OUR COURSES AND PROGRAMS
Communication & Interpersonal Skills
- Customer Contact Skills
- Selection Interviewing Skills
- Analytical Interviewing Skills
- Intercultural Awareness and Communication
- Business Presentation Skills
Customer Contact Skills
This course teaches customer contact skills to Sales, Call Centers, and Field Service Representatives who interact with customers or potential customers, must present a positive image of the company, solve problems under stressful conditions, and generally provide added value to the organization’s products and services.
The focus of this program is placed on both the internal and external customer. The program has been effective for both private and government sector audiences.
Audience: Customer Liaison, Sales Liaison, Customer Service, Sales and Sales Management staff at any level, as well as others with customer interface.
Customizable Format |
Duration |
|---|---|
| Classroom Instruction | 1 or 2 days |
| E-Learning | 30- to 45-minute modules |
| Trainer or manager led self- instruction | Self-paced |
Objectives
- Question more effectively to learn customer's needs.
- Listen more actively and clarify and confirm what the customer is saying.
- Make more effective use of your time during customer contact.
- Develop more consultative customer relationships.
- Use a process for handling irate or difficult customers.
- Follow up more consistently.
Topics
- Customer Service Style Self-Assessment
- Developing a Customer Profile
- Developing and Using a Customer Service Model for the Organization
- Handling Irate Customers, Emergencies, and Complaints
- Building Positive and Profitable Customer Relationships
Related Materials
- Assessment: Customer Service Style Self-Assessment
Selection Interviewing Skills
This behavioral interviewing program has been developed from Dr. Marvin Gottlieb’s very successful book, Interview, which is used in college classrooms and training sessions across the U.S. and abroad. Participants are provided with the basic components of selection interviewing to help ensure that candidates fit the job requirements and the culture of the organization. The course covers four basic principles of candidate selection and provides practice with questioning sequences, evaluating a resume, and surfacing personality characteristics. Participants are also provided with guidelines to avoid questions that cannot be asked legally.
This workshop can be customized to emphasize performance appraisals and exit interviewing.
Audience: Human Resources Recruiters, Managers, Supervisors, and other staff who have a responsibility for interviewing or hiring staff.
Customizable Format |
Duration |
|---|---|
| Classroom Instruction | 1 day |
| E-Learning | 30- to 45-minute modules |
| Trainer or manager led self- instruction | Self-paced |
Objectives
- How to select the people to interview.
- Getting the information you need in order to make a good decision.
- Framing questions to elicit the broadest range of response.
- Separating truth from fiction.
- How to stay within the law.
Topics
- The Interview Process
- The Four Key Areas to Build Questions Around
- Active Listening to Encourage Full Response
- Sex, Age, Race, Handicap: What Can You Ask?
Related Materials
- Book: Interview, by Marvin Gottlieb, PhD (2nd Ed., 1998)
- Book:
Managing the Workplace Survivors: Organizational
Downsizing and the Commitment Gap, by Marvin Gottlieb and Lori Conkling (1995)
Analytic Interviewing Skills
This course will provide the participants with the necessary techniques and strategies during the fact-finding interview to get the required information and build working relationships. The course focuses on understanding the needs and expectations of the interviewee as crucial to building rapport and trust while maintaining control. Drawing from the college text, Interview, by Dr. Marvin Gottlieb, the course covers the three phases of the interview process, questioning, and listening, and how personality styles impact the interaction.
Participants identify their own consulting style using The Communication Project’s online Consulting Style Inventory. The program offers face-to-face interview practice with a series of role-plays, which may be customized to the client industry through the development and use of a case study.
This workshop can be customized to emphasize investigative interviewing, employment interviewing, performance appraisals, and discipline interviewing.
Audience: Management consultants, Researchers, Human Resources professionals, Managers, Supervisors, and other staff who must conduct interviews on a regular basis.
Customizable Format |
Duration |
|---|---|
| Classroom Instruction | 1 or 2 days |
| E-Learning | 30- to 45-minute modules |
| Trainer or manager led self- instruction | Self-paced |
Objectives
- How to prepare for interviews.
- How to define interview objectives and strategies.
- How to conduct interviews and maintain control through skillful listening and questioning.
- How to take notes and summarize findings
Topics
- Types of Interview
- The Interview Process
- Questioning Skills and Strategies
- Power Listening
- Team and Telephone Interviews
- The Impact of Personal Styles
Related Materials
- Book: Interview, by Marvin Gottlieb, PhD (2nd Ed., 1998)
- Assessment: Consulting Style Inventory
Intercultural Awareness and Communication
This course is designed for anyone who needs to communicate effectively in an intercultural setting. It focuses on identifying potential personal “blind spots” regarding culture and illustrates the steps for developing a “cultural IQ.”
Participants are given a self-assessment to measure their level of current openness to the barriers that cultural differences create in both personal and business communication situations. They are introduced to the four major cultural influencers: monochromic bias, polychromic bias, individualist bias, and group-centered bias. By examining cultural dialogues that misfire, the participants learn strategies for minimizing communication failure and repairing damage created through cultural insensitivity.
Audience: Managers, Supervisors, Consultants, Customer Service, and anyone working in multicultural groups or in offshore locations.
Customizable Format |
Duration |
|---|---|
| Classroom Instruction | 1 day |
| E-Learning | 30- to 45-minute modules |
| Trainer or manager led self- instruction | Self-paced |
Objectives
- Understand the major cultural influences that affect communication.
- Recognize disconnects in cross-cultural dialogues.
- Recognize when our own cultural orientation is influencing our behavior.
- Identify and practice a variety of communication behaviors to ensure understanding.
- Become aware of key features and biases of our own culture.
- Become more comfortable with culturally diverse situations.
- Interpret cultural behaviors that are different from our own.
- Transfer learning about one culture to understanding another.
Topics
- Defining cultural “IQ”
- Knowing yourself
- Managing cultural differences
- Case study of intercultural dialogues
- Role play, action planning
Related Materials
- Book: Interview, by Marvin Gottlieb, PhD (2nd Ed., 1998)
- Assessment: Johari Window
Business Presentation Skills
This program walks the participant through the development and delivery of an effective business presentation. Each step of the process is covered, from analyzing the audience, through developing a topic, aspects of delivery including voice quality and body language, and types of visual aids. Participants will have ample time to develop and deliver short presentations and receive feedback from the group.
Audience: Managers and Supervisors, Sales, Marketing, Technical, and other staff who make presentations on a regular basis.
Customizable Format |
Duration |
|---|---|
| Classroom Instruction | 1 or 2 days |
| E-Learning | 30- to 45-minute modules |
| Trainer or manager led self- instruction | Self-paced |
Objectives
- To develop an understanding of the audience, its needs, expectations, and how to approach it more effectively.
- How to develop and organize persuasive presentations supported with appropriate media.
- To practice developing and delivering short presentations and receive feedback from the group.
Topics
- Understanding Your Audience
- Organization and the Motivated Sequence
- Presentation Delivery: Audience, Body Language, Voice
- Opening and Closing Techniques
- Types of Visual Aids