In Expresso, 9 de Junho de 2012
Ana Bernardes speaks of her experiences in the competition and that a decision of her team has benefited from ‘ divine intervention ‘. Ana Bernardes’ participation in the Global Management Challenge goes back to 2010. This experience highlights the learning, team work developed and the holistic view obtained about companies operations.
Ana Bernardes has a degree in human resource management and is currently Director of recruitment and training of Accenture in Portugal and Angola, the consulting firm which she joined in 2007.
Since that time her career development has closely tracked the progress of the Global Management Challenge, but she only joined the competition in 2010, as part of a team of executives from Accenture. This ‘brought together members of the departments of human resources, finance, procurement and legal, which allowed us to have a very different visions of the situation of the company and together define the best approach,” says Ana Bernardes. The time to devote to this challenge was the greatest difficulty encountered, along with his colleagues. It was usually at the end of the working day or close to the time of the closing of the decisions that we gathered together to decide what to do.
‘ Papal ‘ Blessing
The former participant tells us that on one of the days, when we were supposed to submit the decisions, coincided with the visit of Pope Benedict XVI in Lisbon. Around the time of the closing of the Simulator, when we were still submitting the decisions, they heard plenty of cheers and excitement on the street. They went to the window and at this time the papal procession was passing, which they viewed until it went beyond their visual horizon.
“Then we realized, that only one minute remained to meet the closing time for entering the set of decisions. We hastily entered the decisions that we had taken and left unchanged those we had not. Throughout our participation this was the best result that we have achieved but for everyone who believes, this was certainly divine intervention “, recalls Ana Bernandes. Of this learning experience, the human resources Director of Accenture highlights the opportunity she had to see how the combination of working in different areas and experiences are critical in looking at an organization in a holistic way and enabling the best decisions to be made.
Good learning
“The competition reminded me that some management concepts, she thought, still make sense and that teamwork, even if in different ‘ wave frequencies ‘, is a fantastic learning experience”, stresses Ana Bernardes. She recommends this experience, to executives and students, for what they can learn.
Accenture has been sponsoring the Global competition for many years as well as many of the teams. The Director of recruitment and selection considers it an excellent way to assess and recruit talent. To teams entering the Global Management Challenge she advises to “devote quality time to the competition to maximize the learning experience, she concludes.
