KAAPA ethanol: Driving growth through enterprise transformation

22 October 2025 — 1 min read

Energy

Enterprise-Wide Transformation

KAAPA Ethanol came to us with a challenge: unify its culture across multiple facilities after years of expansion through acquisitions. While production scale had been achieved, the organization remained siloed, with employees identifying by plant rather than as one company. To unlock long-term growth, we needed to create ‘One KAAPA,’ a connected culture that fostered collaboration, accountability and leadership.

We partnered with the leadership team and employees to assess, design, implement, adopt and embed cultural change. We began with a full cultural assessment to understand employee perceptions and expectations across all plants. Next, we launched a series of quick-win projects that gave employees ownership of change, surfaced new leaders and created early momentum. Finally, we delivered the Keystone Project, which embedded accountability practices and focused on retention, ensuring sustainable impact.

Together, we successfully implemented and embedded enterprise transformation across the organization in just 18 months.

100% employee participation was achieved across the quick-win projects, driving significant and measurable business results:

Outcome 1: Improved six-month retention by more than 50%, with KAAPA consistently achieving above 90%.
Outcome 2: Built leadership capability from within with 10 internal promotions within 18 months.
Outcome 3: Strengthened identification as a whole with employees working seamlessly across plants and silos having been broken down.