Middle managers from Algerian EBU Member ENTV have completed tailor-made leadership training that is a key strand of a Eurovision ACADEMY and EBU Partnership Programme collaboration to optimize public service media management.

The ENTV managers took the course under a push by the broadcaster to enhance the effectiveness of its decision makers. The first phase followed an internal consultation on the Eurovision ACADEMY Leadership Curriculum, which led to 42 ENTV executives attending a similar course in October 2012.

Developed by Eurovision ACADEMY business manager Frederic Frantz and sponsored by the EBU Partnership Programme, the latest programme focused on skills management, understanding motivation and delegation.

Leadership trainer Remy Siegrist, a Eurovision ACADEMY Faculty Member, said he had been pleased to “see strong interest from the group on new concepts not necessarily easy to implement in a challenging environment.”

He continued: “Many questions were raised on how to solve practical management situations. The implementation has to happen gradually and consistently.”

At the end of the programme, participants were encouraged to draft personal action plans to implement the learned concepts in their work.

Fatima Boulemtafes, Deputy Director of ENTV’s News and Sports Coordination and Eurovision News editorial subcommittee member, described the course content as “very rich”.

She added: “These are new principles, a new vision of management and leadership. On the ground, we’ll need time and patience to apply this.”

And ENTV Director of External Relations Mustapha Bennabi, expressed a similar sentiment: “This is the first experience of this kind dedicated to managers. It is unfamiliar territory: the concepts are new, and this is why we had two trainings.”

ENTV Vice-Director General Mustapha Kadik said the issue of leadership was “generating enormous interest” at ENTV, and that the Eurovision ACADEMY training had helped us all to appreciate that people are the company’s greatest asset.

Eurovision ACADEMY has provided leadership training at NTU (Ukraine) and at LRT (Lithuania), and will lead courses at TRM (Moldova) in May and HRT (Croatia) in July.