-set
are focused on learning and being
insatiably curious to understand our
customers’ industry challenges. Our
partnership with LBS is helping fuel this
mind-set with relevant content our team
can apply to their day-to-day work with
customers. We know this program is
having an impact – it ranks among the
highest in completion rate, relevancy,
and overall satisfaction. We’ve had more
than 1,500 employees take the course
and we look forward to extending this
and creating new online programs.
Toni Townes-Whitley
Corporate Vice President
Worlwide Public Sector
Microsoft