Corporate
Workshops

YOUR SURVIVAL SKILLS ARE KILLING YOU WORKSHOP

How to Create Corporate Cultures that are based in Clarity, Collaboration and Commitment

Companies frequently spend huge sums of money on strategic planning and frequently overlook the vital importance and influence of their culture. Yet, the implementation of any corporate strategy is ultimately in the hands of your people. How they conduct themselves is completely determined by the context of your culture. The basic principles (beliefs, values, attitudes and priorities of its members,) will ultimately determine if your "best laid plans" go awry or fly!

A clear framework of thinking and the attitudes of your people lead to decisive action, bring alignment to teams, build collaboration and help people to focus on what to do, how to do it and what is important now. Your company will thrive when your people are united, focused and possess an attitude of success.

Underlying all effective human interactions in the world, are Eight Principles that are critical for a thriving mentality. When embraced and effectively acted upon, they form the basis of all interpersonal mastery. On a deep level, we are all aware of these principles, yet too frequently our ego survival fears of looking bad, making a mistake, being rejected, losing control, not being liked, etc. drive us into our survival strategies. In order to feel powerful or look powerful (i.e. survive), we cover up mistakes, withhold information, don't ask for support, gossip, dominate, manipulate, control, form sides and silos and so on. In short, we allow our fear-driven survival strategies to limit us and this ultimately hurts ourselves and others. Lackluster results soon follow and the organization falls short of its goals. The Eight Principles are grounded in ancient wisdom proven by time to be the critical ingredients for success. Combined with state-of-the art practical applications, participants quickly learn how to thrive in business and life, not just survive.

In this lively, fun, fast passed, challenging and intellectually stimulating program, senior executives, managers and individual contributors will:

• Learn to tap into their unlimited potential
• Reduce judgment, improve listening, be more willing to entertain other viewpoints
• Focus on producing results and let go of being "right"
• Let go of controlling everything, take risks, and collaborate with others
• Understand the instinctual nature of survival thinking and how it is individually formed
• Identify their own survival strategy and what it is costing them personally and professionally
• Realize the prices that others and the organization also pay for these tactics
• Learn how to access their Inner Wisdom, move through their fears and go beyond surviving to thriving
• Learn The Eight Principles for thriving and how to practically apply them
• Learn how to deal effectively with change, people they don't like, and uncertainty
• More effectively interact and communicate with others to achieve desired results
• Learn how to move from a Command and Control Culture to a Clear, Collaborative Committed Culture
• Become empowered, proactive, accountable, responsible players
• Kill the victim
• Design a clear set of Operating Principles
• Form an Action Plan for immediate implementation of the Eight Principles

The three day workshop, Your Survival Strategies are Killing You, is a unique, experiential, educational program that surpasses the traditional didactic techniques. It supplements conceptual understanding with deep, practical and applicable learning. This exciting and unforgettable program is interactive in nature and provides innovative experiential exercises, role playing, case studies, some lecture, writing and lively, open discussions.

AUTHENTIC LEADERSHIP WORKSHOP

An Unparalleled Leadership Workshop Experience
The path of leadership is never straight and narrow. For the individual, leadership means remaining true to one's current capability, while at the same time searching to become all of who he/she can be. For the organization, it requires remaining loyal to the company's core competence, while at the same time, responding skillfully and productively to constant changes in the business environment.

The Authentic Leadership workshop awakens and advances the leadership abilities that lie within every individual. The result: extraordinary success, on all levels. In contrast to other programs that teach leadership skills and cookbook solutions that fall flat in real situations, the Authentic Leadership Workshop is designed to produce a breakthrough in participants' ability to lead others in a way that unleashes their extraordinary capabilities.

Each participant will deepen their ability to express their leadership by developing the following core competencies of Authentic Leadership:

• Clarity of purpose and strength of their vision
• Impeccable personal integrity
• See and act from a whole systems perspective
• Create conditions where everyone wins
• Ownership of the organization and its success
• Direct, empowering communication style

Together, these competencies define leadership greatness and produce conditions where others are inspired toward extraordinary achievement. In short, this is not just a typical leadership program that tells you how to DO leadership. We address the inner workings of leadership and identify the fundamental issues that make or break exceptional leaders. In other words, within this program, you will learn what it means to BE a leader.

