Professional Development Workshops

This workshop equips managers and leaders with practical skills to coach, mentor, and guide employees effectively. Participants will explore the roles and characteristics of successful coaches and mentors, and understand how these approaches contribute to employee growth, engagement, and performance.

The session also covers how to set meaningful goals, navigate challenging workplace conversations, and apply active listening and effective questioning techniques. By the end of the workshop, participants will be better prepared to support employee development and lead performance-focused conversations with confidence and clarity.

This workshop introduces participants to the structure and workings of Arkansas’s state budget and public finance system. Participants will explore the full budget cycle, including revenue sources, major expenditures, and the unique features of the Arkansas budgeting process.

The session also covers key budgetary roles, important deadlines, and the primary activities that drive state budget development and approval. By the end, participants will have a practical understanding of how public funds are generated, allocated, and managed in Arkansas.

This workshop provides participants with a clear understanding of how Arkansas state government operates. Participants will explore the three branches of government, the legislative process, and the roles and responsibilities of the seven constitutional offices. The session also covers the structure of the state judiciary and how judicial functions influence government operations.

Conflict is inevitable but how we navigate it determines whether it becomes destructive or productive. This workshop provides practical skills for improving communication, strengthening relationships, and managing disagreement while maintaining professionalism and respect. Participants learn how power, trust, identity, and organizational culture shape conflict and how to respond constructively in real workplace situations.

Effective leaders transcend the challenges that exist during an emergency and create new opportunities for innovation by being quick, accurate, and consistent with efforts to address and solve the crisis. In times of great difficulty, effective communication is paramount. This workshop offers strategies for leaders and teams to adequately plan for emergencies and prepare their organizations for routine and novel crises. This includes learning how to create a crisis communication plan and identifying techniques for improving crisis response.

Learning Objectives

• Define the intricacies of crisis situations.
• Consider crisis preparedness strategies.
• Analyze crisis leadership and crisis management.
• Evaluate crisis communication plans and principles.
• Learn conflict mediation techniques.
• Take part in crisis response-related group activities.

This workshop teaches participants to become more effective at navigating the inevitable difficult conversations they encounter in their professional (and personal) lives. Participants learn about the factors that make conversations difficult, the underlying anatomy of a difficult conversation, and a five-phase approach for preparing for and having difficult conversations.

Learning Objectives

• Define what makes a conversation crucial or difficult.
• Explain why we typically handle difficult conversations poorly.
• Articulate when it is – and is not – constructive to initiate a difficult conversation.
• Learn about the principles of mutual purpose and mutual respect in difficult conversations.
• Pivot to strategies that lead to greater psychological safety when we and/or others are feeling threatened.
• Separate facts from the stories we are making up about those facts during difficult conversations.
• Employ strategies to help others share their stories safely.
• Plan for decision making and accountability following difficult conversations.
• Apply the stages of a difficult conversation to workplace case scenarios.

This workshop is intended to help individuals better understand how they can best leverage their strengths to work together with others in their professional lives. By focusing on participants’ signature strengths and ways to use them when working in teams, participants will come away with specific strategies to employ in their own workplaces to build stronger teams, based on the unique strengths of each team member. As part of the workshop, participants will take the Gallup CliftonStrengths assessment.

Learning Objectives

• Understand and articulate your strengths.
• Learn a strengths-based approach to communicate more effectively.
• Understand strategies you can use with your professional teams that leverage your strengths.

Complex problem solving requires critical thinking and the analysis of competing considerations. This workshop provides a structured, repeatable framework for developing well-reasoned positions, navigating disagreement productively, and improving outcomes through informed decision making practices.

Emotions have the capacity to bring people together, but they also possess the ability to draw us apart. This workshop discusses the role of emotions in the workplace and how we can become better leaders through understanding them. The goal is to help participants better understand, develop, and leverage emotional intelligence in the workplace.

Learning Objectives

• Define emotional intelligence.
• Describe the impact of emotions on personal and professional relationships.
• Explain how emotional intelligence can improve your leadership skills and organizational outcomes.
• Implement practices that help mitigate the effects of negative emotions and impede collaboration.
• Create an action plan for improving your emotional intelligence.

