Stories and Images for Information-Driven change

What we have here is a failure to comunicate! 

Whether it is persuading a CEO or CIO to adopt the philosophy of Information Quality Management, or helping management and staff to understand or adopt change, communication is at the heart of effective Change Management. This tutorial has been developed to help managers, business analysts, project leaders and other project team members better understand how to more effectively communicate the key value proposition for Data Change in their organisation.

Learners will develop insights into identifying their key message, packaging their message, gathering evidence to support their message, and communicating it in a variety of formats and media.

About the Course

This course empowers learners to communicate more effectively about the value and importance of information and data in your organisation. It is intended to provide staff involved in Data Protection, Information Quality, and other areas of Information Management with a broad range of skills to improve their ability to:

1. Develop their Value Proposition and shape the core themes of the messages they want to communicate
2. Identify barriers to effective communication and adapt their communication methods accordingly
3. Understand what modern neuropsychology tells us about how people understand communication
4. Tell compelling stories that trigger sustainable change and motivate people.
5. "Prune the Garden" of stories in the organisation to ensure things grow in the direction you want.
6. Use common presentation tools and props to support their communication (including how to use PowerPoint for communication not common assualt).
7. Support narrative with easily understandable presentation of data.
8. Use Storyboarding, Mindmapping, and similar techniques to develop communications ideas
9. Match messages to appropriate media and formats for improved success
10. Use internal and external social media and related tools (e.g. blogging, sharing video or video presentations etc.) to help support and reinforce Change goals. 
11. Understand how messages and values become "viral" in an organisation to support and enable bottom up Change

Practical application is a key element of this course and learners will be encouraged to apply the theory and skills being taught in their day to day activities as early as possible in the course. To support this, the course evaluation will take place by way of an examination and the submission of a project which demonstrates the application of the skills outlined above. 

Sample Learning Units:

• The Human Brain, Narrative, and the neuroscience of story telling.
• Story Telling vs Story CRAFTING - understanding the types of narrative pattern that exist and how they can be used for best effect.
• Death to Death by PowerPoint - how to use presentation software effectively to communicate your message
• The Value Delivery System - Understanding what thrills your audience wants, how you can deliver them, and identifying how you will communicate this.
• Common Problems Speaking with Data - How errors in presentation can distort facts and distract audiences.
• Blogging for Internal (and External) Benefit - how to tell stories to a wider audience using text, image, and video 

 Preferred Entry Level

The preferred entry level for learners to this course are

• Minimum Level 5 FETAC Certificate, Leaving Cert or equivalent
• Relevant life and work experience.

We would recommend that candidates for this course have some basic experience using Microsoft PowerPoint or similar presentation software.

Delivery Modes

Given the "hands-on" nature of some of the exercises in this tutorial it is not currently possible to deliver this course as a distance learning or elearning module.

Delivery is 3 days over 3 weeks, with supplemental reading and assignments during the course to facilitate and encourage learning. The course can alternatively be run as two consecutive days in a workshop environment.

Price: €350 per person for 3 days, including notes and materials and refreshments.

Discounts are available for members of certain professional associations and clients of County Enterprise Boards and Enterprise Ireland.