VIRTUAL MASTERCLASS
Leading High-Stakes Meetings Masterclass Series
Imagine an important meeting at work: a board, C-suite, executive committee or leadership team meeting, a pitch to investors or clients, a tricky negotiation with a customer, or a steering group meeting for a major programme.
The stakes are high. The issues are complex. There are lots of senior, influential, and demanding people involved. Get it right and you leave people feeling impressed and looking for opportunities to help you grow. Make a false move, say the wrong thing, collapse under pressure, or come across under-confident, it can take a long time to recover, if at all.
So, what does it take to be at your best? Our brand-new, signature group coaching masterclass will help you answer this question!
Who is this masterclass for?
This masterclass is ideally suited to:
- A C-suite executive looking to enhance their impact with colleagues, customers and/or stakeholders
- A project manager presenting in front of a steering group or executive committee (Exco)
- A project leader looking for sponsorship from an important decision-making body, such as a board
- Leaders who want to improve their reputation with senior stakeholders in high-stakes meetings
- Executives who want to effectively communicate a high-stakes message to employees or other stakeholders
BENEFITS & RESULTS
By the end of this masterclass, you’ll have transformed your reputation and credibility with important stakeholders, such as your boss, clients, investors, or peers. This will improve your prospects substantially. In doing so, you’ll show more of your best self, feel less anxious, be more confident of taking on bigger roles in the future.
You will learn how to:
- Design the meeting to achieve your outcomes
- Anticipate the agendas, roles, and behaviours of participants
- Prepare yourself to be at your best
- Start the meeting with conviction
- Present with clarity and confidence
- Enhance your emotional intelligence as you read the room
- Respond to questions and challenges when others are difficult, distracted, or unpredictable
- Be agile in response to new perspectives and feedback
- Stay engaged in long sessions
- Focus the meeting on what matters
- Listen, ask incisive questions, and challenge other constructively
- Choose when to speak up and when to stay quiet
- Lead the group effectively to a wise decision
- Create commitment to pursue actions after the meeting
EXCLUSIVE CONTENT
This Strategy Shift masterclass includes:
Six virtual, 90-minute masterclasses (recorded for your own personal use). We’ll use real-life stories and examples that show mastery and give you an opportunity to practise.
50 resources you can use immediately that include scripts, guides, tips, checklists, and exercises.
A network of fellow executives and professionals to engage with and learn from.
A chance to win a ticket to a personal, one-hour coaching session, covering any topic you like.
A Strategy Shift certificate on completion.
CURRICULUM
We start on 19 June 2024. Here’s what happens over the six weeks.
Each masterclass is recorded for your own personal use afterwards.
20.15 (GMT), 19 JUNE 2024
1. Establish the purpose
- Figuring out how a meeting helps your strategy
- How to work out if a meeting is the best option
- Identifying three critical outcomes from the meeting
- Anticipating what comes afterwards
- Working out your purpose
20.15 (GMT), 26 JUNE 2024
2. Design the meeting
- Figuring out who really needs to attend
- Understand the perspectives, needs, and styles of other participants
- Designing the best format
- Assigning roles in the meeting
- Deciding what documentation is required
- How to get everyone to attend
- How to encourage inclusion and engagement
- How to write the best email and agenda
- Preparing the ‘room’
20.15 (GMT), 3 JULY 2024
3. Prepare yourself
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How to identify your role and contribution
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How to influence stakeholders before the meeting
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Writing the best pre-read
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How to prepare what you want to say
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Preparing questions you want to ask
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Illustrating your perspectives vividly
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How to use rehearsals effectively
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Coordinating with your team
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Managing your schedule so you peak
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Preparing your mindset and body
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How to look the part
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Controlling your breathing and body language
20.15 (GMT), 10 JULY 2024
4. Start the meeting
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How to create a strong first impression
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How to handle small talk before the meeting starts
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Introducing the agenda with impact
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How to use framing to encourage full participation
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How to encourage psychological safety
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How to focus peoples’ attention.
20.15 (GMT), 17 JULY 2024
5. Lead the meeting
- Making your best contribution
- Facilitating a substantive discussion
- Responding to surprises
- Managing difficult people
- Sustaining your interest
- Breaking into the group when you’re new or different
20.15 (GMT), 24 JULY 2024
6. Close and follow up
- Bringing the discussion to close and delivering a succinct summary
- Reaching a decision when there are conflicting perspectives
- Dealing with outstanding issues
- Leaving the meeting with presence and confidence
- Communicating actions and key points effectively
- Following up with key stakeholders
- Capturing what you’ve learned about the topic and the group
- Getting people to deliver
LEARNING EXPERIENCE
Listen to some new perspectives, experiences, and methods.
Ask questions to clarify your understanding, spark your curiosity, and challenge your way of thinking.
Share your own experiences, successes, and failures with peers.
Try some experiments to try a new mindset or practice. There will be exercises to do after each workshop.
