A world class leadership programme

01 Content

What We Teach

It's almost impossible to describe what content people will cover during the programme; everyone's needs are unique so everyone gets a unique experience tailored to them.

Because of the highly personalised 360° analysis and 1-to-1 coaching the programme becomes an almost bespoke course for everyone who takes it.

However these are some of the core areas covered.

1. Management vs Leadership

   Leadership is the closest thing in business to a magic bullet. It’s applicable to almost every situation. But the way most business people view leadership is askew. Leadership is not just something used in extraordinary circumstances by exceptional people. Leadership is something that should happen everyday in ordinary situations. Any time people interact there is an opportunity for Leadership: whether you're running errands or running a company.

   Management is typically about reward and punishment. Leadership is about inspiring people to action. Which do you think gets the best results?

   The trouble is, leadership is hard work. It’s much easier to blame everyone else or give someone a rollocking. But is anything worth having easy? We show participants the skills and techniques they need and support them to do the hard work of implementing them.

   1. What makes some people inspirational and others not
   2. The most important factor in leadership
   3. Techniques to be an inspirational leader

2. Feedback

   Feedback is one of the most important tools for a leader. Why do most people struggle with it?

   You've probably noticed that people usually fall into only giving the type of feedback that feels most comfortable for them. For some it's positive feedback and for others it's critical feedback. They do whichever feels easier to them and avoid the one that makes them feel awkward.

   But being able to give both positive and critical feedback is necessary to develop people.

   To be a great leader and get the best performance out of people you need to be comfortable giving all kinds of feedback and give it in the right way and in the right mix. People need to feel valued but they also need to work on their weaker areas.

   We teach participants how, why and when to give feedback and the exact techniques for doing it successfully. So that people accept the feedback and are not put out by it but appreciate it and it inspires them to work harder.

   1. Delivering constructive criticism in a positive way and getting great results
   2. Giving people positive feedback that makes them feel amazing
   3. How you can use feedback to achieve unheard of performance

3. Attitude

   We cover the difference between Knowledge, Skills & Attitude. A great deal of the course is about our own attitudes. We need to change the way we think in order to change our behaviours.

   Attitude makes the difference between an inspirational leader and a boss. If you can’t control your own attitude to someone cutting you up on the journey into work how can you expect to do it when someone frustrates you in the workplace. Your behaviours need to be consistent, practised every day in all situations, not just when it suits.

   1. Why we do what we do and why we don’t do what we don’t do
   2. Getting off autopilot and developing awareness of the 100s of decisions we make every day
   3. How thoughts can become a mood, and a mood, if left unchecked, can become our personality
   

   We cannot change our past. We cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes.

   Charles R. Swindoll, Author

4. Implementation

   Too many people read all the books or take the courses but never put it into practice. Or if they do it never lasts long term. We work with people to make sure they use the skills and develop lasting habits.

   1. Developing Values, guidelines for living a positive life, and having a positive affect on those around you
   2. Real world application of leadership theory
   3. How to carry on all the great behaviours into the future, as well as what to do when the wheels come off

5. Coaching and Developing People

   Participants learn how to develop and motivate others around them (including suppliers, customers and bosses) which means the effects of the course ripple out through an organisation improving the performance of more than just those on the course.

   1. Why we struggle to understand others’ behaviours and motivations
   2. Getting people performing at the top of their game
   3. Developing high performance teams

6. Communication

   We teach people to be exceptional communicators.

   Communication is obviously another massive part of leadership. We give participants techniques of what to say, when and how to say it. Of course we also cover what not to say!

   1. Tell anyone anything and get positive results
   2. The art and science of great communication
   3. Insight and techniques to become an extraordinary communicator

7. Presentation Skills

   Going through the programme hugely improves a participant's confidence and ability to present in front of people.

   We have developed simple structures which participants can build their presentations around, so they're confident in what they are going to say. The constant exposure to presenting week after week inevitably builds confidence.

   People who start the course terrified of standing up in front of their classmates end up giving extravagant presentations in front of strangers by the time the course ends.

   1. Developing Confidence
   2. Structuring a Presentation
   3. Speaking without Notes

02 Structure

The course structure is as important as the content. You may know the ingredients but a recipe is useless without the method.

You can’t learn karate at a one-day workshop

No one ever took one karate class and thought: I know karate!

So why do we do it with business skills?

You can't work on something for a day and compete with people who've been doing it for years. It takes consistent work. Learning, practice and feedback.

Management and leadership are no different. Which is why our programmes are unlike run-of-the-mill, traditional management training.

Traditional management training is better than nothing but usually only provides enthusiasm and change in behaviour for a couple of days or a couple of weeks at best. If at all. Our programme is engineered for long term behavioural change and to deliver real business results.

Accountability

Most training courses don't hold people accountable, they teach people a bit of knowledge and expect them to go out and make changes on their own.

It turns out the secret ingredient isn't all that secret. In most training there is no accountability. It's the age old problem: join a gym and see no results, get a personal trainer and the results "mysteriously" appear. Habits are hard to build on your own but with someone to hold you accountable willpower suddenly sky rockets.

