Open training

Minutes should serve as more than a record of who said what at a meeting. They should help organizations advance their goals and objectives and provide accountabilities. Building on PMC’s course Minute Taking for Better Meetings this day-long seminar provides participants with opportunities to craft minutes that focus on clear, concise writing designed to reach its intended audience — colleagues, board members, decision makers. Workshop participants will take notes in several mock meetings and write minutes in a variety of styles suitable for the audience. Active learning takes place in a relaxed and fun environment. Course participants will be encouraged to summarize their key learning points and prepare a short action plan to implement on their return to work.

Would you like to write more effectively? Have you forgotten what you learned in school? Would you like to have a greater impact and influence on your readers? Today’s business environment relies heavily on the written word. Whether you’re answering email, writing a detailed report, or responding to a customer query, your effectiveness will be judged by your ability to write in a clear and concise manner. Each participant receives a workbook and bibliography of helpful references. Seminar participants are encouraged to participate in writing exercises throughout the day and there is an opportunity for one-on-one consulting to answer specific questions and evaluate personal writing styles.

Meetings are an important part of the group decision-making process. With today’s flatter, less hierarchical organizations, one week you could be asked to chair a meeting and the next week to record the minutes. Minutes are a record of the group’s decisions and action items and it is vital that they are clear, concise and accurate. This seminar helps participants to understand the full range of their role and responsibilities as Minute Takers, to work effectively with the Chair and to produce agendas and minutes in a variety of styles – formal, informal and action. Workshop participants will take part in a mock meeting to gain a practical understanding of the roles of Chair and Minute Taker, to practice taking accurate notes and producing correct minutes. Active learning takes place in a relaxed and fun environment. Course participants will be encouraged to summarize their key learning points and prepare a short action plan to implement on their return to work.

Even strong workplace documents can lose credibility when errors, unclear wording, inconsistent formatting, or accessibility barriers get in the way. This course introduces the SCAN method, a repeatable process for reviewing documents for Structure, Clarity, Accuracy, and Navigation. Participants will learn how to scope a review, strengthen readability, check details, improve consistency, and support basic accessibility before documents are shared. They will also practise using AI-supported tools responsibly and giving clear handoff feedback that helps writers make the right changes without unnecessary rewriting.

Decision-makers rely on reports to understand issues, weigh evidence, and choose a clear path forward. When reports are too dense, loosely structured, or unclear about their purpose, important information can get lost. This course introduces the FOCUS framework to help participants turn complex information into clear, logical, and decision-ready reports. Participants will learn how to define report boundaries, organize evidence, keep sections focused, and write executive summaries that lead with meaning and direction. They will also explore how to use AI tools selectively to test outlines, identify structural gaps, and refine summaries while maintaining accuracy, context, and professional judgment. Participants leave with a reusable report blueprint they can apply to current and future workplace reports.

Busy decision-makers do not have time to search through dense background, unclear issues, or options that are not fully explained. This advanced course helps participants write briefing notes that turn complex, messy, or sensitive information into clear decision support. Using the 4 D’s Briefing Note Framework, participants will practise defining the issue, distilling relevant context, developing balanced options and implications, and delivering a clear recommendation or next step. The course also explores how approved AI tools can help structure non-sensitive source material while keeping human judgment, accuracy, and confidentiality at the centre of the work. Participants will leave with a practical approach for writing briefing notes that help senior readers understand what matters, weigh risks, and move forward with confidence.

In a busy workplace, unclear writing costs time. Everyday messages are often slowed down by dense jargon, long sentences, buried main points, and unclear next steps. This course gives participants practical tools to make emails, memos, notices, internal updates, and short web or intranet content clearer, shorter, and easier for the reader to act on. Using the PLAIN framework, participants learn how to check their writing for purpose, reader needs, main message, tone, sentence clarity, and scanability. This course also explores how AI can help flag readability and tone issues, jargon, and bias while keeping human judgment at the centre. Participants leave with a revised piece of communication and a repeatable process for writing in plain language back on the job.

