Is this course right for me?

Target Audience: Postgraduate Research Students

This course addresses the psychological and practical challenges of communicating in a range of professional settings, for example; communicating with senior colleagues and supervisors; presenting to groups; or negotiating with collaborators. This course provides the understanding and techniques to help individuals learn how to express themselves confidently and persuasively, whatever the situation.

For some of us, speaking up for ourselves clearly so that our opinions or requirements are heard, respected and responded to can be difficult and stressful. In this online course, participants will learn a variety of approaches to increase their assertiveness. They will understand some of the obstacles to successful communication and explore the verbal and nonverbal characteristics of confident communication. They will learn a range of psychological and communication techniques to help them adopt helpful perspectives and be able to express their needs and opinions clearly with a range of people, with greater impact and less stress.

Whilst PhD students learn how to communicate their research evidence and findings comprehensively and robustly, in professional life, a different range of communication techniques is required in order to be able to make an effective case for your opinions or proposals to colleagues or stakeholders. Course participants will learn simple techniques to present and articulate their ideas in order to be better able to convince others of the value of their proposals. The course will introduce a range of rhetorical techniques designed to engage and win over an audience, in order to become a more powerfully persuasive communicator.

This one-day online course will use interactive exercises, self-reflective activities and Q&A opportunities, in order to keep participants engaged and interested. By the end of the course, participants will have assembled a toolkit of communication techniques that will ensure they are more confident, effective communicators, whatever the demands of their professional environment.

By the end of this full day webinar participants will have:

• Understood the characteristics of confident communication and the importance of nonverbal behaviour and psychological dimensions when communicating
• Learned a communication model that will help them understand their own difficulties when asserting themselves and develop the psychological perspectives and communication skills to increase their assertiveness, whatever the attitudes and behaviours of oth
• Learned a range of assertive communication techniques, in order to be able to stick to their guns when meeting resistance
• Learned techniques to find and articulate their core message clearly and convincingly to a range of potential stakeholders
• Learned rhetorical tricks to engage and persuade an audience
• Applied the course content to situations from their current work, in order to ensure they will leave the course equipped to immediately implement their learning

Prerequisites

• About the Researcher Development Programme
• Booking Conditions

PG Certificate in Researcher Professional Development

All postgraduate research students are eligible to access the Researcher Development Programme workshops. This workshop can contribute towards the PG Certificate in Researcher Professional Development (PG Cert RPD).

You can find credit and class information in the Researcher Development Programme Handbook and in NEPTUNE (Engineering, HaSS) or SPIDER (Science).

Please check with your department or Supervisor to confirm if you are enrolled on the PG Cert RPD and how many credits you are expected to achieve if you are unsure.