Reconciling Performance, People and Impact with Sophie Lagandré

In this Transformation in Practice interview, we talk with Sophie Lagandré, director of training and coaching at NextGen, about the profound changes organisations are going through today.

Against a backdrop of growing volatility, mounting pressure on teams and traditional hierarchical models being called into question, Sophie offers a deeply human and systemic reading of transformation. She talks about the need to rethink governance, leadership and the way information circulates, so that a collective intelligence can emerge that reconciles sustainable performance, engagement and societal impact.

Hi Sophie. Can you introduce yourself and tell us about NextGen?

I support organisations and individuals at every stage of their development, whether that means collective transformations or more personal turning points. My role is above all to bring perspective, particularly when facing paradoxes, contradictory demands and the tensions that run through organisational systems.

I work with executives, HR teams, managers and teams, both one to one and collectively, on interpersonal relationships as well as on the various systems within the company. That covers very concrete issues: exercising responsibility with greater autonomy, thriving in your role, restoring coherence and energy within a team, making difficult decisions, getting through periods of crisis or transition, or strengthening the quality of working relationships.

With NextGen, we bring an outside, systemic perspective, backed by robust analysis and intervention tools adapted to each context. Our methods are always tailored, with one clear goal: helping leaders adjust the way they operate and put the conditions for success in place, whether that is team cohesion, decision making, innovative projects or another kind of deeper change.

After more than twenty years of experience as a senior executive, I now work as a certified professional coach, a management trainer and a facilitator of engagement, including through motivation assessments.

What guides everything I do are two inseparable values: care and high standards, in the service of sustainable, deeply human performance.

What Are the Main Challenges Organisations Face Today?

Today, organisations are navigating an ocean of instability: technological disruption, societal pressure to deliver sustainable impact, and teams worn out by hierarchies that are themselves adrift.

The key challenges? Distributing authority in a decentralised way, embedding a robust company culture, and cultivating strong collective intelligence for lasting performance.

The difficulties most frequently observed by NextGen fall into three categories:

• Under pressure, teams fragment: some get stuck in silos and negative loops, which amplifies burnout and information hoarding and holds back innovation, while others excel by creating an agile, dynamic and fluid "shared brain".
• Traditional leadership slows agility: excessive control blocks the flow of ideas, producing superficial transformation without the employee autonomy and accountability needed for genuine agility.
• Reconciling growth and the common good: growing without exhausting your talent, driving people to resign, or even exhausting the planet is a balance to be found over the long term.

We are driven to support pioneering leaders and to turn these difficulties into fuel: unlocking human potential for societal impact. It is humanly rewarding to watch a team move from insufficient collective effectiveness, or even outright suffering, to virtuous collective creation. That is what pushes us to accelerate this wave of high-performing transformation.

How Does NextGen Concretely Support Organisations?

We support organisations through a holistic ecosystem: audits, scientific diagnostics, coaching, tailored masterclasses, training, collective intelligence workshops, learning expeditions, e-learning, and an exclusive club for pioneering peers.

The approach is gradual, with no brutal shock. It starts with a maturity audit (individual or collective) to map out the blockages, then we move on to targeted interventions such as inspiration sessions with the executive committee or team workshops, always tailored to their needs.

The nature of the transformation is multidimensional, human-centred and adaptive:

• Governance: transforming how the collective operates towards a tailored model, inspired by innovative organisations encountered worldwide.
• Leadership: centred on psychological safety, the bedrock of performance, through collective intelligence tools and fact-based scientific diagnostic tools.
• Collaboration and clarity: freeing up interactions to activate the "shared brain," using powerful co-construction tools.
• Operations: building in agility, using realistic role-play scenarios , drawing on the organisation's purpose, and activating the individual and/or the team for sustainable performance .

In short, it is a cultural metamorphosis: from machine to living organism, measured by greater accountability, engagement and innovation.

What Are the Biggest Mindset Shifts Needed to Support This Transformation?

