This engaging workshop offers a hands-on approach to enhancing your communication skills with peers and superiors while providing strategies to prevent and manage potential conflicts.

We begin by increasing our level of empathy through analyzing the different layers of communication and separating the distinct sides of a message. Understanding conflicts, which often originate from miscommunication, can be achieved through changing perspectives. Using example scenarios, we sensitize ourselves to possible sources of conflicts. You will learn strategies to prevent conflicts and further how to minimize their negative outcome if they occur. Effective communication can be considered a key leadership skill, and we interactively train communication in both top-down as well as bottom-up leadership scenarios. Here, special emphasis is also put on giving and receiving feedback. As part of conflict resolution strategies, you will learn how to use empathy effectively and we will further practice negotiation techniques, such as the Harvard principles. Additionally, you will learn how mediators and ombuds persons can help with conflicts that spiral out of control. Finally, we apply our newly acquired skills to resolve conflicts through example study cases.

The specific topics and learning objectives of the workshop are:

• Understand the concepts of interests, positions, and needs in communication

• Learn about values and the four sides of a message

• Practice effective communication in student-supervisor leadership scenarios

• Train giving and receiving feedback constructively

• Familiarize yourself with Glasl’s conflict escalation stages and resolution strategies

• Learn the basic rules of Nonviolent Communication

• Explore example cases of conflicts in academia and discuss potential solutions

• Learn and practice negotiation techniques, including the Harvard model

.

Methods:

This workshop is highly interactive and builds on experience-based learning: we use short roleplays, group discussions and study cases.