There is an aphorism that says: "one difficult conversation is far better than many that avoid the truth". The entrepreneur Tim Ferris takes this one stage further, adding: “Your success is based on how many uncomfortable conversations you are prepared to have”.

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Topics addressed

Whether you agree with this quote or not, there is general consensus that the more our careers evolve, the more our an ability to manage ‘challenging’ situations becomes important (if not essential). 

And yet, many of us prioritise a huge list of other tasks before giving any time over to thinking or planning how we are going to approach those ‘difficult conversations’.

• What do we actual DO when the meeting/conversation/negotiation really hits the pinch? 

• What do we say and how do we say it? 

• What are the red flags to look out for? 

• How do we respond to those red flags? 

• How do we calibrate responses to all of these questions, given the diverse range of stakeholders we are dealing with every single day? 

These are important questions for any business, but are particularly important in our sector, where profit margins for many of our collaborators are tight, where aspirations can often be conflicting, where communication is often muddled and where emotions can run high. 

This 90-minute course will leave you better-positioned to answer these questions helping you come out of difficult conversations with solutions that benefit all stakeholders. 

And whilst the immediate target of this session is on managing difficult conversations at work, it will inevitably help when it comes to doing the same in your personal life, to boot!

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Who this session is for

This is an in-house session that is designed for a group of delegates from the same organisation.

It is especially pertinent for those who find themselves representing the practice in conversations with other project stakeholders, be they a bullying client; an unreliable collaborator; a litigious contractor; or an angry member of the public. 

It will also help with in-house communications, smoothing relationships between colleagues wherever they sit in the practice hierarchy. 

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Format

We know that long training sessions do not work well online, so we have repackaged our expertise into a series of modules that last 90-minute to 2-hours. We believe this makes the best of the online format and ensures that delegates get the most from their time with us. 

We like using Zoom but we are happy to use other platforms if preferred by our clients.

We recommend that the number of delegates is limited to between eight and 12. This is so that we can engage with everyone and pick up questions, building on individual and team ideas as each session progresses.

This session is one of the training modules offered through the Colander Online Academy. Each module has been designed to stand alone, but the short format limits the amount of ground that can be covered in each. This means that most clients will require a suite of modules to deliver a rounded training experience, particularly around the wider issues of good leadership and communication. 

To find out more about the training topics addressed through the Colander Online Academy please refer to the related content below and to the training and coaching page on this website.

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Coaching

Our trainers are both willing and able to support delegates with individual coaching, if people think it would be a helpful follow up to any of the online training sessions.

Our experience of delivering online training has shown that follow up sessions with the trainer - either individually or in pairs, face-to-face or online - have been incredibly useful, helping delegates to embed the learning from the group sessions and relate it to their real life experiences of leading teams.

If appropriate we would be delighted to discuss this with our training clients.

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CPD

If required, CPD Certificates can be issued to all attendees.

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