Management is an art form and like all art forms, it can be learnt, honed and improved. People management starts withthe ability to understand the people around you.
Great people managers get to know people personally and know what motiviates, and inspires individuals. They do this through great coaching converstaions that are fluid and on demand. People managers want people to be happy.
Because people are at the heart of your business, skills in communication and listening are essential. Whether it’s difficulties at home, feeling overwhelmed by a project or challenges with keeping work on track, open and honest conversations are paramount to not only solving the challenge but preventing it early.
Regular little chats that look ahead are better than big conversations that look back once the problem has occurred. Supporting your managers to develop these skills is the aim of our Big Chats, Little Chats programme.
The aim of our Being a People Manager programme is to help individuals be inspiring leaders who create the right environments in which their people can thrive.
Don’t expect any corporate bull either. We believe the best leadership and management qualities are based in human skills such as humour, happiness and empathy.
Traditionally managers are sent on a coaching course to learn how to develop their teams. They then deliver coaching in rigid, informal chunks, usually booked in diaries days or even weeks in advance. But we know life doesn’t work this way.
Coaching teams should fundamentally be an ongoing, fluid process, the success of which is dependent on how managers interact with their people. We recognise that great conversations between managers and their teams should be continuous.
Using this philosophy, we have developed Big Chats, Little Chats as a way for managers to have great conversations that promote development and performance and put people at the heart of the conversation.
The PA-OFF model defines the type of chats managers should be having with their teams that build positive relationships and engaged people whether virtually or face to face.
What’s the difference between a manager and a people manager? Management isn’t just a series of transactions designed to serve a commercial or administrative purpose. People managers get involved with the people around them. They’re genuinely interested in understanding the individuals in their teams and spend time getting to know them. They recognise what motivates specific individuals and know what makes their people happy or unhappy.
Developing relationships, empathy, care and understanding for the people you manage isn’t whimsical or unnecessarily touchy-feely. It makes sound business sense. To get the best out of people, you have to know them, and you have to be attentive. That doesn’t mean you have to be sentimental, but you do have to care about the organisation and the people in it.
Our flexible online or face to face methodology and the wide range of proven, science-backed elements we’ve created allow us to design bespoke programmes around your unique needs.
Broadly, however, our Being a People Manager programme is underpinned by three key modules, each of which are unique to Laughology. They’re innovative and flexible too, and can be adapted to suit your requirements.
These key modules are from our Big Chats, Little Chats coaching programme as we believe Being a People Manager is largely about coaching your teams in the moment, helping them to flourish.
Elements of the programme can be complemented by other modules including: having difficult conversations, negotiation skills and presentation skills. The three key modules are: Creating the right environment FLIP-it Thinking Developing a team and managing with a growth mindset
Teams no longer fit the traditional pattern of office-based attendance. Often, they are a blend of job-sharers, homeworkers and international personnel working virtually. As a consequence, we now communicate through a dizzying array of channels including Skype, Google Hangout and even WhatsApp.
Essentially this has changed the way we speak to each other, and coaching needs to reflect this in order to work.
Traditionally, when someone needs coaching a session is booked in the diary. But this leads to time lapses during which problems may develop further, people may become demotivated and solutions may be found by someone else, leading to a lost learning opportunity.
BCLC encourages a more flexible approach in which coaching gets to the root of the issue quickly and effectively.
Chats should always help people move forward rather than look back with blame and regret. Too often, conversations with managers and leaders reflect on what has gone wrong in the past. Instead, it should be about looking forward and putting things right, learning from errors for the future.
BCLC is perfect for any organisation that requires an innovative, fresh new way to deliver coaching
It can be delivered to managers and leaders, and also forms part of our management and leadership programmes. The delivery content is supported by online resources, activities and self-directed learning through video’s and quizzes. Managers will be expected to compete work and activities between sessions to embed learning with their teams. You can join on Laughology Online Learning (LOL) platform who use our resources on your own platform.
Capacity depends on the organisation’s needs. BCLC has been rolled out in large national organisations using a range of blended-learning methods.
However, in workshops, we advise a maximum of 20 to enable effective discussion groups.
BCLC can be delivered in a blended learning approach through a range of channels including learning shorts, which are online three to four-minute videos covering the main elements of each module.
We can also produce cheat sheets which can be added to your intranet, along with other reference material. The programme also has guides with practical ways to start conversations, have quick chats and embed learning. We can also work with a team of champions to create expert BCLC coaches who can mentor and supervise managers and leaders. Champions can also be trained to deliver content to support learning going forward.
This is flexible depending on needs and budget, but usually, each core module will be delivered over two half day workshops. Our online BCLC programme is deliver over three x 90 minute sessions.
We also recommend training champions who can support learning between sessions through action learning facilitation. Champions should attend an extra day or two for upskilling in facilitation and action learning.
We’ll work with you to identify target goals which we can then assess throughout the delivery process.
We can assess your in-house appraisal processes and use them to measure how people are having better conversations. We can also create a baseline survey with programme participants at the start of the process and use this to plot progress. We’re also able to run focus groups with people being coached, to identify how their experience changes.
Once we receive your enquiry, one of the team will be in touch to talk about how we can help.
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