Meeting Icebreakers

This compendium of activities will add real value to your training by taking critical thinking skills out of the box and into the workplace. Learners will sharpen their critical thinking skills and develop a thought process that are creative, accurate, and assumption-free.

• Quick Wits $149.00 [Add to Cart]

Make it easy for employees to provide great customer service with this collection of motivating and skill-building activities. There’s no need for a special training facility, no huge costs involved, or no prior training experience required. All you need is a group of employees who are committed to giving customers what they rightfully deserve—excellent service.

Areas covered include:

• the customer's first impression
• customer paradigms
• listening to the customer
• finding out who the customer really is
• how rumors get started and spread
• the importance of telephone greeting messages
• dealing with telephone tag
• telephone communications
• understanding what the customer really wants
• characteristics of successful customer service
• customer service diseases
• developing your personal improvement plan
• personalities of potential buyers
• types of customers
• customer complaints
• tips for selling your product or service
• positive and negative words
• winning and losing the customer
• logic vs emotion in selling

Training Objectives

• Provide opportunities for individuals to try out new skills without cost to either the organization or the individual
• Provide training in areas that can only be developed by practice
• Obtain feedback from observers to aid personal development
• Enable participants to test their skills in a variety of real-life situations
• Enable participants to practice in a risk-free environment

Select role-plays to develop skills in each of the five main interview types:

• Selection
• Discipline
• Appraisal
• Separation
• Counseling

Time Guidelines

• Each role play takes between 11/2 and 2 hours.

• 25 Role Plays for Interview Training - (3 ring binder) $99.99 [Add to Cart]

Includes FREE CD with 25 role plays from the popular first volume-50 total role plays!

Updated with 25 new role plays not covered in the first volume, the latest edition of the popular 25 Role Plays to Teach Negotiation will inspire you to think and act like a negotiation expert. If you're a management training and development specialist who needs one or two role-plays to use in a negotiation program, this book's a must. The book provides the opportunity to practice the behaviors used most frequently by successful negotiators-including questioning, clarifying, checking for understanding, summarizing and active listening.

Each of these role plays is based on a unique approach to negotiation embracing three critical concepts:

• Successful negotiation is not an adversarial process, but a collaborative framework for creative problem-solving
• The needs and interests of both negotiating parties must be addressed if there is to be a long-term solution
• Negotiation is an ongoing process, and today's negotiation will affect the long-term relationship between the parties

Try out new behaviors that will help you:

• Handle situations among co-workers regarding their roles and responsibilities
• Talk with your employees about their performance
• Improve relationships between the purchasing staff and internal clients
• Deal with difficult customers

Sample role-plays:

• The new project manager
• The difficult team member
• The difficult discussion/meeting
• Engineering changes

• 25 Role Plays to Teach Negotiation, Volume 2 $149.99 [Add to Cart]

25 Sales Strategies and Activities is a unique training and development tool designed to teach sales professionals how and when to use a variety of proven sales strategies.

A diagnostic sales strategy matrix shows how much each strategy emphasizes both relationship and performance. A relationship performance index further classifies the strategies as highest, higher, moderate, lower, lowest.

Each strategy comes with an activity that clears up any question about how the strategy should be implemented. Each activity includes fully reproducible exhibits which can be used as exercises and handouts in training sessions.

Rather than a one-time training tool, 25 Sales Strategies and Activities is a useful and practical guide your employees will refer to over and over again. It’s packed with a wealth of insight, tips and guidance for motivating sales people to:

• Know the customer
• Create buying habits
• Adapt to change
• Empower customers
• Create the need
• Sell the sizzle
• Understand the customer’s perspective
• Sell service
• And much more

Binder - 176 pages

• 25 Sales Strategies and Activities $149.99 [Add to Cart]

Middle managers, inexperienced team leaders and anyone who has demands placed on their time will benefit from 30 ways to make more time. It provides people with three steps to putting time management into action at work.

Firstly, it will provide them with ideas for planning and controlling time, making best use of the time that's available, using time that might otherwise be wasted, and minimising interruptions and disruption.

Then they should identify which of these are most relevant. Finally, they should use some of the 30 helpful hints and tips covered in the video to help make themselves more efficient and effective.

The benefits

• Versatile resource for all types of staff who face demands on their time
• Highly motivational segments that promote self-help and innovation
• This video has been supported by the technical advice of trainer and writer John Adair

Program includes: DVD(20 mins), Summary (4 mins), Trainer's guide, PowerPoint slides / OHPs on disk, Quick guide and the book: 'Effective Time Management' John Adair

• 30 Ways to Make More Time putting Tme Management into Action - DVD $999.00 [Add to Cart]

One of the few resources that addresses the unique needs of support professionals

By Elizabeth Sansom and Christine Newton

This manual of activities is written for support staff – the unsung heroes and heroines of organizations who often are the ones for whom there is no training budget. Or who can not be spared from their work to spend time in training.

