Team Thinking Asia

Wishing all of our customers a Happy New Year. See you in 2024!

We’ve all been tempted to have a sleep at work at some point (be honest!) but we all know that it’s the unprofessional thing to do. What’s professional to one person, or in one culture, is different to another.
What does being professional mean to you? Share your thoughts below.

Module 5 of our Jisedai Leadership Development programme for Dai-ichi Life Insurance Myanmar. This week, we focused on:

- Building stronger relationships using our Personal Poster activity. An opportunity to reflect and share deeper information about one another

- Exploring how we currently prioritise work and what can be delegated and deleted to free up time

- The 7 Levels of Delegation and practicing making decisions about which level to use in different situations

Once again, our Director Ian was working virtually from the UK and trainer Myat Thinzar Tun was supporting the group in Yangon.

We’ve just finishing the learning journal to send out to the group, so they can reflect and meet up in their support / challenge groups to practice and discuss together.

Psychological safety - everyone's talking about it, but what does it mean in reality?

Fear has a profound impact on our productivity - the human brain just doesn't work as effectively when we are in a fearful state. We’re not just talking about major crisis either. The simple fact that you feel unable to be yourself, ask questions or challenge something at work, can create that commonly talked about 'fight or flight' mode. When that happens, our executive brain functions just don't work as well. Decreased productivity, more stress, less results and increased time-off work.

Some may say 'if you've got an issues or feel unsafe then just speak up or leave the job', but that's not easy for many people to do. It's up to all of us, especially managers and leaders, to take a look at our workplaces and see what can be done to make those positive changes.

One model that we love to share is the 4 Stages of Psychological Safety by Tim R Clarke, from the brilliant book of the same name.

What can you do to help others feel safer? Is your environment moving people in the right direction or the wrong one?

Contact us to find out about our workshops on Psychological Safety, available in English or Myanmar language.

Are you looking for a team building retreat for your work team? Maybe in the city, at the beach or somewhere else? Something for your whole team or perhaps a more specific retreat for your leadership team?

We specialise in designing effective retreats that are not only enjoyable, but highly effective at building your team. We use our teams 25 year experience in learning, development and coaching to create engaging programmes that make a difference.

- Build working relationships
- Improve problem solving abilities
- Develop communication skills

Over the years we have provided effective retreats for a number of our customers, including Wave Money, Nordic Embassies, UN ILO, UN AIDS, BBC Media Action, Goethe Institut and Help Age International.

Contact Ian Davies now to have a discussion -

[email protected]

Module 4 completed for the team of Managers from Dai-ichi Life Insurance in Yangon, Myanmar. We explored human behaviour using the PRISM questionnaire, to help everyone to understand their behaviour preferences and develop their ability to manage others more effectively.

Self-awareness is one of the most important things to develop as a manager. If you would like to help your Managers or team members to develop their own understanding of themselves to improve results, contact us to find out more.

The questionnaire and 25 page report is available in both English and Myanmar language and we can run half day workshops, both face-to-face and virtual.

Thanks to the team from Dai-ichi Life Insurance Myanmar for a great second workshop this week.

Our Director Ian Davies was working virtually from the UK, whilst Myat Thinzar Tun from our team was in the room in Yangon to support the group.

This was module 2 of their 8 module ‘Jisedai’ Leadership Programme that we designed for the team. We focused on effective team problem solving and creating a Kaizen continuous improvement culture. This is the second group that we are working with, having completed the first Jisedai programme in 2022.

Next session moves onto exploring human behaviour and developing greater self-awareness.

It's been a really busy month for us and last Thursday and Friday, we ran another Self-Awareness & Communication Skills workshop for more team members from Plan International Myanmar. Another 2 days of engaging active learning, exploring deeper communication skills and developing self-awareness using the PRISM Brain Mapping questionnaire tool, available in both Myanmar and English language.

This was Group 7 from the Yangon office. Thanks for all your energy and enthusiasm and we hope you had a great learning experience.

Photos of Group 8 from Monday and Tuesday of this week coming tomorrow!

