Kacik
​Consulting
Services LLC
LET'S TALK: 1-267-240-5131
Speaking Topics
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Fast Track Success in Your New Role
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Know how to position yourself as a leader, whether a first-time supervisor or a CEO, with a process that sets you up for quick success. You can still use these tools if you’ve already started or have been there a while. We’ll start with a 30,000-foot view, identifying what you need to know and from whom to set your course and clarify your focus for moving forward. You can still use these tools if you have been in your position for a while. This will help you gain the support and confidence of direct-reports, and impress those above you by demonstrating your ability to produce results.
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Handle Difficult Conversations with Confidence!
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Don't let that difficult conversation keep you awake at night. Learn a scripting technique for difficult conversations that will allow you to clearly communicate the issue, why it is of concern, propose a solution, and inspire positive outcomes for a joint resolution. This will include ways to diffuse anger in others and create safety in these conversations.
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Stress is an Inside Job!
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Understand where stress really comes from. It may not be what you think. I’ll show you ways to uncover thinking that fuels your stress and how to squash it in its tracks. Learn which of the five stress drivers is yours and how to combat its negative effects. Examine irrational beliefs and distorted thinking that sneak into play. Learn when you’ve run up the ladder of perception only to find yourself upset or in conflict and how to get off the top of the ladder. Invest in your thinking and get the return of your life!
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Results Leadership Part I
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As a leader, you are no longer an individual contributor and your recognition comes from the results produced by your team. Results are critical for your success as well as for your team members. The key to success is in how your write your goals. While many are aware of “SMART” goals, few are actually writing goals that really drive results. This session will look closely at how to write goals to drastically increase your rate of success as well as your ability to hold people accountable. You will also explore another important aspect of leading for results, which is creating a vision that others want to follow.
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Results Leadership Part II
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Two important aspects of accomplishing goals are, first, measuring and tracking and second, giving and receiving feedback. Achieving a goal is much like nurturing a growing plant – it requires care and tending along the way. If you plant corn in the spring without watering or fertilizing and come back in August expecting to have corn on the cob for dinner, you may be disappointed. As a leader, you will need to be checking in, coaching and providing feedback along the way to assure the goal is met by the deadline with all its elements intact.
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Leadership Skills
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What are your leadership styles? Yes, styles, plural. Research shows that effective leaders use multiple styles for different circumstances. Awareness is the first step to broadening your repertoire of skills. Good leaders constantly assess the needs of their team and seek ways to provide development through proper training, coaching and feedback. There will be a strong focus on good techniques for supervisory oversight and keeping your team on the cutting edge of best practices.
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Public Speaking & Presentation Skills
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Whether you are a good speaker who wants to hone your skills or someone who panics or gets tongue-tied when having to speak to a large group, this will offer you techniques for speaking with ease in front of one or a hundred as well as simple things you can do to make the difference between being a good speaker and a great one.
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Everything is Negotiable – Do it Skillfully!
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This session addresses key skills in negotiations to apply at any level - beginner to advanced. As a seasoned professional negotiator, I will share rules, skills, tips and simple actionable steps that bring big returns.
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Achieve Team Synergy & High Performance
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Building a highly successful team doesn’t happen by accident. There are four distinct stages teams go through as they develop. Learn not only what happens in each stage, but how you as either a team member or a leader can make each stage more powerful in developing a highly synergistic and high performing team and how you can use each stage to develop a culture that supports the goals and ideals of the team. Even successful teams that work well together can move to greater heights by understanding these stages. It is also helpful for leaders to understand the different needs teams have of their leader at each stage. A key piece is learning which stage frequently blocks teams from forward movement and how to avoid the pitfalls of that stage.
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Thoughtfully Choose Your Approach for Resolving a Conflict
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Conflict resolution is nobody’s favorite task. It’s more manageable for some than others, as approaches to conflict are connected to personality style which will briefly be described. That said, only one of the four basic styles is somewhat comfortable with conflict. So this session will give you tools to choose from to increase your comfort and success in resolving conflicts. Learn which tools work best in what types of situations (This session is best offered with “Handle Difficult Conversations with Confidence” as a pre-requisite. “Achieve Team Synergy and High Performance” can also be helpful as a pre-requisite.)
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Make Yourself Promotable
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Moving up the ladder requires skills that are beyond subject-matter specific, which you recognize and know how to apply to broader challenges. Communicating what you have accomplished is usually easy; more important is being able to recognize your skills and know how to talk about your strengths. We will look at how to dissect your success stories to extract skills you may not have thought about, which are not only highly valuable, but also transferable.