AI is increasingly shaping how work gets done on teams, often through informal or uneven use, without shared expectations to rely on. When that happens, teams begin developing “shadow standards”: unspoken assumptions about what’s acceptable, what’s smart, and what’s risky. Over time, this can create team-level strain through misaligned quality, uneven behaviour, reduced visibility, and the quiet erosion of professional trust and confidence. This workshop helps people leaders replace that uncertainty with team-level leadership judgment. You will learn how to notice when expectations have become blurred, diagnose whether leadership clarity is actually required, and make consistent, defensible calls using PMC’s LENS decision lens.  Rather than waiting for perfect organizational guidance, you will clarify how existing expectations apply to your team’s AI use. You will draft 2-3 practical team guardrails you can reasonably stand behind as a leader, and you will choose a defensible leadership position for how visible that clarity needs to be right now—whether it should be held, reinforced informally, or supported through a focused conversation. By the end of the session, you will leave with a repeatable method to reduce team-level uncertainty and strengthen trust, fairness, and consistency in how AI is used—without relying on policy work, technical expertise, or escalation.

Managers often step in because it feels faster, safer, and more reliable than waiting for someone else to think it through. But when the same questions, errors, and follow-through issues keep coming back, quick fixes start creating more work. This course helps managers and supervisors use coaching conversations to build stronger employee ownership, judgment, and follow-through. Participants learn when to coach, when to give direction, how to guide thinking without taking over, and how to turn conversations into clear next steps. With better coaching habits, employees become more confident in handling real work situations, while managers spend less time solving the same problems again.

Of all the key competencies for supervisors and managers, two of the most important are learning to manage individual performance on a daily basis and learning to delegate. Both represent difficult learning curves. Without mastering delegation, it is impossible to expand your range of responsibility, to empower others or to grow into your role and responsibilities. For many, it is a difficult transition from being paid for doing it yourself to getting the work done through others. Delegation is a critical skill to assist time-starved supervisors and managers in becoming more effective for themselves, their teams and their organizations. This course offers a mix of self-awareness, guidance, skills, ideas, tools and methods to master this critical competence.

In matrix and cross-functional environments, results often depend on people, priorities, decisions, and handoffs that sit outside one person’s direct control. When ownership is unclear, decisions stall, or commitments become vague, shared work can slip even when everyone is trying to help. This course helps participants strengthen accountability around the work itself. They learn how to clarify decision paths, define stronger commitments, keep progress visible, and reset the path when priorities, capacity, or support change. The focus is practical: fewer surprises, less chasing, cleaner handoffs, and better follow-through across teams, projects, partners, and stakeholders.

Influence is a key skill that is necessary for having impact on organizations and communities, especially when you do not have formal authority. Being a leader means sharing your ideas and taking action, regardless of your position or title. This session focuses on how participants can have a positive influence on their personal and professional communities without depending on authority or organizational hierarchy.  Instead of considering influence to be a process of “persuading others”, this session focuses on building 5 key leadership qualities that will positively impact those you work and socialize with. Participants will learn communication strategies to improve influence. This session also includes a social styles assessment to help participants learn how to leverage their strengths. Even when in a formal leadership role, influence can motivate, engage and empower others, rather than relying on giving orders or using formal ‘power’. Instead of presenting traditional approaches to influence such as ‘networking’ or ‘ being persuasive’, this session focuses on authentic leadership, building relationships,  effective communication, connecting ideas to organizational values, and being a leadership role model. Myths around influence as applying pressure, manipulation, or requiring a social media presence will be dispelled. Participants will have the opportunity to develop communication skills, craft a vision statement, and create an action plan for making an influence in their community.

