Online Difficult Conversations Workshop

Law Society CPD (ref: CEZ/CADR) and Bar Council CPD – 5 hours

This exceptional Online Difficult Conversations Course is designed to help you have the hard but necessary conversations that we all have to face. You take the course over the Internet and can pause at any time, picking it up days later from where you left off. The course has 5 modules in which you learn key communication skills by having challenging conversations with online characters. Each module is designed to focus on several key lessons.

The material taught in this course is based on the material presented in the Dealing with Difficult People workshop and some of the ideas in the books Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen, and Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success at Work & in Life One Conversation at a Time by Susan Scott.

In this workshop, you can learn:

• how to deliver difficult messages clearly and powerfully
• how to confront someone without provoking them
• how to persuade difficult people
• how to begin a difficult conversation
• how to discuss issues that take you by surprise
• how to manage strong emotions.

In each of the 5 course modules, you will take part in a simulated conversation with an animated computer character. The characters make statements, ask questions, use difficult tactics, express strong emotions, and otherwise create difficulties for you. You will have to react to what the character says, answer questions, ask other questions, and try to achieve your objective.

If the conversation does not go as well as it can, you will be told why and sent back to the spot where you made your wrong turn so you can try again. At the end of each module, you’ll find downloadable notes that you can save for future reference.

Module 1 – The Presumptuous Customer
In this module, you will play the role of a restaurant owner who must confront a public figure who has jumped the queue and seated himself without a reservation on an evening when you are booked solid.

Module 2 - You’re Fired
In this module, you will play the role of a manager who must fire an unproductive employee who has become a friend.

Module 3 – The Office Dilemma
In this module, you will play the role of an employee who has to explain to your boss why your results are not as good as you would like.

Module 4 – The Contractor
In this module, you will play the role of a homeowner who must confront a contractor about a renovation that went wrong.

Module 5 – The Email
In this module, you will play the spouse of either Helen or Yale and you must explain why you have concealed from your spouse an innocent relationship between you and a high-school sweetheart.