Project Leadership Skills (In-Person)
To be effective within an organization, project managers need to have a wide variety of skills and abilities. Included among these are: creating and executing on a vision; motivating others; influencing without authority; networking; communicating up, down and laterally; negotiating; managing stakeholders; and managing conflict.
This highly interactive workshop focuses on building the soft skills that are critical to leading a team and creating sustainable business change. Participants will gain insight into the social science as well as the brain science behind motivating and empowering others. They will learn and experiment with a variety of influencing strategies and tactics. Working in pairs as well as small groups, they will collaborate with others to brainstorm, share experiences, and apply concepts to everyday challenges.
Participants will also discover their personal communication preferences, strengths, and blind spots and will gain insight into how best to communicate with others they find 'difficult.' They will gain insight into managing the people side of change, learning strategies for dealing with each step in the process. Hands-on negotiation and conflict management activities enhance the theoretical learning, grounding it in real life and making it actionable.
Interweaving role play with experiential learning and group activities, this course will help participants refine a skill set that is invaluable to their organization, and one that transfers easily across their professional and personal lives.
What you will Learn
At the end of this course, you will be able to:
Explain the importance of vision in driving motivation and engagement
Apply science-based research to better motivate those around you
Strategically leverage both personal and positional power to achieve positive project results
Determine influencing and networking strategies needed for personal growth
Identify ways to problem solve communication challenges when others have different personality styles
Connect stakeholder expectations to project success criteria
Assess key stakeholders across various dimensions of complexity
Apply the four rules of principled negotiation to a real-life conflict situation
Recognize key aspects of a physiological response to conflict
Utilize selected tools and techniques to 'defuse' an emotional situation
Leverage various strategies and tactics to successfully deal with ambiguity at work
Getting Started / Foundation Concepts
Introductions
Course structure, goals, and objectives
Beginning a personal action plan
Managing Vision and Purpose / Motivating Others
Communicating and aligning around vision
Tying the present to the future
The importance of purpose
The art and science of motivation
Networking and Influencing
Positive politics and project success
Types of power within organizations
Power and influence
Networking best practices
Communication
The medium and the message
Personality and communication styles
Communication challenges
Stakeholder Management and Negotiation
Identifying stakeholders
Analyzing stakeholders
Negotiation basics
Principled negotiation
Conflict Management
Dynamics of conflict
The anatomy of conflict
Conflict management approaches and tools
Dealing with ambiguity