Our employee engagement programs focus on helping organizations embed engagement into their strategic thinking, leadership practices and daily work practices.   Integrating engagement into your organizations business strategy links department and work group engagement activities to the bottom-line and focuses engagement on specific targeted improvement areas and priorities.

We help clients build a high engagement culture through:

1. 1.       On-Site Engagement Assessment

An outside perspective and experienced set of eyes can be extremely helpful.  This 2 to 3 day process uses management interviews and focus groups to shed light on attitudes and barriers to increased employee engagement.  A summary report includes recommendations on strategies and steps to build employee engagement into your daily work activities and practices. 

Connecting Engagement to the Bottom Line

Our unique approach to engagement links employee engagement efforts to the organization’s business strategic goals and improvement priorities.  This 2 to 3 hour management discussion identifies the strategic link between employee engagement and the core vision and values of the organization.  A follow-up action plan then provides a roadmap for building engagement into the priorities and daily activities of the organization.

“Leading through Engagement” Leadership Workshop  

This 2 day highly interactive workshop is for front-line managers, supervisors and team leaders.  Starting with what motivates and engages people; this workshop focuses on leadership tools and practices that drive high engagement.    The result is that leaders have the tools to immediately enlist and engage their people in improving the efficiency and productivity of their work unit or group. 

Accelerate Change Implementation through Employee Engagement

We have been planning and facilitating high engagement forums and events for the past 20 years.  Our expertise includes the facilitation of department and large group engagement off-sites and action planning forums.  Employee involvement is critical to gaining buy-in to a change or new strategic direction.  We will work with you to clarify your change objectives and design a highly interactive and collaborative approach to engaging your people. 

This process is suited to both large and small groups in face-to-face meetings.  The AI framework can be applied to a variety of interventions such as: strategic planning, performance problem solving, diversity issues, organisational and business process redesign, implementing mergers and transforming work cultures. 

 Why use it?

The positive, affirming nature of Appreciative Inquiry, where people discover and then build on the “root causes of success” rather than dissect problems, can be a powerful stimulus to change. It’s non-threatening and empowering. It taps into the knowledge and energy of internal experts. 

Appreciative Inquiry is a highly successful tool that contributes to team building, and discovers, expands and sustains the best of what an organization can offer. It allows continuity with what has worked well in the past and respects unique cultures that are successful in their own way. AI can be used as a stand alone process or  integrated into other facilitation processes.  AI’s flexible and constructive approach makes it appropriate for a broad range of purposes and can change the focus of any meeting from dissecting problems to harnessing excellence.

Get out of the Busyness of Business. 

Between yesterdays deadlines, tomorrows challenges and constant interruptions it has become more and more difficult to shift focus from what we are working on to how we work together.  This is one of the reasons we work with horses – something completely different from what anyone has every done before. The relaxed rural setting and the intrigue of figuring out how to build a partnership with a 1200 lb animal is amazingly effective at keeping everyone focused on the activities of the day.

The pace that modern teams are under is incredible –getting more done with fewer resources in less time than ever before can lead to burnout and breakdowns unless they gat a chance to focus on the critical skills needed  for working together effectively. 

Become a High Performance Team

In this highly engaging and experiential program your team will have a chance to experience moving through all the stages of becoming a high performance team in one day. 

Every step includes ample opportunity for reflection and action planning to ensure an extremely high learning transfer.

Mary was so focused on Cody that she forgot to check on where they were going. Mary had a huge epiphany – her team wasn’t achieving their goals and were constantly asking her for direction – she was doing her best to support and encourage them but the results were not there – she was so focused on supporting her team she had forgotton how to guide them.

Mary learned that she and Cody could traverse a complex obstacle course together when she stopped constantly reassuring her horse. She discovered that every time she checked in on Cody he interpreted that as a lack of confidence and she learned when she set reasonable boundaries and lead by example she never ran into a wall again!

A few months after the session Mary emailed us to tell us that not only was her team performing better but she had been promoted and she was sure that the short walk with Cody was the key to her success.

Mary discovered that she was not having the influence on her team that she intended. She learned how to stop interpreting feedback through the lens of intention. She learned to stop focusing so much on the message she was sending and start focusing more on the message that others were receiving.

