Training

Need a speaker for your next event?  Need team training and development?  Select something thought provoking or skills building:

Thought Provoking Skills Building
Is your business in evolution or revolution? Momentum: Making meaning out of work
Momentum: Making meaning out of work Death by Meeting
Technology: The plumbing and the sexy stuff Herding Cats: Decision making in groups
IT Change: The human behaviour factor Getting good at goals
Resistance: What Australian organisations can learn from America’s aversion to the metric system  

Speaking and training modules

Is your business in evolution or revolution? 

As organisations grow in size and age, they pass through natural and predictable stages.  But the management styles that promote success during business evolution, become the exact problem areas that must change if growth is to continue (revolution).  Understanding where you are in these cycles of business growth can be a great starting point for strategic planning or organisational change program.  (Based on Greiner, L. 1998.  Evolution and Revolution as Organisations Grow.  Harvard Business Review.  May-June 1998)  Read more about evolution and revolution on the blog: Views from the curve

 
Momentum: Making meaning out of work   

The reason why organisations fail to make intended changes is not a lack of motivation or desire, but of the hidden conflicting commitments carried in their goals – their collective immunity to change.  Rather than focusing simply on developing skills (technical learning), we must focus on genuine development of the human capacity to learn and grow (adaptive learning).   This session will introduce you to the fascinating science of adult development and how it impacts the way we work. It is also the introduction to the longer Momentum program – 3 half-day workshops based on Kegan, R. & Lahey,L.L. (2009).  Immunity to Change.  (Boston, Massachusetts:  Harvard Business Press)  Read more about Immunity to Change on the change blog: Views from the curve


Technology: The plumbing and the sexy stuff

The most important technologies that drive business change are the ones we never saw coming. How can business plan to leverage technology when the rate of change is so significant? The session boils it down to 2 principles: Getting the plumbing right and then getting to the sexy stuff. If your organisation needs a new way to look at technology-driven change, this session is fun, engaging and thought provoking for all levels of technical experience.


IT Change: The human behaviour factor

The software is selected, the hardware is installed and the training has been delivered. Yet, 70% of IT change projects never achieve desired results. Worse, there is a general lack of agreement on how and why technology succeeds and fails in organisations. But, with the right change strategy you can improve your odds and create successful IT change projects. Building on academic research, this talk explains 5 factors of influence which work together to drive technology use in your organisation.

 
Death by meeting 

If your management team suffers from boring, tedious, and unproductive meetings, there is a solution.  Learn to implement a better structure and context for meetings:  Stop throwing every topic needing discussion into 1 meeting (meeting stew) and instead, create 4 different meetings – each with its own important purpose and function.  (Based on Lencioni, P. (2004).  Death by meeting.  San Francisco, CA:  Jossey-Bass).  Read more about Death by Meeting on the blog: Views from the curve


Herding cats (aka decision making and problem solving in groups) 

The process of decision making is essential to organisational momentum.  But it can quickly become confusing and unproductive.   Parallel thinking is how to get everyone thinking the same way about a problem at the same time, leading to faster and better decisions.(Based on de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats method)


Getting good at goals

Managing people? Setting goals?  The process can actually be fun and motivating if you focus everyone on 3 simple things:  motivation, action planning, and monitoring.  Imagine if everyone in your organisation was able to accomplish 1 big thing this year.  An organisation of 50 people would accomplish 50 big things.  How many did you accomplish last year? 
To hear more about goal setting, listen to this podcast of me on BTalk Australia


Resistance: What Australian organisations can learn from America’s aversion to the metric system

In 1975, the United States Congress passed the ‘Metric Conversion Act’. Yet, 25 years later, that country remains just one of 3 in the world who have not made the change. There is much to be learned about organsiational change from Amercia’s aversion to switching to the metric system. This thought-provoking session might help you see why your own organsiational changes haven’t always gone to plan.