If you have any questions about a customized keynote or training session, or would like to discuss your training needs and goals, please click here to send me an email or click here to connect through my convenient online contact form.

What you can expect from me

Thanks for investing your time in exploring the breadth of training solutions I deliver. Your eyes on this page are a reflection of the care you take in planning your event. I understand you have important decisions to make, and it’s my goal to maximize our collaboration to ensure you and your audience have a successful event.

Whatever the scale or nature of your event, I care about reaching people with relevant, pragmatic and inspiring training. In addition to leveraging my own experience and expertise, I pay attention to issues and emerging practices. I make time to understand your specific needs and you can count on me to pose questions. I do this to supplement the research I’ll do to understand your audience as well as your organization and sector. Once we commit to one another, I get to work weaving and then delivering content- and image-rich education, stories and insights into a presentation tailored to your audience.

Audience connections

Audiences and I connect with one another. This is in part because I walked their walk for decades until 2018, and assistants can feel my understanding of their world. These connections also reflect my engaging and pragmatic delivery of content-rich sessions, tailored to each event, and skills I developed as a corporate trainer. Our connections also reflect my attention to your needs and participants’ aspirations.

Engaging learning, tailored to your needs

As you’ll see below, I’ve identified presentations I customize for each client. You’ll find some similar sounding sessions under more than one category. In such instances, the underlying theme will be consistent even as I vary the emphasis on specific learning objectives.

If you’re looking for specific training or presentations not identified here, please do contact me through this convenient online form or by email at ExceptionalEAs@gmail.com. I’m happy to design keynotes, workshops and more to reflect clients’ specific needs.

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Keynotes

1. The Resilient Assistant: Taking Chances on Yourself
2. Let’s Be Future-Ready Rather than Future-Proofing Our Careers  
3. Bending the Perfectionist Curve
4. As I Began – Wisdom for Times of Change and Challenge
5. Career and Life Lessons from the Early Twenties

Adding value – elevated business insights and strategy

1. Deploying Strategy, Confidence and Influence On Your Own Behalf and As an Extension of Your Executive
2. Relationship Management: You and Your Stakeholders
3. Be a Contrarian Among Assistants and Prioritize Resilience Over Perfection
4. Empathy, Alignment and Clarity:  Constructive Approaches to Success With Difficult People or Conversations
5. Cyber Aware: What We Need to Know at Work and Home in 2023
6. Introduction to ESG: Environmental, Social, and Governance
7. Project Management: Applying Principles and Terminology to Work You’re Already Doing
8. Introduction to Risk Management
9. Strategic Planning: Why Assistants Should Pay Attention to the Process and Results

Career transitions

1. You’re Hired! Strategies to Succeed in Your New Role 
2. You and Your New Executive: Establishing and Managing this Key Relationship
3. Making a Successful Transition from Peer to Leader
4. Promotable You: Emotional Intelligence, Credibility and Goal Setting for Career Progression
5. Onboarding New Colleagues and Preparing to Onboard Your New Executive
6. Onboarding New Board Members

Change, and personal and career resilience

1. Let’s Be Future-Ready Rather than Future-Proofing Our Careers
2. Emotional and Cultural Intelligence for Our Changing World/alternate title: Adapting and Thriving in an Era of Disruption
3. Career Recalibration: Resilience and Strategic Alignment with Evolving Norms
4. Bending the Perfectionist Curve/alternate title: Resilience as A Healthy Alternative to Perfectionism
5. The Resilient Assistant: Taking Chances on Yourself
6. After the Crisis: Time to Rejuvenate/alternate title: Shifting Gears: from Reactive to Proactive
7. Career and Life Lessons from the Early 2020s

Communicating with emotional intelligence

1. A Constructive Approach to Success with Difficult People or Conversations
2. Stakeholder Communications: Success through Strategy, Confidence, Empathy and Influence
3. How to Assert and Promote Yourself So People See Your Value
4. Lessons from the Org Chart: Influence, Professional Presence and More
5. Negotiating with Insight and Perspective
6. Assertiveness and Self-Promotion
7. Public Speaking: Stepping Up to Opportunities
8. Presenting Your PowerPoint Deck with Skill and Confidence

Communications – written

1. Business Writing: Grammar and Other Key Skills for Our Hybrid World
2. (Almost) Everything You Wanted to Know About Minutes But Were Too Busy Preparing them to Ask/alternate title: Less is More: Elevating Your Minutes

Crucial conversations or meetings

1. Communication Strategies for Critical Conversations and Problematic People
2. How to Assert and Promote Yourself So People See Your Value
3. Negotiating with Insight and Perspective
4. How to Prepare for Your Best Possible Performance Review
5. How to Positively Influence Perceptions of You and the Assistant Career: Lessons from the Org Chart

Cyber awareness

1. Crown Jewels and Personal Data: What We Need to Know About Cybersecurity in 2023

Governance and success supporting a board

1. Inside the Boardroom: Understanding Governance
2. Great Expectations: Board Management and Relations
3. Stakeholder Communications: Style and Substance  
4. Board Culture: How to Onboard New Members and Navigate Other Transitions
5. Systems and Strategies to Support Board and Committee Effectiveness
6. Cyber Aware: What We Need to Know in 2023
7. Introduction to ESG: Environmental, Social, and Governance
8. Introduction to Risk Management
9. Introduction to Strategic Planning

Influence and networking

1. Communication Skills for Building Influence/alternate title: Executive Presence: Lessons from the Org Chart  
2. Growing Your Networks and Profile On LinkedIn
3. Why and How to Establish Your Personal Brand

Leadership

1. Walking Before We Run: Assertiveness Skills to Support Leadership Aspirations
2. Leadership Begins with Managing Ourselves
3. You’ve Been Promoted! Making a Successful Transition from Peer to Leader
4. Alignment, Empathy Expectations and Clarity for Success with Difficult People  
5. Team Culture on Your Shoulders: The Difference One Person Can Make
6. Who’s Coaching You? – Confidence, Influence and Assertiveness for Leaders
7. Walking the Talk: Relationships as Your Key to Success
8. Performance Management: No to Surprises and Yes to Success
9. Mentorships as Vehicles for Growth and Retention

Minutes and meeting effectiveness

1. (Almost) Everything You Wanted to Know About Minutes But Were Too Busy Preparing them to Ask/alternate title: Less is More: Elevating Your Minutes
2. How to Enhance Committee Operations and Meeting Effectiveness
3. Influencing Best Practices for Virtual and Hybrid Meetings
4. Tapping into Design, Tech and Audience Perspectives for Polished Presentations
5. Presenting Your PowerPoint Deck with Confidence
6. Business Writing: A Key Skill in Our Hybrid World/alternate title: Business Writing: Honing Skills and Reputations

Productivity and effectiveness

1. Shifting Gears: from Reactive to Proactive
2. Managing Your Workload through Self Management
3. How to Enhance Committee Operations and Meeting Effectiveness
4. Project Management for Assistants