Developing a competitive grant proposal requires strategy, structure, and storytelling. This hands-on workshop guides participants through the full grant development process from interpreting funding announcements to crafting persuasive narratives and realistic budgets. Participants will leave with practical tools, templates, and a draft framework they can apply immediately to upcoming opportunities.

Change can create opportunity or resistance. This workshop teaches managers how to navigate change while fostering creativity, adaptation, and continuous improvement. Participants learn practical strategies for supporting innovation in public-serving environments with real constraints.

Learn about the characteristics of quality leaders and team builders and discover your own leadership style. Develop strategies for creating effective teams and techniques for improving shared decision-making in the workplace.

In this workshop your will learn that leading your organizations well doesn’t start with the right plan – it starts with the right people. You will learn best practices for recruiting, interviewing, and hiring, as well as how to optimize employee performance through constructive documentation. You will also learn how to develop and motivate staff; brainstorm ideas for incentive programs; and discuss how generational differences in the workplace affect staff development. Specific laws and policies relevant to human resources are discussed throughout.

Learning Objectives

• Understand employee engagement, its impact, and the role of the manager in improving engagement.
• Create talent management strategies to develop and motivate employees.
• Learn how to use recognition to applaud, reward, and motivate employees.
• Determine strategies for coaching employees to success.
• Understand the laws and policies that affect human resources.
• Learn best practices for recruiting, interviewing, and hiring.
• Recognize how to effectively and constructively document employee performance.

Learn how to manage multi-party public disputes and collaboratively problem solve in the public sector. You will explore effective methods for analyzing and framing public issues and practice step-by-step procedures for solving problems collaboratively. Numerous case studies and real-world examples will be discussed and analyzed.

Learning Objectives

• Understand the characteristics of public disputes and the problems with unmanaged public disputes.
• Distinguish between effective and ineffective approaches to managing public disputes.
• Practice analyzing public disputes.
• Gain the basic skills needed to manage public disputes effectively.

This workshop focuses on planning and facilitating effective meeting. You will learn how to set clear meeting goals and develop agendas to meet those goals. You will also practice techniques to accomplish common meeting tasks such as brainstorming, prioritizing, and action planning.

Learning Objectives

• Start developing the skills needed to facilitate good meetings.
• Analyze a meeting to determine ways to make it more effective.
• Plan an effective meeting.
• Experience meeting facilitation practices.
• Start building a personal portfolio of resources to use when facilitating meetings.
• Learn and practice techniques for managing difficult meeting participants.

Explore your responsibility of working as a public servant charged with protecting the public trust. You will refine your personal code of ethics and understand how personal codes of ethics affect decision making.

Learning Objectives

• Identify your personal ethical style and understand how your style affects your choices when making ethical decisions.
• Understand how different people can make different ethical decisions about the same set of circumstances.
• Develop skills for making ethical choices.
• Understand the primary principles of organizational/leadership ethics.

Participants will gain practical tools and techniques for communicating effectively and positively as leaders. The workshop shows participants how to harness the power of positive communication to inspire their teams, effect real change, and create a positive workplace environment for all. By the end of the course, participants will have a practical model of positive communication that they can apply immediately to transform the way they communicate in their professional relationships.

Leaders present to diverse audiences from organizational teams to community groups to elected boards. This workshop provides practical tools for reducing speaking anxiety, organizing content effectively, and communicating with clarity and confidence. Participants learn how to adapt speaking strategies to audience needs and create engaging presentations that resonate and inspire action.

Whether presenting to a leadership team, commission, legislative committee, or city council, there are skills and techniques that can help you create an effective connection with the audience and a sense of urgency for decision makers to act according to the information shared. In this workshop, participants will learn to deliver a succinct presentation with an understandable and persuasive message.

Learning Objectives

• Identify the characteristics of your audience of decision-makers
• Understand what makes an effective presenter and a meaningful presentation with a targeted message
• Learn how to plan and prepare for a presentation to decision-makers
• Develop confidence in your presentation skills and identify areas where you can improve as a presenter

Learn the “nuts and bolts” of program evaluation to operate effective programs with measurable outcomes and impact. This workshop guides participants through conducting program assessments, creating theories of change and logic models, and designing surveys to collect meaningful program data. Participants gain practical tools to choose the right assessment techniques to improve outcomes for the communities they serve.