Reflect on what you tried and figure out what you will do next time. Share with the group throughout in our online community and in the workshops.
ENJOY A SPECIAL PRICE FOR THIS PILOT MASTERCLASS
Enrol and pay just £500 for your masterclass now.
Is this masterclass right for you?
This masterclass is for you if:
- You already participate in high stakes meetings — or want to
- You feel you have some skills to learn (and possibly unlearn)
- You feel disappointed with some aspect of your performance
- You feel you could do much more
- You want to enhance your reputation with senior stakeholders
This masterclass isn’t for you if:
- You want to sit back and listen to a lecture
- You don’t think you have anything to learn
- You think there is a single way of leading high impact meetings
- You want to perform in front of your peers
- You’re not willing to commit to real work throughout the six weeks and beyond
A pilot price of £500
This masterclass is brand-new. We’re confident in the value you’ll get from it, but we also recognise there will be opportunities to fine tune it.
If you join the first cohort, you’re helping shape the masterclass for future groups. In exchange for your help, we’re offering a significantly reduced price of £500, a very substantial saving on the price in the future.
The price reduction is our way of thanking you for the feedback you’ll give us during your participation. If you joined our wait-list, we’ll send you a coupon code for a further discount.
Please note: registration closes 31 May 2024.
BONUS MATERIAL & MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE
Bonus material
When you join the Leading High-Stakes Meetings masterclass you get free bonus material to enhance your impact and experience:
- Attend a Lancefield on the Line podcast with one of my guests, shaping the questions I ask, sitting in the ‘room’, and being first to hear what they say
- A bonus ‘Ask me anything’ session that any participants can join
- Tips on how to write with impact, learned from my articles published in Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Review, Strategy+Business, Forbes, and covered in the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times
- Prompts for how to focus your schedule
Money-back guarantee
If you’re ready to transform your contribution and reputation in high-stakes meetings, we’re willing to make a commitment, too.
We’ll guarantee that your transformation will occur in the 180 days following the masterclass, if you attend all the workshops, complete the exercises, and practise new mindsets and skills using the resources we give you.
If it doesn’t, we’ll happily refund your investment.
ANSWERS TO POPULAR QUESTIONS
What makes this meetings masterclass distinctive from others?
- We focus specifically on what it takes to succeed in the most challenging, demanding, and stimulating meetings you participate in
- These test participants’ mindsets, skills, and practices to the limit
- We cover what it takes to not just cope but also thrive
- It also covers real-life personal experiences as well as insights from leading research
I’m busy right now. Should I wait until the next masterclass launches?
You could. But you might have the opportunity to join a high-impact meeting very soon — as a presenter, participant, or observer. Would you not want to get a headstart on learning what it takes to show up well?
How much time do I need to invest in this?
- Each workshop lasts 90 minutes. On top of that, there is at least two hours per week of reflection and practice.
- It’s not so much the time investment. It’s more about the attention you put on embedding new ideas, frameworks, and methods into your day-to-day interactions. That requires commitment and discipline — a positive approach to experimentation!
What can I expect once I enroll?
You’ll receive a short questionnaire which will start you thinking about your own experiences, as well as strengths and weaknesses. You’ll also receive a series of invites to workshops, and some pre-readings.
I’m not attending high impact meetings right now. Should I join?
You might be invited tomorrow to one — so why wait? You can also start practising these new skills in your existing portfolio of meetings, ready to step up when you are invited.
How many people will be part of this programme?
The number of participants is limited to 30 to guarantee learning quality. In the event the masterclass you’re applying for is full, you’ll be put on the wait-list.
GOT MORE QUESTIONS?
Feel free to email us.
About your masterclass host
This masterclass is led by David Lancefield, founder of Strategy Shift. He has worked with 50 CEOs and hundreds of C-suite executives over the last 25 years.
He’s led, facilitated, participated in, and presented high-stakes meetings in 30 countries. He is a contributor to HBR, MIT Sloan Review, and Strategy+Business, and has been quoted in the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. David’s HBR article ‘Stop Wasting People’s Time with Bad Meetings’ is one of their most popular and widely-read.
SO WHAT DO OUR CLIENTS THINK?
Tim Davie
Director-General (CEO), BBC
“David is excellent at knowing what makes organisations tick…based on a combination of a natural sense for the soul of an organisation blended with an ability to apply best practice from around the world.”
Lesley Titcomb
Former CEO, The Pensions Regulator
“David’s breadth of knowledge and experience, his ability to come at problems from many different angles, and his intuition about people and what drives them are really valuable.”
Ashley Chapman
CEO, inlumi
“David supported our organisation through the development of the strategy and the culture we want to have, and need to have, for the growth trajectory inlumi is on. He provides stimuli and perspectives that are practical and useful whilst leaving your hands, as CEO, firmly on the steering wheel.”
A selection of our C-suite clients
