Conversational Leadership Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Line Managers, Senior Managers 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-174

Before you join: Participants should have experience leading meetings, supervising staff, coordinating projects or influencing stakeholders without direct authority.

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

Leadership is enacted through conversations: setting direction, making decisions, addressing performance, handling disagreement, building trust and explaining change. When these exchanges are poorly prepared or dominated by hierarchy, leaders receive filtered information, meetings produce vague commitments, conflict hardens and staff withhold concerns. Conversational leadership gives managers a disciplined way to create the conditions for candid, purposeful dialogue while retaining accountability for outcomes.

This course develops the practical communication skills needed to lead through everyday and high-stakes conversations. Participants learn to structure meetings, listen for interests and assumptions, ask questions that improve judgement, invite challenge, give evidence-based feedback, handle conflict and lead change discussions. They use named methods including the SCARF model, Ladder of Inference, SBI feedback, ORID questioning, RAPID decision roles, ADKAR and GROW coaching.

The five-day instructor-led programme combines short briefings with realistic cases, peer discussion, role-based simulations and structured reflection. Participants practise conversations involving missed performance standards, contested decisions, stakeholder resistance, difficult feedback and operational change. Each participant leaves with a personal conversational leadership plan, reusable preparation templates and a set of observation criteria for improving real meetings and one-to-one discussions.

The course suits managers who already lead people, projects, services or stakeholder relationships and need greater consistency in how they communicate under pressure. It is relevant to leaders in public services, banking, infrastructure, healthcare, NGOs, manufacturing and corporate functions where decisions depend on cooperation across roles, seniority levels and professional disciplines.

What you will be able to do

  • Structure leadership conversations using clear purpose, participation, decision and follow-through agreements
  • Apply the Ladder of Inference to separate observations, assumptions and conclusions
  • Use active listening, ORID questions and paraphrasing to improve shared understanding
  • Create psychological safety through framing, curiosity, micro-affirmations and trust repair
  • Deliver SBI feedback and feedforward requests supported by specific behavioural evidence
  • Prepare and lead difficult conversations using mutual purpose, interest-based negotiation and de-escalation language
  • Facilitate decision conversations using RAPID roles, red-team questions and decision logs
  • Produce a 30-day conversational leadership application plan for priority workplace conversations

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Greater confidence addressing poor performance without avoidance or unnecessary confrontation
  • A repeatable preparation method for consequential meetings and one-to-one discussions
  • Better ability to test assumptions before making decisions or escalating issues
  • Stronger coaching conversations that produce employee-owned actions
  • Clearer personal habits for managing triggers during disagreement and pressure

For your organisation

  • More candid reporting of risks, errors and operational concerns
  • Clearer decisions with recorded rationale, ownership and follow-through
  • More consistent manager feedback linked to observable standards and outcomes
  • Reduced meeting drift through explicit purpose, participation and decision agreements
  • Better change communication through timely answers, acknowledged uncertainty and local action

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can design purposeful leadership conversations with clear participation and follow-through.

  • Conversational leadership as the daily coordination mechanism for shared work
  • Leader talk ratios, turn-taking, and silence as observable behaviours
  • Conversation architecture: purpose, participants, sequence, agreements, and follow-through
  • Distinguishing dialogue, debate, discussion, and briefing by intended outcome
  • Communication channels matched to ambiguity, urgency, confidentiality, and relationship needs
  • Meeting charters defining decisions, roles, escalation routes, and documentation

Participants can recognise and regulate personal patterns that affect leadership conversations.

  • Triggers, assumptions, and identity threats affecting leader responses
  • SCARF model used to anticipate status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, fairness
  • Ladder of Inference separating observations, meanings, assumptions, and conclusions
  • Emotional regulation through pause, label, reappraise, and choose techniques
  • Personal conversational patterns mapped from pressure situations and stakeholder feedback
  • Contracting behavioural norms before high-stakes meetings and contested decisions

Participants can use listening and questioning techniques to surface facts, interests and concerns.

  • Active listening behaviours: attending, paraphrasing, summarising, and checking understanding
  • Open, probing, and reflective questions matched to conversation purpose
  • ORID questioning sequence moving from facts to meaning and decisions
  • Paraphrasing disputed statements without endorsing inaccurate claims or interpretations
  • Silence, wait time, and invitation techniques that broaden participation
  • Listening for interests, constraints, emotions, and unspoken decision criteria

Participants can encourage candid contribution while maintaining respectful challenge and accountability.

  • Psychological safety conditions established through leader responses to bad news
  • Edmondson's framing, fallibility, and curiosity actions for speaking up
  • Equal-airtime structures preventing senior voices from prematurely closing discussion
  • Micro-affirmations recognising contribution, expertise, and dissent without false praise
  • Repairing trust after interruption, dismissal, defensiveness, or broken commitments
  • Conversation agreements protecting confidentiality, challenge, candour, and respectful disagreement

Participants can conduct fair, evidence-based feedback and performance conversations.

  • SBI feedback structure separating situation, behaviour, and observable impact
  • Feedforward requests converting past-performance discussion into future behavioural commitments
  • Performance conversations balancing accountability, support, evidence, and employee voice
  • Specific recognition linked to standards, customer outcomes, and team behaviours
  • Manager preparation using examples, desired outcomes, questions, and follow-up dates
  • Documenting agreements, support actions, review points, and unresolved concerns

Participants can prepare and lead difficult conversations without avoiding conflict or escalating it.