Leadership and management are some of the most challenging roles in work and business. Leaders strive to achieve results while effectively leveraging the skills and talents of their teams. In today’s workplace it is critical to recognize that people bring both their minds and their emotions to work and the reality is that emotions drive performance. The research is clear—leaders who have higher levels of emotional intelligence create positive work environments, generate higher levels of employee engagement, deliver higher performance, manage change better and experience less work-based stress. This course considers the impact of emotional intelligence (EQ) on leadership and organizations. It presents research that supports the business case for EQ in the workplace. Participants will be introduced to key concepts of EQ and self-evaluate their current leadership style, identifying areas of strengths and opportunities for development. Participants will build knowledge and skills related to self-awareness and self-regulation and how to be emotionally intelligent leaders. The second half of the course will focus on how to use EQ to motivate teams and implement practical strategies for organizations.

This two-day workshop will provide you with an overview of how to understand financial information without requiring an in-depth knowledge of math, bookkeeping, or accounting practices. In addition to providing the basics of financial statements, you will also learn how financial information can support financial management objectives and decision-making. You will receive practical tips on how to analyze reports and data to identify key elements to provide a clearer picture of your business to highlight your financial position and identify financial areas requiring your attention. You will gain insight to better evaluate the information you are receiving from your financial data.

In today’s workplace, training has taken on a broader role as more employees are now responsible for, or taking on the challenge of, training others within their department or organization. Recognizing that training and education is one of the key components to any organization’s success, whether you are providing new hire orientation, transferring knowledge or skills, or training a group of employees on a specific subject, some basic learning principles will apply. That’s where we come in. By guiding you through the ins and outs, the tips and tricks, and the do’s and don’ts of training others, we will help you to provide an effective and positive learning experience. This one-day course provides an essential tool-kit to help you acquire the underlying skills of an effective trainer. We will help you understand the learning and training fundamentals, and review the tools and techniques in designing and delivering training that will guarantee positive results from your audience. You will also learn how to evaluate your training effectiveness, while receiving practical feedback on how to improve and hone your training skills.

Supervisors make constant decisions all day long about when to step in, what to say, and how to respond when work or behaviour starts to slip. When these moments are handled inconsistently or too late, issues linger, expectations become unclear, and teams end up dealing with avoidable rework and frustration. This supervisor training course is built around PMC Training’s 3-Zone framework, a practical approach to everyday supervision that helps managers set work up clearly, adjust performance issues while they’re still recoverable, and reset missed standards when needed. It gives supervisors a simple way to decide when to coach, when to give feedback, and when to take more direct action. As a result, teams work with clearer expectations, stronger accountability, and fewer unresolved issues. It also helps your organization apply standards more consistently, fairly, and promptly in a way that supports stronger performance and team morale.

Stepping into management changes more than your responsibilities. It changes how people interpret your actions, how standards need to be applied, and how often you find yourself needing to address issues you may have previously overlooked, tolerated, or left to someone else.  This course uses PMC Training’s Four Shifts framework to help new and experienced managers lead more consistently across role, relationship, communication, and routine. Participants learn how to communicate more clearly, apply expectations fairly, navigate changing team dynamics, and build the structure that supports team accountability.  The result is a steadier approach that strengthens trust, visible fairness, and day-to-day performance for both the manager and the organization.

This workshop is for professionals ready to move beyond curiosity and start applying artificial intelligence (AI) in their everyday work.  You’ll learn how to write better prompts, avoid common pitfalls like bias and hallucination, and apply AI to tasks like writing, summarizing, and problem-solving. Through real-life scenarios and collaborative practice, you’ll build the skills to integrate AI effectively and ethically. Whether you’re aiming to work more efficiently or support your team more strategically, this session will help you turn AI from an occasional tool into a trusted assistant.

Microsoft Excel is the preferred spreadsheet software for many individuals and businesses to manage their data and reporting. Yet most are only using 20% of the features of this powerful productivity tool. In this one-day workshop, you will learn the basics of creating, modifying, formatting and printing worksheets. You will learn to use basic formulas and functions and manage large workbooks to analyze and understand data.

