Confident Communication in Academia

Starting Point:
PhD students are confronted with a wide variety of communication situations in their everyday work – for example, when collaborating with supervisors, in research groups, or at conferences. In addition to technical expertise, these situations also require clear communication, especially in negotiations, conflicts, or other challenging conversations. At the same time, confident communication is usually a prerequisite throughout the academic qualification but is rarely explicitly taught. Concrete tools and opportunities to practice will help PhD candidates to represent their concerns clearly, respectfully, and appropriately for the situation, and to confidently fulfill their role in an academic context.
 

Workshop Content:
In this workshop, the participants will learn what will add to their confidence in challenging communication situations like negotiations or conflicts. We will experience how the use of body language and tone as well as verbal expressions make a difference on how confident we come across. There will be room for reflection as well as for trying out new behavior. The workshop will conclude with the individual development of an implementation plan: In which situations will I try out what with increased confidence?
The participants can bring own cases from their work life. In a trustful atmosphere they will have the chance to discuss own issues and experience each other’s support.
 

Workshop Objectives:

• Understand what confident communication is (not) and what supports an appropriate attitude
• Learn to prepare difficult conversations
• Gain security in bringing difficult messages across
• Understand the impact of (body)language use to appear confident
• Define individual next steps to increase confidence in communication