Making Meetings Work: Planning and Leading High Performance Meetings

Meetings are where the work gets done, and every manager needs to know how to plan and lead a successful, high performance meeting. This one-day course will focus on practical concepts and tools for designing and facilitating meetings that produce useful outcomes, engage meeting participants in meaningful discussion, and ensure that teams work together effectively. The course will go beyond presenting reminders of starting meetings on time and presenting agendas to offering new insight into the strategies of successful meeting planning and effective meeting leadership.  A set of eight key questions that must be answered to ensure meeting success will be presented and practiced.  Managers will be able to immediately apply these strategies to a real meeting during the workshop, and a follow-up session will be scheduled to focus in depth on actual experiences using these approaches. This session will also provide managers and team-leaders with knowledge of the skills needed to successfully facilitate and guide others through discussions that stay on track, produce shared understanding, and are most likely to produce lasting agreements. While these facilitation techniques are useful and effective in departmental and team meetings, they will also serve managers well in both formal and informal one-on-one conversations.
Facilitator: Joe Goodman
Date: Wednesday, June 18th, 9am-4pm
Location: Amenities Conference Center, 1st Floor, Stahl Building
Lunch is included

The Coaching Manager: Developing Talent in Your Organization

The presenters are co-authors of the new book, The Coaching Manager: Developing Top Talent in Business

Who Should Attend
This seminar is designed for line managers, supervisors and HR professionals from higher education and academic medical centers who are interested in improving their ability to develop employees through on the job learning.

Program Overview
This seminar will help managers at all levels learn to develop the talent in their organization through coaching. Coaching, that is helping employees learn and grow on the job, is one of the most desired of all leadership skills. Unfortunately it is also one of the least practiced. Coaching isn’t just about helping to “fix” those in your organization with performance problems. It is about helping your good and great employees progress even further and in the process, retaining their commitment and improving business results. Participants will have an opportunity to make hands on use the developmental coaching model. They should be able to immediately use what they learn in the workshop on the job to begin coaching or further improve their coaching efforts.

Program Outline
Topics covered will include:
• The link between coaching and business results
• An overview of a versatile model of developmental coaching.
• How to create a “coach-able” point of view.
• How to create a coaching friendly context.
• How to spot those most able to take advantage of coaching.
• The nature of a coaching mindset.
• How to decide which skills to emphasize when coaching.
• How to start a coaching dialogue with helpful questions.
• How to observe effectively and provide balanced feedback.
• How to keep the learning going through the use of informal learning contracts.
Facilitator: James M. Hunt DBA, Joseph R. Weintraub PhD
Date: Friday, March 14th, 9am-4pm
Location: Babson Executive Conference Center
Lunch is included

Core Writing Skills

Refresh your understanding of core writing skills. Avoid common grammar errors that affect the quality of your writing. Improve your proofreading skills. This workshop helps you to acquire the confidence to undertake short on-the-job writing assignments, which we will practice in class. At the conclusion of each section, you will complete exercises and receive individualized feedback to help ensure understanding and competency. Please bring three or four recent samples of your writing to the class.
Facilitator: Wallace Coyle Ph.D
Date: Wednesday, April 30th, 9am-4pm
Location: Babson Executive Conference Center
Lunch is included

Everyday Leadership

Do you have ideas for improving your own job or the work flow in your department? Do you see ways you could get things done more effectively? Do you have ideas for how to increase satisfaction in your workplace? In traditional models of leadership, these types of changes came down from the top. In today’s workplace, leadership can and should come from all levels of the organization. Everyone possesses the capability to develop leadership behaviors. In this class, participants learn how they can act as leaders in their everyday work life, identifying opportunities for change as well as the steps needed to implement those changes.

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:
• identify characteristics of leadership
• describe the characteristics of leadership they already possess
• identify leadership opportunities in their workplace
• set clear goals and analyze possibilities for change

This course is not intended to help people manage others; instead, the focus is on how participants can become leaders by making change in their own workplace.
Facilitator: Judith Stein & Kande Culver
Date: Thursday, May 15th, 9am-4pm
Location: Babson Executive Conference Center
Lunch is included

Dealing with Difficult People

In today’s workplace, collaborating effectively with others is a key driver to any employee’s success. In this workshop, participants will learn how to work effectively with others by understanding behavioral styles, underlying motivations and the hot buttons which each of us possess. Participants will learn specific strategies for dealing with difficult behaviors and a greater understanding of your own tendencies when dealing with difficult behaviors in others.
Facilitator: Julie Wilson
Date: Thursday, May 29th and Wednesday, June 18th, 9am-12pm  Duration: 6 hours (meets twice)
Location: Center for Workplace Development, 124 MT. Auburn Street, 3rd Floor, Cambridge, MA
Lunch is not included