Mastering Courageous Conversations

A difficult conversations workshop for managers

If I had to pick the one thing managers struggle most with, it’s difficult conversations.

And to be honest, it’s not usually the obvious stuff. If someone didn’t deliver the 10 things you asked for last month, that’s actually an easier conversation than ‘you delivered them, but how you delivered them had ripples in the organisation that aren’t okay’.

So we put them off, or hand them over to HR.

Or we go in with ‘it wasn’t my decision’…which might protect us for a bit, but tells the other person we’ve got no say in it either. When actually, we’ve usually had a role in it.

I’ve got this wrong myself. I’ve been too close to my team when I needed to give feedback, and too distant when I was new in a senior role and protecting myself (and had feedback that I was too cold).

This day is about having these conversations in a more human way. Working through the challenge together, rather than delivering a message at someone..

Who is the workshop for?

Any manager, new or experienced. And if you work in HR or OD and these conversations keep landing on your desk, it’s one to bring in for your managers.

A bit about me

I started my career on the front line of public services, having difficult conversations with people at vulnerable times in their lives.

Later I was Head of OD at a new council formed through a big merger (at a time of lots of uncertainty). Now it’s something managers and organisations call on me for, in the public and private sector.

If you’d like to hear how I think about it first, I talked about it on The Whole Marketer podcast: https://podcasts.marketingsociety.com/episode/the-whole-marketer-ep96-dealing-with-difficult-conversations-with-guest-ann-marie-barlow

Pricing

In person: from £2,200 (up to 12 people)
Virtual: £1,500