A Note to the Employer:
Our purpose is to support participants in becoming strong, motivated, clear thinking, directed leaders equipped with a keen self-awareness that empowers them to motivate others to greatness. Through experiential exercises, deep personal reflection, lively discussions and thought provoking challenges, they will:

• Evolve a more truthful, honest, and effective communication style with others
• Explore their own patterns as leaders and shift core assumptions
• Identify the ways they can sabotage their effectiveness and adopt strategies to augment their strengths
• Become more effective people managers, not just text book robots
• Be more able to deal with conflict and differences
• Learn how to deal with difficult employees and how to respond to the dynamics of power and control that exist within themselves and the organization
• Improve their ability to give and receive constructive feedback
• Shift their interpersonal attitudes and behaviors so that they are empowered to move to the next level of effective leadership
• Realize how their strategy affects the climate of the organization and how the climate determines the bottom line results for the company

A Note to the Participant:
In this program, we have no interest in merely achieving the ordinary or the commonplace. Our goal is the exceptional. As a participant in the Authentic Leadership Workshop you are requested to lend your talents and energies to that objective. In return, each of you will have the rare opportunity to develop the awareness and skills that will showcase your natural abilities to lead with strength and certainty.
The Contents of the Workshop:
In addition to state-of-the-art materials and challenging lecture-ettes that stimulate creative thinking, participants will engage in experiential group exercises that are fun as well as enlightening. These exercises are designed to deepen participants' understanding of the core competencies of powerful leadership, and significantly improve their ability to live these competencies.
Ample opportunity will be given for questions and discussion both within the large and small group settings. Although we encourage active participation, each participant will be respected and supported to move at their own pace.
Additionally, each person attending will participate in two scientifically researched feedback instruments that will give them accurate assessments of their personal leadership core competencies, capabilities, skill areas and motivation mind-sets. In the workshop, each participant will also be asked to develop a clear, step-by-step action plan and identify concrete steps to apply their learning to real work situations.

SELF MASTERY WORKSHOP

A Breakthrough Program in Individual and Team Performance
Through significant research and many years of experience creating dynamic culture change environments for companies large and small, Martha Borst has created an extraordinary, dynamic process that enhances peak performance. Introduced in the form of a workshop, this process provides a foundation and a framework that generates a high degree of personal ownership, creative thinking and effective action for the future success of individuals who are committed to extraordinary results.

The Self Mastery program is designed for managers and professionals and provides them with a multitude of ways to deal more effectively with their work related challenges. Because she works with participants as whole and complete people, most will apply their learning to their personal lives as well.

Benefits to the Participants
Many people who participate in this program say it has changed their lives, forever. As a result of participating in this program, participants will learn how to tap into their unlimited source of creative potential and develop skills and practices that will allow them to deal more effectively with change, ambiguity and uncertainty. They will learn how to reduce judgment, improve listening, make better decisions, take more risks and develop consistent thinking for problem solving. In short, people will gain tools as well as a deeper understanding of how to be more effective in the areas of their lives that are most important to them. Additionally they will:

• Gain a deeper understanding of key principles of peak performance
• Develop a strong ability to be self-empowering and self-managing
• Learn how to get into the “driver's seat” in their personal and professional lives
• Significantly improve the quality of daily work
• Gain a stronger internal focus of personal control
• Enhance problem solving and decision making capabilities
• Discover a deep sense of responsibility for their goals and their results
• Connect with a contagious excitement about their future and the future of the organization
• Develop a greater sense of well-being, clarity of direction and balance
• Learn how to integrate themselves successfully into a team environment
• Experience an automatic development of their natural leadership skills
• Learn effective communication techniques
• Learn how to move from a competitive to co-operative framework of thinking and acting
• Develop a set of Operating Principles that will serve as a foundational guide for all future team interactions.

