Collaborative Leadership Masterclass Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Advanced Certificate on completion
Who attends Executive Directors, Programme Directors and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 7 Nov 2026 Course code SD-LD-173

Before you join: Participants should have substantial management or leadership experience and current responsibility for work involving several teams, functions, partners or stakeholder groups.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Senior leaders are increasingly accountable for outcomes they cannot deliver through their own authority: an interagency service reform, bank risk programme, merger integration or community investment. Collaboration often stalls because decision rights are unclear, incentives conflict, informal power is ignored, and disagreement is either suppressed or allowed to delay action. The result is slow execution, brittle agreements and damaged relationships between functions, partners and sponsors.

This masterclass examines collaborative leadership as a disciplined approach to achieving shared outcomes across organisational boundaries. Participants diagnose interdependencies, map stakeholder power and interests, form coalitions, establish shared purpose, and create governance that preserves accountability. They work with practical methods for psychological safety, ethical influence, conflict intervention, joint decision-making, dependency management and adaptive learning. The course also addresses the difficult realities of collaboration: competing mandates, unequal power, political pressure, incomplete information and resistance to shared ownership.

Teaching combines focused instructor briefings with sector-based case work, group analysis, simulations of contested decisions and structured application planning. Cases reflect issues faced by public bodies, banks, multinational firms, regulated industries and NGOs, including programme delivery, transformation governance, service partnerships and cross-functional change. Participants leave with a collaboration charter, stakeholder and coalition analysis, decision-rights design, conflict intervention plan and 90-day application plan for a current leadership challenge.

The course is designed for experienced leaders who already manage significant responsibilities and need to convene people outside their direct reporting line. It is particularly useful where results depend on sustained cooperation between business units, professional disciplines, delivery partners, regulators, communities or government agencies.

What you will be able to do

  • Diagnose collaboration failures using causal loop diagrams, stakeholder analysis and power mapping
  • Construct stakeholder engagement and coalition plans for contested cross-boundary initiatives
  • Design collaboration charters defining purpose, governance, decision rights and working norms
  • Build psychological safety through inquiry, productive dissent and relationship repair techniques
  • Apply ethical influence strategies using power-base analysis, framing and pre-wire conversations
  • Facilitate conflict intervention and negotiation using interest-based methods and BATNA preparation
  • Establish decision protocols, escalation thresholds and accountability mechanisms for joint delivery
  • Produce a 90-day collaborative leadership application plan for a live organisational challenge

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Handle high-stakes disagreement without avoiding conflict or damaging relationships
  • Increase influence with peers, sponsors and external partners lacking direct reporting lines
  • Lead cross-functional decisions with clearer authority, participation and follow-through
  • Recognise informal power dynamics before they undermine a critical initiative
  • Convert a current collaboration challenge into a practical 90-day leadership plan

For your organisation

  • Faster resolution of cross-functional decisions delayed by unclear ownership
  • Stronger delivery partnerships through explicit commitments, escalation routes and review rhythms
  • Reduced rework caused by unmanaged dependencies and conflicting stakeholder expectations
  • Better retention of trust during transformation, restructuring and contested change
  • More reliable execution of initiatives requiring joint action beyond formal reporting lines

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can diagnose when collaborative leadership is required and identify the system conditions affecting joint action.

  • Collaborative leadership compared with command, consultation, coordination and co-creation models
  • System boundaries, interdependencies and feedback loops mapped through causal loop diagrams
  • Authority, accountability and influence distinguished in multi-party leadership mandates
  • Diagnosing collaboration failures: misaligned incentives, fragmented information and ambiguous decision rights
  • Cynefin domains used to select ordered, complicated, complex or crisis responses
  • Leadership stance adapted between directing, convening, facilitating and sponsoring

Participants can identify critical stakeholders and build engagement strategies suited to their interests and influence.

  • Stakeholder Salience Model assesses power, legitimacy and urgency of claims
  • Network maps reveal brokers, isolates, informal authorities and critical relationships
  • Interest-position analysis separates stated demands from underlying needs and fears
  • Influence strategies matched to stakeholder incentives, risk exposure and decision authority
  • Coalition maps identify allies, blockers, swing actors and bridging opportunities
  • Engagement plans specify message, messenger, channel, timing and listening method

Participants can design governance arrangements that support shared ownership without obscuring accountability.

  • Shared purpose statements connect outcomes, public value and stakeholder commitments
  • Operating charters define scope, membership, escalation routes and working norms
  • RACI matrices clarify accountable decisions without reducing necessary joint ownership
  • Decision rights allocated using RAPID for cross-functional approval pathways
  • Governance cadence aligns sponsor forums, delivery meetings and exception reviews
  • Terms of reference distinguish advisory, delegated and statutory responsibilities

Participants can create conditions for candid challenge, learning and relationship repair in senior groups.

  • Psychological safety diagnosed through candour, challenge, inclusion and error-reporting behaviours
  • Leader vulnerability signals learning without weakening accountability or role clarity
  • Working agreements establish dissent protocols, confidentiality boundaries and response expectations
  • Ladder of Inference exposes assumptions before they harden into positions
  • Active listening uses paraphrase, inquiry and acknowledgement to test understanding
  • Repair conversations address missed commitments, exclusion and damaged working relationships

Participants can use ethical influence to gain commitment from stakeholders outside their direct control.

  • French and Raven power bases inform ethical influence choices
  • Reciprocity, social proof and commitment applied without coercive tactics
  • Influence currencies identify valued resources, recognition and access among partners
  • Framing links proposed action to each party's interests and constraints
  • Pre-wire conversations build support before formal decisions and public meetings
  • Boundary spanners translate priorities, language and evidence between professional groups

Participants can intervene in conflict and negotiate workable agreements between interdependent parties.

