Organizational Trainings

“I think the RE approach to improving communication works beautifully in a corporate setting. I know from first hand experience that these skills have been used to resolve long-standing conflicts in our office, in addition to improving our ability to work as a team. I have attended many communication workshops and seminars that focus on acknowledging people’s different communication styles. This RE-based workshop was the first one that gave me the skills to overcome these differences. I especially recommend NIRE’s organizational training program to managers responsible for orchestrating the efforts of a culturally perse employee population.”
– Corporate Program Manager

The National Institute of Relationship Enhancement® (NIRE) offers specialized trainings to businesses and organizations through its own Interpersonal Dynamics Skills Training Program for Businesses and Organizations.

The Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program is the organizational development version of the Relationship Enhancement® Program. The effectiveness of both programs has been consistently demonstrated through scientifically tested methods and extensive empirical research.

RE Works!
For example, a before and after study of production line workers in two glass-producing factories demonstrated the power of Relationship Enhancement® (RE) for Organizational Development.*

*Catherine Gutelius Rathmell, The Effects of the Relationship Enhancement Program With Industrial Work Teams, Doctoral Dissertation, The Pennsylvania State University, 1991.

After training, participants in the RE Program improved their communication and problem-solving skills, as well as interpersonal relationships at work. Participants:

Significantly increased feelings of trust and closeness
Perceived improvement in their ability to handle interpersonal problems on the job, and experienced increased confidence and initiative in doing so
Demonstrated improvement in peer leadership. Participants felt that there was more support, goal emphasis, work facilitation, and interaction facilitation among team members following their RE training
Showed a significant improvement in their conflict resolution skills
Men and women showed similar improvement

What sets NIRE’s Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program and workshops apart is their intensive skills-training focus. This includes the workshop leader conducting demonstrations that model effective interpersonal behavior and frequent coached practice exercises, realistic role-played scenarios, and group processes for workshop participants that foster the internalization of new and more effective behavior patterns.

Participants in our Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training workshops learn how to:

Promote a spirit of cooperation with colleagues, customers and clients
Be responsive to and deal effectively with difficult people
More deeply understand another person’s point of view, and convey that understanding effectively
Express ideas in a way that eliminates polarization and increases receptivity
Constructively criticize in ways that foster change without creating alienation
Create win-win solutions to difficult problems

Three Unique Workshops
The Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program for Businesses and Organizations includes three workshops designed to address common business and organizational needs (click below for detailed descriptions):

TEAM-BUILDING WORKSHOP

THE NEED: Many businesses and organizations experience lower employee productivity and morale because of problematic interpersonal dynamics or unresolved interpersonal tensions that interfere with open, genuine communication. These dynamics often stymie the effective resolution of concrete issues facing a work group, team or department. In turn, this can spill over into customer or client relationships, with consequences adversely affecting the company’s bottom-line or the fulfillment of the organization’s mission and goals.

THE OBJECTIVE: This workshop aims to foster a spirit of trust, creativity, enthusiasm and team cooperation by teaching a set of practical interpersonal skills that can be applied to improve communication and to ensure cooperative problem-solving. These skills can also be used unilaterally to improve working relationships with colleagues outside one’s work team, or with external customers or clients.

WORKSHOP FORMAT: The format of this intensive skills-training workshop is uniquely powerful at eliciting concrete and long-lasting changes in attitudes and behavior. The workshop provides demonstrations and frequent coached practice exercises and group processes so that participants can internalize new patterns of interaction with co-workers, colleagues and other significant parties.

WORKSHOP OUTLINE: The workshop is structured in a two-day format, each day comprising two modules.

Module 1 introduces participants to the fundamentals of the Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program and explains its utility in corporate or organizational team-building. The communication process is broken down into its two component parts, expressive speaking and empathic responding. Coached practice exercises facilitate the mastering and internalizing of these basic skills of good communication.

Module 2 explains a two-step problem resolution process that encompasses problem definition and problem solution. Additional coached practice exercises provide participants first-hand experience in using the problem resolution process to solve realistic issues typically encountered in a work group or team setting.

Module 3 provides participants a custom-tailored opportunity to apply these skills in a group setting to specific issues, problems or conflict situations arising in their own day-to-day work environment. This facilitated exercise allows participants to deepen and refine their ability to use problem resolution skills to enhance their cooperatively working together in a group setting.

Module 4 teaches participants how to generalize these skills beyond their immediate team environment so that they can be used unilaterally with non-trained colleagues in the company or organization, with external business associates or stake holders, and with customers and clients. The goal is to learn how to generate good will and build a cooperative atmosphere, thereby diffusing potential conflict and improving the odds for meeting shared goals.

FOLLOW-UP TRAINING AND CONSULTATION SERVICES are available on a custom-tailored basis to meet your work group or organization’s special needs for additional skills training or for consultation and facilitation in resolving particularly difficult problems.

PARALLEL WORKSHOPS
Customer Relations Training
Management Leadership Training Workshop

CUSTOMER RELATIONS TRAINING WORKSHOP

THE NEED: One of the greatest challenges of any business or organization is to be able to effectively manage and respond to client concerns and customer complaints. The inability of employees or staff to deal skillfully with these challenges can lead to frustrations over mis-communication, increased conflict and general customer dissatisfaction. In turn, this can adversely affect a company’s bottom-line or the fulfillment of an organization’s mission and goals.