Learn about best practices for project management from scoping to planning to execution. This workshop will help you manage your own project work more effectively and help your team(s) achieve their goals.

Learning Objectives

• Identify the project lifecycle and different organizational structures.
• Learn how to create a project charter, articulate the business case for a project, conduct a stakeholder analysis, develop a project schedule, identify task dependencies and the critical path, track and report on project status, and evaluate proposed changes to a project with respect to the project constraints (time, cost, quality, etc.).
• Understand how to identify risks and create risk responses.

Professionals serving the public good operate under high expectations and complex demands. This workshop teaches practical strategies for regulation, reflection, and recovery to help leaders remain composed, values-driven, and effective under pressure. Participants also learn how to strengthen teams by examining psychological safety and exploring resiliency leadership tools.

Employees in the public sector must be equipped with essential skills for navigating the complex and ever-changing governance landscape. Participants will analyze current trends, focusing on building resilience and readiness for present and future challenges.

Learning Objectives

• Learn strategies for leveraging emerging technologies like AI while addressing ethical considerations.
• Understand the need to rebuild public trust and revolutionize our service delivery.
• Develop actionable plans to drive positive change through interactive activities, self-assessments, and peer discussions.
• Prepare to anticipate disruptions, make informed decisions, and lead confidently in an ever-evolving environment.

Engaging stakeholders, both internal and external, is crucial to fulfilling an organization’s mission and purpose. Participants in this workshop will learn how to identify and map stakeholders, gain support for organizational goals, and develop protocols to connect and communicate with stakeholders effectively. Participants will understand how to leverage the power of partnerships to achieve maximum impact.

Learning Objectives

• Learn how to gain buy-in and support for organizational goals.
• Identify and map existing stakeholders.
• Develop protocols to connect stakeholders and communicate effectively with them.
• Understand stakeholder expectations and how to manage challenges.
• Gain insight about how to leverage the power of partnerships to achieve maximum impact.

Storytelling enables professionals to transform mission, data, and strategy into compelling narratives that resonate. This workshop teaches the components of powerful stories and guides participants in developing narratives that inspire action, build trust, and deepen engagement with stakeholders.

This workshop equips participants with the knowledge and skills to develop effective program and project budgets within the public sector financial system. Participants will gain a clear understanding of essential budget terminology, including appropriation, revenue stabilization, line-item budgeting, and authorization versus funding.

The session also explores how strategic plans guide budget development, the role of performance measures in demonstrating value, and the fundamentals of crafting strategic budget requests that align with organizational goals and priorities.

Strategic Doing helps groups move from planning to results through agile, asset-based collaboration. Participants learn to form action-focused partnerships quickly, keep them moving toward measurable outcomes, and adjust in real time while maintaining momentum. This workshop empowers leaders to accelerate progress using the resources they already have.

The content for this workshop includes strategies for creating effective teams and techniques for improving shared decision-making in the workplace. The workshop also provides guidelines for inclusive leadership practices. Since teams often improve employee participation, planning, and problem-solving; learning new approaches for enhancing teams can improve outcomes. Ultimately, this workshop addresses the necessity of creating strong teams to improve employee engagement and workplace inclusion.

Learning Objectives

• Explore the concept of team building.
• Review shared decision-making strategies.
• Examine different types of teams.
• Consider guidelines for collaborative action.
• Learn inclusive leadership practices.
• Participate in team-building activities you can use in your workplace.

In the current online work environment, writing skills become even more important. This engaging workshop offers many hands-on opportunities to work on real-world scenarios (emails, memos, reports, and more). Learn strategies to edit for clarity, develop persuasive arguments, write to different audiences for different purposes, and format documents to assist with reading comprehension.

Learning Objectives

• Analyze different audiences and their requirements for information.
• Understand how to develop persuasive arguments for different audiences.
• Learn effective business writing techniques and practice writing efficiently, organizing complex information, using appropriate visuals, formatting to assist comprehension, and proofreading effectively.
• Participate in specific exercises that will focus on writing effective emails, designing government reports or other long documents, and revising for clarity.