  • Crucial conversation preparation: facts, stories, stakes, and mutual purpose
  • Nonviolent Communication observations, feelings, needs, and requests for tense exchanges
  • Interest-based negotiation distinguishing positions, underlying needs, and acceptable trade-offs
  • Thomas-Kilmann modes selected according to importance, relationships, time, and power
  • De-escalation language replacing blame, absolutes, accusations, and mind-reading
  • Closing conflict conversations with commitments, boundaries, owners, and review dates

Participants can lead conversations that improve judgement, clarify decision rights and record commitments.

  • Sensemaking conversations distinguishing data, interpretations, uncertainties, and assumptions
  • After-action review questions examining intended results, actual results, causes, lessons
  • Decision rights clarified through RAPID roles and recorded decision criteria
  • Red-team questions testing evidence, alternatives, risks, and unintended consequences
  • Disagree-and-commit protocol closing debate while preserving accountable challenge
  • Decision logs capturing rationale, dissent, owner, deadline, and communication plan

Participants can communicate change credibly and respond constructively to stakeholder concerns.

  • Stakeholder mapping identifying affected groups, influence, concerns, and conversation needs
  • Change conversations linking case for change, local impact, choices, support
  • ADKAR conversations diagnosing awareness, desire, knowledge, ability, and reinforcement gaps
  • Rumour response distinguishing confirmed facts, unknowns, next updates, and ownership
  • Town-hall question handling using acknowledge, answer, bridge, and follow-up
  • Manager cascades translating enterprise messages into team commitments and questions

Participants can use coaching and delegation conversations to build ownership and capability.

  • Coaching contracts agreeing topic, outcome, confidentiality, roles, and timebox
  • GROW model questions clarifying goals, reality, options, and way forward
  • Directive, coaching, and collaborative modes chosen by competence and urgency
  • Delegation conversations specifying outcomes, authority, constraints, checkpoints, and escalation
  • Developmental feedback integrated with stretch assignments, support, and review
  • Closing coaching conversations with owned actions, evidence, and follow-through dates

Participants can apply course methods through a focused plan for priority leadership conversations.

  • Conversation portfolio prioritising recurring meetings, stakeholders, and leadership moments
  • Stakeholder-specific conversation plans defining purpose, questions, risks, and commitments
  • Pre-meeting checklist covering intention, evidence, listening goals, and decision rights
  • Conversation observation rubric assessing airtime, questions, safety, clarity, and follow-through
  • Personal triggers and replacement responses documented for high-pressure interactions
  • Thirty-day application plan scheduling conversations, feedback, reflection, and peer review

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

What you take back to work

  1. Conversation architecture template
  2. Ladder of Inference reflection worksheet
  3. SBI feedback preparation guide
  4. Difficult conversation planning canvas
  5. RAPID decision conversation checklist
  6. 30-day conversational leadership application plan

Who should attend

  • Line Managers — need clearer conversations on performance, priorities and team accountability
  • Senior Managers — need candid input and reliable follow-through across functions
  • Project Managers — need to align stakeholders around decisions, risks and commitments
  • Team Leaders — need to address conflict and build productive working relationships
  • Change Managers — need to explain change and respond credibly to concerns
  • HR Business Partners — need to support managers with feedback, conflict and development conversations

Skills and tools covered

Dialogue facilitationActive listeningDifficult conversationsFeedback deliveryDecision conversationsCoaching dialogue

Tools and standards

SCARF model, Ladder of Inference, SBI feedback model, GROW model

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce each method, followed by case analysis, group exercises, structured simulations and facilitated peer feedback. Cases reflect common leadership situations: delayed delivery, performance concerns, stakeholder disagreement, service incidents and organisational change. Participants prepare conversation openings, questions, evidence and commitments using course templates. Trainers adapt scenarios to the cohort’s sector and management level while maintaining a practical focus on language, behaviour and follow-through. Individual reflection and application planning connect each method to upcoming workplace conversations.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have experience leading meetings, supervising staff, coordinating projects or influencing stakeholders without direct authority. They should be familiar with routine workplace communication such as briefings, one-to-ones, feedback discussions and team meetings. The course assumes willingness to reflect on personal communication habits and practise structured conversations with peers. No formal leadership qualification, coaching credential, psychology background or prior study of communication theory is required. Participants do not need to disclose confidential workplace matters during the course.

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

You should have experience leading meetings, people, projects or stakeholder relationships. No leadership qualification, coaching certification or communication theory background is required.

Bring a laptop or notebook and examples of upcoming conversations you need to prepare for, without sharing confidential information. Course templates and case materials are provided.

It is designed for managers, team leaders, project managers, senior specialists and HR professionals who lead through regular conversations. It is most useful for people already responsible for decisions, performance, change or stakeholder alignment.

This course focuses on leadership conversations where power, accountability, disagreement and decisions matter. It covers feedback, conflict, coaching, psychological safety, decision-making and change rather than presentation delivery or general writing skills.

Participants use preparation templates for real meetings, feedback discussions, decision forums and change conversations. The final module converts priority situations into a 30-day application plan with specific behaviours and review points.

Training runs from 08:30 to 16:30 each day, with about 6.5 contact hours daily. Time is divided across ten connected modules, combining method briefings, cases, simulations, peer feedback 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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