ProMatch

I've been actively involved in creating and participating in a number of workshops for ProMatchers - who are professional people in job transition. My latest is to hold a regular Tuesday morning drop-in for people interested in advancing their job search and professional skills.  
 

Among the workshops I've offered (or been heavily involved with presenting):

• Jump Start Your Job Search:      
  •   this is the how and why of what you need to do.  
• Marketing (Branding) Yourself:    
  • Most people out of work don't know how to market their services.
  •  Also, when people think of marketing they tend to think of product marketing and service marketing is different - services are intangible and thus your image, reputation, and "free samples" become critical in how you sell yourself.   
• Self-Assessment Seminar:
  •  Knowing your wants, needs, values, interests help you decide  
• Strategies and Tactics for your Job Hunt
  • Lots of time, people just blindly do a bunch of chores without having an overall plan - that's what this workshop was designed to help.  
• Who are You?  Part I & Part II  
• • Part I:  How do you describe yourself professionally in a conversational manner (rather than the stylized elevator pitch we've all been taught to use.)
  • Part II:  "What's in it for Me?" - How do you answer the unspoken question posed by the person to whom you are speaking, whether that is someone with whom you are networking, or a recruiter/HR person or hiring manager?  
• Negotiation Skills for Women:     
  • Maybe part of why women don't earn as much as men is because they don't know how to ask for what they want. 
  • This is also one of the reasons I decided to start a new women's forum.  
• Getting Your Mojo Back 
• Being out of work is debilitating, depressing and frightening.  This workshop gave participants ideas for re-vitalizing themselves emotionally and psychologically as well as physically.
• Enhancing Your Professional Image:  Your Unique Brand
• This is about marketing services and employment - how to create a brand that takes in the perception you want to create, what you do, and what;s in it for the person to whom you are speaking.  This workshop is being repeated in August.
• Negotiation Strategies and Tactics
• In this workshop we will be using role-playing, fishbowl exercises, feedback and suggestions for those practicing their negotiation skills.
• Enhancing Your Professional Image:  Your Unique Brand - again
• WOW, we had about 50 people in attendance and actually spent an extra hour giving feedback to people as they offered their revised introductions and elevator speeches.  Lots of feedback that this was an outstanding experience - and people want me to come back and do more for them regularly.

Campaign Consulting and Involvement

Diamond Associates' team is now fully launched supporting several candidates for office.  Our Treasurer is helping several candidates, our events consultant is speaking with a few candidates to help them with meet and greets and fundraisers - and of course I am offering my ideas about persuasion, image, and messaging with several people running for office.  

Consulting Clients:  Individuals and Organizations

Lest I forget:  I am still earning money by consulting and offering workshops to organizations, private, public and government and also working with some individuals wishing aid with their professional development.  Truth of the matter is, these are my major activities.  Your referrals are always appreciated - and in this slowly climbing out of the recession - needed.

Stanford University, Continuing Education: Conflict in the Workplace

 Books - Published  

Leading and Managing in a Global Economy -                   Super Star Press 

Conflict in the Workplace:  Causes and Cures      Robertson Publishing Co.

The following books can be ordered directly: www.ProductivePublications.com  

Training Your Board of Directors:  A Manual for the CEOs, Board Members, Administrators and Executives of Corporations, Associations, Non-Profit and Religious Organizations.  

The "Please" and "Thank You" of  Fundraising for Non-Profits:  Fifteen Essential Ingredients for Success.

Shameless Self-Promotion:

My videographer and friend Carlos Cruz has started a series of programs he is calling Titanslaws.  He interviewed me as part of his series - and this is the link.

http://titanslaws.com/webcast/episode-1-Interpersonal-Relationships-in-a-Global-Environment.php

Resolving Workplace Conflict

Since this seems to be my topic for the month - why not talk about what I teach. 

Most conflict is minor - a misunderstanding, a tiff, a disagreement, something easily resolved through conversation.  Yet, we seem to be so about "zero tolerance" that no matter how small we react as though it were major.

What I teach is how to listen neutrally, try to learn the different sides of the story - and that's very hard to do since the tendency in all of us is to believe the first person's story - so that means we tend to believe the person making the accusation without taking into account that what we are hearing is their perception, often distorted, frequently exaggerated to convince us, but only one side of the story.

Unless the allegation is egregious (a felony - rape, murder, drug usage on site, etc.) most of the time the proper way to resolve it is to bring the parties together and help them work it out.  Technically, this is called mediation.

Sometimes there is too much anger or pain and you make the decision to first separate them and act as a go-between trying to help each side calm down and gain some perspective - this is called conciliation. 

At some point you feel comfortable asking them to meet face to face.  At that point, you move from conciliator to mediator and help them resolve it.  I teach how to do this! 

If you are successful mediating they can go back to work and inform their allies (teams) that all is well.  You have now avoided tension among groups of people, as well as the protagonists themselves.

See the value?

This is so much better than playing judge and jury and "arbitrating" the dispute.  No one is happy when you make the decision for them.  You have now added to the polarization of the people that are allies with each of the parties.

All managers and all HR professionals ought to be taught how to do a neutral investigation, and mediation and arbitration.  This can be accomplished in a one day training with lots of practice.

Neutrality

As I said, it is so easy to believe the first person coming in the door.  Here are a few other biases that we all have and need to fight against.  This is from an article "58 Cognitive biases that screw up everything we do" by Drake Baer and Gus Lubin, in Business Insider.

Affect heuristic:           The way you feel filters the way you interpret the world - for example, if you are hungry your focus will be on food and other things coming your way might be ignored.

Anchoring bias:           Going against the norm, the example is that you are better off in a negotiation if you make the first offer.

Confirmation bias:       We tend to listen only to the information that confirms our preconceptions.  (This is my point about how hard it is to be neutral.)

Observer-expectancy effect:   Looking for a result, you only see those things that confirm that result and never notice, or deny those that don't.

Bias blind spots:          Failure to recognize your cognitive biases is a bias in itself.

Galatea Effect:            Where people succeed or underperform depending on their self-perception - in other words where they think they should.

Inter-group bias:          To view people in our group differently from how we see someone in another group.

Negativity bias:            The tendency to put more emphasis on negative experiences rather than positive ones.  People with this bias feel that "bad is stronger than good" - this is also where it becomes easier to believe the bad about people than it is to believe the good.

Ostrich effect:              Sticking your head in the sand rather than paying attention to dangerous or negative information.

Planning fallacy:          the tendency to underestimate how much time it will take to complete the task

Selective perception:   allowing our expectations to influence how we perceive the world.

Advice from CISCO:

Apparently CISCO advised their employees how to conduct an investigation as follows:

• Maintain confidentiality, discretion, and above all neutrality throughout the investigation.
• Promote witness candor by assuring no retaliation and holding interviews in an appropriate location.
• Be mindful about the details you reveal about the complaint.
• Always begin with open-ended questions and avoid loaded or inflammatory language.
• Protect confidentiality to the fullest extent possible.
• Be thorough.

So, How Can I help you?