THE OBJECTIVE: This workshop aims to foster an organizational culture of responsiveness to client concerns and customer complaints. This will be accomplished by teaching a set of practical interpersonal skills that are designed to improve communication, promote an atmosphere of responsiveness and cooperation, and engender higher levels of job satisfaction and productivity.

THE BENEFITS: Past experience has demonstrated that organizational trainings using this model have resulted in numerous tangible benefits, including: faster handling of customer complaints, reduced levels of mis-communication and conflict, increased customer satisfaction, reduced employee stress, improved employee morale, better team-work and increased company profits.

WORKSHOP FORMAT: The format of this intensive skills-training workshop is uniquely powerful at eliciting concrete and long-lasting changes in attitudes and behavior. The workshop provides demonstrations and frequent coached practice exercises and group processes so that participants can internalize new patterns of interaction with customers and clients – and, by extension, with co-workers and other professional colleagues within one’s own organization.

WORKSHOP OUTLINE: The workshop is structured in a two-day format, each day comprising two modules.

Module 1 introduces participants to the fundamentals of the Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program* and explains its utility in dealing effectively with client concerns and customer complaints. The two core skills of effective communication – expressive speaking and empathic responding – are explained and demonstrated. Coached practice exercises facilitate the mastering and internalizing of the empathic responding skill.

Module 2 continues with additional coached practice exercises on the use of the expressive speaking skill. Participants then will be given the opportunity to rehearse using both skills by role-playing realistic scenarios encountered in dealing with client concerns and customer complaints.

Module 3 provides participants a custom-tailored opportunity to apply the core communication skills in a group setting to specific issues, problems or conflict situations arising in their own day-to-day work setting. This facilitated exercise allows participants to deepen and refine their ability to use these skills to enhance their team’s ability to work cooperatively in a group setting.

Module 4 provides additional practice opportunities focused on responding effectively to client concerns and customer complaints. The goal is to learn how to generate good will and build a cooperative atmosphere, thereby diffusing potential conflict and improving the odds for meeting client goals and creating overall customer satisfaction.

PARALLEL WORKSHOPS
Team-Building Workshop
Management Leadership Training Workshop

MANAGEMENT LEADERSHIP TRAINING WORKSHOP

THE NEED: Many businesses and organizations experience lower employee productivity and morale because management-level personnel are unaware of using a management style that breeds interpersonal tension and interferes with open and effective communication. This negative interpersonal dynamic contributes to a lack of employee motivation and feelings of resentment that drain away creative energy and interfere with successful task accomplishment. In turn, this can adversely affect a company’s bottom-line or the fulfillment of an organization’s mission and goals.

THE OBJECTIVE: This workshop aims to teach executives and managers how to inspire trust, unleash creativity, and motivate cooperation on the part of their employees and team members. This will be accomplished by teaching principles of effective motivational leadership, in particular a set of practical interpersonal skills that are designed to improve communication, foster an atmosphere of cooperation, and generate positive feelings of loyalty that engender higher levels of productivity.

WORKSHOP FORMAT: The format of this intensive skills-training workshop is uniquely powerful at eliciting concrete and long-lasting changes in attitudes and behavior. The workshop provides demonstrations and frequent coached practice exercises and group processes so that participants can internalize new patterns of interaction with team members and, by extension, with management colleagues and other significant parties such as customers and clients.

WORKSHOP OUTLINE: The workshop is structured in a two-day format, each day comprising two modules.

Module 1 introduces participants to the fundamentals of the Interpersonal Dynamicssm Skills Training Program and explains its utility in executive and management leadership. Special attention is given to the principles of effective motivational leadership. In addition, the two core skills of effective communication – expressive speaking and empathic responding – are explained and demonstrated. Coached practice exercises facilitate the mastering and internalizing of the expressive speaking skill.

Module 2 continues with additional coached practice exercises on the use of the empathic responding skill. Participants then will be given the opportunity to rehearse using both skills by role-playing realistic scenarios and issues encountered in the management of inpidual employees.

Module 3 provides participants an opportunity to apply these core communication skills in a group setting by role-playing issues, problems or conflict situations that might arise in the context of a work group or team meeting. This facilitated exercise allows participants to deepen and refine their ability to use these skills to enhance their team’s ability to work cooperatively in a group setting.

Module 4 teaches participants how to generalize these skills beyond their immediate team environment so that they can be used with other colleagues in the company or organization, with external business associates or stake holders, and with customers and clients. The goal is to learn how to generate good will and build a cooperative atmosphere, thereby diffusing potential conflict and improving the odds for meeting shared goals.

PARALLEL WORKSHOPS
Team-Building
Customer Relations Training

NIRE staff can also meet with you to customize a workshop designed to meet your organizations specific needs. In addition, follow-up training and consultation services are available on a custom-tailored basis to meet your work group or organization’s special needs for additional skills training or for consultation and facilitation in resolving particularly difficult problems.

Personalized executive coaching is also available on a time-limited or on-going basis for managers and corporate executives. Coaching sessions are typically scheduled three or four times per month by telephone, for between 30 and 60 minutes. On-site visits to attend staff or board meetings can also be negotiated.

For further information, or to schedule a workshop for your work group, team, department or organization, please contact Rob Scuka, Ph.D., M.S.W., L.C.S.W.-C., at 301-680-8977, or by email at niremd@nire.org.