The Yarbrough Group training transforms people and groups, providing precise presentation of subject matter within at atmosphere of safety, challenge, and joy. We offer several courses a year for open enrollment and plan all other training to meet the specific needs of our clients. Our courses and a sampling of other training is described below.

Masterful Facilitation
Inspired Leadership
Executive Retreat For Women
Artful Mediation
Organizational Development Course
Diversity Offerings
Women And Men Working Together
Valuing Diversity: How To Create An Inclusive Workplace
Training Of Diversity Change Agents
Diversity: Next Steps For System Change
Coaching
Polarity Management Introductory Course




Masterful Facilitation: Forging Community in Change
What can contain and sustain the firey change that confronts us? What skills are critical? In our 3 decades of organizational development work on 5 continents and 20 countries, we are sure that community is the container and facilitation is the skill. This course builds on our previous Masterful Facilitation course renewed to help you address current issues.

Masterful Facilitation is the ability:
  • to read accurately what goes on among people and
  • to intervene precisely to guide change with compassion.
The aim of masterful facilitation is:
  • to forge human communities strong enough
  • to sustain quality work and healthy relationships in chaotic times.
This 5 day, residential course is designed for change agents in many roles: human resources and organizational development professionals, external consultants and trainers, educators and counselors, managers and leaders.

Within a highly interactive, supportive community, you will learn:
  • an overall model of facilitation that helps you direct your skills
  • the steps for building authentic community with diverse people
  • models to help understand individuals, groups, and larger systems
  • how to observe people and dynamics at all these levels
  • how to help systems heal so they progress without heavy baggage
  • how to intervene at the right time at the right level for maximum impact
  • ways of understanding yourself as the primary facilitation tool
  • new fast-forward methodologies that match the speed of change.
We will make time for learning, reflecting, resting, playing, exercising ...taking care of ourselves in mind, body, and spirit so that we are living the kind of community that masterful facilitation is meant to forge.

Instructors: Drs. Elaine Yarbrough, Jim Firth, Michael Burr

To Register:
  • click here,
  • or call 303-449-7107




Inspired Leadership: Finding Wisdom in Fire
Carrying Fire Dr. Elaine Yarbrough, primary instructor

Organizations are desperate for Inspired Leadership. Tribal leadership that hinges on control, territory, and rationality is outdated in organizational worlds topsy turvey with speed, competition, technology, virtual teams, and the need for many voices to face complex problems. It's ironic that the qualities and skills we have always known create healthy conditions for high performance can no longer be denied and must be remembered and relearned. Leaders also need to take care of themselves. Rather than being thrashed about, running from one demand to another, taking breaks only to re-build some strength, leaders need to dip into their well of wisdom that provides a guide for good decisions and inspired leadership.

For information and to Register: Call 303-449-7107




Executive Retreat For Women: Carrying the Fire of the Future
Carrying FireDr. Elaine Yarbrough

As women have gained in numbers and influence at work, the boon of success has meant we are often over-scheduled and exhausted. Or we have made decisions about slowing our treadmill lives and are wondering what do we really want: what is the vision of our life? What is the unique tapestry each of us is trying to weave? When we look into the cultural mirror, we see only a small part of who we are, or could be, reflected. And so we must have time for reflection in a supportive circle to remember our unique talents and deep yearnings. Remembering happens when we slow down, honoring the natural rhythm of life of which we may have only a faint memory, like the gentle rustling of leaves on an autumn day.

This retreat provides women at any stage of her career or life the chance to:
  • re-connect with herself and other women,
  • re-juvenate her energies,
  • re-new her commitments to what is important in our worlds,
  • re-learn and re-own the leadership qualities that are so critical to the well being of our teams, organizations, and personal lives.
  • re-flect her full image to ourselves and our world.
We will spend time with our minds, bodies, and spirits, focusing on our internal and external worlds....re-membering that they are always connected. We will make time for learning, resting, exercising, playing, sitting by the fire, story-telling, and planning..whatever your life needs at this time.

When: Times to be determined




Artful Mediation: Constructive Conflict at Work
Drs. Elaine Yarbrough and William Wilmot

The modern organization, under pressures of continual improvement, cannot operate efficiently with disputes sapping its strength... conflicts recycle, people withdraw rather than deal with differences or erupt over minor issues, departments compete rather than cooperate, difficult relationships block work. This highly interactive workshop gives you the skills to transform the tension of conflict into productivity and satisfaction.

