"The UOC has known how to respond to our changing needs as a company over time"

 

Joseba Arano Echebarria is a senior manager with experience in the areas of human resources and management quality. With over twenty years' experience in large corporations such as Ikusi and Calidad Pascual, he has led highly complex transformation projects and made notable achievements. He is a curious person with a capacity for analysis, who is open to lifelong learning and who likes to work as part of a network and channel his energy, skills and effort into demanding challenges. In his efforts to create a workforce that embraces continuous retraining, he has relied on the UOC, and UOC Corporate in particular, which designs innovative learning for companies. Calidad Pascual has collaborated with UOC Corporate several times over the years in training its employees in a number of different fields.

 

Joseba Arano Echebarria is a senior manager with experience in the areas of human resources and management quality. With over twenty years' experience in large corporations such as Ikusi and Calidad Pascual, he has led highly complex transformation projects and made notable achievements. He is a curious person with a capacity for analysis, who is open to lifelong learning and who likes to work as part of a network and channel his energy, skills and effort into demanding challenges. In his efforts to create a workforce that embraces continuous retraining, he has relied on the UOC, and UOC Corporate in particular, which designs innovative learning for companies. Calidad Pascual has collaborated with UOC Corporate several times over the years in training its employees in a number of different fields.

Our main link with the UOC grew out of a close collaboration that Pascual maintained with the University for several years for the deployment of an initiative that left an indelible mark on the organization and its people: the Advanced Course in Strategic Direction and Management of Food Companies. This course was held several times between 2000 and 2008 and was attended by nearly 300 people. It offered participants a global vision of the company, providing knowledge about its different functional areas, and enabling the sharing of technical knowledge about business administration. Above all, it provided a multidisciplinary forum in which we could debate, share reflections and a vision, and create alignment with the objectives that we, as a company, set ourselves at that time.

The UOC is an institution that has consistently responded well to our changing needs as a company over time. Just as the UOC has pursued leadership in the field of education by maintaining a clear focus on developing a transformational learning model, Pascual has always pursued the development of its people so that they transform their environment and contribute their best. Pascual is currently proposing a learning model similar to that of the UOC, whereby people are the main protagonists of their own development and give the best of themselves. Now that technology is our great ally, collaborative learning becomes even more relevant to developing skills and generating the desired transformation, which in turn generates greater value for the company. 

Irrespective of previous experiences, with the redefinition of our learning model at Pascual in 2019, we saw an opportunity to work decisively across a broad range of leadership skills. We saw UOC Corporate as a partner that could support us by providing a programme to educate and raise awareness among our employees about the importance of using their own capabilities and talents to lead the areas for which they are responsible in their day-to-day work. 

Thanks to its extensive experience over the last 25 years and the evolution of its educational approaches, the UOC has covered the need we had and consolidated a learning model that is very much in line with the current times, in which self-development and collaborative learning are becomingly increasingly important.

At the end of each edition of the leadership skills programme, we ask the participants to complete a survey in which we ask their opinion of the format, the content, the support provided by tutors during the training process, and their perception of the experience as students in a fully online environment. To date, the average rating of the 535 people who have had the opportunity to complete the training itinerary is 7.9 out of a possible 10. The principal value we understand it gives them is the ability to make the leadership model we currently have at Pascual their own. As participants, it enables them to get to know each other better and become aware of the contribution they can make, and use their own capabilities to create a greater impact in the area in which they operate.

In recent years, and more recently as a result of the current health crisis, it has become apparent what is really important. For many people, the situation has enabled them to become aware of the dynamic that was driving them, and reflect on their motivations and how they can become agents of change in their environment. Training and, in particular, programmes that seek to provide a systemic vision, and which enable people to boost their development and in turn generate an impact on their environment, are becoming increasingly important. This will undoubtedly have an impact on our customers and on Pascual's approach to its customer relationship model.

Pascual has been around for fifty years now and, throughout that time, our aim has always been to give the best of ourselves through quality products that offer a guarantee to our consumers. All of this is made possible by teams of skilled, committed people, aligned through shared goals; in addition to the fact that we surround ourselves with good travelling companions, partners who share a similar vision and values. We hope to be celebrating the fruits of this long-standing relationship for years to come.