This workshop is a unique, experiential educational experience that surpasses the traditional didactic techniques and supplements conceptual understanding with deep, practical and applicable learning. In addition to the presentation of state-of-the-art approaches as well as ancient principles, proven by time to be critical ingredients for success, participants engage in lively, revealing and impactful discussions, processes and exercises which lead to increased awareness of self and others. Better choices become available and new possibilities emerge as they break out of old (and oftentimes unconscious) non-productive patterns. Unprecedented results soon follow. As each participant on the team raises their personal bar, the entire team becomes connected and aligned in a deep, genuine and abiding way. This time tested adult educational experience, although challenging and demanding, is also a fun, provocative and humanly meaningful experience and will contribute a long range, positive influence on the participant's attitudes, decisions and results.
The Self Mastery program impacts participants with a strong, positive energy, and a willingness to embrace an empowered personal and professional context. This new framework of thinking will launch them into their next phase of growth with a clear and directed power. It is ideally suited for organizations that have a deep desire for their employees to be highly motivated, self- empowering and self-managing. Organizations that seek to cultivate these qualities will find that the Self Mastery program will significantly enhance these goals and if properly reinforced by the culture and leadership of the organization, will create enduring success.

TEAM DEVELOPMENT WORKSHOP

The definition of team: A small number of people with complimentary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals and approaches for which they hold themselves mutually accountable sounds simple enough but is perhaps one of the most challenging constructs of human interaction in the business world – and one of the most critical.

Based on the premise that Ten Factors must be present and operating in excellence for true teamwork to flourish with success, Team Development II is designed as a stand alone workshop or ideally as a follow-up to the workshop, Self Mastery–Team Development I.

Benefits:
In this highly interactive workshop, filled with experiential learning, large and small group discussions, inspirational videos (not those “old HR films’), fun and creativity, the Ten Factors of Teamwork are presented and participants:

• Practice how to “think” team (not just “do” team) – one for all and all for one
• Determine/understand their common purpose and performance goals
• Identify their individual roles and specific responsibilities
• Discuss and identify direction for goal achievement
• Develop/deepen trust between all members
• Increase personal competence through integrity, accountability, collaboration, willingness to play a big game
• Identify technical or other skills needed and what support required
• Learn how to communicate effectively - feedback, e-mails, performance evaluation, data, facts, charts
• Identify Standards of Excellence – develop team Operating Principles and personal action plans based on the workshop discoveries
• Will generate genuine team spirit and fun
• Decide how to monitor results through course correction as well as support and recognition

Prior to workshop delivery, it is recommended:

• To conduct one day of interviews with random participants
• For each participant to take the Understanding Me – Understanding Your personality/behavioral assessment.

UNDERSTANDING ME - UNDERSTANDING YOU

Overview: Understanding Me – Understanding You is dedicated to mastering the art and science of interpersonal communication. It is one of the most essential skills in one's professional toolkit. In this program, participants will be exposed to an enlightened approach to effective interpersonal communication, and will practice their new-found skills by engaging in interactive exercises.
Objectives
Specifically, in a short period of time, participants will learn and acquire or reinforce some of the most critical features of communication. They are:

• Proactively communicate so that others understand you clearly
• Listen to others in a way that understands them clearly
• Understand and listen for differences in communication styles
• Respond to those differences effectively
• Motivate and inspire others by speaking their "language"

How The Program Is Organized
Phase One of the program focuses on providing participants with the two key features of effective communication: assertion skills and listening skills.

• Assertion skills has to do with the kinds of communication that produces an immediate and clear impact in the listener.
• Listening skills has to do with hearing another in a way that matches the intention of the communicator.

Phase Two of Understanding Me - Understanding You helps participants have a deeper understanding of how different personality/behavior styles directly impact their communication effectiveness. For years, researchers and experts in the field of human interaction have been seeking ways of understanding how personality and behavioral styles impact the workplace. Their efforts have led them to design instruments that look at psychological factors that affect working relationships. Understanding Me – Understanding You is based on over 50 years of in-depth research on differing personality/behavioral styles and has been perhaps the single most powerful way of learning about these styles affect interpersonal effectiveness.