The major mindset shifts are deep pivots: moving from a paradigm of control to one of collective trust. Three key ideas grounded in collective intelligence:

1. From "I know best" to "we know together": moving towards a mental model where intelligence emerges from the collective, not from the top; positioning yourself at team level so the transformation spreads and lasts. This frees up information flows, but it is difficult because it bruises the ego of leaders used to signing off on everything, the fear of losing power, reinforced by traditional cultures.
2. From infinite growth to sustainable value: reconciling profit and the common good, seeing purpose as a lever of resilience. Is it difficult? Short-term KPIs and shareholder pressure create cognitive inertia; it takes courage to redefine success.
3. From stability to adaptability: embracing uncertainty as an opportunity, through positive feedback loops. The obstacle? Human risk aversion, amplified by past failures, making vulnerability (transparency around mistakes) feel terrifying.

These shifts are challenging because they touch identity and culture: they require letting go, with peer support (such as in the Leaders Club) to anchor the change.

What Role Does Technology Play in Anchoring These New Behaviours?

Technology is not the lone hero, but an amplifier of the way an organisation works according to NextGen, it anchors new ways of working by making collaboration invisibly fluid, without imposing rigidity.

Its role? To facilitate constant information flows and feedback loops, transforming collective insights into lasting actions.

The ideal solutions are lightweight, integrated collaborative platforms:

• Real-time digital transparency tools for daily individual and collaborative check-ins linked to defined goals, which sustain clarity by making ideas accessible without friction.
• Decentralised feedback systems such as retrospective apps or AI-moderated tools for co-construction, encouraging humility and continuous learning.
• Using AI as a major tool for in-depth research and day-to-day support.
• And the essential point: choosing "human-first" technology that strengthens relationships rather than replacing them, for a sustainability rooted in everyday use, lifting engagement by 20 to 30 % according to our observations at NextGen.

Can You Share a Concrete Example of Impact?

A defining moment at NextGen came during an engagement with the executive committee of a tech company in scaling mode. An audit revealed a "shared brain" blocked by silos, with a 35% turnover rate and stalled innovation under post-merger pressure.

After a masterclass on positive feedback loops and a virtual learning expedition to a decentralised organisation, the human turning point came during a workshop: a senior executive, accustomed to control, let go by publicly sharing a past mistake. Silence, then a flood of collective ideas emerged. Within six months, the team launched a disruptive product, reducing burnout by 40% and boosting engagement through transparent rituals.

A simple framework to illustrate this: imagine a funnel

• Starting with chaotic silos (isolated stress)
• A middle phase of leadership facilitation (flows unlocked) by NextGen
• Closing with a collective intelligence activated by innovation and resilience.

"The leader concluded: 'I found the human element in my role again, we were no longer cogs, but a shared heartbeat.'"

That is real impact: transformed lives, not just metrics.

What Advice Would You Give to Leaders Who Want to Transform Their Organisation?

Start by auditing your managerial maturity, then free up the flow of information within a pilot team. That is the lever that activates the human side, and it can be measured over time, with exponential performance gains.

What Questions Do You Continue to Explore?

What if we treated organisations as living ecosystems, measuring success not by ROI alone, but by a "collective vitality index" (engagement + societal impact)?

It sounds bold, because it redefines governance towards decentralisation and refocuses on the direction set by the objectives. Our answer to every issue has to be tailored if it is to work, through co-construction for engagement and agility, to be explored further depending on each organisation's own story.

Conclusion

Throughout this conversation, one conviction emerges: transforming an organisation is not about applying a new model, it is about shifting perspective.

Moving from control to collective trust, from short-term performance to sustainable value, from illusory stability to living adaptability. It takes courage, a willingness to let go and genuine support between peers.

And what if, tomorrow, we measured success not only by ROI, but by the collective vitality of an organisation: engagement, capacity to adapt and societal impact?

An open question, and a deeply structuring one, that invites us to treat organisations not as machines, but as living ecosystems to grow together.

Learn more about NextGen: https://nextgen.how/