Keynotes for Executives & Management
Strategic Mismanagement (there are no Silver Bullets)
Every year, we are expected to deliver more with less. Typical answers: work more hours, implement new management techniques, re-engineer the organization, upgrade accountability procedures, increase scrutiny over funding and enhance control systems, just to name a few.
Management has identified the problems all right, and the solutions are typically on target as well. Our albatross is that we try to install people systems like they were accounting systems, leading us to over-control, under-management, minimal-motivation, and reverse-incentive systems. This combination ensures that we accomplish the exact opposite of our objectives. This session is a reminder that many times, because of our constant tactical focus, we strategically mismanage our critical and scarcest resources.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 3 hours
Management on Purpose Instead of by Accident
Most of us are promoted because we are good technicians or very detailed in our approach to work. And now as managers, we often find ourselves not only working harder, but disappointed with the production of those who report to us. This session focuses on what you need to do to become a better manager, approaches that should help to avoid the most common pitfalls, as well as techniques to consider to motivate those who work with and for you. This session also looks at how accountability, incentive systems and strategy all have to holistically be integrated to achieve maximum effect.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 3 hours
Leadership
The need for skilled leaders today is critical and likely more urgent than at any time in our recent history. Today’s rapid pace of change has created an environment of uncertainty, unpredictability, and vulnerability. The opportunity and challenge is there for those who have the knowledge and skills to positively channel the momentum of change. This session identifies and discusses the fundamentals of what good leadership is all about and helps the participants understand where to focus their energy to leverage their personal leadership potential.
Format of Session: Lecture or Lecture and role playing
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours in a Lecture environment. In a lecture, role playing, style feedback environment, this can be from 1 day to 3 days.
The Art of Negotiation
Every day, whether in business, family or social situations, we negotiate for something. With customers and clients, we attempt to structure pricing, sell product/service offerings, convince key players to implement ideas, etc. At home, we negotiate minute by minute, from household chores, to restaurant selections, to how to spend discretionary income. This session will focus on how to make your negotiations more successful by understanding 1) how to approach a negotiation situation in the way most likely to provide you with your desired outcome, 2) how to avoid the typical roadblocks and traps which bring negotiations to a halt, 3) how to find strength in your offering when it appears that the other side has all the advantages/power, and 4) how to communicate in such a way that your negotiation can shift from a personal win-lose to a collaborative win-win situation.
Format of Session: Lecture or Lecture and role playing
Typical Duration: 1.5 to 2 hours in a Lecture environment. In a lecture, role playing environment, this expands to about 4 hours.
Do I Have to Resort to the Bottle
The role of management has undergone rapid change. This session discusses how you can improve your ability to communicate and motivate those around you. How you decode the messages you are receiving, and even more importantly,
knowing the real messages you are sending, is paramount to enhancing this. Too often, we feel like we have successfully communicated because the words have been transmitted. That is just not true. It would be like writing a note, putting it in a bottle, sending it out to sea, and assuming our job is complete. Good communication, and improved motivation, starts with becoming a higher self-monitor. This means you have to become more aware of non-verbal queues, of differences between the way men and women translate information, aware of how status impacts messages, and much more. This session is delivered in both an informative and humorous manner while conveying what managers have to do to communicate with, and motivate their employees more effectively.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours
Professional Sales Skills
Selling is often viewed by professionals as something you shouldn’t have to do. In other words, “The work you do, your expertise, your product, etc. should sell itself.” There is an incorrect belief that permeates the business community which states, “if you build a better mouse trap, the marketplace will come knocking on your door.” The fact is, everyday in business, those with the best mouse traps go out of business while their competitors with inferior traps thrive. Why? Because success is all about your adeptness at selling what they have. This session is focused on how to sell, how to motivate customers to buy, how to quantify the value of your product/service, and how to close the business.
Format of Session: Lecture or Lecture and role playing
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours in a Lecture environment. In a lecture-role playing environment, this can be a 1-4 day workshop.
Presentation Skills
Your ability to sell yourself and your ideas is critical in today’s fast paced information overloaded business environment. Some people are born “silver tongued devils” and this skill is natural. But most people are not. Good presentation skills can be learned by anyone. And most people, with just a little effort, can rapidly advance their competency in this area. This session focuses on developing the skills to deliver a powerful presentation, whether that be to a customer, a management team, a board of directors or to an audience of hundreds. The tips and techniques covered will, with just a minimum of effort, significantly improve your presentation capability.
Format of Session: Lecture or Lecture and role playing
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours in a Lecture environment. In a lecture-role playing environment, this is typically a 1 day workshop.
Meeting Management and Facilitation Skills
John Kenneth Galbraith, a noted economist, was quoted as saying, “Meetings are indispensable when you don’t want to do anything.” In 3M’s book, “How to Run Better Business Meeting”, the meeting management team clearly states that meetings are not a waste of time, it’s just that few people know how to conduct them. The real issue is, “too much time is wasted in meetings.” The bottom line is … there is a great deal to consider if you want to run productive and effective meetings. It requires planning, organization, effort and established meeting protocols. Without utilizing all four, you will likely be just another executive that calls meetings that waste both employee time and company resources. This session will help you better manage meetings, become a more skilled facilitator, and appear more confident in the process.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours
Seven Easy Steps to Employee Motivation
Most managers, in survey after survey, consider money to be the #1 motivator of their employees. The problem is … in those same surveys, from the employee perspective, often money ranks down around 7th or 8th on the top 10 list. What do employee’s rank as number 1, 2 or 3 in almost every survey? Come find out. This session focuses on how to improve your chances of getting the work you want performed, while simultaneously making those doing the work happier about doing it.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours
Teamwork versus Super-performing Teams
You can’t talk with any organization today without Teams being mentioned as part of the culture. What is truly surprising is how defensive management gets if you mention the inefficiency of teams. Unfortunately, in many organizations, the word team merely is a replacement word for department. And the ability of this model to spawn super-performing teams is truly rare. There is a huge difference between generating teamwork, and generating super-performing teams. This session discusses nine fundamentals that create the framework for super-performing teams, it outlines how to facilitate a culture of teamwork, and it creates a clear distinction between the two. Teams and teamwork are both powerful tools, but they are not the same. And when the lines are blurred between them, both under perform.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 2 hours
Implementing Performance Measurement and Accountability
The buzz word for the 90’s in management was Accountability. And as we entered the 21st Century, while everyone seemed to be saying it, no one seemed to be doing it. Accountability is heavily supported by management and the rank-and-file because everyone wants someone else to be accountable for the work that is not getting done. The theory — if we implement accountability, “my supervisor, peer or subordinate will finally have to pull their share of the workload.” In order to successfully implement this, you have to create a non-discriminatory, objective (not subjective), system of metrics that are tied to your organization’s strategy. This session focuses on setting goals at the proper level, communicating and managing your workforce, establishing objective and measurable expected outputs, and using various techniques (like Balanced Scorecard) to tie it all together.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 3 hours
Strategic Planning (from retreat to implementation)
The program walks through how organizations should develop Strategic Plans. We will review exactly how to organize a retreat, how to manage the time you have with management, and tactics to complete the project after the initial direction has been established. In addition, this session will focus on common pitfalls encountered, how to minimize the impact of power-players, what you should do to continue the energy and synergy generated by the retreat, and much more. You’ll leave knowing what you need to do to make Strategic Planning work within your organization.
Format of Session: Lecture
Typical Duration: 1 to 3 hours