The problem with most difficult conversations is the illusion that agreement has been reached.

Coming to a town near you.

Book your spot or sign up for updates on dates and locations here.

We estimate that the average manager will spend more than nineteen thousand hours of their working life having difficult conversations.

Invest nine learning how to have them well.

Decisions are made but somehow don't lead to action. Performance issues drag on for months before they're addressed, if at all. Meetings produce agreements that are quickly forgotten or ignored. Your people are experienced and capable, yet reluctant to address the hard issues.

Most of us were never taught how to have a direct conversation without damaging relationships. So we soften, defer, or avoid, and the problems compound.

Every avoided conversation is a tax on your business. It shows up in your culture, your execution, and your results.

This is not a character flaw. It is simply a skill gap.

Designed for current and future leaders, managers and teams ready to have the important conversations that most of us would rather avoid.

In one day and one hour (we interview everyone beforehand), you’ll learn how to navigate through contentious issues to reach genuine agreement that results in action, and preserves the most important relationships.

You’ll work on your real life examples, not abstract concepts or made up scenarios.

The workshop draws on almost three decades of real-world experience, research, and first-hand observations from working with and within start-ups to multi-nationals, in both the private and public sectors.

It combines lessons from recognised experts on psychology, human communication, leadership, negotiations, and neurodiversity, and provides proven, practical tools developed for the New Zealand audience.

Avoiding or fumbling difficult conversation is not a character flaw.

It is simply a skill gap, and like any other skill, it can be learned.

RESOLVE
ISSUES
PROTECT
RELATIONSHIPS

NINE HOURS
SKILLS
FOR LIFE

FUNDAMENTAL
SKILLS
PRACTICAL
TOOLS

PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS

EIGHT MODULES

YOU'LL LEARN HOW TO

Leadership, people, and performance management.

Strategy setting and organisational change and alignment.

Investment and resource prioritisation.

Conflict resolution.

Commercial negotiations with customers, suppliers, and other partnerships.

Product and service design.

Shareholder and governance conversations.

Leading and embedding change.

Influencing: up, across, and out.

Culture, engagement and retention.

Decision execution and accountability.

Personal relationships with the people who matter most.

What is a Difficult Conversation, and why do they matter?
Understanding your brain when under pressure.
Preparing and framing for dialogue.
Rewriting the stories we tell ourselves.
Facts, fiction, feelings, and the power of curiosity.
You have what it takes. Practical tools and a particular set of skills.
When others experience or process the world differently.
From dialogue to decision to action.

Get crystal clear on what you want, and don’t want, from a conversation.

Set up a difficult conversation without triggering defensiveness.

Notice and control your emotions that hinder dialogue.

Read the signals in the room before a conversation can spiral.

Rewrite the unhelpful stories we tell ourselves, about ourselves and others.

Get the most from and for culturally, generationally, and neurodiverse teams.

Find the shared interest and avoid bargaining over positions.

Shift the conversation from ‘me vs you’ to ‘us vs the problem’.

And you will leave with a completed plan for a real conversation you’ll have within three weeks of the workshop.

Topics we cover:

Why we avoid difficult conversations. The psychological and social mechanisms that make avoidance feel rational, and why they are more costly than the conversation itself.
What makes a conversation difficult. How to read the specific conditions that raise the stakes: high emotion, power imbalance, conflicting interests, and prior history between the parties.
How to prepare without over-scripting. A practical method for getting clear on what you actually want from a conversation before you walk in, and what you are willing to accept.
The stories we tell ourselves. How to separate facts from fiction, and how to reframe the stories that trigger our unhelpful emotions.
Opening without causing defensiveness. How to raise a difficult issue directly without putting the other person in a position where they feel they have to defend themselves before they've heard you.
The power of curiosity. How to stay curious long enough to really understand the other persons point of view.
Finding shared purpose. How to shift the conversation from you against me, to us against the problem.
Resisting the false binary. How to resolve the issue AND preserve, or even strengthen, interpersonal relationships.
Conversations in diverse teams. The importance of considering cultural, generational, and neurodiverse experiences.
Staying in the conversation when it gets hard. Techniques for managing your own and the other person's reaction in real time, when the conversation goes somewhere you didn't expect.
Listening under pressure. How to hear what someone is actually saying when emotion, defensiveness, or conflict is present, and how to respond to what you heard rather than what you feared.
Reaching a clear outcome. How to close a difficult conversation with a clear agreement, and defined actions.

Run over a full day, participants work on their own real world experiences, not fictitious scenarios.

The content is structured around the situations that cause the most stress, not just for leaders, but for anyone who relies on other humans to get their job done.

Before the workshop we interview all participants individually. This enables us to tune the content to meet the groups most pressing needs, and ensures everyone arrives ready to make the most of the day.

After the workshop we offer a free one on one coaching session to help everyone prepare for their next difficult conversation - we do this because we know that if new skills aren't used within three weeks, they're often lost forever.

By the end of the day each participant will have:

Worked through their own examples of difficult conversations in order to understand their unique challenges.
An understanding of their personal triggers and behavioural tendencies when under stress.
A completed conversation plan for a real difficult conversation they will have within three weeks.
Practised the techniques taught in the room, so they're prepared to confidently apply them in a real-world situation.
A shared language with colleagues so difficult and productive conversations become a normal part of how the team operates.

We spend just enough time on the science and communication theory to understand what happens when we avoid or engage in difficult conversations. However, the emphasis is on building the skills and introducing practical tools participants will use from the minute they walk out the door. This is not an academic lecture.