Thanks to Chubb Life insurance Myanmar for inviting our team to deliver their Aspiring Manager and New Manager programmes in Yangon this week. It was a pleasure for Daniel and Myat Thinzar to work with everyone. Wishing you all the best of luck in the future

Our Director Ian ran Module 1 of the Jisedai Leadership Development programme for Dai-ichi Life Insurance Myanmar today

We ran our first programme for Group 1 in late 2022, so moving onto Group 2.

It’s an 8 module programme, run over 4 months to help develop essential people management skills.

He’ll be working virtually from the UK, but our Myanmar team will be in the Yangon office, so a kind of hybrid set up.

We had a fantastic time working with more team members from Plan International Myanmar on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. This was the 6th Self-Awareness & Communication Skills workshop that we've run for Plan International, this time for members of the Sittwe team, run in Yangon. Thanks to everyone for your fun and energy! More pictures coming tomorrow for the 7th group, also from the Sittwe office!

Thanks to UNAIDS Myanmar for asking us back for the 4th time, to work with the Leaders from their Second Line Community Leadership Development Programme. A two-day experiential programme designed to explore the development of high-performance teams, build self-awareness using the Myanmar language PRISM behaviour questionnaire and allow an opportunity for the group to build their network. As always, great fun and energy from the participants!

Thanks to Daniel and Myat Thinzar Tun, two of our Myanmar training team for making it a success and for the team at the Chatrium Hotel Royal Lake Yangon for your excellent care and attention.

Our team were in Myitkyina last week, in Kachin State in the far north of Myanmar. We were running another 2-day self-awareness and communication skills workshops for Plan International, the 5th of these workshops so far. We've another 4 happening for Plan International in September!

We mixed lots of activity based learning together, to create an engaging and memorable 2 days to help the team explore their own behaviours using the PRISM tool, discover more effective ways to communicate and build deeper relationships with one another.

Thanks to everyone for your energy and participation. It's always such a pleasure to work with engaged groups.

Here are some photos from the recent self-awareness & communication skills workshops that we ran for 75 team members from Plan International Myanmar, this time run in Nyaung U (Bagan).

We ran 3 two-day programmes, mixing loads of activity based learning and including the PRISM Brain Mapping tool that we use to help develop understanding of behaviours and communication styles. The PRISM questionnaire is available in a number of languages and we had it fully translated into Myanmar language some while ago.

With 4 programmes now completed, the team are flying to Myitkyina in Kachin State, Myanmar today for another 2-day programme with more Plan International staff! Photos coming soon!

Our team are busy in Nyaung U, Myanmar this week, running 3 x 2-day communication skills and self-awareness workshops for Plan International. Here are some photos from today with Group 1, led by Daniel and Myat Thinzar Tun

We are delighted to be working with Plan International Myanmar, helping their team members develop increased self-awareness and improved communication skills over a series of 2-day workshops. The workshops feature activities, discussions and include the PRISM Brain Mapping tool, to help the participants understand their personal behaviours.

We will be running 9 workshops over the coming months, with different team members. Here are some photos from last weeks workshop with the Mrauk U team

This quote from Adame Kahane, from his book 'Facilitating Breakthrough', sums up the power and process of a skilled facilitator.

It reminds us of some feedback that a participant said on a 2-day Facilitation Skills course that we ran last month. They said that the course had made them realise that anyone can learn to facilitate groups well, that it's not a skill you're necessarily born with and that it's a case of learning skills and tools to help people to talk, engage and move in the direction towards their goal.

Facilitation is not just about putting people in a room and expecting them to talk effectively. It rarely works well. People are different, with diverse behaviours, communication styles and agendas. The key is to learn how to create engaging ways to create that free flow of communication.

If you'd like to know more about training in facilitation skills, let us know, as we run a fantastic 2-day Advanced Facilitation Skills course, in English and Myanmar language.

Our team are in Chaung Thar, Myanmar today, running a 2-day team development programme for one of our valued customers.

Fully prepared and ready to help 45 participants to improve their performance through the development of team work, building of problem solving abilities and growth of relationships in an enjoyable and memorable way.

