THE MICHELANGELO PROJECT

management

Helping people who are disadvantaged in

employment into work and financial independence.

(CONCEPT DOCUMENT, APRIL 2017}

Long-term unemployment and underemployment takes a heavy personal and social toll,

with those who suffer from either more likely to experience issues with physical,

emotional and psychological health. In the limited work opportunities they may have,

the stress and pressure of inadequate and insecure work interferes with their ability to

perform, further contributing to the problem.

Without enough people working, the economy will run out of all the things it needs to

be healthy: consumers, individuals engaged in purposeful activity, investment in growth,

taxpayers and stable communities. As we move towards the elimination of the

estimated half of all current jobs, employers will need people able to transition to the

new jobs that will be created.

If people cannot undertake enough work to develop the contemporary skills and

experience employers are already struggling to find, enterprises will stagnate. The

standard approach of training people in vocational skills for jobs and work

environments that are fast disappearing is not only a waste of resources, it sets them up

for further disappointment as the world of work changes.

We want to be part of a solution by equipping people with skills employers need to

compete in the rapidly shifting digital environment, and giving the unemployed and

underemployed a chance to participate meaningfully in the workforce.

To achieve this, we are putting together an initiative called ‘The Michelangelo Project’.

HELPING THE EMPLOYMENT DISADVANTAGEDTHE WHY

They can struggle to

maintain their

relationships with

family and friends

They are more likely

to suffer physical and

mental illnesses

Unemployment places

pressure on the health

of the community

INNOVATION & ENTERPRISE SKILLSTHE WHAT

For years, enterprises have prioritised workforce management around a mindset for

maximising productivity and minimising costs. This is the talent management approach

that has prevailed for years. It works by narrowing employment criteria down to the

finest match between people and production needs. With this approach refined over

the years, it became easier to measure performance, outsource roles, and eliminate

‘waste’.

But in doing so, enterprises also eliminated diversity, deep work, creativity, risk taking,

outliers in the workforce, counter viewpoints and upsetting the status quo – together

which make up the essential components for innovation.

Innovation is defined as new ways to create new value. Without innovative capabilities

enterprises will not only struggle to identify emerging opportunities, they will fail to

adapt effectively to the digitisation of business, leaving themselves open to disruption.

Innovative capabilities depend on organisations that are rich in enterprise skills.

The Michelangelo Project aims to help its participants develop enterprise skills, which

we define as personal skills (emotional, interpersonal and social) combined with

organisational and business acumen and adeptness in different thinking abilities

(critical, creative and systems) to come up with, apply, learn from, and adapt solutions in

different – often new and/or unstructured – environmental contexts.

Enterprise skills are innate meaning they cannot be learned through information alone.

Instead they need practice, feedback and experience to develop. We will use an

immersive, experiential process in which participants work on real business problems to

develop enterprise skills they can apply in real world scenarios.

Workplaces are being

deprived of much-

needed diversity

Enterprises cannot

innovate without the

relevant enterprise

skills

NOT-FOR-PROFIT PARTNERSTHE WHO

We will develop relationships with not-for-profit organisations that work with clients who

are at any stage of seeking work, but find it difficult to do so, such as those with a disability,

are victims of domestic violence and those who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

Through these organisations’ referrals we will select participants who only need to

demonstrate they have been trying to find work, are able and willing to work, and will

commit to turning up reliably for the duration of the three month program.

Our not-for-profit partners are:

• Encompass Community Services supporting universal opportunities for people with

disabilities

• TBA

• TBA

• TBA

THE MICHELANGELO PROJECT KEY DETAILSPROJECT HOW

Participants will run an enterprise from planning through to implementation. The focus is not on the

enterprise itself but the factors that makes a business successful and organisations and their people effective.

Intake: the program will run in three-month intakes. Each intake will consist of 14 places.

Timeline: places will be made available one month before each intake begins. Not-for-profit partners will be

provided program details to ensure the most suitable candidates are selected. The program runs for three

months, culminating in a ‘demo day’, i.e. presentation day and graduation.

Format: participants will attend three days per week from 10AM to 4.30PM. The format will favour interactive

group work alternating between facilitator-led sessions and group tasks.

