Please, please help me!
Featured in the Essential Interpersonal Skills for Outstanding Managers training manual
By Eddie Davies
Category: Communication Skills
Credit price: 4 download credits (Single user)
Line managers have an inbuilt responsibility to use a variety of interpersonal skills to ensure their staff work efficiently and effectively. No matter how well they control the work environment to optimise performance, individuals also have a private life outside work. At times, the overlap between work forces and external circumstances can be positive in both environments, but what happens when the equation gets out of balance? Individuals come under pressure and their work performance can decline. Adopting a counselling skills approach to discussions with their workforce will benefit the manager, the problem holder and the rest of the team, who will appreciate that loyal and competent co-workers with personal problems won’t be victimised or punished for situations that are often outside their control.
You begin this training activity by leading discussion with the participants to define counselling, what is involved and how to recognise when individuals could benefit from a counselling approach. The participants then engage in a group activity in which they identify the advantages and difficulties of a manager counselling someone at work. You use their ideas to widen the discussion into two critical areas; the limits of confidentiality and the boundaries of competence that may cause the manager to refer the problem-holder to someone with more experience. Next, the participants discuss the three phases of a counselling interview and the required skills and attitudes needed to conduct one effectively. They then consolidate their learning by taking part in a practical interview designed to give them the opportunity to practise and develop the skills. Finally, the participants review what they have learned from the practical exercise and discussions and make plans for their own further development in using counselling skills at work.
Who is it for: This training resource is intended for use by trainers to define counselling and examine the difficulties that the participants will face when counselling in the work place setting.
- Themes:
- Assertiveness,
- Coaching,
- Communication,
- Counselling skills,
- Customer care,
- Influencing skills,
- Interpersonal skills,
- Interviewing skills,
- Introduction to effective management,
- Life and career planning,
- Managing meetings,
- Negotiating skills,
- Performance management,
- Project management,
- Sales training,
- Self-assessment,
- Self-development,
- Stress management,
- Supervisory skills,
- Team-building skills,
- Team development,
- Time management,
- Trainer development,
- Women into management,
| Resource Type: | Activity |
| Min Group Size: | 4 |
| Max Group Size: | 12 |
| Typical Duration: | 02:45:00 |
| No of Pages: | 32 |
Resources: View standard resources for Fenman training activities
Purpose: This training resource is intended for use by trainers towards the end of a general interviewing skills course, as it requires an ability to use advanced interpersonal skills, such as being able to question and listen actively. If the participants haven’t experienced these core skills (covered in the training activities ‘Ask a silly question,’ ‘It’s not what you say, it’s the way you say it’, ‘Ma – he’s making eyes at me!’ and ‘Listen. Do you want to know a secret?’), then extra time should be allowed to introduce and build up these skills.
Download the training activity, Please, please help me! as featured in the Fenman training manual; Essential Interpersonal Skills for Outstanding Managers