Best of all Mary learned all this in a few hours while she was having an amazing experience with her peers. She was amazed at how many “Aha” moments the group shared at the end of the day – every person seemed to get something different from the program. For some it was simply learning to listen to body language, for others it was the importance of debriefing as a learning tool, for many it was simply an increase in their own confidence in themselves as leaders.

I was watching this video taken at the farm four years ago and realized that here is a perfect study in engagement. 

Watch the video – and pay attention to your first impressions…

Did you enjoy it? I do – and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen it.

What really stands out is how engaged Rowan is with that ball. Imagine how difficult it would have been to “train” him to do this. 

If you look at some of the comments you’ll see how many people there are wishing they had a horse that was “trained” to do this – some are even looking for tips.

The real story is what happened before this video was taken. Rowan was terrified of the big purple ball – he would snort and race in the other direction every time he saw it.  Truly – you would think the darn thing was out to get him!

What did it take to shift from fear to engagement? It took Vicki – Rowan’s amazing owner. Let’s look at what Vicki did through the lens of employee engagement.

Vicki led by example – no matter how fussed Rowan got about the ball Vicki stayed calm – in fact she spent time in the arena with Rowan loose while she bounced the ball around herself.

VIcki created a climate of safety -she never forced Rowan to interact with the ball.

Vicki create opportunities for Rowan to be successful. The ball started on the far side of the fence, then when Rowan was OK with that it moved to the ring but out of the way, then to a more central location until finally Rowan stopped worrying about it.

VIcki allowed Rowan to take initiative = even when it wasn’t convenient for her. Did you notice the saddle on Rowan’s back? Vicki was testing that out when Rowan suddenly got interested in the ball – instead of reprimanding him for lack of attention she took advantage of his initiative, dismounted and let Rowan take the lead.

Vicki gave Rowan freedom within set boundaries. As the leader Vicki set the boundaries (the tape fence that you see) and created challenges (the arch)- so she could focus Rowan’s efforts. Control shuts down engagement while boundaries and goals focus it.

In the end Rowan developed a new talent that we would have never known about. The relationship between Rowan and VIcki got stronger. Rowan completely eliminated his fear of exercise balls and did eventually try out the saddle. The whole experience with the ball only took a few minutes – but it created a world of new possibilities.

This reminds me of great leaders -  you can spot them more by how engaged their people are – often they are just standing on the sidelines cheering just like you hear Vicki doing in the video.  This is the kind of engagement I would love to see more of in the workforce.

Watch the video again – and then let me know what you think.

If you would like a chance for you or your team to learn about engagement from some of Rowan’s friends just let me know.

Hope you are enjoying this lovely sunny day.

Sharon

Up to now companies have relied on periodic change projects and suggestion programs while failing to continually surface the ideas and the desire of people to eliminate the things that they know are getting in the way of doing their work in the most efficient and effective way possible.

This workshop provides you with a management system for building continuous improvement into everyone’s daily job requirements. It requires leaders to spend time every day observing work processes, talking with employees, assessing improvement ideas, leading problem solving teams and implementing changes. Based on the work of David Mann of Steelcase, author of “Creating a Lean Culture” (Productivity Press) this insightful and practical workshop teaches department heads, managers and supervisors how to shift the focus of their time from “running” to “improving” the work of their units.

Learn to apply an integrated set of steps and methods for engaging employees in making incremental improvements to their work areas and jobs. See how a core set of leadership practices can be used to identify improvement opportunities and hold everyone accountable for implementing the needed changes. Learn to sustain the effort by having 3 levels of leadership directly involved and accountable for follow-through and the implementation of positive change.

With more and more positive experiences, people start to have beleive that their ideas will not fill some bottom drawer or be looked at “when we get time”. A new sense of partnership between managers and employees emerges as everyone focuses on what is most important – improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the work and ensuring the highest possble customer satisfaction. With leaders who listen and value their input, the level of engagement, enthusiasm and effort will quickly lead to the transformation of attitudes and the implementation of positive changes.

