Consulting fundamentals
In this highly participative programme, you will learn the consulting techniques and skills that are a prerequisite in consulting:
- Understand your consulting style and how to work effectively together in teams
- Increase your awareness of the business context and commercial drivers
- Use best practice frameworks to develop your strategic thinking and analysis
- Understand and practice the fundamentals of good conversation with clients
- Strengthen critical key communication skills around listening, advocating ideas, inquiry, coaching, storytelling, meeting management and facilitation.
- Know how to gain the client͛s commitment to your ideas and recommendations
- Identify mental models and bias and understand their impact on decision making
- To understand the sources of creativity and strengthen your creative thinking
- Learn about personal and organisational change and how to influence them
- Recognise the factors to affecting successful change and overcoming resistance
- Strengthen your coaching skills and know how to support clients through change
- Strengthen the ability to develop propositions to illustrate and demonstrate your and your organisation͛s competencies to your client
- To be able to surface further opportunities to contribute from current work by deepening empathy and understanding of client needs and stakeholder politics
What the Programme will cover
Participants recognise and be able to adapt their consulting style and mental models, see the broader strategic context, analyse and articulate strategically and develop a roadmap for change. They will strengthen their client development capabilities and be able to gain buy-in to their ideas, recommendations and propositions.
Strategy and change analysis and management tools
- Understanding and mapping the broader business context
- Analysing and current strategy and potential future state
- Managing personal and organisational change
Self-awareness, thinking and creativity
- Analysing and owning your personal consulting style
- Recognising and managing your mental models and bias and your client͛s
- Strengthening creativity and brainstorming approaches
- Developing lasting client relationships
Communication
- Mastering key influencing phases of executive conversations
- Developing inquiry strategies and questioning techniques
- Advocating a point of view and gaining buy-in to recommendations
- Using coaching to empower colleagues and clients
- Managing and facilitating meetings
- Using storytelling to engage and influence
- Developing and articulating compelling propositions
How individuals and organisations benefit from this programme
Participants will be:
- Able to maximise their contribution to any consulting type project or strategic and change conversations.
- More self-aware and engaging around clients and colleagues.
- Able to integrate ideas with existing company processes and projects.
Organisations will:
- Increase team productivity and client impact through common tools and approaches.
How we will embed learning
- Workshops with managers on the leadership and processes required to maximise ROI.
- Use of online orientations and process and tool overviews before any face to face training.
- Participants work in teams on a case study (optional technology based gaming and simulation).
- Highly experiential exercises and roleplays interspersed with tutor coaching, debriefs and peer reviews.
- All case learning, processes and tools are applied to real world situations and integrated with existing approaches.
- Follow up coaching on live projects with online resources, reference videos and articles.
