Personal Resilience for Women Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Women Managers, Women Team Leaders and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 16 Nov 2026 Course code SD-PE-060

Before you join: Participants should have at least two years of professional work experience and current responsibilities involving deadlines, stakeholders, clients, projects or team relationships.

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

Women professionals can face sustained workload pressure alongside heightened expectations to be agreeable, available, confident and consistently high-performing. These pressures can contribute to exhaustion, overcommitment, self-doubt, difficulty recovering after setbacks and reluctance to raise concerns. Personal resilience is not about tolerating unreasonable conditions; it is the disciplined ability to assess pressure, regulate responses, protect capacity, seek support and act with purpose when demands are high.

This course develops practical resilience habits for managing professional pressure without sacrificing health, relationships or career direction. Participants examine their stress patterns using the Transactional Model of Stress and Coping, regulate physiological responses through recovery techniques, challenge unhelpful thinking with CBT-based methods, and set clearer boundaries around time, workload and communication. The course also addresses assertiveness, difficult conversations, workplace power dynamics, sponsorship, feedback, conflict and career self-advocacy.

Teaching combines focused instructor briefings, realistic workplace cases, guided self-assessment, peer discussion, communication simulations and structured application planning. Cases reflect situations such as conflicting deadlines, unmanageable requests, critical feedback, exclusion from decisions, difficult stakeholder relationships and career progression conversations. Participants leave with a personal resilience plan, a resilience risk register, boundary scripts, a workload review system and a 30-day implementation plan that can be used immediately at work.

The course is designed for women in professional, supervisory, managerial and specialist roles who already handle significant responsibilities and want more reliable ways to sustain performance, influence others and respond constructively to pressure.

What you will be able to do

  • Assess personal pressure patterns using the Transactional Model of Stress and Coping
  • Apply physiological regulation techniques to recover from acute workplace stress
  • Use CBT thought records and the ABCDE model to challenge unhelpful thinking
  • Set workload, communication and availability boundaries using clear operating principles
  • Conduct assertive conversations using DESC scripts, SBI feedback and broken-record techniques
  • Prepare support, sponsorship and career-development requests with evidence and clear ownership
  • Build a demand-capacity map and weekly review system for sustainable workload management
  • Create a personal resilience plan with recovery actions, escalation routes and progress measures

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Earlier recognition of personal overload signals and stress triggers
  • Clearer boundaries around workload, availability and communication
  • More confident responses to criticism, conflict and unreasonable requests
  • A practical recovery routine for demanding meetings and high-pressure periods
  • Stronger evidence-based career conversations with managers and sponsors

For your organisation

  • More sustainable performance during sustained workload and organisational change
  • Earlier escalation of capacity risks before they affect delivery
  • Clearer workload agreements and fewer hidden commitments
  • More constructive feedback, conflict handling and stakeholder communication
  • Improved retention of experienced women in critical professional and leadership pipelines

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can assess their current resilience patterns and identify pressure requiring action.

  • Resilience as recovery, adaptation and purposeful action under sustained pressure
  • Stress appraisal using Lazarus and Folkman’s transactional model
  • Distinguishing controllable demands from constraints requiring escalation or acceptance
  • Gendered workplace expectations, double binds and invisible emotional labour
  • Early warning indicators across cognitive, emotional, behavioural and physical domains
  • Baseline resilience self-assessment against current workload, support and recovery patterns

Participants can recognise stress activation and use practical methods to restore energy and choice.

  • Autonomic nervous system responses: sympathetic activation, recovery and allostatic load
  • Window of Tolerance used to recognise dysregulation and restore choice
  • Box breathing and paced respiration for immediate physiological downregulation
  • Sleep, movement, nutrition and stimulant habits assessed as recovery inputs
  • Energy audit mapping high-drain tasks, people, settings and times
  • Micro-recovery routines scheduled between demanding meetings and decision periods

Participants can identify unhelpful thinking patterns and reframe them into constructive actions.

  • CBT thought records separating situations, automatic thoughts, emotions and behaviours
  • ABCDE model challenging unhelpful beliefs after setbacks or criticism
  • Evidence testing distinguishes facts, interpretations, predictions and mind-reading
  • Imposter feelings examined without confusing self-doubt with performance evidence
  • Self-compassion breaks counter harsh internal commentary after mistakes
  • Growth-oriented reappraisal converts feedback into specific next actions

Participants can make capacity-based priority decisions and communicate workable professional boundaries.

  • Values clarification identifies non-negotiables, trade-offs and meaningful professional goals
  • Circle of Control separates influence, concern and direct responsibility
  • Boundary types: time, workload, communication, emotional and digital access
  • Priority decisions using Eisenhower Matrix and realistic capacity estimates
  • Personal operating principles define acceptable workload and response expectations
  • Recovery-protecting calendar blocks defend focus, breaks and personal commitments

Participants can state needs, decline unreasonable requests and maintain boundaries professionally.

  • Assertiveness continuum distinguishes passive, aggressive, passive-aggressive and assertive responses
  • DESC script structures clear boundary, request and consequence conversations
  • Broken-record technique maintains a reasonable refusal under repeated pressure
  • BIFF responses handle hostile or high-conflict written communication
  • Requests for support framed with context, options and explicit ownership
  • Language choices reduce apologising, hedging and unnecessary self-justification

Participants can manage difficult professional relationships while protecting credibility and wellbeing.