Course Objectives:

• Help leaders to engage employees and implement a results oriented continuous improvement process
• Provide a view of leadership as coaches and facilitators committed to organizational learning and improvement
• Demonstrate how the daily Standard Work for Leaders can drive consistency and continuous improvement
• Simulate the application of an integrated set of tools for engaging employees in continuous incremental improvements
• Ensure that employee engagement initiatives are supported and positive changes implemented

Topics include:

• The problem with periodic improvement projects and programs
• Making continuous improvement a part of everyone’s job and accountability
• Balancing the time and effort to run the business versus improve it
• Steps to engaging employees in reducing errors, waste and inefficiencies
• Shifting leadership thinking to support and faciliate employee input and idea generation
• Hands-on simulation of continuous improvement tools and methods
• Application of continuous improvement to production,office, support and client service department
• Actioin planning to implement a continuous improvement process in participant work areas and units

Getting your message through sounds simple but can be extremely frustrating and difficult. Difficult people, misunderstandings, different styles and mindsets can all get in the way.Learn to overcome these obstacles and communicate in a way that is clear, non-threatening and encourages constructive two-way dialogue.

Go beyond the basics and understand the underlying factors that both help and hinder communication. Learn to appreciate differences and talk to others in a way that they will hear, appreciate and support what you are saying. Communicate in a way that increases your ability to plan, problem solve and make decisions with others. 

Become aware of how you impact people – your thinking, body language, tone and words.  Apply new ways of working with others remove barriers and facilitate mutual understanding. Practice managing difficult conversations in ways that promote working together to resolve issues and problems.

Course Objectives:

• Understand how you impact others and where you get in trouble
• Communicate in ways that promote mutual understanding and two-way dialogue
• Overcome obstacles and manage difficult conversations

Topics include:

• Communication styles and how we impact others
• Mindsets and how they influence our listening and understanding
• Communicating across different style and thinking
• Using non-threatening body language and tone to promote trust
• Shfiting out of negative, critical communication patterns
• Redirect conversations to focus on shared goals and possibilities
• Effectively managing difficult conversations

You are on the fast track to success.

Your career is progressing steadily and you have been told you have leadership potential. You know you can have a larger impact in the future, but it will require a broader scope of vision and sphere of influence than you have cultivated in the past. You are poised to take the leap. How do you better prepare yourself to make this critical transition?

The Leadership Accelerator is an extraordinary, unconventional experience. Consider investing one day of your professional life to enhance your success as a leader. Reflect on your individual leadership style and develop a plan to expand your comfort zone. Strengthen your influencing skills and learn how to use power constructively. Identify systemic factors in your work environment and in your own behaviour that can work against your plans.

Our objective is to develop your leadership capacity. Our unique learning model helps you to increase your personal understanding and also to close the gap between this understanding and effective action. You will develop a practical and personal action plan to implement immediately upon your return.

What to Expect

A series of innovative sessions on practices and processes, through case discussions, exercises, games, role plays, and group coaching, will increase your leadership potential.  In this program you will have the option of observing and/or participating in experiential exercises that involve developing a leadership relationship with horses.   Our leadership clients tell us that this is the most important component of the program – and the feedback they receive and the lessons they learn are not only powerful but often life changing.

Moving from Awareness to Action

On your return to the job you have the chance to put into practice the strategies and skills you have learned. You will implement an action plan, and identify a peer coach to work with.  During on line post session group dialogue you will examine your progress, fine-tune and re-strategize.

Key benefits

• Gain valuable insight into your leadership style and its impact
• Develop a more constructive use of leadership power allowing for more effective behaviour and results as a leader
• Become a more effective change agent, facilitating an increase in positive results from senior level initiatives.

Your leadership style is crucial to your success. Consciously, or subconsciously, your preferences, values, experiences and beliefs combine to create a style of leadership that is unique – a style that likely has contributed significantly to your success – and a style that contains blindspots and weaknesses that may be frustrating to others and are impacting your performance. 

You can become a more impactful and effective leader once you’ve had a chance to assess your leadership style, appreciating and capitalizing on your strengths, learn how to communicate with different styles and identify and plan for working with your blindspots.

This program is perfect for everyone who wants to understand more about the impact their style has on others.  Are you ready to maximize your influence?.

Course Objectives

• Provide an opportunity to personally evaluate your current leadership style and the leadership style of others
• Gain an understanding of the impact different leadership styles have on individuals, teams and the organisation as a whole.
• Maximize the use of your leadership strengths and be able to build positive work relations with people whose style is different than yours

Key Learnings:

• Understanding your leadership style strengths and blindspots
• Assess the impact of your leadership style on others
• Appreciate and value differences in leadership style
• Identify sources of conflict linked to your style
• Adapt your style to maximize your impact and influence
• Utilize differences in style as the basis for synergy and teamwork