New institute leads way on learning

The success of ECR Europe’s learning programmes has led to the creation of a new governing body, the International Commerce Institute. The development comes two years after the launch of the Shared Learning Initiative, the wide-ranging vocational training and executive education programme.

ECR Europe said the scale and success of the SLI had “brought a need for a more focused governance of learning activities grouped under one entity”. Details of the new institute – which was officially constituted in September 2005 – were unveiled to delegates in a well-attended preliminary forum at Stockholm.

Eight members, all with long involvement in ECR Europe, have been appointed to its board of directors under the cochairmanship of Graham Booth (formerly Tesco) and Robert Wilkinson (Coca-Cola). Bernard Karli (ECR Europe) has been appointed managing director. Explaining the background to the development, Graham Booth described the rapid growth of the Shared Learning Initiative – with 1,500 people taking part in its programmes in its first year (against a target of 1,000), 5,000 participants in 2005, and an anticipated 14,000 this year.

The programmes, said Robert Wilkinson, had become “the conduit for the widescale implementation of ECR business models in Europe, leading to a sustainable change in behaviour”.

The institute’s activities will include:

• accreditation and industry qualification programmes to ensure consistency and a high level of quality across national boundaries
• executive and vocational education programmes to foster broad-scale change in the way business is conducted within and between retailer and manufacturer companies
• partnerships with academia to ensure that ECR knowledge is developed, shared and disseminated both in academic curricular and within retailer and manufacturer companies throughout the world
• publications to disseminate ECR knowledge.

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Download the Collaborative Learning Programme presentation
Download Learning In Practice presentation
Download Progressive Management Programme presentation
Download the conclusion