CBS Training

Impactful Leadership Conversation

Leadership Conversations™: Challenging High Potential Managers to Become Great Leaders

– Move from Monologue to Dialogue to Grow Your Leadership Influence

Leadership revolves around “Conversations”, ones that allow a Leader to interact, build relationships, deepen trust, and share information in intentional ways. It is through those conversations that we as a leader ultimately achieve results. To be effective, we know that those conversations require “Dialogue”; we need to exchange ideas between people.

However, not everyone of us feels comfortable in holding dialogue, do we? Conversation can be tricky. This is especially so in our Leadership context, when other responsibilities may be riding on the backs of those conversations too.

Yet without conversations, we as Leaders have little “Bandwidth”; we cannot organise our team, build bonds, manage conflicts, share direction, engage ideas, measure progress, take corrective action, and celebrate results, can we? Our own & the well-being of our team may be compromised. As a consequence, organisational productivity may suffer too.

We understand this because we see the benefits in becoming a more impactful Leader. We know we need to develop our ability to communicate with Others. We have to learn to listen, and listen well. We need to sensitively use questions to discover what’s on another person’s mind. And we recognise there are times, places, and ways, to hold those more difficult leadership conversations. We also know that modelling good conversation skills is good for team members too.

This Workshop therefore takes an emotionally intelligent approach to personal leadership. Our focus dives deep into the communications dialectic, to explore core interpersonal skills & behaviours that are relevant to help us become much more effective communicators.

Our approach builds on the belief that a leader is not just a passive actor, they are also an active coach. The more effective we become at demonstrating impactful techniques, the more we influence our team to grow & reciprocate.

Course Objectives
Our intentions are to fortify your leadership conversational skills and abilities. We’ll help you feel more comfortable and able to build constructive, productive, and impactful relationships that better deliver results.

You’ll recognise how conversation is a process that’s layered upon a number of building blocks. For fluency, it requires, presence, patience, and practice. Moreover, you’ll realise that the more comfortable you are in basic conversation, the more easy it becomes to handle more challenging aspects of conversations, such as when giving feedback to your team.

Emotional intelligence or EQ sits well at the heart of this soft skills Workshop, as effective conversation is “Dialogue”, it requires active, powerful connections between the Self, and Others.

Course Outline
  • Understanding the importance of listening
  • Appreciating the role of non-verbal communication
  • Asking relevant questions to initiate & drive conversations
  • Paying attention to build rapport & make others feel comfortable
  • Asserting your voice more constructively and with greater strength
  • Recognising the significance of language and persuasive word choice
  • Providing coaching feedback to reinforce behaviours and stay on-track
  • Modelling more effective communications strategies to team members
Who Should Attend
This one-day Workshop acknowledges the vital role that effective communication plays when managing people. Yet, it understands how some people may lack the personal & interpersonal skills & strategies necessary to hold conversation.

Therefore, if you are an Officer or Supervisor managing a small team, one who wants to dramatically improve your ability to hold leadership conversations that positively impact your team and other stakeholders, then, this Workshop has been designed for you. It will give you courage & skills to hold conversations with those people that matter.

Training Methodology
This is an experiential Workshop, which emphasises engagement, interaction, and practice. Participants should expect short presentations that introduce content, experiential activities for skills practice, and group discussions for reflection that deepens their learning.
Testimonials
  • Communication is key to success as it is about relationships and trust
  • It was relevant, as communications skills are important to the role of manager
  • I have more confidence in myself as I now know more techniques on being assertive
  • I learnt a few more skills that may overcome my weakness in speaking with superiors
  • The section on questions to build dialogue was a particularly interesting practice opportunity
  • It wasn’t a workshop limited to inspirational talk; doing activities really makes a difference to the learning process
  • I enjoyed most the activities of the sharing sessions, as I learnt from the experience of other peers
  • Activities such as active listening and asking questions, were quite refreshing
  • The feedback and coaching in this session I will remember going forward
  • A great learning experience and strengthens interpersonal skills
Trainer
Mr. Patrick O’Brien, CMgr

With a constant appetite for change, Patrick came to realise one very important thing; it’s the People that matter in With a constant appetite for change, Patrick came to realise one very important thing; it’s the People that matter in business, their personal development & growth counts.

His approach to learning is reflected in his facilitation during delivery; it focuses on building & strengthening an individual’s “soft skills”. This leads to Training that’s designed to scaffold on top of three firm foundations.

First, learning needs to be fun for it to stick; enjoyment & engagement are precursors to absorption & adoption. Next, it has to be sufficiently real to be relevant; it needs collaboration, openness, creativity, and, a little intensity. Finally, it must match Participant expectations to be valuable; it has to substantially deliver what it states “on the tin”.

Patrick therefore designs Workshop experiences that masterfully combine Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) with a deep Coaching mentality. Both are invitingly interlaced using Improvisational techniques. His diverse background and experience also allow him to facilitate inclusive and valuable learning moments. These are highly engaging, deeply empowering, and, thoroughly enjoyable.

His life’s journey has straddled different countries, continents & cultures, from Ireland and England, to New Zealand and Singapore. He’s worked his way through a variety of roles & levels in the corporate world, from Individual Contributor up to Managing Director. And, he has built considerable business experience whilst working across sectors such as government, technology, manufacturing, finance, consulting, aviation, telecommunications, and the Internet.

His formal education is well rounded: at Honours-level in IT, Masters-level in Marketing, and, an MBA in Finance. He is also a “Master Practitioner” of NLP, and an enthusiastic author with Articles appearing in the local media. In whatever form you experience his work, you’ll always feel his curiously cheerful sense of enjoyment; it just shines through.

Patrick is an active member of many international Professional bodies, such as the Chartered Management Institute, the Chartered Institute of Marketing, and the Institute of Directors. He is proud to be one of only a small handful of “Chartered Managers” in Asia.

With a warm Irish wit, a love of the “craic” and a big beaming smile, audiences in over twenty-five countries have found his disarmingly, unpretentious, and conversational approach to learning, to be a refreshing & rewarding experience.