During this intermediate one-day Excel program you will learn and practice higher level Excel functionality to further made sense of spreadsheets and larger data sets. By using hands-on practical techniques you will be able to analyze complex data sets, organize and visualize data in simple meaningful terms, faster data list management and querying and working with corporate and professional templates.

This advanced level, one-day course is intended to help everyday users of Excel present their data in more effective ways using PivotTables and PivotCharts. Users will also learn advanced analysis tools like the Scenario Manager, Goal Seek, Data Tables, and advanced functions. Basic macros will also be covered in this course.

Microsoft Outlook can be a powerful productivity tool or a constant source of distraction, depending on how it’s used. This workshop focuses on using Outlook more deliberately to manage email, time, and commitments by making clearer decisions about how work is captured, tracked, and followed up on. Participants explore practical approaches for handling messages, coordinating schedules, and tracking work, and they apply selected techniques during the session, so Outlook supports their work instead of adding noise. The emphasis is on everyday workflows and decisions that help professionals stay organized, responsive, and focused in a busy work environment. Note on Versions: This workshop is designed for users of Microsoft 365 Outlook, and the skills also apply to Outlook 2019 and 2016. While some features or layouts may differ slightly between versions, the core tools and workflows covered remain consistent.

In any workplace, people will disagree. What often makes these moments difficult is deciding what needs to be addressed, what fits your role, and how to speak clearly without overreacting, backing down, or taking on responsibility that belongs elsewhere. In this one-day course, participants use the HOLD framework to decide whether and how to respond assertively in everyday workplace situations. Through practical scenarios and guided practice, they learn to state concerns, perspectives, requests, refusals, and boundaries using clear, concise, controlled, and credible language. Participants leave better prepared to address tension early, hold their message when challenged, and prevent avoidable friction, rework, and escalation.

The ability to communicate effectively at work and in life is perhaps the most critical skill for anyone. Those who have demonstrated an ability to effectively communicate are more likely to receive promotions and job offers. Effective communication allows you to use all the other skills you have to the fullest. Your success in motivating, delegating, organizing, solving problems and obtaining information depends heavily on your ability to communicate with others. At this workshop you’ll learn how to influence and inform through the use of real life examples, group discussions, role plays and interactive hands-on exercises.

Whether you’re delivering bad news, giving a negative performance evaluation, challenging a colleague or client, objecting to additional workload, presenting options in the midst of a crisis, or simply letting people know that the direction on a certain project is changing — communicating difficult subject matter can be an emotionally charged event. Understandably, many people would do anything to avoid that situation. Yet avoiding critical and difficult conversations or mishandling them can result in many negative consequences. Learn how being assertive, open, honest and fair in your critical conversations, and fostering others to do the same, can develop alignment and agreement within your organization. Encouraging open and honest dialogues around important, emotional, or risky topics – at any level – can significantly reduce and resolve conflict, nurture relationships and boost productivity and efficiency. This workshop is designed to help individuals, teams and organizations improve the way they approach their critical conversations, with confidence, and manage the conversation skillfully so that feelings are spared and the organization’s best interests are kept front and center.

Every workplace has behaviour that wears on people. Only some of it slows work down: meetings where people stop speaking up, handoffs that get missed, decisions that stall while a team silently works around one person. Most advice on how to deal with difficult people at work moves straight to what to say. This workshop starts a step earlier, with judgment: which work standard is being strained, what the pattern is costing, and whether this is yours to name, to raise, or to pause on. Designed for individual contributors and managers alike, it gives you a decision framework and tested language for resetting expectations without labelling anyone or overstepping your role. You leave able to tell disruption from discomfort, and able to say something clear about it.

