Our Workshops

In association with Foodstuffs Wellington, Cardinal Solutions is proud to offer a new 3-year programme titled “A Great Place to Work”. 

Underpinning this programme is the belief that competitive advantage comes from having an engaged workforce who will give the business discretionary effort.  These engaged employees can then deliver a customer experience which ensures that the customer is delighted.  It is a delighted customer who then becomes a loyal customer.  Loyal customers are profitable customers.   

The programme is a combination of surveys, training and systems which all combine to create competitive advantage and increased profits. 

In year 1, a culture survey is used to measure and benchmark the culture within the business.  A customer survey is used to gain feedback on the current customer experience before a performance management system is introduced which emphasises the importance of regular workplace coaching for performance. 

A series of workshops is then conducted to understand, design and implement a unique customer experience.  The customer experience action plans resulting from each department in store will drive a series of checklists and procedures which are all designed to exceed the customers’ expectations.

Finally, a short 3-hour workshop called “Customers Count!” explains the concepts to all staff and department managers unveil their checklists & “steps to quality service” for their department.  

Coaching is provided from both Foodstuffs Wellington & Cardinal Solutions to assist with implementation in-store.

The second & third year programmes provide catch up training for new staff members with both the “Performance Management” & “Customer Count!” workshops.  “Self Leadership” and “Health & Wellbeing” workshops are also offered in year 2 while a “Teams” and a “Financial Planning” workshop are included at year 3.   

Click on this icon for an overview of the 3-year programme

  Click on this icon for an overview of the year 1 key content and outputs

This intensive leadership skills training programme is typically delivered via four days of facilitated learning spread over two residential block courses and includes 1:1 coaching, behaviour profiling, 360 degree feedback and transformational action learning project work. 

Although the content is customised for the client, typical programme themes are:

Lead with authenticity

• Discovering the leader within

• Identification of personal values

• Understanding how values impact leadership decisions and choices

Create an engaging vision

• Envisioning personal and organizational futures

• Developing a shared vision

• Communicating the vision

Challenge the process

• Generating a mindset for change

• Challenging organisational complacency

• Incremental vs. transformational change

Empower others to act

• The challenges of working with others

• Enrolling others in new possibilities

• Empowering others to act

Engage the heart

• The principles of engagement

• The secret to unlocking commitment

• Feedback – the language of leadership
  
  
   

Workshops in this category focus on providing participants with the fundamental skills of performance leadership. The workshops aim to provide participants with a range of options for solving the age old question, ‘how do you get people to do what they are supposed to do’?

Our standard Leadership Development Programme consists of four 1-day workshops, conducted 4-6 weeks apart and progresses from leading self effectively to leading & coaching others into high performing teams.  Workshops are typically followed up with action learning projects and individual coaching with one of our specialist executive coaches may be included.

Why do some people achieve their potential, while others languish in a mire of self doubt? Self Leadership is the key to developing committed and inspired employees. Workshops in this genre focus on challenging participants to look at what really drives them and what they really want to achieve in life. Common themes in our Self Leadership workshops are:

• What it takes to be successful
• Assessing own behaviour and whether it is helping them to be successful or holding them back
• The number one method for taking control of their life
• Three essential keys to unlock success

Our workshops in this area are designed to improve customer retention by empowering supervisors and managers with the tools and techniques to design and implement powerful business systems that continually exceed customer expectations.

This programme is made up of three distinct but inter-related 1-day workshops:

• Understanding the Customer Experience
• Designing Your Customer Experience
• Implementing Your Customer Experience

Workplace project work follows each of these workshops with a complete customer experience system, including scorecard, implemented into the business following workshop 3. 

‘Customers Count!’ is a 3-hour interactive workshop designed to get all of your team members considering their role in exceeding the expectations of your customers.  Customers go where they are invited but stay where they are looked after and so we see it as the responsibility of every member of the team to protect the level of service that your customers receive. 

This workshop is a short, sharp, interactive 3-hour workshop which is typically delivered 2-3 times per day to fit in with operational requirements.

You only have three choices – to disappoint, satisfy or delight your customers.  It is only by delighting your customers will you generate loyalty and this does not happen by accident.  Make a purposeful decision to exceed your customers’ expectations – every customer, every time!    

This workshop is often delivered toward the end of the 'Delivering a Unique Customer Experience' programme and is used as a platform to launch the new customer experience action plans.         

Training is a huge organisational investment both in terms of time and effort. Developing your company trainers to their full potential should be a “no brainer”.   Imagine the return on investment possible if improving the skills of your trainers by 20% resulted in an improved effectiveness of all the training they deliver by 20%.

This three day interactive train the trainer programme is designed to provide participants with the skills and knowledge to present formal training programmes with greater impact.

Who should attend?

Anyone that is responsible for training groups of people and is looking to either increase their confidence or improve their ability to deliver training with impact would benefit from attending this programme.