A few of the key things you will learn are how to:
  • manage conflicts from start to finish
  • use key skills at the right time
  • surface hidden agenda
  • break deadlocks
  • balance power
  • diffuse hot conflict
  • convert dirty tricks into constructive outcomes
  • use your organization's culture for positive agreements that stick.
These skills can be used whether you are involved in the conflict or whether you are asked to mediate: help manage others' conflicts. Your role may be a manager, human resources professional, mediator, organizational consultant, public official, or non-profit leader.

When: Training to be scheduled in-house. Please contact the Yarbrough Group for details




Organizational Development Course
Carrying FireThe Yarbrough Group offers an extended course in Organizational Development. This course has been taught recently in Colorado and California as well as Austria and Turkey to people from 15 countries.

The course is an overview of the field of Organizational Development which involves accurate assessment of what an organization (or any part of it) needs, joint planning with the people involved in the change, and action steps that lead to change that is accepted by those involved. The overall aim is to create a well functioning organization in which people can contribute their best, are satisfied and productive. To do so, HR professionals and managers need to understand how the entire system functions and how one part supports or blocks another.

Understanding and knowledge in OD theory can help those attending:

  • Develop plans for change that are accepted within
    an existing culture
  • Develop plans for establishing or changing an
    organization’s culture
  • Be flexible in designing interventions for rapid
    change
  • Work cross-culturally
  • Develop teams within and between functions
  • Understand how to better coach managers and
    employees
  • Think and act strategically about change

The course covers, theoretically and experientially, key OD theories from the individual, interpersonal, group, intergroup, and systems levels of the organization; and then, with that background, provides participants ways to intervene on those levels. The design of the course fills the need for education that falls between a formal university offering and more typical short courses.

Dates: To be announced
Cost: To be announced
Place: To be announced

Registration limited to 20 participants.




Diversity Offerings
Many issues under the heading of Diversity are being examined in order to attract and maintain top employees, to enhance productivity by appreciating differences and to create what each of us knows is a healthy workplace.

The Yarbrough Group can help you assess your entire organization in terms of the current state of your diverse workfoce (numbers, attitudes, strengths and concerns); plan and conduct training; and conduct strategic planning to align the system with your vision to utilize your diverse workforce.

Changes that necessitate a focus on diversity include:

  • Entrance of women into the workplace,
  • Continuing awareness of racial inequities and failure to use special skills of diverse people,
  • An aging workforce,
  • Diverse customer base,
  • Focus on work/life balance,
  • A growing gap in educational levels of workers,
  • Migration of highly qualified workers into Western European countries and the U.S.
  • Shrinking pool of qualified labor from traditional sources,
  • Diverse life styles and a desire to be open about them,
  • Demand for better teamwork in a diverse employee environment.

All of these trends necessitate understanding how to create a work environment that is inclusive and welcoming to diverse people so that employees can support the organization by contributing their best and the organization can support them in leading balanced lives.

Click here to request more information.





Women And Men Working Together
This course looks at the diversity of women and men working together as colleagues for greater productivity and satisfaction. Since every person fits into one of the gender categories, many companies have chosen to begin diversity work through the door of Women and Men Working Together. In addition, demographics point to gender diversity as a key focus. In the last two decades, women have entered the workforce in staggering numbers so that today over 40% of all women worldwide work outside the home. Women have moved into lower supervisory and management positions but only a fraction of a percent of top level positions are held by women. With the aging of the workforce and the decreasing education of entrants into the workforce, women represent some of the most qualified applicants and hence must be tapped for the well being of the organization.

Goals

Awareness of
1. How socialization affects values and behaviors toward our own and the opposite gender.
2. How men and women collude to maintain helpful and unhelpful patterns.
Skills for
3. Improving communication between women and men.
4. Managing uncomfortable situations between women and men.
5. Creating healthy work partnerships between women and men.
Improvement of the business climate by
6. Legitimizing honest, serious discussions between women and men.
7. Increasing support across and between genders.
8. Creating organizational rewards for managing diversity.
9. Increasing leadership for managing diversity.


Click here to request more information.




Valuing Diversity:
How To Create An Inclusive Workplace
The course provides an overview of the issues in creating an inclusive environment for a diverse workforce. It includes information and dialogue about

  • overall economic and global trends that necessitate a focus on diversity
  • conditions in the workplace that allow and encourage all people to perform their best
  • communication skills needed for being successful as an individual and company in a diverse environment
  • special information about diverse groups to increase understanding and improve working relationships
  • predictable dynamics that keep employees excluded
  • specific action steps for individuals and organizations to manage diversity better.



Click here to request more information.




Training Of Diversity Change Agents
For diversity efforts to be successful, there must be visionary and effective leadership. This course guides diversity specialists, managers who champion diversity, and human resources professionals through the maze of diversity issues to increase their competency in creating cultures that value all people and promote their highest contribution.