  • Stakeholder mapping identifies allies, decision-makers, blockers and support sources
  • Power analysis distinguishes formal authority, expertise, relationships and resource control
  • Psychological safety behaviours support candid questions, dissent and error reporting
  • SBI feedback model addresses conduct without attacking identity or intent
  • Conflict preparation separates interests, positions, facts and assumptions
  • Escalation decisions use documented patterns, policy channels and risk thresholds

Participants can advocate for development, recognition and support using credible professional evidence.

  • Strengths evidence inventory captures outcomes, expertise, feedback and preferred work
  • Achievement stories structured through STAR for credible self-advocacy
  • Sponsorship and mentoring mapped to distinct career-development needs
  • Development requests linked to business priorities, readiness and measurable contribution
  • Negotiation preparation defines aspiration, reservation point, alternatives and evidence
  • Visibility plan selects forums, stakeholders and messages without overextension

Participants can respond to change and setbacks with structured recovery and support decisions.

  • Change curve distinguishes normal adjustment reactions from persistent impairment
  • Scenario planning identifies likely disruptions, triggers, responses and contingencies
  • After-action review captures what happened, why, lessons and adaptations
  • Antifragility claims tested carefully against actual capacity and harm
  • Support-seeking plan specifies people, services, timing and request language
  • Professional help thresholds recognise when resilience methods are insufficient

Participants can create a practical system for managing commitments, energy and recovery.

  • Demand-capacity map compares commitments, available hours, energy and dependencies
  • Weekly review reconciles priorities, deadlines, risks and recovery commitments
  • Kanban work-in-progress limits expose overload and protect completion
  • Implementation intentions link triggers to specific resilient responses
  • WOOP method converts desired changes into obstacle-aware action plans
  • Delegation conversations clarify outcome, authority, checkpoints and decision boundaries

Participants can establish a measurable resilience plan for continued workplace application.

  • Resilience risk register records triggers, impacts, controls and escalation routes
  • Personal resilience plan integrates recovery, boundaries, support and development actions
  • Thirty-day experiments define behaviour, cue, measure and review date
  • Accountability partnerships establish check-ins, confidentiality and constructive challenge
  • Progress indicators track energy, workload, sleep, relationships and confidence
  • Relapse response plan restores routines after travel, crises or setbacks

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

What you take back to work

  1. Personal resilience self-assessment
  2. Demand-capacity mapping template
  3. CBT thought record template
  4. Assertive boundary conversation scripts
  5. Personal resilience risk register
  6. Thirty-day resilience implementation plan

Who should attend

  • Women Managers — managing people, priorities and stakeholder pressure while protecting capacity
  • Women Team Leaders — setting sustainable expectations for themselves and their teams
  • Women Professionals — handling complex workloads, visibility demands and competing commitments
  • Women Specialists — maintaining confidence and influence in technically demanding roles
  • Women Project Managers — responding constructively to deadlines, conflict and changing scope
  • Women Emerging Leaders — preparing for greater responsibility without adopting unsustainable habits

Skills and tools covered

Stress self-managementAssertive communicationBoundary settingCognitive reframingWorkload prioritisationCareer self-advocacy

Tools and standards

Transactional Model of Stress and Coping, ABCDE model, Eisenhower Matrix, DESC script

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce resilience models, followed by workplace cases, guided reflection, group discussion and communication simulations. Participants analyse realistic situations involving workload pressure, difficult requests, feedback, conflict, career visibility and organisational change. Trainers use structured tools such as thought records, demand-capacity maps, boundary scripts and stakeholder maps. Individual application planning links each method to current responsibilities, with peer feedback used to test clarity, practicality and likely obstacles.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have at least two years of professional work experience and current responsibilities involving deadlines, stakeholders, clients, projects or team relationships. They should be willing to reflect honestly on workplace pressure, behavioural patterns and career goals. No prior study of psychology, coaching, mental health, leadership theory or mindfulness is required. This is not clinical treatment or therapy, and it does not require participants to disclose personal medical information. Participants may bring current workplace situations they wish to analyse, while respecting organisational confidentiality.

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 have at least two years of professional work experience and current responsibilities involving deadlines, projects, stakeholders or team relationships. No prior training in psychology, coaching, mindfulness or leadership is required.

Bring examples of current workplace situations involving pressure, workload, boundaries, feedback or career development. Do not bring confidential documents, client information or sensitive personnel records.

The course is designed for women in professional, specialist, supervisory, management and emerging leadership roles. It is particularly relevant for participants facing sustained workload pressure, difficult stakeholder relationships or increased responsibility.

The course addresses stress regulation, but it also covers workplace boundaries, assertiveness, power dynamics, feedback, sponsorship, career visibility and workload systems. Its focus is sustained professional effectiveness rather than relaxation techniques alone.

Participants use current work situations to build boundary scripts, workload maps, support requests and recovery routines. The final personal resilience plan identifies specific actions, measures and review dates for the next 30 days.

Each day runs from 08:30 to 16:30 and includes approximately 6.5 contact hours, with breaks and lunch. The ten modules progress from pressure assessment and recovery to communication, workload management and personal action 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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