Structure

The structure of the programme can be customised to meet the unique needs of the client.  However, the programme used by most clients is comprised of two parts:

Part One: 

This is a two day interactive workshop that focuses on providing participants with skills and knowledge required to deliver high impact group training sessions.  Over the two days participants will learn:

The three parts of the brain that every trainer should understand if they want to put people at ease and make their training stimulating and memorable;

The importance of “multi-shot” delivery strategies. This includes an understanding of:

• Left brain / right brain theory;
• Visual, auditory and kinesthetic modes of acquiring information;
• The use of adult learning principles to improve learning results;
• Using the primacy recency effect to make training memorable.
• The three essential facilitation skills that every trainer needs to master if they want to inspire confidence and engage participants;

The art of professional presentation.  This includes:

• How to reduce stress prior to delivering training;
• Identify and eliminate personal distracting mannerisms;
• Using visual aids professionally.
• Tips on setting up the learning environment;
• How to deal effectively with difficult participant behaviours;
• How to prepare to deliver a professional training session; and
• Much more!

Part Two:  This is a one-day session that normally takes place at least one week after part one.  On this day, all participants are required to deliver a session that is at least 30-minutes in duration.  Each person receives comprehensive feedback from the facilitator on areas of strength and required development. 

 To provide the skills, attitudes and knowledge required to deliver effective on job training sessions.

Structure  

Participants spend a day learning the fundamentals of effective on job training.  They then spend a week preparing an on job training session before returning to deliver it to fellow participants.  Finally, participants receive a written development plan on areas of strength and further development.  

Maximum People  

Due to the interactive nature of the programme  a maximum  of 7 people can attend.

Key Content

How people learn

• Brain basics

• Learning styles

• How people acquire and process information 

Stages of learning

• Factors that influence performance

• Ability and willingness

On job training skills

• Communicating clearly

• Questions that teach

• Giving feedback

• Structuring effective sessions

• Maximising recall

• The six step method of instruction

 Presentation practice

• Delivering one 30 minute presentation with full feedback

General feedback session

• Individual evaluations by course facilitator

• Personal action plans 

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Our performance management workshop is designed to equip managers and supervisors in the business with the tools they need to effectively manage performance in the workplace.  We work with the Human Resources department to ensure that a clear performance management structure and system is in place before rolling the new or revised system out as part of the workshop. 

Best practice performance management does not mean sitting down once a year and doing an appraisal!  Although better than nothing, this dated system is not designed to drive performance and is typically approached with an element of fear by both manager and employee alike.

Cardinal Solutions advocates a regular Performance Planning and Review (PPR) system whereby managers and supervisors coach their charges on a monthly basis, providing supportive and corrective feedback to enable individuals to realize their full potential.  The focus is not on filling in forms but honestly discussing performance, development and engagement.    

Without changing any other structure within a business, this structure alone can drastically improve the engagement levels and return on your most important investment – your people.        

The Business Improvement Programme provides a training and coaching framework which will enable department managers to identify and present a business improvement initiative within their respective departments which generates a minimum of $10,000 Gross Profit within six months. 

By the end of the programme, each department manager will: 

1. Research a business improvement initiative within their department using standard business improvement tools;
2. Present a formal written business proposal outlining the business case for the initiative;
3. Present a 30-minute verbal presentation, including the use of visual aids, to senior management outlining the initiative; and
4. Implement the initiative in the department after gaining authority from senior management.

This programme is typically delivered over three 1-day workshops spaced about 6 weeks apart.  Individual coaching can be delivered internally or externally by one of our specialist executive coaches. 

Once this programme has been delivered, it is expected that annual business improvement projects will be included as part of the managers’ annual KPI’s, thereby developing and entrenching a culture of continuous improvement.   

DISC is the universal language of observable human behaviour and is a model that Cardinal Solutions uses to enhance several of its programmes.  Throughout history, scientists and researchers have observed basic behavioural similarities which have in more recent times been clearly validated.  The lineage of the DISC language, although not then called DISC, takes us all the way back to Empodocles in 444 B.C.  The major developer of the DISC language is William Moulton Marston with some influence from Carl Jung. 

The DISC model merely analyzes behavioural style; that is, a person’s manner of doing things.  Behaviour is classified into four behavioural characteristics.  By learning these characteristics, we can improve communication and understanding of ourselves and others. 

D = Dominance – Challenge
How you respond to problems and challenges

I = Influence – Contacts
How you influence others to your point of view

S = Steadiness – Consistency
How you respond to the pace of the environment

C = Compliance – Constraints
How you respond to rules and procedures set by others

‘All people exhibit all four behavioural factors in varying degrees of intensity’ – W.M. Marston

DISC therefore plays an integral role in:

• Developing the self-awareness of individuals within your business;

• Developing common understanding and appreciation within a team; and

• Improving the effectiveness of your recruitment process.