Thanks to the Healthcare Leadership Team from DKSH Myanmar for asking us to design and deliver their team development workshop in Ngwe Saung yesterday, as part of their annual kick-off meeting.

We planned a programme involving a number of our problem solving activities, supported by learning reviews, to help the team explore their performance, build deeper working relationships, practice problem-solving and re-energise everyone. We love helping people learn in an active way!

It was great to work with DKSH again :-)

Are you looking to build your Myanmar team, boosting motivation, developing a range of important soft-skills and enhancing effective working relationships?

We've many years of experience in designing high quality tailor-made team development retreats in Myanmar, that help you team to learn and develop in an enjoyable way. We use our extensive training knowledge to design a programme that will meet your individual requirements. Some team programmes are just fun....ours are more than that and deliver real value and learning.

Our experienced team of trainers can run the programmes in Myanmar and English language, and will work with you at the venue of your choice, whether city, beach or countryside.

We've run programmes for a range of customers, including Wave Money, ILO, UNAIDS, Paung Sie, BBC Media Action, KBZ Pay, Nivea and Nordic Embassies.

Please feel free to contact us for a discussion:

Email our Director Mr Ian Davies - [email protected]

A question for you to answer....

Imagine that you have a specific career goal and that you'd like to be promoted to a new position in the future...would you:

1) Feel comfortable contacting your Manager to organise a meeting to discuss your goals.

2) Feel that it is your Managers responsibility to approach you for the conversation.

What do you think? Please post your answer below

Wishing all of our friends and customers a very Happy New Year.

We hope that 2023 brings you peace and happiness.

It was great to finally meet all the amazing future leaders at Dai-ichi Life Insurance in Yangon.

We’ve been working with the group virtually for the last 6 months, as part of their Jisedai leadership programme, but as our Director Ian is back in Myanmar, it was the perfect opportunity to meet face to face for a programme reflection session.

We’re looking forward to Team Thinking Asia’s continued partnership with Dai-ichi and to help develop their future leaders.

Today was Part 3 of a development journey for the team from the Netherlands Embassy in Yangon.

Over the last 6 months, we’ve been helping them to explore high performance, build more effective working relationships and develop understanding between team members.

Thanks for asking us to assist in your development

The Stages of Team Development

It's a great theory to reflect upon if you're building a team.

If we can help with the development of your team in Myanmar, our experienced Team Thinking Asia training team can help.

𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝟑 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐩𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐮𝐥𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐞𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞

Whether you're a first time supervisor, junior manager or senior leader, there will be times when people 'go off track' and behave in the wrong way and your role is to bring them 'back on track'.

If you're naturally assertive, with great people skills, you might find this straightforward, but a lot of people struggle with these situations, either diving in head first, being too aggressive and making a mess of things or standing back, tip toeing around the situation and never resolving the issue.

We've always found the DESC framework a great way to approach more difficult conversations. It's a useful tool to use as a manager, but equally for anyone who wants to have a more assertive conversation. It's based upon the work of Sharon and Gordon Bowers, in their book Asserting Yourself.

We've introduced the framework to all sorts of people - individuals wanting to approach conversations in a more assertive way, managers who freeze or mess up what they are saying and even students who want to communicate more assertively.

It's a great framework to base your conversation around. Have a look at the tips below and let us know what you think.

If you want to develop your communication skills or those of your team, contact us for a chat.

[email protected]

PRISM for Teams workshop

Do you want to strengthen your team?

The most effective teams have strong relationships and team members who are aware of their behaviours, their skills and strengths and the impact that they may have on others. This workshop uses the PRISM tool to:

► Increase awareness of self & others using the PRISM tool.
► Discover behaviour preferences & positive / negative impacts.
► Develop flexible communication skills.
► Improve understanding of other colleagues to build relationships.

FORMAT:

► 4 hour in-person or 2 x 2 hour virtual workshop.
► Relaxed and informal style, mixing discussion & group activities.

Contact us to have a chat about how we can help your team.

[email protected]

Wishing all of our Myanmar friends a Happy Thadingyut Festival