Most professionals don’t think of their day as a negotiation, but it is. Every time priorities compete, deadlines shift, scope expands, or expectations are not fully aligned, a decision has to be made. When handled with a soft yes or unclear commitment, the impact often shows up later in rework, unspoken resentment, and avoidable escalation. This one-day course focuses on the everyday decisions that shape how work gets done. Using PMC Training’s MOVE framework, participants learn to define the outcome they need to protect, understand what may be driving the other side, identify realistic trade-offs, and build clear if/then agreements that prevent one-sided concessions. Through practical scenarios, including those with pushback and pressure, participants develop the judgment to respond deliberately instead of reacting. They leave better prepared to create clearer agreements, reduce rework, and protect their own capacity when the pressure is on.

Influence without authority is a daily reality for individual contributors who need to move work forward through people they do not formally manage. A request may depend on a peer’s input, a stakeholder’s decision, a partner’s handoff, or a colleague’s follow-through, and even when people intend to help, work can stall through vague asks, soft yeses, competing priorities, delayed replies, or unclear ownership. This course helps participants make clearer asks, test whether agreement is reliable, keep progress visible, and choose the right next move when work starts to slip. Participants leave with practical tools to get work done through others with more confidence, while organizations benefit from fewer delays, clearer handoffs, stronger follow-through, and less unnecessary escalation.

If you’ve ever had occasion to facilitate or lead a meeting, you probably understand how challenging it can be. Not only do you need to stick to the agenda, you need to manage group dynamics, and often, get everyone to agree on a decision. That is no easy task, especially when opinions and personalities conflict. Facilitation is part art and part science, and luckily, it is a skill that can be learned. Leading a group through the facilitation process- rather than controlling the meeting- will result in participants fully supporting and taking ownership of the outcomes. Ensuring that all have been heard and have an opportunity to voice their opinions reduces negative feedback and backlash afterwards. After all, most people will accept not getting their way, but will resent not having their say. Facilitation skills is one of the most important competencies professionals can develop for their career today. Meetings are unavoidable, and if you can manage them effectively and efficiently, you’ll be an asset to any organization. In this dynamic and practical facilitation course, participants will learn how to gather information from a group, clarify and present ideas, remain neutral when appropriate, and gain consensus. They will learn strategies to manage group dynamics, how to deal with a group that is “stuck”, and techniques to keep energy high. Participants will practice their new skills in a safe and supportive environment.

Knowing the material is not enough to make a presentation work. Presenters can lose their audience when they are unsure what to emphasize, struggle to organize the content, rely too heavily on slides, or let nerves affect how they speak and respond. This presentation skills course gives participants the FRAME approach, a repeatable process for planning, organizing and delivering clear workplace presentations in virtual and in-person settings. Participants learn how to focus the result, shape the message for the audience, create an easy-to-follow route, reduce distractions, and deliver with effective voice, pace, presence and adaptability. Throughout the course, participants apply each stage of FRAME to their own short workplace presentation or a provided scenario. They practise key delivery techniques and test whether their message is clear and usable. Participants leave with a reliable method for future presentations, while their organizations benefit from clearer communication and better use of meeting time.

Knowing the material is not enough to make a presentation work. Presenters can lose their audience when they are unsure what to emphasize, struggle to organize the content, rely too heavily on slides, or let nerves affect how they speak and respond. This presentation skills course gives participants the FRAME approach, a repeatable process for planning, organizing and delivering clear workplace presentations in virtual and in-person settings. Participants learn how to focus the result, shape the message for the audience, create an easy-to-follow route, reduce distractions, and deliver with effective voice, pace, presence and adaptability. Throughout the course, participants apply each stage of FRAME to their own short workplace presentation or a provided scenario. They practice key delivery techniques and test whether their message is clear and usable. Participants leave with a reliable method for future presentations, while their organizations benefit from clearer communication and better use of meeting time.