  • Thomas-Kilmann modes selected according to stakes, time and relationship value
  • Interest-Based Relational Approach separates people, issues and workable options
  • Conflict mapping identifies triggers, histories, narratives, needs and escalation patterns
  • Crucial conversations use contrasting, mutual purpose and respectful candour
  • Negotiation preparation defines BATNA, reservation point, concessions and tradeable variables
  • Restorative dialogue rebuilds agreements after breakdowns between interdependent teams

Participants can structure meetings and decisions to achieve commitment, clarity and timely follow-through.

  • Decision protocols distinguish consent, consensus, consultation and accountable authority
  • Meeting design assigns purpose, participants, pre-reads, timeboxes and decision records
  • Consent decision-making tests objections against safety and organisational aims
  • Disagree-and-commit procedures prevent repeated debate after legitimate decisions
  • After-action reviews capture evidence, assumptions, outcomes and corrective commitments
  • Decision logs record rationale, owner, dissent, review date and dependencies

Participants can translate shared commitments into coordinated delivery, clear ownership and effective escalation.

  • Joint outcomes translated into measures, milestones, owners and interface commitments
  • Dependency mapping exposes handoffs, bottlenecks, service risks and sequencing constraints
  • Integrated plans align workstreams through critical path and milestone logic
  • Accountability conversations test commitments using request, promise, renegotiation and completion
  • Escalation thresholds distinguish local resolution from sponsor intervention requirements
  • Shared dashboards combine leading indicators, delivery status and stakeholder sentiment

Participants can use joint learning methods to adjust strategy when conditions, evidence or stakeholder needs change.

  • Sensemaking cycles combine weak signals, frontline evidence and competing interpretations
  • Double-loop learning challenges governing assumptions behind recurring coordination failures
  • Adaptive leadership distinguishes technical fixes from value conflicts and uncertainty
  • Scenario planning tests collaborative responses against plausible disruption pathways
  • Experiment charters define hypothesis, safeguards, measures, review points and owners
  • Learning reviews convert outcomes into changed routines, policies and decision rules

Participants can convert course methods into a focused plan for leading a current collaborative challenge.

  • Personal collaboration diagnostic identifies default behaviours, triggers and development priorities
  • Stakeholder engagement plan applies salience, interests, coalition choices and messages
  • Collaboration charter sets purpose, governance, norms, decision rights and measures
  • Conflict intervention plan sequences preparation, dialogue, agreement and follow-through
  • 90-day application plan names commitments, sponsors, checkpoints and evidence
  • Peer accountability arrangements support review, feedback and adjustment after return

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Stakeholder salience and coalition map
  2. Cross-boundary collaboration charter template
  3. RAPID decision-rights matrix
  4. Influence and pre-wire plan
  5. Conflict intervention and negotiation preparation sheet
  6. 90-day collaborative leadership application plan

Who should attend

  • Executive Directors — align functions, partners and sponsors around enterprise priorities
  • Programme Directors — govern complex initiatives with multiple accountable parties
  • Transformation Leaders — secure commitment across business, technology and operational teams
  • Public Sector Leaders — coordinate agencies, providers and communities with different mandates
  • Risk and Compliance Leaders — gain cooperation without relying solely on formal control
  • NGO and Partnership Directors — sustain coalitions among funders, delivery partners and stakeholders

Skills and tools covered

Stakeholder coalition buildingShared governance designEthical influenceConflict interventionJoint decision-makingCross-boundary accountability

Tools and standards

Stakeholder Salience Model, RACI Matrix, RAPID Decision-Making Framework, Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce methods, followed by case work drawn from cross-functional, partnership and public-value settings. Participants analyse stakeholder relationships, diagnose governance failures, practise difficult conversations and test decisions through structured simulations. Group exercises focus on competing interests, unequal authority and delivery dependencies rather than abstract leadership scenarios. Each participant applies the methods to a live challenge, receives peer and instructor feedback, and develops a practical plan for action after the course.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have substantial management or leadership experience and current responsibility for work involving several teams, functions, partners or stakeholder groups. They should be comfortable discussing live organisational issues, authority boundaries and difficult relationships. Familiarity with basic project governance, stakeholder management and meeting facilitation is useful. This is not an introductory leadership course. Formal qualifications in management, project management, mediation or organisational psychology are not required, and no prior knowledge of the named frameworks is assumed.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

Participants should already lead teams, programmes, functions or partnerships involving multiple stakeholders. The course assumes leadership experience but does not require prior study of mediation, organisational psychology or the named frameworks.

Bring a live collaboration challenge involving competing priorities, dependencies or stakeholders outside your direct authority. Participants use this issue to develop their stakeholder analysis, governance design and 90-day plan.

It is intended for senior practitioners responsible for results that depend on cooperation across functions, organisations or sectors. It is particularly relevant to executives, programme leaders, transformation leaders and partnership directors.

The course concentrates on leading between teams and organisations where formal authority is limited or shared. It addresses stakeholder power, coalition building, joint governance, contested decisions and conflict between accountable parties.

Participants leave with working documents for a current issue, including a stakeholder map, collaboration charter and conflict intervention plan. These can be used to prepare sponsor conversations, governance meetings and partner engagement.

Each training day runs from 08:30 to 16:30 and provides about 6.5 contact hours. The five days progress through ten connected modules, combining instruction, cases, simulations, group analysis and application planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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