Custom & Tailored Programs

Our custom programs are built by our faculty and staff, qualified consultants, professors of practice and others who are of the foremost thought leaders in their fields.

We recommend a needs assessment in which we interview selected members of your board, senior leadership, heads of divisions, and even key customers to determine your concerns, interests, goals, and objectives. We will then confer with you to jointly create the best solution for your business needs.

WHAT IS A CUSTOMIZED PROGRAM?

Customized programs are programs designed specifically for a company or organization by Lehigh faculty and staff in partnership with your leadership team. Typically, these programs address a particular issue or strategic initiative for a group of experienced employees, such as: enhancing leadership, business acumen, and/or supporting an innovation or growth initiative.

WHY WOULD MY COMPANY NEED A CUSTOMIZED PROGRAM?

Business is competitive and fast-paced. Organizations rely on their human capital, senior leaders, managers, emerging leaders and functional experts to drive business success. These employees need constant development to enhance their business skills, leadership ability, and capacity to innovate. A custom program, designed and developed by our renowned faculty and staff, ensures impact and efficiency. We work with you to align the program's content directly to your business's needs. We explore employee competency gaps and incorporate only relevant content, increasing your return on investment.

WHAT TYPE OF PROGRAMS CAN YOU DEVELOP?

Whether an organization wants to address competitive changes, build or reinforce a high performance culture, jump-start a corporate transformation process, or foster technical and market innovations, The Vistex Institute will work with you to design and develop the optimal custom solution aligned to your goals.

WHAT DOES THE PROCESS TO DESIGN A CUSTOM PROGRAM LOOK LIKE?

We look to optimize budget and impact by working with you one-one-one. We have four steps in our custom program development process, which involves our faculty/staff directly interacting with your team. The process is seamless and our internal logistics team handles coordination and scheduling. Here are the four steps:

1. Define: Working directly with the company's leadership team, we define or explore the strategic initiative that the custom program will be supporting.
2. Design: We interview the leadership team, collect input, explore competency gaps for the cohort, test alignment, and begin a preliminary design.
3. Develop: After you approve a preliminary design, together we select the best faculty/instructors for the project based on expertise and fit. Taking into consideration all of the information from this point, we begin to design the program.
4. Deliver: Finally, after a few iterations, the full design is a completed program. We arrange logistics, scheduling, and communications - involving your team as much or as little as requested.

WHAT IS UNIQUE ABOUT OUR CUSTOM PROGRAMS?

Lehigh University has over 150-years of history. Ranked among the top 50 best research universities in the country, Lehigh has a reputation for the practical application of learning and is known for project-based teaching. Our focus is on:

1. A Rich Intellectual and Practical Experience: As one of the nation's top universities, our faculty/staff works directly with you to design a unique educational solution that has a lasting impact. Our clients are important to us and we do not provide programs for all issues.
2. Boutique Executive Education: Our clients are not just a number to us. We believe in forming in-depth partnerships and working closely with our clients to deliver programming that inspires individuals, educates groups, and drives organizational success.
3. Depth of Expertise and Research: Our comprehensive portfolio of thought leaders and faculty will enable content that is unique, backed by innovative research, and most importantly, aligned to your organization's development goals.

WHAT IS THE RETURN ON INVESTMENT OF A CUSTOM PROGRAM?

The return on investment of a custom program occurs in the beginning steps and relies on three key factors: proper alignment to a business goal, faculty/instructor skill and practical application of content. We strive to maximize all three factors and only engage in projects where we can guarantee impact. We do this by integrating unique learning methods into our programs. You can measure the impact of a program in several ways. In our process, we track impact from the beginning and work with you to design a metric to help track both engagement and impact.

TO WHAT DEGREE DO YOU CUSTOMIZE THE EDUCATIONAL SOLUTION?

The degree to which the program design and content is customized will be determined by the defined needs of the participants or cohort. Some programs require intense upfront design and content development, and others require less customization based on the defined need. Typically, we can determine the degree of customization after an exploratory meeting.

** WHAT ARE SOME OF THE MOST ADDRESSED BUSINESS CHALLENGES ACKNOWLEDGED BY A CUSTOM PROGRAM?**

Some of the issues we have addressed through our past programs include: strategic leadership for senior leaders, creating an innovation mindset to drive growth, strategic branding, creating new market opportunities, and creating a culture of change and adaptability. Custom programs are useful in support of change initiatives and as a stage gate for emerging leaders or high potentials. We have also designed company-wide Leadership Academies and Corporate University Offerings.

HOW LONG WOULD IT TAKE TO DEVELOP OUR PROGRAM?

It typically takes us between three and six months to develop a company-specific program, depending on the complexity of the program and the content required. For example: a two week program involving several locations and broad technological support will take longer to develop than a short three day workshop.

HOW MANY PARTICIPANTS CAN ATTEND A GIVEN PROGRAM?

The number of participants depends on the program's goals and ultimately its design. In line with our emphasis on exchange and interactivity, as well as our experience, we typically recommend at least twelve but no more than thirty-five participants. However, with distance learning solutions, we can address the needs of broader groups if needed.

WHAT LEVELS OR BANDS WITHIN AN ORGANIZATION ARE PROGRAMS TYPICALLY DESIGNED FOR?

This pertains to the program design and thus the business goal/need that the learning solution is designed to support. Typically, content is designed for: senior leadership, mid-level managers, functional experts, and high potentials.