The costliest policy mistakes usually happen early. Teams over-analyze low-risk issues or rush early analysis that misses the real decision point, leading to stalled files, rework, and frustration for decision-makers who need clarity early, not volume later. Calibrating Policy Analysis focuses on these critical initial stages, before options harden and momentum is lost. Participants leave able to frame a decision-relevant policy question, make key assumptions explicit, and justify how much evidence is “enough” for the decision at hand when discussing their work with colleagues or supervisors. The emphasis is on proportionate, decision-support analysis so work moves forward with less rework and clearer direction. The workshop is anchored in PMC’s Q-CASE Decision Support Lens (Question, Context, Assumptions, Sufficiency, and Early Options). It is used throughout the day to help participants calibrate scope, analytical depth, and the role of provisional options in a defensible and consistent way. This one-day workshop is designed for policy and policy-adjacent professionals who contribute to early analysis and influence direction without owning the final decision.

The ability to succinctly brief others is a highly valued competency in today’s fast-paced workplace. This expertise requires the speaker to clearly understand the issue, structure the briefing in a way that is easy to transmit and deliver the message effectively. Participants will leave this experiential workshop with techniques, strategies, and tips for delivering a structured and influential oral briefing to senior management.

Are you a member of the Public Service who will be reaching retirement age over the next five to ten years? This comprehensive course features an expert in pension and financial issues who will provide you with the necessary knowledge and tools to help you develop an individual retirement plan to meet your goals. 

Understanding how Ottawa really works is essential for anyone new to the federal public service or looking to better navigate Canada’s decision-making system.  This workshop demystifies the roles of Cabinet, central agencies, and Parliament, while clarifying how policy and legislation are developed and influenced.  Participants will leave with a clear, approachable map of government processes so they can engage with confidence and see how their work connects to the bigger picture.

Risk is something we face every day. We deal with most day-to-day risk at a subconscious level; however, many risks require a little more consideration. Some risk takes us well out of our comfort zone and so we avoid it – sometimes at all costs. But risk is something that can and should be embraced; risk management is actually a very useful toolset for thought in everyday decision making and often the risk of not doing something can be greater than the risk of doing something. IRM is a systematic and holistic approach to understand, communicate and manage risk across the organization allowing more timely, appropriate and effective responses. It is about the right people having the right information to guide strategic and tactical decisions that contribute to the achievement of an organization’s overall objectives. This course is intended to provide an initial overview of integrated risk management – sometimes known as ‘joined-up thinking’ about risk. The story builds by firstly developing an understanding of risk itself and our attitudes to it, next we look at how we bring risk under our control by means of risk management, and finally we look at how we can take a more strategic view of risk and develop a consistent pan-organizational approach. All the way through, we will build the concepts into practical examples so that attendees can take away real experience of having ‘managed’ risk. While not specifically a course on the Government of Canada’s Framework for the Management of Risk, this workshop will cover many of the same principles using the same terminology. And so, this course will be eminently suitable for anyone wishing to understand and apply the Framework.

Are you excited about your retirement but worried about getting bored and not having enough to do? Has your work consumed you over the past 30 – 35 years and you are no longer sure what interests you have outside of work? Are you concerned about a lack of a predictable structure, a different or limited social network or the demands that may be placed on you by your parents or children? Do you have a pretty good idea of your basic plan but want to make sure all core components are in place? Are you considering a new career in retirement and want an opportunity to network and share ideas? Are you starting out in your career and want to ensure that your career and life plan are in balance with each other? While being financially prepared for retirement is important, addressing the emotional, physical and psychological realities before retiring, and integrating them into a balanced plan is ultimately the key to a successful and meaningful retirement. This one-day workshop prepares you for a successful transition into retirement by addressing key areas of concern with realistic strategies.

Public programs and initiatives are under constant pressure to show clear evidence of results. This workshop equips participants with practical tools to connect objectives to measurable outcomes. Through hands-on exercises, you will learn how to design logic models, identify performance indicators, and build evaluation frameworks that withstand the scrutiny of decision-makers, funders, and oversight bodies. The focus is on applying proven methods in real-world contexts so you leave with skills you can immediately use in planning, reporting, and accountability.

