MANAGING IN TURBULENT TIMES: THE POWER OF RESILIENCE, OPTIMISM AND MANAGING STRESS

PROBLEM

Setbacks happen in every career. The reason for the setback may be due to personal actions such as a mistake, a bad decision or a miscalculation. Or, it may be due to circumstances beyond your control, such as a downsizing, economic conditions, a change in management or a merger/acquisition.

Those who survive and thrive are typically those who are resilient. They manage the stress from the setback and keep an optimistic frame of mind in the face of tough conditions. They learn to move on.

PROCESS

• A paper and pencil assessment identifying the primary source of stress for each individual
• A review of documented scientific techniques for reducing stress
• An understanding of the power of realistic optimism
• Techniques for being more optimistic (a core component to resilience)
• Tactics for coping with uncertainty
• Review of resilience as a whole

TAKEAWAYS

• Scientifically based, concrete actions on how to cope with, and counteract setbacks
• Understanding the underlying issues that establish and promote resilience
• A smorgasbord of tactics on how to be resilient. Given their personality and style, participants can chose the ones that best work for them.

GETTING THE BEST OUT OF KEY RELATIONSHIPS

PROBLEM

There’s always a person, or personality type, with whom we have to work and who drives us nuts, or at the very least, is a difficult person to manage.

This program is about gaining a quick and memorable insight into how to distinguish between styles, understanding your own style and learning how you can adapt to get the most out of your critical relationships.

PROCESS

• Complete a 15 minute online or paper & pencil self-assessment that reveals enormous insight into the primary differences between people in terms of styles and preferences
• Discuss the different patterns and consider how these patterns make it easy or hard to work together
• Acknowledge the positive and negative downsides of each pattern
• Provide practical tips for a current situation that will help you build or re-build a relationships with someone who is quite different than you

TAKEAWAYS

• A simple, memorable framework for thinking about different styles
• Practical and realistic tactics for dealing with a difficult style
• Concrete actions to help in current relationships

EXECUTIVE PRESENCE

PROBLEM

Many CEO’s privately admit that women in their organization lack “executive presence.” Many women even receive the feedback that they need to develop their executive presence, yet they don’t know what this means. How can a problem be fixed if you don’t understand what the problem is? What does executive presence look like for women?

PURPOSE

The purpose of the program is to help participants understand what executive presence is and what you can do to portray greater executive presence.

PROCESS

• Discuss the elements of Executive Presence such as being confident, relaxed and in control, displaying the appropriate emotions at the appropriate time, speaking concisely, choosing your moments, and adapting your style to your audience
• Review of people who do and do not have executive presence
• View and critique short video clips of public and business leaders
• Evaluate actions (words and body language) that display confidence
• Conduct a quick exercise to illustrate executive presence, showing appropriate gravitas, confidence and emphasis, emotion and passion to name a few

TAKEAWAYS

• An understanding of what Executive Presence means and looks like
• Examples of what to do to develop Executive Presence
• Self-audit for a personal evaluation of Executive Presence

STRENGTHENING WOMEN LEADERS: SO HOW ARE YOU DOING?

PROBLEM

While there is no single “best” way to lead, there are some fundamental principals common to all effective leadership. One of these principals involves getting the balance right between being strategic vs. being tactical, and between being soft and being tough – two areas that are a big issue for all leaders, and especially for women.

PROCESS

• Complete a 360-degree evaluation prior to attending the program. The results of this confidential, developmental assessment are only available to the participant. This assessment includes open-ended comments that provide extremely helpful insights.
• Review of the framework to help participants understand the issues that are being assessed and why they matter for leading others.
• Provide individual reports and illustrate where to focus attention.
• Provide examples of what to do in key categories.
• Discuss surprises with one other colleague in a safe, structured format.
• Summarize key actions in a one-page format.
• Follow up with one-on-one coaching.

TAKEAWAYS

• Clear understanding of how others perceive you as a leader, particularly on critical dimensions for advancement
• Synthesis of key actions you need to take
• Tactics for what to do
• An hour coaching session to personalize the actions and provide the greatest mileage for the effort