Company: Polpharma, Warsaw, Poland
Company Description: Polpharma is Poland’s largest pharmaceutical company and one of top 20 generic drug manufacturers in the world. We employ over 7000 people all over the world. We have 7 manufacturing plants in Poland, Russia and Kazakhstan, and 7 research and development centers. Polpharma Group’s portfolio includes about 700 products and another 200 are being developed.
Nomination Category: Corporate Communications, Investor Relations, & Public Relations Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Communications or PR Campaign of the Year - Internal Communications - 100 or More Employees
 Nomination Title: Leonardo - making internal innovations work!
- Which will you submit for this nomination, a video of up to five (5) minutes in length about the nominated campaign or program, OR written answers to the questions for this category? CHOOSE ONE:
Written answers to the questions
- If you are providing written answers to the questions for this category, you must answer this first question: Specify the date on which this campaign or program was launched:
15.06.2020
- If you are submitting a video of up to five (5) minutes in length, provide the URL of the nominated video here, OR attach it to your entry via the "Add Attachments, Videos, or Links to This Entry" link above, through which you may also upload a copy of your video.
- If you are providing written answers to the questions for this category, you must answer this second question: Describe the genesis of the nominated campaign or program: the reasons it was initiated, the challenges it was created to address, the problems it was developed to solve, etc. (up to 250 words):
Total 214 words used.
How to activate employees and encourage them to co-create the company, making it mora agile? Leonardo - the internal innovations program launched during the pandemic was the answer. Thanks to strong internal communication, the level of engagement exceeded our expectations and resulted in over 400 innovative ideas within half a year. And all that while working remotely.
But let's start from the beginning Polpharma Group is a leading producer of pharmaceuticals in CEE & CIS region and a leader in the pharmaceutical industry in Poland and Kazakhstan. For over 85 it has been trusted by patients, doctors, pharmacists and business partners.
So where is the problem? Due to its size and a traditional, hierarchical structure with very formal company culture, it was like a huge, but slow ship. And we wanted to transform it into a an agile, flexible and innovative organization, where employees co-create the company.
What have we observed? There are many creative thinking people in Polpharma, but without supporting processes and with hierarchical structure, their innovative ideas were not supported enough. So we set ourself a task - create a platform for sharing the innovative ideas and give submitters the support for implementation. The challenge was to engage and embolden people so they submit ideas and show that anybody can participate.
- If you are providing written answers to the questions for this category, you must answer this third question: Describe the development of the campaign or program: the planning process, the goal setting, the creative and media development, the scheduling, etc. (up to 250 words):
Total 249 words used.
We built our strategy on 3 pillars:
- creating community of innovators, so people feel being a part of something big
- naming the program after the great innovator Leonardo da Vinci
- create call-to-action claim referring to a higher purpose: Change the world with Polpharma!
Then we translated the strategy into concrete steps and activities.
Step 1: community building When people were sitting alone at home during the pandemic, being a part of a broader community was an asset. We created 3 groups to run and support the project:
- Innovation TEAM - 13 people from different departments: IT, PR, Branding, Commercial, HR who set the core team for Leonardo. Volunteers who crave to build something exciting. They evaluate ideas at the first gate.
- Innovation AMBASSADORS
23 people representing all divisions. Volunteers who spread the Leonardo idea and engage their business streams. They evaluate ideas at the second gate.
- Innovation COUNCIL - CEO and all N-1s who meet once a month and discuss the submitted ideas after the initial evaluations. As the submitters present the ideas in front of the Council, they feel appreciated.
All teams received hours of trainings on how to build Innovations, talk about them, make elevator pitch and many others.
Step 2: create digital platform & web channel "Leonardo TV" - A cloud based platform for innovations management was created, where people can submit their ideas and track the progress of evaluation and implementation. It has the social functionality like „likes’, „comments”, „sharing”, so people in organisation can share their opinion.
- If you are providing written answers to the questions for this category, you must answer this fourth question: Outline the activities and concrete results of this campaign or program since the beginning of 2019. Even if your initiative started before 2020, limit your response to activities and results since the beginning of 2020 only (up to 250 words):
Total 248 words used.
Step 3: inspire and show possible areas for innovation - The ideas submitted answer one of 3 questions:
- How can we help our patients live healthier lives?
- How can make our workplace more friendly and efficient?
- How can we make our planet, climate, environment healthier and reduce our impact?
Step 4: apply effective communication tool - The tools for communication of Leonardo used corporate channels as: town hall meetings, CEO newsletter, intranet, mailings, Yammer (internal social platform), Panaceum (bi-monthly magazine), posters & screens (in production sites), ambassador networking.
But the language was totally different than the corporate one! - There was no dichotomy: you, employees vs we, the Management. The program was created by people for people. It was seen in very direct language and in the visual part.
Results after 6 months?
- Almost 400 innovative ideas and 1325 comments
- 20 entries on Yammer about Leonardo were viewed 20,053 times
- 8 episodes of LeonardoTV viewed 10006 times
- 4 articles in Panaceum were published and read by 4900 people
- 9 mailings were sent to the entire organization - 31,500 e-mails
- 8 entries on the intranet opened 9800 times
- Program Brand Awareness 98%
The quality of ideas was so high that the Innovation Board accepted 32 ideas for the concept instead of 10 as in KPIs. In 2021 Leonardo program was rolled-out to other Polpharma markets: Kazakhstan, Russia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania and Vietnam. Now, after 2 years, we have 7 innovative ideas implemented and over 70 in pipeline.
- You have the option to reference here any attachments of supporting materials throughout this nomination and how they provide evidence of the claims you have made in this nomination (up to 250 words):
Total 5 words used.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i6es47H03k&
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