Our leadership programme has accountability at its core. People change behaviour and build habits when they're held accountable. People know we’re going to challenge them and we do so in a supportive manner that helps them be the best person they can be.

Between each session every participant is asked to go back to the "real world" and put the skills they discussed into practice. The most important thing is that participants are expected to come back in the next session and deliver a prepared presentation to the group on what they did and the results they achieved. It's this important accountability that "forces" people to put new skills into practice, not just have a nice chat about them at a workshop. No one wants to come back to stand up at the front of the room and say: I didn't do anything.

Feedback

We really focus on getting feedback so that participants develop exceptional self awareness of their strengths and weaknesses. Our 360° process is a true 360° Assessment process.

Many companies claim they have a 360° assessment but what they actually have is a 180° assessment. Truly great leaders learnt long ago that the secret to being a better leader is simply being a better human being. If you have an argument with your wife or are worried about your children does that not affect your performance at work? If you have stressful day at the office can you honestly say you don't take it out on your family when you get home? We've all done it. You're 1 person, not 2. The different parts of your life feed into and affect each other. That's why we take a holistic approach.

Our true 360° assessment takes feedback from all the important people in your life, from work and home.

Group Learning

Participants say they learn almost as much from the other people in the room as they did from our instructors. With up to 12 highly experienced business people in the room, the group discussions are an extremely important part of the learning experience. With everyone working on their own unique issues there is a wealth of experience, support and advice available. Not to mention the intense feelings of camaraderie that develop over the weeks, many of our cohorts continue to meet up for years after the course finishes.

1-on-1 Coaching

We work one-on-one with participants outside the course to maximise their learning.

In between sessions our instructors coach participants to discuss the particular issues they are dealing with that week. Instructors are also available at any time for further 1-to-1 sessions either on the phone or in person.

Individual time with the coaches is just as important as group time as it allows the coaches to really drill down into issues that are affecting individual performance.

Experienced Instructors

Each of our instructors has worked with thousands of people developing their leadership skills. Firm but fair, none of them will be afraid to challenge participants, but will always be respectful and aware of the difficulties you are facing. All of our instructors have been through the programme themselves and absolutely walk the walk as well as talking the talk.

Location

All this takes place in inspiring surroundings where participants can focus on getting the best out of themselves. Studies show that people learn more, quicker and longer lasting in new environments.

03 Philosophy

In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, they're not.

Most training does not deliver results.

That's why our programmes are engineered to change behaviour not just impart knowledge. We live in the smartphone age, all human knowledge is at our fingertips and seconds away, yet we face the same obstacles we have for thousands of years.

If more information was the answer, then we'd all be billionaires with perfect bodies. There'd be no unhealthy doctors and no divorced marriage counsellors.

Derek Sivers, Author

We've learnt that the only way to get lasting change is to put theory into practice every single day in the real world.

Some of our competitors work on the model of sitting participants in lectures for a couple of days or a week, learning academic theories and leadership models, then assigning essays and exams. Do you think that gets real business results when those people go back to work?

Bernard Arnault founder and CEO of LVMH, the world's largest luxury goods company, and one of the richest men in the world, knows that training without action is pointless.

Most training is useless. You just sit there and don't do anything. You just listen. You watch but you don't do anything.

Bernard Arnault, Founder and CEO, LVMH

What you're not going to get from us is a bunch of psychobabble, or academic theories that are difficult to understand, ideas that might be theoretically true but are way too complex to put into practice in the real world of everyday business. What you will learn are techniques that are simple, easy to understand and easy to apply that lead to real results. Most businesses start benefiting as soon as their participant leaves the first session.

We've done ILM leadership training before. It was very theory based, the tutor knew the content of the course but wasn't particularly inspiring, in fact it was quite boring. There was loads of theory, we had to write a lot of essays, it was a massive amount of work and very few results. We learnt theories and models about leadership and management, which was good, but didn't really get any practical ways of solving the real problems that we were facing day-to-day. We came out with a certificate, which really didn't mean anything.

Abi Broadley, Managing Director, Aquarius

There's a reason we don't accredit our programmes with ILM or others. Once upon a time all our programmes did have ILM accreditation but we let them expire. We found that the accreditation didn't actually make any difference to the results our clients got.

If you want to get results from a course then you can't just expect it to happen by magic any more than you can get fit by just buying a gym membership. You actually have to do the work.

There are training companies out there that will gladly take your company’s money and give you a nice certificate, some CPD points, and check you off as completed. But we believe you need to take action for things to change, not just sit in a training room.

That's why our programme is designed to get participants to take action from the beginning and make a real difference.

Who's it for? Not Everyone

Thousands of business leaders have completed our training but it's taken us many years to realise, we're not for everyone. We've lost more government tenders than we're comfortable admitting. We've come to accept that our real world - real results, ROI focussed, pragmatic approach just doesn't fit with the often formulaic, bureaucratic HR Departments or Public Sector request for tenders approach.

If you're looking for a jargon filled, ILM accredited, theory-heavy, box ticking exercise then we're probably not for you. If you're a forward thinking successful leader looking for real business results then we'll achieve great things together.

We don't want to work with everyone, we only want to work with people who are serious about their development.