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Hints and tips for new and experienced managers
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eManagement Tips - March 2018

A free monthly update for Associates and Members of RiverRhee's Managers' Community
 

Welcome to RiverRhee's Managers' version of the March 2018 issue of eManagement Tips, our monthly resource for new and experienced managers who have attended or are considering one of our management courses.

The two topics for this month's eManagement Tips are:
  • Tips for influencing others
  • And... how to facilitate productive team discussions
Other news:

Our programme of drop-in surgeries and courses continues at Chesterford Research Park with Coaching Skills for Managers on 24th April and Presentation Skills on 22nd May.  These courses are open to everyone, not just CRP tenants.

We are also running Transition to Leadership on 26th April

All our other 1-day courses will be running again in May and we are already picking up bookings for some of these (details below).

We have a new course on AssertivenessDo ask us for more information about running this for your company, or scheduling this as an open course.

Our March Introduction to Management course kicks off this week.  Do get in touch if you would like to book a place on the 19th-21st June course.
 
As always, we would love to hear your thoughts on any of this content, and also any suggestions for what we might feature in future issues of eManagement Tips.
 
eManagement Tips is circulated to over 200 managers  / HR contacts each month.  


Tips for influencing others

Delegates on last month's Effective Influencing and Communication course particularly valued getting insights into people's different communication styles, and how they could adapt their own style to be more effective.

Being able to influence others effectively is very dependent on emotional intelligence; in particular, our ability to understand and build rapport with others.

Daniel Goleman is one of the gurus of emotional intelligence, and co-author of "The Building Blocks of Emotional Intelligence".  One of the 12 booklets in this series focuses on Influence.  Elisabeth's blog on leadership, emotional intelligence and influence highlights some of their tips.

Emotional intelligence and influencing skills will feature in our one-day Transition to Leadership course on 26th April.  They are also topics that come up in our one-to-one coaching for individual contributors and managers.



Facilitating productive team conversations

The interactive discussions and exercises are a feature of our courses and workshops that our delegates value most. 

When we run our courses in-house for companies, we help delegates to get to know each other better, and to explore and address some of their challenges.

There are a few ingredients for facilitating productive conversations, whether in your own team, or when working with others.  They include being clear about your goal, getting the venue right, being prepared for the group dynamics and emotions that might arise, having the right tools, managing your own energy, thinking and emotions. These are explored in this preview of our forthcoming publication "The Effective Team's Facilitation Workbook".

A little more about facilitating productive team conversations...

The March-April 2018 issue of Harvard Business Review includes an article by the executive director of the MIT Leadership Center, and author, Hal Gregersen on Better Brainstorming.

Twenty years ago he discovered, by chance, that generating questions, rather than solutions, can lead to more productive brainstorming!  Since then, he has developed and tested a simple three-step methodology for facilitating "question bursts".

His methodology would seem to work because it addresses some of the traditional obstacles to effective team conversations.  For example:

  • It creates a safe environment for everyone to contribute (not just the typically more vocal members of the group)
  • It enables people to surface "the elephant in the room"
  • It encourages different perspectives as opposed to "social loafing" (coasting on others' ideas) and "social anxiety" (worries about what others might think)
  • It encourages leaders and team members to demonstrate humility.  They are open to questions about problems and relinquish the need to demonstrate that they always have the answers.
Companies such as Amazon, Pixar, Tesla have adopted this question-based approach as a way of working, resulting in a climate of "creative friction".  This is the kind of constructive storming we encourage people to have as part of their journey through the stages of team development.  Looping back to our new Assertiveness course, this "creative friction" is also the desirable win:win result of individuals being comfortable to assert their ideas and opinions.

(We will be looking for opportunities to test this question-based brainstorming.  Perhaps as part of our May Introduction to Lean and Six Sigma course?)
Do get in touch to enquire about or book a place on one of our upcoming courses:
  • Coaching Skills for Managers - 24th April*
  • Transition to Leadership - 26th April
  • Introduction to Lean and Six Sigma - 15th May
  • The First Steps in Selling - 16th May
  • Presentation Skills* - 22nd May
  • Managing Change - 23rd May
  • Introduction to Project Management - 24th May
  • Introduction to Management - 19th-21st June
*Courses being held at Chesterford Research Park

Other training, workshops and one-to-one coaching can be customised on request.


Contact Elisabeth on 07876 130 817 or elisabeth@riverrhee.com.
Copyright © 2018 RiverRhee Consulting, All rights reserved.


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