Communication is key – it’s how we articulate ideas, how we ask for what we need and how we gain what we need from others
“The more elaborate our means of communication, the less we communicate” – Joseph Priestly
At Archimedes, we draw on years of experience in business communication – from working with the person sitting next to us to those on the other side of the world.
Our communications training includes:
Interview skills - Young People
Gaining a competitive edge
It’s often a stressful time for young people when they have interviews for university places, industrial placements (internships), or first jobs. Competition for places and for jobs is fierce. So preparing for interviews and progression stages often represents the biggest pressure situation, with the highest stakes of their young lives.
We can help young people to build their skills and confidence to deal with this and maximise their chances of success.
Coaching, by definition, is tailored to the individual but we can cover topics such as:
- Online psychological behavioural profiling to assess their behavioural style and to coach them in their “default” styles, to help understand their strengths, build confidence and understand the best job fits for their style and to be adaptable.
- Working to develop a practical plan that reflects their goals and aspirations that is action orientated and motivating to them.
- Helping deal with nerves / shyness in interviews / presentations / public scenarios. Reviewing / reflecting how they come across, body language, tone, words, phraseology and learning techniques and approaches to ensure that they create a positive first impression and can be more comfortable and confident within themselves.
- Interview practice; give young people 121 mock interviews, with video feedback that helps them practice dealing with questions, pressure and stress. Video feedback is key to learning from self-review rather than instruction.
- Briefing on key areas of interviews such as competency-based interviewing, panel interviews and assessment centres. Helping them develop a repertoire of responses and examples to help optimise these scenarios.
- Industry insight; giving young people a fast track to sounding / being knowledgeable on key commercial roles and industries that they are applying to. What the key dynamics are in major industries, what employers are looking for, key terminology, main current topics.
Complete flexibility
The coaching can be one session or several, face to face or using remote coaching software. It can cover one topic or several; the whole idea with coaching is that it is designed to meet the needs of the individual!
“Doing the mock interview was really worthwhile; it made me realise exactly where I need to improve for my university entrance interview!” Florence -6th Former
“Seeing myself on video was horrible at first but it really helped me see what I say and do and how to improve how I come across for my job interview” Jamie- University graduate
“It made me think about all the questions I’d get for my internship interview and practice how best to articulate my answers; I also feel much more positive and confident.” Alexander- University undergraduate
Interview skills - Adult coaching
Many people haven’t attended an interview for a number of years – possible never even had a formal interview! Whether you are returning to work after having children, or a long career break, looking to gain a promotion in your existing company, or simply want a change, competition for promotion and new jobs is fierce. Preparing for interviews and progression stages often represents the biggest pressure situation, with the highest stakes of your life.
Archimedes is here to help people to build their skills and confidence to deal with this and maximise your chances of success.
Coaching, by definition, is tailored to the individual but we can cover topics such as:
- Online psychological behavioural profiling to assess behavioural style and to coach in your “default” styles, to help understand your strengths, build confidence and understand the best job fits for your style and to be adaptable.
- Working to develop a practical plan that reflects your goals and aspirations that is action orientated and motivating to you.
- Helping deal with nerves / shyness in interviews / presentations / public scenarios. Reviewing / reflecting how you come across including body language, tone, words, phraseology and learning techniques and approaches to ensure that you create a positive first impression and can be more comfortable and confident within yourself.
- Interview practice; 121 mock interviews, with video feedback that helps you practice dealing with questions, pressure and stress. Video feedback is key to learning from self-review rather than instruction.
- Briefing on key areas of interviews such as competency-based interviewing, panel interviews and assessment centres. Helping develop a repertoire of responses and examples to optimise these scenarios.
- Industry insight; giving a fast track to sounding / being knowledgeable on key commercial roles and industries. What the key dynamics are in major industries, what employers are looking for, key terminology, main current topics.
Emotional Intelligence
Managing emotions at work can often be difficult, especially when a business is failing to hit targets and goals. However, Archimedes Consulting offer emotional intelligence training that has helped many businessmen and women in the past.
