For an important meeting such as a strategic planning session, team building offsite or annual goal setting and action planning, consider working with a professional meeting facilitator to design and manage the session in a purposeful and constructive way.
Build sustainable leadership capabilities across all levels of your organization and management. West End Partners works with you to create custom programs and solutions that are aligned with your business objectives and have a clear and lasting impact on your people, teams, and organization.
Our DiSC and Strengths workshops provide a great foundation for team building by increasing understanding of natural talents and work styles, improving communication and increasing team effectiveness. We are an authorized partner of Everything DiSC® and certified coaches of Gallup CliftonStrengths®.
Leadership Development Program
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The International Coach Federation (ICF) defines coaching as partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential, which is particularly important in today’s uncertain and complex environment. Coaches honor the client as the expert in his or her life and work and believe every client is creative, resourceful and whole. Standing on this foundation, the coach’s responsibility is to:
This process helps clients dramatically improve their outlook on work and life, while improving their leadership skills and unlocking their potential.
An individual or team might choose to work with a coach for many reasons, including but not limited to the following:
Measurement may be thought of in two distinct ways: external indicators of performance and internal indicators of success. Ideally, both are incorporated.
Examples of external measures include achievement of coaching goals established at the outset of the coaching relationship, increased income/revenue, obtaining a promotion, performance feedback that is obtained from a sample of the individual’s constituents (e.g., direct reports, colleagues, customers, boss, the manager him/herself), personal and/or business performance data (e.g., productivity, efficiency measures). The external measures selected should be things the individual is already measuring and has some ability to directly influence.
Examples of internal measures include self-scoring/self-validating assessments that can be administered initially and at regular intervals in the coaching process, changes in the individual’s self-awareness and awareness of others, shifts in thinking that create more effective actions, and shifts in one’s emotional state that inspire confidence.
Coaching typically begins with a personal interview (either face-to-face or by teleconference call) to assess the individual’s or business’ current opportunities and challenges, define the scope of the relationship, identify priorities for action and establish specific desired outcomes. Subsequent coaching sessions may be conducted in person or over the telephone, with each session lasting a previously established length of time. Between scheduled coaching sessions, the individual may be asked to complete specific actions that support the achievement of one’s personally prioritized goals. The coach may provide additional resources in the form of relevant articles, checklists, assessments or models to support the individual’s or business’ thinking and actions. The duration of the coaching relationship varies depending on needs and preferences.
West End Partners team is based in the Chicago area, and we have team members based near most major U.S. cities. We have facilitated and delivered work in the regions listed below and our team regularly travels to offsite meetings and locations.
• Atlanta
• Boston
• Charlotte
• Chicago
• Cleveland
• Dallas
• Denver
• Houston
• Indianapolis
• Jackson, WY
• Miami
• Milwaukee
• Minneapolis
• New York
• Orlando
• Philadelphia
• Phoenix
• San Francisco Bay Area
• St. Louis
• Washington, D.C.
West End Partners facilitates internationally. We’ve worked with global teams and have facilitated in-person by traveling to the meeting site, and we facilitate virtually when it is more practical for a team or group. Please note, at this time, we do all of our facilitation work in English.
We believe it is essential for you to meet with our team and the facilitator we propose so that you can ask questions about our approach and experience, and so we can learn more about your goals and the details around your meeting. Based on this conversation, West End Partners will draft an initial proposal and schedule a call to discuss it with you and decision makers on your team. This conversation will give you a sense of how we approach preparation and design. It will also serve as an important opportunity to provide feedback so we can refine or add any elements to fit your needs. At this point, you will have solid information for a comparison to other facilitator services that you might be considering.
Event planners play a vital role in organizing things such as travel, venues, food, and the selection of speakers and outings that happen for conferences, off-sites and the like. Professional meeting facilitators focus on the design and delivery of the working sessions, prepare with you in advance to build an intentional agenda and get buy-in from stakeholders before the meeting occurs. The design will be structured with a logical build that will surface issues, create meaningful discussion and progress to a clear outcome and set of next steps. During the meeting, the facilitator manages the conversation to make sure input is gathered from all participants, keeps the group to the agenda and captures topics that should be considered at a different time, and is there to pivot if something is surfaced that must be addressed constructively.
Professional meeting facilitators often structure pricing based on the number of days of work required for an engagement. This should include the facilitator’s time to prepare for the meeting, such as interviews with key stakeholders, surveys with participants, and then the design and review of the plan with the stakeholders. After a discussion to understand your needs, we will be able to provide a proposal based on the work required.
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