What differentiates Kagan Associates from other consultants is our insight into how people in organizations think and behave and the depth of the client relationships we create. Because each organization is different, our services are highly customized. Our work begins and ends with what you are seeking to achieve and how we can help you realize your goals through principled actions. (For information on program formats, click here)

Strategic Planning

In today's turbulent world, organizations must be able to think strategically and act decisively. Strategic planning can make the difference between an organization that stagnates and one that transforms itself.

We help you and your organization deepen your understanding of current realities and encourage your search to recognize who you want to become in the future, clarifying the values, purposes and vision at your core. We next explore how you will get there, discovering resources, initiatives, and processes that together form a strategic plan consistent with this authentic core. Undertaking strategic planning allows you and your organization to create your future rather than simply react to it.

High Performance Teams

When individuals come together as a work team and transform themselves into a synergistic, creative force, the outcome is far greater than the sum of the parts would suggest. Why do some teams achieve all their goals with seeming ease, while others flounder? Teamwork is developmental. High performance is cultivated, not assumed, through careful attention to the interpersonal dynamics of team members and through fostering commitment to shared goals.

We work with a variety of teams, from leadership teams, to cross-functional project teams, to ad hoc task forces tackling strategic initiatives. In each case, our approach includes affirming team purpose, goals, functions, and scope of responsibilities to make sure the right results are achieved. In particular, we focus on the dual priorities of attending to relationships and tasks. Team dynamics (relationships) have to be right if the team is to be able to deliver on its promises (tasks).

As part of our work with teams, we often use one or more self-assessment instruments, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® and the Kolbe Pure Instinct System^TM. Both instruments help your team members learn to value and leverage differences through understanding themselves and others better. We also develop a set of operating principles for your team, called an Agreement for Working Together, that helps manage team member expectations and behaviors. All of our team development programs are designed to transfer skills to team members to create lasting change in the organization.

Leading With Grace^SM

Kagan Associates teaches recognized and potential leaders at all levels of organizations how to lead others in a respectful and forthright way by first gaining greater awareness, knowledge, and mastery of themselves. We help organizations develop effective, principled leadership by educating core groups who then model for others the behaviors conducive to productive, exciting work experiences.

Leading With Grace^SM is our renowned leadership training program that focuses on the development of capable, compassionate, and collaborative leaders. The program is customized to the specific needs of your group, and case studies and other exercises are designed to reflect the challenges and opportunities of your organization. As part of the program, we create a forum in which real issues are aired, and you use the skills you are learning to work through these issues to a successful conclusion. Our goal is to facilitate collaborative leadership that is self-sustaining long after the formal training has been completed.

Transforming Organizations

Sometimes, the most significant challenge you face is the one no one ever talks about, or the challenge that everyone acknowledges openly, but no one is willing to tackle. It could be a leadership vacuum or lack of leadership accountability, or a team that is unwilling to collaborate with others but is tolerated because it is highly profitable. Left unacknowledged or unaddressed, these "killer issues" sap morale and divert your organization's energy and attention away from more productive and positive undertakings.

Kagan Associates specializes in transforming organizational cultures and relationships. We help your organization surface and resolve such complex or sensitive issues by providing a safe context in which to explore the ramifications and agree on how to resolve them. Our approach includes teaching participants a four-step conflict management framework so that you learn the critical skills you need in the process of working the issues through to conclusion. In this manner, we promote recovery and reconciliation while strengthening your organization's ability to deal proactively and affirmatively with diverse - and potentially divisive - opinions, working styles and perceptions.

Coaching Programs

Our coaching programs help individuals achieve their full potential through a process of learning and transformation. Some people seek coaching for support in achieving specific goals, others because their jobs are at stake. While the impetus for seeking our assistance may vary, the prerequisites to a successful coaching relationship do not. These include:

• A professional relationship based on mutual trust and respect.
  
• A context of complete confidentiality.
  
• The client's openness to being coached and willingness to engage in a process of experimentation and change as a path to personal and professional growth.
  
• Our ability to be fully present to the client, listening for what's behind the words, knowing when to push, offering ideas, and creating options.
  
  

Most of our coaching programs are built around a series of conversations between the client and coach over a defined period of time, typically four to six months. At the outset of the engagement, coach and client discuss the reasons to engage in coaching. Together, we clarify the outcomes the client seeks and discern any attitudes and behaviors that are getting in the way of the client's success. Subsequent sessions are devoted to helping the client develop the skills, strategies, and wherewithal to achieve his or her goals, including exploring levels of personal commitment and desire to change.

Special Coaching Programs

In addition to executive and individual coaching, we offer two programs for specialized audiences:

Our Coaching Up^SM program involves creating a cadre of non-management coaches-in-training, each of whom is assigned to an executive or senior manager to deliver a traditional coaching program over a period of six months. The program creates the opportunity for senior managers to gain a direct and unique perspective of how they are perceived in the organization, with less filtering and dilution, and to be coached accordingly. All coach-trainees are under the supervision and guidance of one of our master coaches and participate in monthly peer evaluation sessions to further develop their skills and enhance their personal growth.

Our Instant Focus^SM program is a half-day intensive coaching session that is designed to help sole proprietors and senior executives commit to paper the concerns, ideas, and aspirations they may have in their heads, but have not yet had the opportunity or perspective to clarify, prioritize, and put into action. The Instant Focus session is a catalyst for focused action that helps clients get the traction they need to get moving and keep on moving in the right direction, without protracted expenditures of time.

Assessment and Development Tools

Kagan Associates offers clients the opportunity to work with a variety of assessment and development tools designed to facilitate professional growth in individuals and organizations.

Individual and Team Awareness Instruments

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®) offers a pathway for understanding individual preferences in the ways people think, communicate, and interact. Of value to both individuals and teams, the MBTI® demonstrates the benefits of including different “personalities” and styles in the workplace.

The Kolbe System® helps individuals validate their natural instincts and unique talents for initiating action, responding to situations, and preventing problems. The Kolbe is an especially powerful tool for building synergistic teams that are effective and efficient in achieving their goals. We also recommend the Kolbe RightFit® for recruiting high potential employees.

360˚ Feedback/Multi-rater Tools

Human Synergistics® Life Styles Inventory^TM (LSI) is a multi-rater assessment tool for professional growth and development that helps individuals strengthen behavioral styles that promote their effectiveness and moderate styles that prevent them from realizing their potential. Used with individual coaching clients, the LSI offers invaluable and otherwise unavailable information to support self-development.

The Emotional Competency Inventory¹ (ECI), based on Daniel Goleman’s work on Emotional Intelligence, is a multi-rater tool for leadership development. The ECI profiles an individual’s strengths, as well as areas for improvement, relative to emotional competencies that research has shown to be necessary for good leadership, specifically in the areas of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management.