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Manage People Through a Change Process
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Managing the project side of change and managing people through change are two different things and require different skills. Learn about the three phases people go through during change and what you as a leader can do during each phase to facilitate an easier, more productive transition. If you’re not a leader, it will help you personally and enable you to support other team members as well. Learn what behaviors to expect in each phase, how you can support others differently during each phase and what you can do at the beginning to make it smoother for everyone. We’ll also look at the value of using a transition team (a subset of your team) before and during the process.
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Be a Strategic Thinker & Decision-Maker – Part I
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Learn to look beyond just what you are assigned to do, how you can bring new value to your organization and how to spot valuable gaps for new offerings or improvements, and explore political strategies to promote your ideas. Identify techniques to look at your work, your processes and your organization in ways that further the organization’s vision. Execute strategies to increase efficiency, profitability and customer satisfaction. Doing this also serves to highlight your talents and skills and make you more visible and promotable. (“Leadership Skills” is suggested as a pre-requisite to this webinar.)
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Be a Strategic Thinker & Decision-Maker – Part II
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Not all decisions are about improvements. There are often difficult decisions to be made requiring budget cuts, down-sizing and the like. Sometimes difficult decisions are about hiring the right person. Whatever they are, being aware of your mental and emotional perspectives can be critical and can either help or hinder the best possible outcome. Some decisions require facing ethical challenges and accepting what can and cannot be done. Being at the top of your game during difficult decisions requires clear thinking and awareness. This webinar will give you tools to embrace during times when you face difficult decisions.
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Expand Your Influence
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Influence is not only a skill for contributing to personal, team and organizational successes; it is a huge career-builder. Influence comes through a wide variety of skills and methods. It is as important to understand the strength of your personal style as it is to be able to adapt to others. Being self-aware, reading the room and using good timing are just a few of the aspects we’ll explore to help you become more confident and a more-recognized thought-leader in your role.
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Be a Motivator of Others
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Not everyone has the level of self-motivation that you might prefer, so how do you ramp up another’s motivation when you need them to step up? Understand motivating factors of different personality styles to begin crafting a plan that fits the individual. Motivation is highly personal and requires highly individualized plans if you want to have an impact. Explore options for coaching and meeting that individual where they are so you can help them unlock their inner motivation.
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Mediation Skills for Employee Conflicts
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While we’d like to think that employees can work through their own conflicts, that’s not always the case. Even executive-level employees sometimes need the help of a third party to work through difficult conflicts. Intervention is necessary when conflict is affecting the work of those in conflict and/or others in the organization. Learn a simple and basic method you can use in situations where you need to get involved. Set the stage properly and use this method to facilitate the conversation in a way that helps the participants create a resolution they are both willing to embrace.
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Running Effective Time-Saving Meetings
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It’s true that meetings are a huge drain on everyone’s time, but good productive meetings are necessary to accomplish goals and get the job done. So make meetings more productive, accomplish the right things, experience less redundancy and save time. There are things to do before, during and after the meeting so it takes less time, gets everyone on the same page and actually addresses the important work for which the meeting was intended.
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Facilitation Tools and Processes for Meetings and Retreats
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Are you tired of “brainstorming” that doesn’t produce the results you hoped for or deteriorates into meandering discussions that go down multiple rabbit-holes? Using the right tool for the right situation is important to accomplishing your goal. Facilitators have a lot of tools in their tool boxes, so let’s explore a few that can give you more options for building consensus, gathering data, analyzing factors, generating ideas, narrowing choices, and providing focus.
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Working Effectively With Your Manager
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Everybody has a boss, even if you’re the CEO who reports to a board. It can be challenging at times, but there are ways to make it a mutually supportive relationship with communication that works for both of you. With a healthy relationship, you will be in a better position to grow and be prepared for future opportunities. Learn how to handle questions, mistakes and more in ways that elevate your image to the boss and help you get the support you need.
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Networking – Opportunities for You Personally and for Your Organization
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Networking is an essential skill in the business world. Doors are opened, deals are made, introductions happen and both business and personal growth happens through networking. For some though, it’s a challenge to put yourself out there and you may not know where to start or how to make it a valuable experience. Learn how to find networking opportunities and how to prepare for a variety of types of networking, whether it’s planned or spontaneous. Walk away with simple tips to start conversations and leave a good impression that allows the conversation to continue beyond one event. Add the value of “Informational Interviews” for your own career growth and opportunities within or outside your current organization.
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Effective Time Management Skills
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Time management is everyone’s challenge and you’re not alone. Learn some critical basics that will help you get more out of each day without going into overdrive to do it. We’ll start by getting clear about the difference between a plan, a to-do list and a schedule. In the next step, you’ll learn tools to help you prioritize your work and get organized. You will also learn tips to create a realistic schedule and develop consistency to increase your productivity even further so you save time and simplify your life.