Understanding Me – Understanding You, and the research upon which it is developed, is based on the assumption that there is no one best way of dealing with situations, but that differing approaches and different people have their own unique strengths and weaknesses. The better able we are to understand and appreciate our differences as people and to learn how to meld our differing approaches together, the more effective we will be when working together.

CONFLICT RESOLUTION: MASTERING THE ART OF SUCCESSFUL COMMUNICATION IN CONTENTIOUS SITUATIONS
From subtle sarcasm to workplace wars, conflict can undermine an organization’s best laid plans and preparations. In this highly interactive workshop, participants will develop the skills to effectively handle any challenging and contentious situation or person. After active role playing (with real life issues), improvisational exercises, case studies and lively discussions, participants leave well prepared to resolve and manage conflicts (and even prevent them before they start!) In their hands they will hold a simple, powerful tool: The Six Steps to Win/Win Solutions an easy and invaluable step by step process that will guide their interactions to successful conclusions.

Benefits to the Participant:
This eye-opening workshop, which is focused on skill building as well as intellectual understanding, is perfect for all managers and executives who want to improve their communication effectiveness when dealing with difficult people in uncomfortable situations. It will also help individual contributors learn how they can be effective in diverting brewing conflicts as well as how to handle negative people with confidence and clarity.

Participants can expect to learn:

• The difference between constructive and destructive conflicts
• Communication techniques – how to confront others effectively
• How to listen and hear what is really being said
• How to identify the warning signs and signals of conflict
• The mistakes to avoid when dealing with conflict
• How to prevent conflicts from escalating
• To develop leadership skills by learning how to coach others to be accountable
• How to resolve:
• any conflict
• potential conflicts
• conflicts between others
• conflicts between yourself and another
• team conflicts
• strategic management and organizational conflicts

GIVING AND RECEIVING EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK: HOW TO HAVE EMPOWERING COMMUNICATIONS
One of the most important person-to-person communication skills is the ability to give and receive feedback effectively. It is also the most challenging. No amount of sophisticated technology can eliminate the anxiety that managers, supervisors, team leaders and team members feel when faced with a feedback session. But it doesn't have to be painful and you can do it well if you learn some simple proven techniques. People have different communicating styles and the truly skilled communicators know these four basic styles and are adept at knowing how to confront each style and speak the "language" of each. Through fun exercises and role playing, participants will learn these styles and will know how to effectively confront all types of people - even the very difficult ones! As a result, awareness of others, self-awareness and self-confidence are significantly increased. The ability to constructively confront others is greatly improved.

Benefits to the Participant:
This highly interactive workshop will provide participants with the tools needed to give and receive feedback in a variety of situations so that productivity and self-esteem are not only maintained, but greatly improved. Practicing these techniques in a variety of "real issue" situations, participants leave with a sense of clarity and confidence to be able to handle future interactions -- even the very difficult ones.
Participants can expect to learn:

• Three factors that make the difference between a good manager and a great one
• The three types of motivational feedback
• The six steps for giving effective feedback
• Twenty things to remember for maximum impact
• The art of listening
• How to receive feedback without being defensive
• How to deal with valid and invalid critical feedback

In addition, they will learn how to:

• Confront others without being terrified
• Identify and understand the four communication styles and how to effectively communicate with each (in their "language")
• Plan an effective approach for a "real life" feedback session
• Identify feedback pitfalls that must be avoided
• Remove feedback misconceptions which were set in childhood
• Give constructive feedback to their managers or colleagues
• Provide unsolicited feedback
• Handle recurring problems

COACHING FOR PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT

Overview:
Businesses that are becoming industry leaders of the future are challenging their managers and employees to think and act differently. They are developing their workforce as partners in achieving lasting change and success. To be successful in the new business environment requires that all managers lead by developing clarity and commitment. The command and control style has proven ineffective in this rapidly changing business environment. This requires that managers shift their leadership style to a model based on partnership, mutual influence, and commitment. The key is in developing their coaching skills.