Facilitators: A program facilitator will work continuously with the group. Speakers, industry professionals and

specialist facilitators will be invited to help the group as their business progresses. A topic will also be

presented each week by a specialist facilitator.

Support: a program administrator will provide on-site support and assist with everything from catering to

printing to research assistance.

Content officer: a content officer will capture videos and images and produce marketing and public relations

materials, post social media updates, issue press releases and provide updates to sponsors. Because online

activities are so important today, the program’s content officer will also help participants to create and

manage their own online and social media accounts. This will not only teach them how to use this important

medium, it offers an avenue for participants to share their learning and experiences with the many others with

whom we cannot directly work.

THE MICHELANGELO PROJECT PROGRAM OUTLINEPROGRAM HOW

The program will run over the course of three months covering the following:

1. Using interactive sessions, participants will be asked to draw on their personal experiences to identify a

problem in the market for which they can practically develop a solution.

2. The group will decide the culture they want for their organisation and how it will be enforced.

3. Drawing on design thinking techniques and lean startup principles, participants will create user

archetypes and define the user experience their offering aims to deliver.

4. The basic offering is taken through early user testing and feedback following a design sprint process.

5. Key financial targets are set. Participants will be led through the process and will need to make key

decisions for use of their limited resources.

6. A marketing and sales plan to reach the target users with the beta offering is developed.

7. As the offering is established and rolled out, the participants will consider operational considerations.

At each stage, participants will be prepared for the interactions they can expect and will practice the skills

they need to make those interactions a success. They will debrief the process undertaken and lessons learned,

as well as how well they managed the process.

The aim for participants is that they develop a sense of the value they can contribute as active participants in

the economy. Traditional employment is not a solution for everyone, therefore the program will also help

participants learn how to work as contractors, online entrepreneurs, or in the sharing economy.

THE MICHELANGELO PROJECT SPECIALIST SESSIONSWEEKLY WORKSHOPS

The specialist workshops are designed to enhance the participant’s abilities to work on their business. The

topics delivered over the 12 weeks (subject to change depending on availability of facilitators) are:

1. Mindfulness

2. Ethics and courage

3. Design thinking

4. Story telling

5. Cyber security

6. Working agilely

7. Digital tools and programming basics

8. Working collaboratively

9. Enterprise and performance tools and metrics

10. Copywriting and design

11. Speaking in public

12. Health and wellness

SPONSORSHIP LEVELSPACKAGES & BENEFITS

MAJOR PARTNERS

• Sponsorship promoted with the Project

• Prominent logo displayed on all marketing

and program materials and social media

channels

• Places for 2 representatives to attend the

entire program (with limited participation) and

take all materials to share their experiences

back in their workplaces

• Invitation to book a facilitator for two days’ of

workshop time to work with the sponsor’s

team or speak on a topic of choice related to

the Project

• Logo featured on content re-packaged for

future programs to be delivered in workshops

or online

• Invitation to attend the end of program ‘demo

day’ (graduation) and present awards named

after their organisation

Investment: $30,000

PROGRAM SPONSORS

• Logo displayed on all marketing and program

materials and social media channels

• Places for 2 representatives to attend the formal

workshops that may be shared back in their

workplaces

• Invitation to book a facilitator for one day’s

workshop time to work with the sponsor’s team

or speak on a topic of choice related to the

Project

• Logo displayed on content re-packaged for

future programs to be delivered in workshops

or online

• Invitation to attend the end of program ‘demo

day’ (graduation) and present certificates

named after their organisation

Investment: $15,000

PROGRAM PARTNERSHIPSDONATIONS

The success of The Michelangelo Project will depend on the generous contributions of organisations and

individuals able to provide supplies, equipment and/or their expertise. Donations for the benefit of the whole

program, one-off or to make things easier for individuals are appreciated. Suggested items/services:

• Laptops and tablets

• Furniture, furnishings, room decorations

• Catering

• Coffee breaks

• Reading and maths tutoring

• Managing personal finances

• Stationery

• Professional services (marketing, accounting, etc.)

