… the PDE with this transversal component, with a focus on leadership and with a holistic approach to the various subjects, is unique.
I really enjoyed doing the PDE – Business Management Program.
My career has been all in the public sector, with a diversified path, but always with a connection to human resources, namely in management positions. In 2018, I started working for the Mint, which belongs to the state’s business sector, and this required a different challenge on my part, and with this I am not saying that it is more demanding. The truth is that the leaders of the Public Administration deal every day with many obstacles and with many rules, which makes it very difficult to have a margin of action, which is very much shared by the numerous rules, but the Public Administration has many profiles that are not accommodated and it is these professionals who fight hard to ensure the functioning of our services. When I arrived at the Mint, the challenge was effectively different because it consisted of the possibility of integrating, in the public sector, a company, a public limited company, and, therefore, having much more management margin in the definition of policies and activities, making the company attractive to people in market competition. To do so, he needed to acquire more knowledge of the different areas of the company. The PDE was the program that existed on the market and that could respond to this.
We know that we have a good education in Portugal, a good academic background. However, the PDE with this transversal component, with a focus on leadership and with a holistic approach to the various subjects, is unique. Only the ESA provides us with this, in a long-term programme: that is indisputable. Therefore, for me, it made perfect sense to do the PDE.
Those who are in the People area have an additional obligation to know the pains of other areas, because only if we know the difficulties that our peers have can we support the training of teams, their development, recruitment and retention. In my specific case, this was the program that made perfect sense.
Having to go to lunch on the days of the program shows how different AESE’s approach is from the outset. The whole program is set up to promote a team spirit, the possibility of meeting people from different organizations – which is already an indisputable richness. Then, the way the groups are set up from a multidisciplinary perspective – which for me is fundamental in the way the whole program takes place-. Therefore, when we sit down as a Board of Directors to analyze the cases we have been reading, it is very interesting to realize how in our area we have different approaches to solving the case. This generates very interesting discussions, heated discussions. Therefore, AESE is a different School.”
The challenge of taking the PDE is the discipline of having to fit the training into our lives. That scares a little, more for those who are going to start than during. “With the crazy schedule I already have today, how am I going to be able to fit in an afternoon and a morning and still read the cases?” In fact, the reading of cases, as a rule, has to take place on the weekend. It’s difficult to fit into our weekly schedule, but the break we have to study and come to class twice a week, I remember helping myself several times to solve problems. I think this has happened to all of us. When I was completely tangled up in the middle of the problem, the fact that I had been away for a while, allowed me to have a different approach and face the issue with a clearer, lighter head and solve the problems. I commented on this a few times with participants in the EDP and several people agreed that this happened. This exercise of fitting the program into the agenda ends up bringing us advantages: although it is a challenge, it is also an opportunity.
By the way the program is set up, these personal relationships are quickly created, as well as the spirit of companionship, within the whole group. This is a differentiating factor of this training, which does not exist in any other school. It is promoted by AESE and the team, which for me, has everything to do with the fact that in all modules People and ethical and human management are present at all times.
The PDE was decisive for my ability to better understand and have a greater degree of empathy with the problems of my colleagues and peers.
We conclude that the problems of different organizations, which we all feel, are very similar. There is a classic discussion in organizations, of conflict between the commercial and production areas. The business strategy module was especially relevant. Today I have another capacity and another flexibility to understand the difficulties that my colleagues feel.
On top of that, from the moment we attend this long-term program, we become better.”
