Distinctive Offerings

The two large challenges in delivering high performance in most orgs are – creating a high performance infrastructure (strategic objectives,system, structure, process) and second is high performance culture. While the first is relatively easier, and is supported by many cognitively strong organizational frameworks, the second however ends up in being a hit an miss / trial and error experience for many organizations. Our Building and sustaining a Performance Culture program seeks to address this dimension.

High-performing cultures are characterized by an ability to align (gain clarity on vision, strategy, and shared employee behaviors), execute (move in the agreed-upon direction with minimal friction), and renew (continuously improve at a pace that exceeds competitors) ̬three factors we also refer to as ‘organizational health.’

It is possible to meaningfully change no more than five aspects of an organization’s culture in a 12- to 18-month period and choosing those and concentrating on those could be the first steps towards a performance culture. Concentrating on a short list has the additional value of forcing everyone to focus on the changes most important to reaching the desired end state. Having said that culture change efforts run as stand-alone programs typically rarely succeed and hence finding ways to. And hence finding ways to fully integrate the culture change initiatives into the business initiatives is critical. This program through case studies and live projects helps participants work on various cultural elements they choose to address and integrate.

Organizations strive to incorporate diversity to improve productivity and to remain competitive. Diversity initiatives are gaining tremendous importance in the current global context . Organizations do not implement diversity programs just because it is the social, legal, or the “in” thing to do. Perhaps the strongest rationale for incorporating diversity is to increase productivity amongst all workers, especially in groups that have historically been under-represented and under-utilized.

The impetus for diversity initiatives for organizations must come from awareness of business implications; addressing the needs of a diverse workforce, satisfying the demands of competitiveness, and fulfilling requirements of the company’s role in the community.

Organizations are willing to accept change related to diversity only if the potential benefits are clear and worthwhile. We help organizations work through various elements for working with diversity including –

Training and education programs
Organizational policies and systems that mandate fairness and equity for all employees
Mentoring programs for minority employees
Systematic career guidance and planning programs
Outreach programs and initiatives for chosen areas of focus within diversity

Emotions are powerful and yet many tend to bottle them up/ not share them even upto the extent of being dishonest with their own selves and their feelings. Relationships, both personal and at work could range from those with – Lack of emotional space to – Superficial Emotional Space to– Uneven Emotional Space to– Emotional Space to be yourself – to Emotional Space to show/be vulnerable to each other, Vulnerability being the most effective for fostering an environment of trust within a system/organization.

Emotional space is a unique experiential program designed to address and provide the participant an opportunity to –

Increase their understanding of group development and dynamics.
Gain a better understanding of the underlying social processes at work within a group.
Increase their skill in facilitating group effectiveness.
Increase interpersonal skills.
Experiment with changes in their behavior.
Increase awareness of their own feelings in the moment; and offer them the opportunity to accept responsibility for their feelings.
Increase their understanding of the impact of their behavior on others.
Increase their sensitivity to others’ feelings.
Increase their ability to give and receive feedback.
Increase their ability to learn from their own and a group’s experience.
Increase their ability to manage and utilize conflict.
Powerfully own up and use their emotions.

The Program for Women Leaders uses research to understand the perceptions, behaviors, stereotypes, and backlash that women uniquely face. And then transforms those empirical results into effective strategies and solutions. The program emphasizes – Power, influence, persuasion.

The program helps women leaders –

Work with self –
- Challenge their assumptions, confront fears, and turn obstacles into opportunities through an experiential learning process.
Work with others and system –
- Tackle the issues of negotiation, team effectiveness, power and relationships, social networks, and influence.
- Interpret the subtle messages of power, and recognize and react to the organizational impact of diverse management styles.
Work with the environment –
- Learn about and leverage social networks and techniques to influence individuals and groups.
- Create a personal and professional network you can leverage throughout your career.
- Learn from inspirational women leaders who come together to share their leadership experiences, their personal and professional stories and encourage one to reach your full leadership potential.
- Using the three components of self-awareness, empowerment and activation, the program focuses on aiding participants to recognize their strengths, develop the wherewithal to achieve their leadership potential.

Increasingly more organizations are recognizing the effectiveness of arts-based learning in developing key leadership competencies. These include the ability to intuit, think critically and holistically, see connections, and reframe problems. Although arts-based learning is not necessarily a substitute for more traditional approaches to leadership development, it can—when used skillfully—guide participants to transformative insights about themselves and their interactions with others.

Arts-based learning is defined as the use of artistic expression—including poetry, drama, dance, film, literature, music, and all forms of visual art—as a catalyst for improving business performance. It can occur in a conventional program or workshop setting, or beyond the walls of the training room (for example, a concert hall, photography studio, or museum).Arts-based learning typically is used in two ways in the context of leadership development: parallels are drawn between the artistic process itself and leadership, and participants create art or engage with a work of art firsthand. Both can be useful depending on the objective of the initiative. For instance – one exercise called for participants drawing a picture of how it feels to be in a conflict. The resulting images—almost all of which are negative—serve as a springboard for dialogue around fear of conflict and the possibility for constructive resolution.The participants report that arts-based learning fostered positive changes in their beliefs about leadership, risk taking, ambiguity, collaboration, and self-image. There are several reasons for these results:

The arts tap into our emotions in ways that defy rationality, often leading to a heightened sense of self-awareness and introspection.
Artists and leaders have more in common than one might think, which allows for intriguing and fruitful associations to be made between the two disciplines.
By altering our perceptions, art can peel away illusion and assumptions to reveal the truth at the heart of an issue or subject.
Engaging in the creative process of making art can require the application of cognitive, interpersonal, and problem-solving skills that are essential for business success.
Engaging in the creative process of making art can require the application of cognitive, interpersonal, and problem-solving skills that are essential for business success.
Art can simplify the complex, which leads to previously unseen or unimagined solutions to intractable problems.

Mukta's Art