There are many different versions of DISC.  We use an online version out of the United States which takes only 10 minutes to complete.  The resulting profile is typically a 24-page report written in plain language which does not require a great deal of interpretation and gives information on the individual's:

• General characteristics;
• Value to the organisation;
• Communication triggers;
• Communication barriers;
• Communication tips;
• Ideal environment;
• Perceptions;
• Descriptors;
• Natural behavioural style;
• Adapted behavioural style;
• Keys to motivating;
• Keys to managing; and
• Areas for improvement.

It also contains a behavioural factor indicator which graphically displays the individual’s behavioural skills against 12 specific factors - typically we use general management or sales factors depending on the target audience. 

So how do we use such profiling? 

Firstly, it is used as an integral part of our communication workshops, providing a tool by which individual's gain some feedback on their behavioural style, as well as providing an objective forum to disclose relevant information to their peers. 

It can also be used to add integrity to a recruitment process whereby the profiles of short listed applicants can be compared against pre-determined behaviours required for the position.  This also allows for some great behavioural anchored questioning as part of the interview process.

Most people who use the profiling are amazed at the accuracy of the results. 

Contact us to arrange a complimentary profile and you be the judge! 

Click on the icon to view a sample profile

"The DISC profiling system provided by Cardinal Solutions is now a key part of the recruitment process used by the 'NZ Breakers' for players, coaches and management staff alike. We find DISC invaluable, both as a way of matching individual behaviours with the specific positions, and equally importantly for the overall 'fit' with the 'NZ Breakers' culture."

Richard Clarke, General Manager, 'NZ Breakers', Auckland

The Cardinal Solutions culture survey delivers a powerful “litmus” test of the culture within your organisation, indicating the engagement levels of your most valuable asset, your people.  Disengaged employees are costing business billions of dollars per year and many businesses have no idea of how engaged (or disengaged) their employees are.  Smart businesses are identifying their people as a source of competitive advantage and are keen to understand how and where they can invest to gain the greatest return on investment.  An effective organisational culture – one in which employee are engaged, the mission is understood, and customers expectations are exceeded – can create great competitive advantage.  This survey is a useful tool in assisting business to achieve the following:   

• Establish a compelling rationale for change;
• Focus leadership development efforts;
• Provide a benchmark on which to measure organisational culture;
• Provide specific data on the engagement levels by department or business unit;
• Indicate annual change to measure the effectiveness of leadership
• development initiatives; and
• Provide a pathway to future profits. 

Our culture survey typically consists of around 64 questions across nine standards:

• Share the company’s vision & direction;
• Build the best leadership team;
• Communicate openly and often;
• Provide interesting & challenging work;
• Foster pride & quality;
• Encourage teamwork & camaraderie;
• Provide meaningful performance feedback;
• Encourage continuous learning & development;
• Recognise and reward the right things.

Contact us to find out how a Cardinal Solutions Culture Survey can contribute to your business goals.

Click on this icon to view a sample survey

  To download our brochure, click on this icon

What is 360 degree feedback?

360 Degree Feedback is a system or process in which employees receive confidential, anonymous feedback from the people who work around them. This typically includes the employee's manager, peers, and direct reports. The feedback forms include questions that are measured on a rating scale and also ask raters to provide written comments. The person receiving feedback also fills out a self-rating survey that includes the same survey questions that others receive in their forms.

Managers and leaders within organizations use 360 feedback surveys to get a better understanding of their strengths and weaknesses. The 360 feedback system automatically tabulates the results and presents them in a format that helps the feedback recipient create a development plan. Individual responses are always combined with responses from other people in the same rater category (e.g. peer, direct report) in order to preserve anonymity and to give the employee a clear picture of his/her greatest overall strengths and weaknesses.

A powerful development tool

When done properly, 360 feedback is highly effective as a development tool. The feedback process gives people an opportunity to provide anonymous feedback to a coworker that they might otherwise be uncomfortable giving. Feedback recipients gain insight into how others perceive them and have an opportunity to adjust behaviors and develop skills that will enable them to excel at their jobs.

What does a 360 feedback instrument measure?

The Cardinal Solutions 360 tool typically measures across the following 6 clusters, comprising 24 competencies in total:

• Leadership

• Managerial skills

• Interpersonal skills

• Decision making

• Personal effectiveness

• Strategic skills

Each competency can comprise up to 3 behaviours.

Contact us to find out how a Cardinal Solutions 360 Feedback Instrument can contribute to your business goals.

Click on the icon to view a sample profile

Cardinal Solutions have developed a reputation for developing & delivering unique indoor and outdoor scenarios for conferences and seminars.  Whether it is an entertaining and energetic Master of Ceremonies, a challenging business simulation, a high impact key note address or a unique outdoor evolving scenario that you are looking for, talk to us about how we can inject something different and memorable into your conference.