London Business School Enhances Staff Experience and Leadership Growth with Explorance Blue

About London Business School

London Business School’s purpose is to have a profound impact on the way the world does business and the way business impacts the world. The School is consistently ranked among the world’s top business schools and is widely acknowledged as a centre for outstanding research and thought leadership. In addition to its highly ranked degree programmes, the School offers award-winning Executive Education for business leaders, frequently placing at the top of global rankings for open and custom executive learning.

The School equips a diverse student body to tackle modern business challenges and connects them with leading global thinkers. Its community includes 58,000+ alumni in 160+ countries. LBS’ 165 faculty, from over 30 countries, cover seven core areas: accounting, economics, finance, management science and operations, marketing, organisational behaviour, and strategy and entrepreneurship.

The Challenge: Need to introduce effective psychometric and 360 assessments

LBS’ Executive Education programmes empower professional staff and organisations to achieve lasting impact. With a diverse portfolio of short and custom courses delivered by leading faculty, LBS helps participants sharpen their leadership, strategic and digital skills.

Flexible formats and a global network make LBS a premier destination for executive learning. In the FT Executive Education 2025 ranking, LBS is number one in the world for Open programmes and number two in the world for Custom programmes.

However, the Executive Education team faced two challenges in delivery to participants, including those on their flagship programmes: Accelerated Development Programme, and Senior Executive Programme:

• Managing the implementation and daily operations of technologies deployed for the LBS Open and Custom programmes.
• Use of psychometric and 360 assessments to support leadership growth and development in executive education.

The Solution: Using Blue for assessments to support leadership development

LBS identified a need for psychometric assessments (exploring strengths and growth areas) and 360 assessments (gathering holistic insights from line managers, direct reports, peers and others). Oluwaseun Olofin, Technology Manager at London Business School, said:

“Leadership development starts with meaningful feedback. Psychometric and 360 assessments provide critical insight into leadership, enabling personalised development by equipping coaches with tailored insights to create actionable growth plans for each leader. By bringing these assessments in-house, LBS can streamline processes – improving efficiency, reducing costs and enhancing the overall participant experience across our Executive Education programmes. However, we needed expert support.”

Explorance Blue was chosen as the platform for these assessments to support leadership development within its Executive Education programmes.

Outlining the “seamless process management,” Oluwaseun explained: “Two tools were created in Blue: a standardised psychometric questionnaire and a customisable 360 survey for Open programmes as well as for our various client needs on the Custom programme.

“The entire assessment process is managed to ensure data integrity, consistency and stakeholder satisfaction – and it gives us the ability to view and download reports. Participant responses are collected and reports generated are shared with both participants and coaches to support development. More than 2,000 individual reports were distributed on both assessments by the end of 2025, meaning we have been able to operate at scale.”

The Outcome: Improved experience, stronger engagement, and lower costs

In describing the “positive outcome” from the collaboration with Explorance, Oluwaseun highlighted three elements that have worked particularly well:

• Tailored Questionnaires: Design team creates customised questionnaires aligned with programme objectives for accurate assessments.
• Valuable Coaching Reports: Coaches use detailed reports as valuable tools for guiding development conversations effectively.
• Streamlined Client Journey: Clients receive timely and relevant information, making their journey smoother and more efficient.

“Overall, we measure the benefits and impact of Blue on three levels,” Oluwaseun shared. “It has enhanced the participant experience, increased coach engagement, and reduced costs compared with LBS’ previous approach. The Explorance support team has been effective, responsive and efficient throughout our relationship.”

Future plans include data integration and the seamless syncing of participant accounts from LBS systems to Blue; strengthening assessment and trend analysis for deeper insight; and advanced analytics for cohort-level trends and reporting using the Blue dashboard.

LBS is also seeking to expand its assessment offerings and meet diverse client needs, and explore the potential of MLY for free-text analysis.