Goals

1. Greater understanding of organizational approaches to creating and developing diversity programs.
2. Greater understanding of the interpersonal skills needed for diversity work including responding to resistant people.
3. Knowledge about specific areas of diversity work: gender, sexual orientation, ethnic discrimination.
4. More precise observation skills regarding diversity dynamics: how people are included and excluded with what effects.
5. Greater awareness of self: our own needs and biases and stages of development.
6. Development of a support network for managing the stress and sharing the accomplishments of diversity work.
7. Development of action plans for future diversity work.


Click here to request more information.




Diversity: Next Steps For Systems Change
When organizations begin work on diversity, typical patterns emerge including many initiatives that may be uncoordinated leading to frustration by well intentioned leaders and from those who have traditionally been left out of the mainstream. In our diversity work, we are now working on prevention of negative consequences of positively intended change, building on the excitement generated by diversity educational courses, and beginning system wide changes for an inclusive work environment.

Toward those ends, we conduct Search Conferences to fast forward the creation of an inclusive work culture. A Search Conference is a group planning meeting for people to seek common ground for joint action toward their defined future. Participants are chosen who have information about and are committed to the outcomes of the conference. With the right people in the room and with the conditions for success created, the organization produces faster, more coordinated action and builds more trusting relationships which support quality, productivity, and innovation.

A full description of the method and steps can be obtained through The Yarbrough Group.

Click here to request more information.




Coaching
In The Yarbrough Group, we work with at least three approaches to coaching. The focus is to help develop the skills and talents of individuals so that they can support high performance in themselves and the organization as well as increase their personal effectiveness and satisfaction.

I.
The Big Picture
  • Context of life story
  • Callings
  • Core Values
  • Developmental Life Phase
What does the person want to accomplish in the large sense? 		II.
Specific Outcomes
  • Leading
  • Managing Conflict
  • Building a team
  • Coaching others
What is the person trying to improve or change? 		III.
Leadership as Coaching
  • Coach, not control
  • Understanding the differences
How can the person lead to match the milieu?

Authentic Community

We assume that people are whole and as such their competence is embedded in their unique talents, their particular phase of life, and their experiences. To learn new skills, refine old ones, and/or drop unhelpful ones, learning must be attached to the broader picture of peoples' lives and must be specific in terms of outcomes desired.

Our focus then is to
  1. Have the person understand his/her context and unique talents.
  2. Clarify what is needed in terms of fine-tuning and change.
  3. Practice skills in the coaching session and plan to do so in the work setting with supportive others.
  4. Receive feedback from the coach and others in the workplace on their changes so that learning improves and increases.
Information sources include
  1. The person being coached.
  2. Expectations from significant others in the workplace.
  3. Observation of the person in action, e.g., staff meetings, if needed for real time feedback.
The process includes
  1. Discussion with the person desiring coaching and with relevant people inside the organization about expectations, outcomes desired, ground rules of the sessions, and length of time for the coaching.
  2. A long first session-usually a full day for gathering background information, completing and/or reviewing assessment tools, understanding goals, and beginning to build skills.
  3. Follow-up sessions scheduled as needed based on the goals. These can be a combination of face-to-face and phone conversations.
  4. Observation session(s), if appropriate.
It is our assumption that the contents of the coaching session are confidential unless other ground rules have been agreed upon.

Click here to request more information.




Polarity Management Introductory Course
Use Polarity Management® to Gain and Maintain High Performance

The research is clear: leaders and organizations that manage polarities well outperform those that don't - both in the short term and the long term. Polarities go by a variety of names: paradoxes, dilemmas, or wicked problems. High performance leaders and organizations have developed a tacit wisdom about managing polarities even if they have never heard the name. Their experience and intuition has led to a natural ability, as F. Scott Fitzgerald said, to "... hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function."

What is needed is a way to make this tacit wisdom useable so leaders and organizations tap the power of polarities. We lose this power when we think only in either/or terms. Either we plan for stability at the expense of change and creativity OR we go for change and let people hang on for dear life. Either the organization centralizes for efficiency OR decentralizes for speed.

Polarity Management allows leaders and organizations to identify interdependent pairs and plan for using the best of both, while avoiding their downsides. The question, for example, is NOT whether to seek stability or change but how to plan for both. The question is NOT whether to compete or collaborate but when and how to do both. The question is NOT whether to centralize or decentralize but what parts of the organizations or functions work best in one or the other structures.

When polarities are managed to obtain the best of both conditions, the tension between the poles is converted into creative energy. For example, people are eager to come to work AND they are productive which makes them eager to come to work and more productive... When leaders mistake a polarity to manage as a problem to solve, the tension between the poles is converted into destructive energy: people dread coming to work and become less productive...