Who Should Attend
This action packed skills-oriented workshop is designed for all managers in the organization who want to increase their ability to coach their employees toward enhanced performance. It is based on the principle that employees and managers achieve significant performance improvements through the guidance of an effective coach. At its best, the manager as coach leads by developing clarity and commitment as opposed to command and control. Ideal participants are those who want to deepen their understanding of themselves and others as leaders, and who want to improve the performance capabilities of their direct reports.

How You Will Benefit

• Learn about the limitations of the command and control approach to leadership and the advantages of coaching toward clarity and commitment
• Increase your listening skills as it relates to opportunities for performance improvement
• Create stronger, mutually satisfying relationships with your employees
• Practice using skills and tools that will enhance your leadership effectiveness
• Develop your ability to give and get feedback

What You Will Cover

• How the command and control form of leadership was developed and its limitations
• The key philosophy that underlies effective coaching
• The 11 keys to performance excellence and how they relate to coaching excellence
• The process of coaching: step by step
• How to listen and what to listen for in performance coaching
• How to give powerful feedback toward enhanced performance
• How to deal with difficult cases

Features of the Program
The CPE Program is highly interactive in nature. The use of business simulations, films, role playing exercises and case discussions give participants both an intellectual understanding and a direct experience of the kind of coaching that will significantly enhance the performance of others. It is based on a large body of research that relates to performance improvement and goal setting and it is a tried and true method of coaching that will likely produce significant and immediate results in leadership and performance enhancement.

Have you ever wished for a 30 hr. work week? Do you leave things undone? Do you feel that you should do things that you really don't need to? Are important things slipping through the cracks? Do you procrastinate? Do you feel out of balance, guilty, discouraged, overwhelmed and drained of energy? Do you hear yourself say, “If I just had MORE TIME…?”
Of course we all know that’s impossible. We have the amount of time we have and that’s that. But the mistake most people make is thinking that if they learn how to manage time and they sign up for a time management course that gives them many time management “tools”, everything with change. However, these tools only work for a short period. It isn’t long before the unfinished tasks pile up and overwhelm and self-loathing returns. This is because they are working on the wrong thing and no matter how hard you work on the wrong thing, it makes no difference!

Time cannot be expanded and time cannot be managed. The solution lies in managing yourself. To achieve higher levels of personal productivity, you must learn how to manage two things: 1) the way you think about time and 2) your old time management habits and behaviors.

The results you have in your life right now are a direct result of how you think. Your thinking drives actions and actions produce results. Self-management comes about through a process of first understanding your own self sabotaging thoughts and behaviors that undermine your success. More Time and Energy is a unique program that deals with your self-awareness first and then gives you the guidance and tools that allow you to maximize your time and talents to achieve worthwhile goals based on sound thinking and effective actions.

When you relieve yourself of the burdensome weight of ineffectiveness, your energy returns, you step back into the driver’s seat and raise your personal productivity bar. It will feel like you have more time because you will be 1) in control of your self-limiting behaviors, 2) eliminating time wasters and 3) utilizing the effective time saving tools.

What can you expect to learn?

• A deeper awareness of how you are sabotaging yourself and how to change that
• An understanding of the power of your thinking
• The five basic bays to generate energy
• The five things you must do to Self Mange time and energy
• How to plan effectively
• The art of delegation
• The power of accountability
• Completion - the biggest time waster is not finishing what you start
• How to prioritize – learn what to hold on to and what to let go of
• The three ways to make better use of your time
• The six common self-generated time wasters and what to do about them
• The five common environmental time wasters and what to do about them

Throughout the program are experiential exercises, surveys, self-awareness quizzes, some lecture, many practical real-life examples and lots of sharing and discussion of specific personal problem issues. The environment is stimulating, fun and highly enlightening. You will walk out with an Action Plan in hand and a renewed commitment to get things done with a fresh outlook and plenty of energy.