Person-to-Person Communications
For Project Managers

Workshop structure
and content

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Brief outline:

Introductions

Whichever format you elect — presentation, seminar or workshop — we'll be doing some actual communication. So we begin with introductions. We'll introduce ourselves to each other, and we'll introduce the ideas that we'll be talking about.

Examples of problem communications

A system as powerful as the human communication system can fail in a rich variety of different ways. We'll look at some of them — from a humorous and provocative perspective.

What do we mean by communications?

One problem that can arise in person-to-person communication is the failure to align the meanings of words. So let's agree on what we mean by communications.

A model of interpersonal communications

Analyzing information flow using the Satir Interaction Model, we gain insight into the elements of the communications process, and we come to a new understanding of how it can go wrong.

Sources of defects

We'll use the Satir Interaction Model to explore how communications failures can so easily arise. This is a fun and interactive illustration that never fails to amaze.

Interventions

Once we understand how communications failures arise, we can easily see how we can limit their occurrence and impact. These interventions are simple and straightforward.

In this fun and interactive presentation, we'll explore how our person-to-person communication system works, with special emphasis on its failure modes. We'll emphasize communication under stress, where the most expensive failures occur. And we might just change how some of us send and receive interpersonal communications.

Understanding how we communicate is not enough. We must have access to what we know in the moment, when we are deeply involved in problematic communication. That's why we use an experiential approach in which participants actually get out of their chairs and do things. The doing itself becomes practice and heightens understanding and retention.

Our approach is unusual. Far from the dry, laptop-driven format of most corporate presentations these days, the workshop is highly interactive and experiential. Not only is the method effective as a training tool, it's lively and fun.

This is one workshop that brings benefits to everyone. There's no need to segregate participants by profession, by specialty or by "org chart level" — in fact, this workshop gives your organization a way to bring together people from diverse parts of the organization.

Formats are available in lengths from one hour to one day. In the longer formats, we can go deeper, and the learning experience can be much more significant. But even in the shorter formats, participants regularly report that they had fun and learned a lot.

Here is a currently scheduled public event for this program:

Download to
your calendarColumbus, Ohio: July 10, Dinner Meeting, Central Ohio Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
 

If you would like to observe this event to help you evaluate the suitability of this program for your organization, please contact me to arrange for VIP admission.