Leadership Communication Skills

for

This program will help you prepare and deliver the National Grid Gas Strategy more effectively in a broad range of situations:

In-person and remote meetings and presentations
Calls, one-to-ones, and difficult conversations
Town halls, webinars, and other public speaking opportunities

You will strengthen your ability to:

Create clear, concise, and compelling communications
Use presence and tailored messages to engage and influence listeners
Respond to questions with convincing and confident answers

Experienced coaches from McAlinden Associates — who regularly work around the world with leaders from a wide variety of companies — will conduct this highly interactive and practice-intensive program. National Grid has partnered with McAlinden for 7+ years.

The program is a day and a half, including extensive practice and feedback time, multiple one-to-one coaching sessions, as well as preparation periods and breaks.
During the one-to-ones, you will watch recordings of your practice, so you get a clear picture of your strengths and areas for work, as well as concrete suggestions for how to improve.
The small working groups will ensure you have a very personalized experience. We don’t think there is one right way for everyone to communicate to all listeners. Instead, we will help you strengthen your skills while remaining true to your own personality.

The rest of this page explains how to prepare for the program and provides an overview of the sessions.

Fossil Free Future

You will practice with your own real communication situations regarding our Fossil Free Future. Think about an upcoming meeting or hub where you can communicate re: our Fossil Free Future to a specific internal or external audience. Carissa has emailed information for you to review and use as a starting point for your presentation. You can use this information and also add to/ change it to fit your communication and audience.

The situation you practice should be important to you because you will improve your ability to tell that story, as well as your skills more generally.

You will present 5-10 minutes of content. If the actual presentation is longer, you can condense it before the program or during the preparation period. Do not script yourself or over-prepare. You can bring work-in-progress. You will use your computer to prepare content during the program and adjust it based on feedback.

Tell us who you are and what your goals are

If you would like to use a self-evaluation to think about your skills before answering these questions, click here. Many people also seek input from a few colleagues whose opinions they value.

Name

First Name

Last Name

Role

What would you like to improve about the way you prepare for in-person and remote meetings and presentations?

What would you like to improve about the way you conduct in-person and remote meetings and presentations?

Which types of interactions are most difficult for you?

What three skill areas would you like to improve during the program?

Tell us about the material you are bringing to practice — which story did you pick and why is it important for you to practice it?

Basic requirements above and session descriptions below

Overview of the sessions

The program is divided into three half-day sessions:

If your program starts in the morning, Sessions 1 and 2 will be on the first day and Session 3 will be in the morning of the next day.
If your program starts in the afternoon, Session 1 will be that afternoon and Sessions 2 and 3 will be the next day.

Session 1

Opening

Discuss the challenging communication situations you face and link the agenda to them.

Set goals

You set personal goals within our intellectual, emotional, and physical communication skills framework.

Increase presence

You practice telling a brief story — expanding your use of eye contact, voice and body language — to increase your presence, confidence and impact. We record your story. Together, we begin the process of giving and receiving feedback.

One-to-one coaching

You review the recording of your story privately with the coach.

Create compelling messages

You use our preparation tools to work on the meeting or presentation you plan to practice. You analyze your listeners and then personalize the Gas story you have chosen to them — adjusting language and level of detail, and emphasizing key issues the audience cares about. You will create an outline with a clear opening, compelling messages, and an action-oriented close.

Session 2

Visual aids can be powerful tools to support your messages, but they also can draw you into low-level details and make some listeners disengage. We discuss some simple techniques to design and use them well.

Discuss visuals

Deliver engaging presentations & meetings

You present a ten-minute version of the material you prepared during Session 1. You practice and receive feedback on your ability to tell a personalized story and be engaging. We record your presentation.

One-to-one coaching

You review the recording of your presentation privately with the coach.

Session 3

Concise executive summaries

You practice delivering the same story as a 2-3 minute executive summary, without visuals, to strengthen your ability to be concise and get across a memorable message. We record your executive summary.

Answer questions confidently

You practice answering questions and responding to challenges on your executive summary — with credibility, confidence and empathy. We record your Q&A practice.

One-to-one coaching

You review the recording of your executive summary and responses privately with the coach. You end the final one-to-one coaching with a plan to apply the skills in upcoming meetings.

Questions?

Email us goals@mcalinden.com or call us +1 212 986 4950

About us

Visit our main website McAlinden Associates