The Challenge
Multiple Olympic Gold medallist, Michael Johnson, wanted to create something that unified his belief in excellence and the power of sport for social change with the unique asset of his performance centres. Cementing a purposeful legacy for one of the greatest sprinters of all time.
The Solution
Think Beyond identified that in communities around the world, young people are overcoming adversity, giving back to their communities and showing real leadership potential. However, due to their life circumstances, they often find themselves forced to stop participating, leading and volunteering within their communities. We wanted to create something that would provide these young people with the opportunity to overcome these barriers. We created a bespoke purpose-led initiative – Michael Johnson Young Leaders.
Through an annual program focusing on sporting performance, leadership development and community engagement, the initiative provides these extraordinary individuals with the confidence, skills and resources to achieve a better future. Michael was fully involved in the programme from selection of beneficiaries through to ongoing mentoring throughout the year.
We designed, delivered and managed the programme for Michael for 3+ years. We created the brand strategy which aligned Michael’s purposeful leadership goals with the needs of the young people he wanted to impact. We built the narrative and communications plan to engage people in his vision. We managed the recruitment and shortlisting process of potential beneficiaries, developed and oversaw the leadership curriculum for each new cohort, as well as a year-round package of support. We also delivered the alumni programme for Michael Johnson Young Leaders, keeping them engaged in the programme and helping them become mentors themselves to new Young Leaders coming through the programme.
Our role extended into the monitoring and evaluation of the programme where we worked with Michael on continuously improving the programme delivery.
The Impact
Michael Johnson Young Leaders are making a difference in communities across the globe. The projects that were born out of the young leaders programmes have been implemented on six continents across a diverse range of key social areas.
What Our Client Says
“The program in a very short time has exceeded even my own goals. We have young leaders from over 20 different countries and they are working hard and making an impact in their communities and beyond. The success is in the number of people we are positively affecting through our young leaders. Our young people are not only helping people in their communities to overcome adversity they are also passionate about helping them develop even more young leaders, recognising people like themselves and banding together believing there is strength in numbers”
Michael Johnson
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