Internal consultancy skills (Also described as “Change Agent” Skills)

(Typically two to four days)

Custom designed:

Quality, in-house training for your organisation’s needs

Overview:

 This highly practical "Internal Consultancy Skills" programme will provide participants with a range of tools and techniques that management consultants are trained in and which can be applied in any circumstances where business improvement is required.  A process consulting framework will be introduced to help participants understand the full business improvement cycle. The approaches, tools and techniques of the "Internal Consultant" are applied to an appropriate business case study

Internal consultancy skills

"Most commentators believe that between 50 and 75% of all change projects fail to deliver their stated benefits"

Training Style:

Interactive, enjoyable  and thought provoking. The workshop uses inputs from the course leader, group and individual exercises, and organisational change case studies.

Participants act as a team of internal consultants advising the leadership team of an organisation whose features and challenges parallel their own.

The course also uses a “Hothouse” component, where participants work intensely (in small teams) on key real-life organisational challenges

More Information:

If you want to know more about this course or its suitability for you or a colleague, call us on 020 8374 3985 and speak informally to one of our course leaders, or message

Who will benefit:

All those in organisational roles which are about initiating and / or implementing changes to processes, systems, products, services or culture. Our "Internal Consultancy skills" participants are often drawn from Corporate, HR, Finance, Operations or Marketing functions.

Objectives:

By the end of this "Internal consultancy skills" programme participants will be able to:

• Describe the role of an internal consultant and the Shifting Minds five step "Improving Business Performance" framework
• Describe the principles of change management and explain why some changes fail
• Explain the importance of understanding and engaging with the change ‘sponsor’
• Identify, collect and analyse appropriate data using multiple methods
• Facilitate focus groups and workshops
• Select and apply appropriate problem solving tools to ‘live’ business problems
• Develop effective presentations, business cases and proposals
• Explain the importance of good project management discipline and demonstrate easy to use project management skills
• Explain group dynamics and understand how such insight can be applied to change teams

Content:

(We customise and structure the content to your organisation's specific needs)

• What are internal consultancy skills?
• Using ground rules
• What's your vision of a successful internal consultant?
• The many roles and skills of an internal consultant
• Your personal reactions to this role
• What is change management?
• Where does organisational change occur? Types of change and their respective challenges
• Participant experiences of changes
• Why do many change initiatives fail to deliver their stated benefits? Six key change management insights
• Why do people resist change? Techniques for surfacing resistance and overcoming resistance
• Identifying and managing stakeholders
• The Shifting Minds "Business Improvement Framework"
• Effective contracting with “sponsors”
• Building rapport with sponsors and other key stakeholders
• Listening skills - why they are critical?
• Collecting / analysing data - facilitating interviews, meetings and focus groups; including dealing with “challenging people”
• The role and practice of "Bench Marking"
• The role of questionnaires and desk research
• Why do internal consultants need Emotional Intelligence?
• Understanding mind sets - understanding and working with paradigms and group think
• Internal consultants toolkit (20 tools)
• Introduction to Benefits Management
• How to "sell" solutions and plans
• Change project start up sessions
• Project planning and implemention essentials e.g., resourcing, communications and delivering change vs. managing " business as usual"
• Personal action planning