• Photography

• Professional grooming

Donations will be acknowledged in the marketing materials and social media channels. Program partners are

invited to attend the end of program ‘demo day’ (graduation).

Michelangelo Buonarroti was born in Caprese, Italy on March 6, 1475. As a boy,

Michelangelo’s father’s attempts to make him study were so unsuccessful that

eventually he was allowed, at 13, to enter an apprenticeship with master artist,

Domenico Ghirlandaio.

As Michelangelo’s reputation spread, he received painting, sculpting and architectural

commissions from many famous clients including Lorenzo De Medici and Pope Julius

II. Michelangelo, however, hated being boxed in by people’s expectations and often

accepted work only reluctantly. His dissatisfaction between the work he wanted to do

and the work he was doing saw him fail to finish, and even damage in frustration,

many of the projects he began.

When in 1524 Michelangelo received a commission to design the Laurentian Library

in Florence, his response was characteristic, “Farò ciò che saprò, benché non sia mia

professione.” (“I’ll do what I can, although that’s not my profession.”)

Roderick Conway Morris for The Spectator, writes: “...despite his universally recognised

brilliance in every art he turned his hand to (including poetry)…beneath the proud and

difficult exterior there lurked the autodidact, constantly in fear of failure.”

Before his death in 1564, Michelangelo destroyed many of his drawings and papers

because he did not want people to see him in a less than perfect light.

We have named our project after this man because he reminds us that we are all, in

own way, difficult, insecure and apt to fail to see our own brand of brilliance.

THE MICHELANGELO PROJECTABOUT THE NAME

ABOUT US

management

The Michelangelo Project is an initiative of Meta Management. We are a management company that works

with values-led enterprises to navigate and leverage the benefits of the new world of digitisation.

The time between the onset of digital disruption and a reshaped industry is critical. It begins with all players

feeling the pinch before those with the weakest value proposition become critically if not fatally, injured. But

to make a successful transition from a legacy business to a digital one needs two essential ingredients:

organisational confidence – to explore its opportunities and act to move on from the world it knows – and

people with the skills to move them forward. This is the work that Meta Management does.

When we work with clients to help them to recruit for their teams, we are struck by the number of people

who gamely apply for jobs they have slim, if any, chance of securing. Their CVs show both in content and in

presentation how little work they have done over the years and how unskilled and unprepared they are for

the future. Many of them rely on the guidance of welfare officers whose advice is rooted in the 1990s. We

also meet many talented people in our work with not-for-profits who, but for these organisations, would

never be offered work simply because they do not fit the mould.

The stories of people like these are our inspiration for The Michelangelo Project. We hope that we can make

a material difference to many lives, but we also know from experience that they are likely to make more of a

difference to ours.

When I started Meta Management as a consultancy in 2003, I enthusiastically built a

portfolio of clients, working from my background in marketing, human resources,

organisational development and organisational behaviour, to help to improve their

organisations’ performance and build their team capabilities. I researched and wrote

all my own material and often wrote materials for other consultants and trainers.

But in all this research there was also growing evidence that many ‘truths’ of

organisational performance we took for granted were, in fact, merely artefacts of the

industrial era: structured hierarchies, strategies, job specifications, competencies,

leadership attributes, competitive advantage, standardised work – just some of the

popular approaches that, until then, seemed immutable.

By 2007, I was convinced that digital technology was going to produce social

changes so significant, it would not be enough for organisations to merely upgrade

their business processes, they would also have to change their practices. I set out to

work and research as widely as possible to understand what those changes should

be and how to apply them.

Now it is time for me to share the benefits of ten years’ applied research and practice

with people who are vulnerable in our society, the disadvantaged in employment.

FOUNDER, ISABEL WUMY (META MANAGEMENT) STORY

INQUIRIES & MORE INFORMATIONCONTACT US

META MANAGEMENT

103/125 Fitzroy Street

St Kilda, Victoria, 3182

Website www.metamanagement.net

Telephone +61 9016 3827

ISABEL WU

Email iwu@metamanagement.net

Mobile +61 411 748 096

Skype @metamanagement

Twitter @metamanagement