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The Company
Ryan Companies is a national commercial real estate company that takes projects from conception to completion, with a team of nearly 2,000 people headquartered in Minneapolis. The work spans development, design, and construction, and the culture is built on integrity, civic pride, and community impact. Delivering on that reputation depends on the people running its job sites, and on the early-career professionals who will run them next.
The Challenge
Ryan Companies saw something in its early-career field engineers. These are talented people who don't lead teams day to day, but in construction, careers move fast. The engineers walking job sites now will be directing crews, coordinating trades, and managing client relationships sooner than they think. The company wanted to invest ahead of that curve and move the needle on this group's leadership skills before the title arrived, not after.
- Leadership Before the Title: Field engineers needed core leadership skills like communication, collaboration, and resilience, even though leading teams wasn't yet part of the job.
- A High Bar for Growth: Company priorities called for people who build relationships, think strategically, navigate ambiguity, and develop talent. That doesn't happen by accident.
- A Workforce in the Field: Learners spend their days on active job sites, not at desks, so training had to fit around real construction schedules.
The Solution
Ryan Companies partnered with Bundle to put its field engineers through a structured Individual Contributor Development Pathway: live, one-on-one sessions with an expert trainer, one skill at a time, over six months. The curriculum matched the company's own leadership priorities, covering effective communication, emotional intelligence, resilience leadership, collaboration, managing change, and coaching and feedback.
- Built Around Practice: Every session was a real conversation with role-play scenarios drawn from the learner's actual work, from frustrated subcontractors to tough feedback, not videos or slides.
- Met in the Field: Bundle handled onboarding, scheduling, and engagement, and added text reminders for learners walking job sites, so the program fit around real construction schedules.
- Measured Past the Last Session: Learners rated every session, then completed an impact survey six weeks after the program ended, so Ryan Companies could see whether the skills actually showed up at work.
The Results
The sessions earned strong marks, with learners rating the program 4.8 out of 5 for overall experience across more than 120 rated sessions. But the real test came six weeks after the program ended, when Bundle surveyed learners on what changed at work. The skills held.
- Performance Moved: 92% of learners said their work performance improved, and 92% said their job satisfaction improved.
- Skills in Daily Use: Every learner reported using the skills on the job, with half using them frequently or always, and 75% feeling very or extremely confident applying them.
- Careers Are Moving: Half of learners took on new or expanded responsibilities since training, an early sign the leadership bench is building exactly as intended.
- Stronger Teams: 92% reported better teamwork and collaboration, and learners described using the skills in real moments, like turning around a tense conversation with a frustrated subcontractor.
- Culture and Retention: Every learner said the training contributed to a positive workplace culture, and 92% said they are likely or very likely to stay with the organization.
The Future
The clearest sign of the program's impact is what Ryan Companies did next: they expanded it. A second cohort is now underway with a deeper pathway that pairs skills training with dedicated coaching support, and the program has grown beyond individual contributors to include seasoned managers. The goal stays the same: build the leadership bench before the business needs it.