The book presents a wide range of activities and handouts to help teach and apply the most critical competences for administrative, secretarial and support professionals. Titles include: Delivering Bad News, Getting My Point Across, Proud to Be Part of the Team and Getting Organized.

It’s all here... the activity description, target group, objectives, number of participants, time, materials, important notes for the trainer, method and optional elements. Included is an activity time checklist – so you can choose from exercises that can be completed in 60 minutes, 60-90 minutes and two hours.

The 50 activities are conveniently organized into 10 areas:

• Orientation
• Motivation and Empowerment
• Caring for Our Customers
• Face-to-Face Communication
• Telephone Skills
• Written Communication
• Time Management
• Managing Small Projects
• Meetings
• Presentation Skills

This training can be carried out in short sessions and in-house by supervisors or managers who are not officially trainers. The exercises all actively involve the participants and –because they are fun – have much more impact.

With 50 Training Activities for Administrative, Secretarial and Support Staff, you can motivate your staff, encourage them to achieve the best possible standards and enable them to grow in their constantly evolving jobs.

$159.99 [Add to Cart]

New

By Wendy Denham and Jane Jestico

Teaching employees how to deliver effective performance appraisals will pay big dividends in your organization. But, too often, employees perceive the training as uninteresting – even boring.

Here’s a terrific resource full of hands-on exercises that will make training in this vital area enjoyable and extremely motivating. Every employee – regardless of how experienced they are in appraisals – will be stimulated by learning how to question, listen, be objective, give feedback, communicate and manage the process.  

Each activity is ready-to-use and includes a description, when to use it, objectives, materials and time required, and methods. Each activity takes under 60 minutes or so to complete.

Need to find a specific activity quickly? No problem. The activities are categorized into two groups – the skills and the process – so they are easy to select. All handouts are numbered using the same number as the activity. And some you’ll want to make into transparencies for use with an overhead projector.

Whether you’re a new or experienced trainer, you’ll find all the support you need to lead the activities, adapt them to your own training style and give performance appraisal training the priority it deserves.

Sample activities:

• Actions Speak Louder
• Confirm It in Writing
• Do You Really Mean That?
• Just Stick to the Facts
• Praise versus Criticism
• What Do You Think?
• Where Do We Go from Here?

Format: 3-ring binder, 308 pp

• 50 Activities for Performance Appraisal Training $159.99 [Add to Cart]

Find Out How to Calm – and Not Calm – the Caustic Client! Humorous, broadcast-quality DVD packed with strategies for handling abusive customers.

In Part 1, service representative Carlos violates every rule for dealing with angry customers, from blaming the client to refusing ownership of the issue. The customer, Warren, quickly escalates from annoyance to frustration, from infuriation to hostility. Carlos accuses Warren of being abusive, and ends the call.

In Part 2, Warren calls back and Angela takes over. Calm and professional, Angela knows the four strategies for how to handle irate customers: allow them to vent, empathize, refocus away from emotion and toward the issue, and use closed-ended questions to satisfy. She acknowledges Warren’s frustrations, but skillfully changes the focus to the issue. Angela turns conflict into collaboration, solves the issue, and reduces the cost of unhappy customers

Benefits:

•    Easy-to-use – includes facilitators manual designed by service experts

•    Highly engaging – quick-paced, lifelike scenarios show how to handle angry customer calls

•    Save money – broadcast-quality video while saving 60% off average training video price

•    Save time – quick program for efficient learning and behavioral change

•    Versatile – use for meetings openers, training sessions, and more 

Main Learning Points on how to handle angry customers

•    Allow customers to vent

•    Acknowledge customers’ feelings

•    Take ownership of the issue

•    Avoid blaming the customer

•    Focus away from emotions, toward issues

•    Collaborate with customer to solve problem 

Special Bonus! Facilitator's Guide on CD-ROM types of difficult customers

•    PowerPoint Presentation

•    Interactive Activities

•    Trainee Worksheet

•    Discussion Questions

•    Pre and Post-Training Assessment

Meeting Opener

Simple, inspiring and thought-provoking wisdom from across the ages is presented through gentle and visually arresting animation and moving music.

Life’s Lessons: Teamwork is a positive look at how teamwork can not only help us as individuals, but can bring us all together to do the very best we can. Highly recommended for organizations that need to work together in top form and with great attitude!

Includes: DVD (includes Full program with music and narration, Music only (no narration)& Continuous play options.

Length: 3 minutes

• Life’s Lessons: Teamwork - DVD $295.00 [Add to Cart]
• Life’s Lessons: Teamwork - DVD Preview $0.00 [Add to Cart]

This piece shows our intrepid salesperson finding the key to success by remembering the little things. His "bear" of a customer turns into a gentleman and gives our hero more orders and other goodies.

Includes: DVD Only / Length: 2 minutes

• Little Things Mean Everything: An Animated Meeting Opener - DVD $295.00 [Add to Cart]