Leadership Development Academy
The Leadership Development Academy uses well-researched, experience-tested concepts and curricula to develop current and future leaders for business and industry and presents it in a flexible way allowing an organization to customize the academy to best meet needs. There are up to 32 hours offered within this academy. Open-enrollment courses are also offered for individuals and small businesses to gain the leadership skills required to drive business forward. These are functional courses which can be adapted to any industry and even personally. Courses are four hours, cost $125/participant (group and business/industry partner discounts are available), and may include:
Accelerating Business Decisions
In today’s turbulent, fast-flowing business environment, individuals usually don't have the luxury of time when making decisions. You need people who can quickly size up the situation, identify the most workable and expedient course of action, and then act—often without having all the data or the time to consider every possible option. This course helps individuals accelerate the decision-making process, yet still make quality decisions in fast-paced environments with limited time and information. It also teaches them to identify their own and others' decision-making tendencies and understand how to balance them in situations requiring accelerated decisions.
Building and Sustaining Trust
What does trust have to do with business success? Everything. Trust is directly linked to employee engagement, retention, productivity, and innovation. Leaders who demonstrate trust and trustworthiness inspire higher levels of performance and commitment to team and organizational success. This course introduces Trust Builders, actions leaders can take to build and sustain trusting relationships, as well as common Trust Breakers that can erode or quickly break trust. Applying these skills to build trusting relationships enables people to take risks, identify and solve problems, and collaborate to achieve business results.
Coaching for Peak Performance
Effective coaching is one of the most important drivers of team member performance. Whether leaders are guiding people toward success in new or challenging situations or helping people improve or enhance their work performance, their ability to coach and provide feedback makes the difference between mediocrity and high performance. By helping learners understand the importance of three coaching techniques and how to effectively handle both proactive and reactive coaching discussions, this course helps leaders have more effective and efficient interactions.
Communicating for Leadership Success (Pre-requisite for all other academy courses)
Organizations need leaders who can do more and be more in order to succeed in today's complex environment. They need frontline leaders with strong interpersonal skills who can get things done by mobilizing and engaging others. This foundation course for most Interaction Management® courses helps leaders communicate effectively so they can spark action in others. The course teaches leaders the Interaction Essentials they need to handle the variety of challenges and opportunities they encounter every day in the workplace and beyond.
Delegating With Purpose
Delegation is a critical skill for leaders in today's "do more with less" business environment. Fewer resources, changing motivations, virtual employees, and global workforces are just a few of the challenges leaders face as they attempt to meet ever-increasing workplace demands. In this course, leaders learn the skills they need to address these challenges, gain the commitment of team members, develop individual skills and abilities, and enhance the overall capability and capacity of their teams and, ultimately, the organization. Leaders learn to identify the tasks they need to delegate, select the most appropriate individuals, assess capabilities and commitment, and plan the delegation discussion. That discussion includes the level of decision-making authority, amount of support, and methods for monitoring progress and measuring results.
Driving Change
In today's complex and competitive environment, it's no surprise that 70 percent of workplace change initiatives fail. For workplace change initiatives to be successful, organizations need leaders who are able to turn resistance into commitment and inspire team members to take ownership of change. This course provides the skills and resources leaders need to accelerate the process of implementing change with their team members and to create an agile work environment where people are more open to change.
Engaging and Retaining Talent
Research tells us that employee engagement is the primary enabler behind the successful execution of any business strategy. And, no one affects engagement and retention more than the employee's immediate leader. This course provides leaders with a model to determine what drives each individual's engagement, as well as methods for proactive engagement and talent retention. Participants learn how to conduct "engagement conversations" and "retention conversations."" They explore ways to offer recognition and create an engaging environment using no-cost "everyday engagers.""
High-Impact Feedback and Listening
When sharing feedback is part of an organization's culture, it is an effective business tool that reaches across all levels. In this course, individual performers learn how to effectively deliver both positive and developmental feedback. They also learn how to be receptive to feedback and to listen to accurately understand the speaker's intended message. In the workplace, these skills help them to optimize and sustain their own and their coworkers' performance.
Making High-Quality Decisions
Sound decision making in today’s tough business environment demands much more than just coming up with or picking the best alternative or option. It requires analyzing potential problems or opportunities and making sound judgments based on analysis. Using an engaging simulation, this course teaches a logical decision-making process that addresses the critical elements that result in high-quality business decisions. Participants will develop the skills and confidence to generate options and compare them to important decision criteria, and to select the best course of action. Utilizing this process will also help individuals avoid the pitfalls that often undermine high-quality decision making.
Maximizing Team Performance
Managers can misdiagnose the root causes of team conflict or less-than-optimal team performance when they consider only the capabilities or character of individual team members. Often there are more systemic conditions that undermine a team’s cohesiveness, collaboration, or ability to achieve goals. This course focuses on how leaders can work with their teams to build the infrastructure that enables maximum performance. Leaders gain experience in diagnosing and applying the five Team Success Factors—Results, Commitment, Communication, Process, and Trust.
Planning and Managing Resources
An organization’s success relies on everyone getting their jobs done and on time. Many are able to meet daily challenges and complete their assigned tasks and projects. However, there are some who have difficulty getting things done because of conflicting priorities, the task’s scope changes, or they might be prone to procrastination. They might also be unaware of all the resources available to them and how to utilize them effectively. This course helps associates develop the skills they need to use time and manage resources more effectively so they are able to make stronger contributions to the organization. Using the tips, techniques, and tools in this course will also help learners complete projects successfully by anticipating obstacles and devising a plan to address them. This course is designed as a four-hour course with an additional four-hours of self-study, or it can be scheduled as a full eight-hour course.
Resolving Workplace Conflict
Today’s business environment challenges organizations to increase productivity, improve quality, shorten cycle time, and reduce costs. An unfortunate but natural byproduct of these challenges is conflict. While conflict can lead to discoveries such as new ideas and innovative breakthroughs, it can, if allowed to escalate, result in damage to critical working relationships. This course teaches leaders how to recognize the signs of escalating conflict and take appropriate action to minimize damage. Leaders are introduced to two resolution tactics—coach and mediate—and practice using the Interaction Essentials as they coach then mediate to resolve a conflict.
Setting Goals and Reviewing Results
People are more engaged and strive for better results when they feel ownership of their work process and outcomes. Unfortunately, leaders fail to engage and reinforce this sense of ownership during performance management discussions. This course will show the positive effect of shifting the traditional role of planner and evaluator from the leader, to a shared responsibility between leader and employee. This shift builds employee ownership, and allows the leader to focus on coaching and developing throughout the performance cycle. Leaders will experience how to use effective (SMART) goals to help them and their employees track progress and fairly evaluate outcomes. A well-written performance plan is also a powerful tool for leaders to use when determining where to focus their development and coaching discussions with their employees.
Valuing Differences
Today, the organizations with the greatest competitive advantage are those that create an inclusive environment that makes the most of their people’s diverse experiences, ideas, and talents. Valuing Differences gives people effective skills and tools for exploring others’ unique perspectives, understanding and leveraging people’s inherent differences, challenging devaluing behavior, and creating an environment in which people’s differences are respected and utilized.
The academy can be customized to meet your needs and other courses are available. For more information on courses that can be included visit DDI. If you would like more information or to customize the Leadership Development Academy contact the department of Workforce Education and Training today.