We believe emotional intelligence training can really help you to become more effective when working with or managing people.
We will typically cover:
- What is the role of emotion at work?
- How does emotion affect decision making?
- Where do beliefs, values and personality fit in with this?
- Personally?
- With others?
- What impact does your communication have on the emotions of others?
- What impact does the communication of others have on you?
How we handle our emotions at work changes as we progress through our careers. Age can bring maturity and experience but it can also bring additional pressures and a changing outlook on life in general.
We offer:
- The Archimedes “Psychology @ Work” programme to help participants to understand basic psychology – how people deliver and receive communication.
- 1:1 Coaching on techniques and how to apply them to help with challenging situations or people.
- 1:1 Coaching on handling work emotions and anger management.
It may be that one of the reasons you’re having to manage emotional people is because other areas of the business need support or that there are in fact underlying conflicts that need resolving. Combining our emotional intelligence training with our sales and presentation services may be worthwhile. Please contact us directly if you’d like to discuss any of the above with a member of our team.
Handling conflict and challenging conversations
At some point there will be conflict between colleagues, their peers and/or their managers – it is human nature and can be very difficult to control. Avoiding and failing to resolve the conflict or getting involved in an escalating conflict situation are neither effective or helpful situations for business.
Our programme can be designed to specifically fit your business’ needs but can include elements of:
- Transactional analysis – understanding and using the different ways of interacting with others (parent – adult – child) and how to manage the communication or transaction to the best effect.
- Understanding different behavioural styles (the DiSC behavioural analysis) and how they can lead to conflict and how style flexibility can help avoid or resolve those conflicts.
- Communication skills to manage conflict, reflective listening, acknowledging, exploring, empathy and responding
- Dealing with challenging emotions in yourself and others.
These sessions are very interactive and skill and participation based. Deploying and practising the skills is what critically makes a difference.
It’s not what you say, but how you say it!
Influence and persuasion
We talk about the need to be influential in a business in our sections about Sales and Presentation. However, the skills that are needed to be more influential at work are founded in the way that we communicate and those in turn affect sales and presentations, not the other way around.
Some key questions to consider:
- Why do some people always seem to get what they want and need and others struggle?
- What makes someone really influential?
- Do you understand and apply the principles of influence?
- Is being influential born or made?
- Can you be influential without being manipulative?
- How do you get in sync with people and build rapport with them?
- Do you have to be an extrovert to be influential?
- Why is it easier to sell to customers than influence internal colleagues?
These topics are covered in our influence and persuasion training
- Influencing skills audit
- Establishing rapport
- Understanding the principles and methods of influence
- Understanding people’s behavioural styles – including the use of DiSC profiling
- Identifying the causes of internal politics
- Understanding the principles of internal networking and stakeholder management
- Developing an influencing strategy
Webinars and remote communication
How do we need to adapt communication styles to remote teams? It’s not possible to just pop into an office, or have a chat over lunch or coffee, and everything you’ve learnt about body language and tone of voice is no longer relevant in an email conversation. With more and more people working at least part time from home, these skills are becoming more important.
How can you get the most out of your webinars? You want people to fully listen to what you have to say, rather than flit in and out from an obligation.
Too often when people attend webinars or remote meetings, they are “multitasking” – reading emails or doing other work while “listening”. All the research shows this is highly ineffective. We focus on how you use technology, your voice, and visuals to keep attendees engaged and fully participating in remote communications
Our training will help you manage both remote and virtual teams and to know how to engage and keep engaged remote audience in conference calls and webinars.
Training sessions
We can deliver training in a classroom or workshop format or remotely via innovative remote coaching software. We work at your location and work with individual staff members 121 or an entire team, working closely with you to provide a solution that best suits your needs.
Whether it’s honing your internal influencing skills or improving office politics, our communication skills training programme is here to help. If there are any issues that are affecting your business that we haven’t covered here, please get in touch with a member of the Archimedes team and we will be happy to discuss these with you.