Policy-related situations often show up before the work is clearly named, assigned, or owned. A request, recurring issue, informal conversation, or unclear hand-off can pull capable professionals into action before they know who owns the decision, what authority they have, or what contribution is needed. This course helps participants pause before acting and make better participation choices. Using the SEAT Policy Lens, they consider ownership, authority, timing, and contribution type so they can decide whether to engage, escalate, redirect, or hold back. Designed for professionals who support policy-related work without always holding formal decision authority, this course focuses on orientation and participation, not policy analysis or recommendations. Participants leave with practical language for contributing at the right level and explaining their judgment clearly.

“There is no such thing as creative and non-creative people, only people who use creativity and people who don’t” – Brene Brown. Creativity is innate in all of us; but too many people and organizations unknowingly hinder it from flourishing. Without creativity, it is impossible to develop an innovative organization that can deliver improved services and products and maintain sustainable competitive advantage. And the stakes have never been higher. The world is in the early stages of a new era of disruptive innovation that promises to transform every workplace and sector of society. Adaption is the new normal, and creativity is the new literacy. Explore how using creativity strategically can help you provide powerful solutions to problems and increase motivation, job satisfaction and engagement. Learn how creativity can be harnessed at an organizational level, and, with the right process in place, serve as an engine of innovation.

Mastering critical thinking and problem-solving skills can help you make better decisions or recommendations- an essential competency in today’s knowledge workplaces. Critical thinking helps you to examine and improve thought processes, ask the right questions, challenge assumptions and consider varying viewpoints. Effective problem-solving helps you to properly identify and systematically work through a problem in a comprehensive manner, ensuring clarity when it comes time to make decisions or recommendations. This course will demonstrate how critical thinking, problem-solving and decision-making work optimally together, and will provide hands-on practice with tools that you can apply to your everyday workday tasks, big or small.

Your memory helps you to shape your understanding of your present, and your application of your memories helps you to shape your future. How well your memory works has a direct impact on how much you get done in a day and the quality of your work. Your memory is a window into the health of your brain, how you care for it, and how you use it. It also helps to define who you are – for yourself and for those around you such as family members, friends, colleagues and others. This very engaging, interactive, and memorable workshop is about your memory – how it works, how you can better use your recall capacity, and much more. We guarantee you’ll remember it for years to come!

Management is frequently described as the art of getting work done through others. This requires a set of skills and talents that Administrative Professionals can develop to extend their influence, meet their manager’s expectations, create a professional image, take initiative, solve problems, resolve conflict, plan current and future activities, and have a springboard for career development. If you are in the role of executive secretary or administrative assistant you’ll find this workshop to be essential to your present job and critical to your future. This workshop is not a lecture. It is a “hands on” opportunity to identify your existing management skills, develop new skills and bring increased opportunity to your organization and to you personally. The list of practical exercises includes confidence & conflict resolution role-plays as well as a ‘guess my personality type’ exercise based on the True Colors personality indicator. For prioritization, students will learn how to create a Daily Map in order to prioritize tasks.

Emotions are a key component of what makes us human. While emotions have often been seen as less important than intellectual reasoning, emotions motivate us to act, inspire us to create and connect our relationships. Our experiences shape how we understand, process and manage our emotions. Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the ability to identify, assess and positively engage with one’s own emotions and the emotions of others. Many people have not developed the foundational building blocks to be emotionally intelligent, resulting in emotions getting in the way of our judgement, relationships, or careers. This workshop provides opportunities for participants to build emotional intelligence by focusing on developing understanding and skills in: self-awareness, emotional management, physiological and behavioural reactions, understanding the connection to values and motivations, overcoming barriers to communication, building trust, and exercising empathy. Participants can apply their new skills in EQ to their personal and professional lives. 