Advantages of the Polarity Management® Introductory Course

The Polarity Management® Introductory Course is intended for individuals interested in expanding their thinking and awareness of the phenomenon of interdependent pairs - polarities - and how to manage them well. This course is provided as an introduction for those who have had little or no exposure to Polarity Management®. It is both a stand alone introduction and the prerequisite for the next step in learning; the Consultant Development Intensive (CDI).

This one-day program helps ensure that participants understand the fundamental principles of Polarity Management®, how polarities work, and the steps for managing polarities well over time. The objective is to supplement participants' thinking and improve their effectiveness in addressing the "5 C's": Complexity, Change, Conflict, Chronic and Cross-Cultural Issues.

In the workshop participants will:
Understand the
  1. Background and context for Polarity Management
  2. Critical importance of managing polarities in complex times
  3. Nature of polarities
  4. The difference between problems to solve and polarities to manage
  5. The value of either/or thinking and the value of both/and thinking
Develop skills in
  1. Identifying polarities,
  2. Mapping polarities and predicting their movement,
  3. Action planning to create virtuous cycles.
The PMI is not a licensing process through which someone is "certified" to consult or train with Polarity Management®. It must be understood that effectively training and consulting with Polarity Management® is a skill acquired over time with practice and coaching support from someone who has developed those skills.

Faculty of the Polarity Management® Introduction

Chandra G. Irvin, the founder and president of Irvin, Goforth & Irvin, LLC, has over 20 years experience in management, human resources, and organization development. Chandra is a master consultant and frequent presenter on Polarity Management®. Employing the GOFORTH Principles and Polarity Management®, she equips individuals and organizations to simplify complexity, capitalize on differences, overcome chronic problems, resolve conflicts and manage change. She is the executive director of the Diversity Strategy Consortium, a group of corporations that examines domestic and global diversity issues and develops strategies for advancing diversity leadership, accountability, communications, and performance.

Margaret Seidler, MPA, is an Organization Development (OD) Consultant and Master Trainer. Her practice involves organization assessments, work culture advancement, leadership development, team building, conflict resolution and work relationship training. Margaret has extensive experience as a Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award Examiner through service in South Carolina, Georgia and Minnesota. She has presented nationally at the 2003 Association for Quality & Participation, 2003-2008 American Public Power Association (APPA) conferences; Polarity Management®/Real Time Strategic Change conferences; the 2005 National OD Network Conference; and the 2006 inaugural session of the Houston OD Network Learning Community.

Elaine Yarbrough, Ph.D. will be teaching a Constructive Conflict: A Polarity Perspective in the future. She will also be a part of the core faculty for the Introductory Course.

  
  SESSION AGENDA  
  7:30 am  Gathering  
  8:00 amSession  
  NoonLunch  
  1:00 pmSession  
  4:30 pmEnd of Day  
TUITION......$375.00
Cost includes tuition and all materials. Materials include a workbook containing exercises, guidelines, and handouts that will ground you in the basic methods used to identify and manage polarities.

SCHEDULED COURSES:
  • Atlanta, GA., January 12, 2009. Location: Holiday Inn Express, 4601 Best Road, College Park, GA 30337
  • Chicago, IL., March 3, 2009.l Location: Days Inn Chicago (Used to be called Days Inn Lincoln Park), 644 W. Diversy Prkway, Chicago, Il 60614
Class size is limited to allow a rich variety of experience and concentrated attention on the individual needs of each participant.

REGISTRATION:
You can email Dana at Dana@polaritymanagement.com OR Shalom Bruhn at Shalom@alamedanet.net with the following information which you can copy and paste into the body of the email ( * = must have for registration):
  • Name*:
  • Email Address*:
  • Title/Position:
  • Organization:
  • Address:
  • Phone Number*:
  • Registrant for: Atlanta PMI - Spring 2008*
We will then send you a PayPal link and will place you on our roster.
Alternately, you can MAIL this form with check payable to:
Polarity Management Associates; 1496 Manitou Lane, Middleville, Michigan; 49333

Polarity Management® Introductory Course: Atlanta, Ga. 2008
First Name*:
Last Name*:
Title/Position:
Organization:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip:
Phone*:
Email*:

For alternate payment plans or other questions:
CALL Dana Wilcox at 616.233.3291, or
Email Dana at Dana@polaritymanagement.com

Click here to request more information.





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The Yarbrough Group
1113 Spruce Street, Boulder, CO 80302
303-449-7107 - Fax: 303-938-5005
info@yarbroughgroup.com
www.yarbroughgroup.com