CPD How to have Challenging and Powerful conversations

These resources come together as a CPD for delivering a session on Powerful Conversations in education. I am a teacher of 20+ years and I use this model as a blueprint when speaking to parents or to anyone where the conversation is challenging. Feel free to contact me using the details provided and I am happy to network and to support you in the delivery of this material.

From this, you and your team will have a particular a structure to follow. Believe me, this works!

A lot of my thinking and practice around having difficult conversations has come from my reading of a book by Chris Voss and Tahl Raz called “Never Split the Difference”. I’ve used quotes from the book as a guideline for holding difficult conversations with parents or for anyone.  From my experience many (but not all) challenging conversations are negotiations.

We usually want parents to see our point of view and to come to our way of thinking. We usually want them to come on-board to our way of thinking. We are the professionals and we have a wealth of experience when it comes to understanding the typical outcomes of poor behaviour or less than good outcomes when it comes to a rift between parent and school values.

We need to prepare to be bold and to ask for what we want. Take note of the below quote.

“In this world, you get what you ask for; you just have to ask correctly. So, claim your prerogative to ask for what you think is right.” Ask difficult questions but phrase them in a clever way as outlined below.

In my view we can be direct and we can have candour but it’s the way we “say it” and the way we “come across” that counts.