This course follows Personal Effectiveness Through Emotional Intelligence – EQ1. It builds on the theory and tools presented in the initial program and dives deeper into developing the practical skills and behaviours that increase one’s own emotional intelligence both at work and in personal life. This course provides the opportunity to gain greater knowledge and skills to understand, express and regulate one’s emotions. In addition, participants will develop strategies to manage emotional interactions with others.  Participants engage in a variety of self-reflective exercises, group activities, and discussion to explore and develop higher levels of emotional intelligence in a supportive environment.

Thinking strategically can be described as the way people in an organization think about, view, assess and create the future for themselves, their team, and the organization. More than simply reacting to day-to-day or long-term problems and opportunities, it is concerned with creating opportunities and choosing options in order to be able to realize the best possible future. It is an ongoing process that becomes part of the organizational culture and part of the local vocabulary; it also ensures that strategic planning activity is more meaningful. Strategic thinking is a foundational skill and the same principles can be equally applied to people’s personal lives and their work responsibilities. The same thinking approach is relevant to all levels of responsibility throughout the organization. However, thinking strategically is only half of the workplace challenge; the ideal outcome for any organization is for its people to be able to both think strategically while acting tactically. Striking the proper balance is critical to the smooth operation of the organization and the full involvement of all its people. Achieving the balance helps team members collaborate and better align their day-to-day activities with the higher goals and vision of the project, department, or organization as a whole. This workshop will explore both what it means to think strategically, and how day-to-day operational action can be aligned to the grander strategy at both the individual and team level.

More and more people are encountering stress, overwork, and the pressure of time constraints in their lives. Some stress is actually good for you because it inspires you to meet life’s challenges. Too much ongoing stress causes an almost continuous activation of your body’s stress-response system. The overexposure to cortisol and other stress hormones can increase your risk of obesity, insomnia, digestive problems, heart disease, depression, memory impairment, and physical illness. It is important to recognize when we are in DISTRESS. This workshop will provide practical tips and techniques to help you achieve better results and health through the effective management of distress.

In today’s workplace, the administrative support position is the nerve centre of business, industry and government at all levels. Called upon to increase the effectiveness of the office environment, the administrative assistant needs to manage strategies, public relations, resources, time, stress, difficult people conflict and crisis situations calmly, effectively and professionally. This workshop provides management skills vital to today’s support position. This energetic, fun and fast-paced course will show you how to achieve respect as an indispensable member of your office team. In a comfortable and controlled learning environment, you will explore and expand upon techniques and methods, and learn the critical skills required to get the work done on time, keep the office running at peak efficiency, and balance work and personal life.

Most professionals lose time to a work scattered across inboxes, chats, sticky notes, and memory. When work lives in too many places, the day gets spent restarting tasks instead of finishing them. Participants learn how to capture and organize work into one reliable place, allowing them to make better decisions about what gets their time. They also learn to stay in control when work builds up, making priorities and capacity visible when demands exceed the time available. With practical strategies to reduce context switching and review overload, work moves forward consistently, with fewer missed items, less rework, and clearer handoffs across the team.

This 3-day program equips sales managers with the tools and strategies to navigate the unique challenges of sales leadership in Canadian organizations. Participants will develop expertise in leadership, business management, and talent management—ensuring they can translate organizational vision into a meaningful direction for their sales teams. The course provides actionable frameworks for coaching, performance tracking, sales forecasting, and talent development, enabling managers to drive sustained sales success.

Project management doesn’t have to feel complicated. At its core, it is about understanding what needs to be done, who needs to be involved, what could get in the way, and how to keep the work moving. This course helps participants build a solid foundation in project management. Through a realistic project scenario, they work through the key steps of managing a project, including how to clarify the work, plan ahead, communicate with stakeholders, manage risks and changes, and make better use of time, budget, and resources. It is designed for professionals who manage, coordinate, support, or participate in projects and want a clearer way to keep work organized and on track. Facilitated by a certified Project Management Professional (PMP).