Introduction

More than ever before, implementing strategic improvement changes in an organization requires leaders who think and act in a strategic manner. To maintain competitiveness, work is becoming increasingly complex and sophisticated, but often strategic improvements are implemented by competent professionals who have little or no strategic leadership training. Modern organizations cannot afford anything less than competent management that leads to successfully implemented improvements. Establishing and maintaining personal and team leadership skills, creating productive work environments and leading teams in strategic activities to meet goals is a challenging, every-day part of a strategic leader’s life.

This program offers an opportunity to focus on the development and use of strategic leadership practices that allow for effective and efficient management of strategic improvements. It provides practical skills to take back to the job, along with insights needed to adapt principles to specific work environments. The seminar is designed to give participants an in-depth understanding of the skills required to successfully demonstrate strategic leadership.

Technical reports often present complex information to non-specialists.  Their effectiveness depends as much on the quality of the writer’s ideas as on the accuracy of their information.  An effective technical report displays complicated information in ways that make it easy to understand, and – above all – relevant to the reader.

Did you know there is a secret language of leadership that determines who reaches the top in politics and business? This course sets out the techniques that you can use to speak like a leader. Public speaking is required in almost every business role, but a variety of factors cause many professionals to struggle when talking in front of an audience. Attend this Public Speaking & Presentation Skills training course and learn to present with confidence!

Course Objectives

• Understand strategic leadership and its role in the implementation of changes
• Gain greater skill in working in the role of strategic team leader
• Develop skill in strategic leadership techniques of creating a strategic change environment, planning, relationships and communication
• Understand the role of stakeholders in strategic leadership
• write more efficiently;
• understand the functions of different kinds of technical reports, especially evaluations and proposals;
• adapt and focus the writing on the needs of the target audience;
• organise material effectively to support explanations and arguments;
• create effective summaries and introductions – and clearly understand the difference between the two;
• Speak publicly in a convincing, confident, and concise style
• Deliver dynamic and effective presentations
• Employ a method to create materials that support a compelling speech
• Build audience rapport through eye contact, vocal delivery, and body language
• Sharpen your public speaking skills by integrating feedback

Course Outlines 

Day One

Strategic Leadership Skills in a Changing Business Culture

• Identification of strategic leadership skills
• Challenges leaders face in changing organizations
• Conditions that exist that require strategic leadership
• The role of strategic leadership in dynamic organizations
• Understanding the role of strategic management in leadership
• How leadership skills change with organizational change

Day Two

Strategic Leadership in Organizational Excellence

• The role that organization type plays in strategic leadership
• Developing a culture of strategic organizational excellence
• Learning the skill and techniques of strategically managing stakeholders
• Focusing on strategic priorities in leadership
• Setting strategic priorities with other leaders

Day Three

The Importance of Communication in Strategic Leadership

• Importance of strategic leadership and communication methods
• Strategic interpersonal communication is two-way
• Understanding of how interpersonal communication preferences differ
• Developing a strategic listening communication style
• Communicating empowerment techniques as a strategic leader

Day Four:

What makes reports work?

• Functions of reports
• What makes a report effective?
• Overt messages and hidden messages
• Key principles of functional writing
• Three key factors: objectives, audience, structure
• Time management: a structural approach to writing

Day 5:

Practical work: a critique of a range of examples of text

Reports as functional documents

• Planning your material
• Making sense of complexity
• Getting to the point: summarising and grouping
• Chunking and sequencing: core planning techniques
• SPQR:  a technique for introductions

Explain or persuade?

• Six modes of explanation
• Persuasion in three dimensions
• Logic: deductive and inductive

Creating an outline

• Key features of an effective outline
• Checking for coherence and sense
• Producing the outline

Day Six: 

Practical work: participants plan, write, critique and rewrite an outline.

From outline to draft

• Essential apparatus of reports
• Summaries, introductions, appendices
• Navigation aids
• Presenting information graphically: tables, charts algorithms…

Day Seven: Speak Like a Leader

Six Rhetorical Devices by Lancaster

• Breathless x3
• Repetition x3
• Balance x3
• Metaphor
• Exaggeration
• Rhyme

Write according to the laws of attractions

• Secrets to Commanding Attention and Getting Results
• How to speak effectively and win over the audience
• Prepare your script and rhetoric
• Techniques to impress your audience

Day Eight: Designing a professional presentation

• The 5 key elements
• Problem: what problem?
• PowerPoint Its uses and flaws
• Other methods of presenting

Day Nine: Delivering a presentation that has an impact

• Posture
• Legs and feet
• Arms and hands
• Gestures
• Delivering without notes or props
• Use of the voice
• Facial expressions
• The words used

Day Ten Overcoming anxiety when presenting

• Planning and preparation
• Rehearsal
• Top tips for calming nerves
• Visualizing success

Think fast and talk smart

• 8 secrets from Speak Like a CEO
• Practice 15-minute sessions