I offer workshops and custom learning experiences on Public Narrative and Empathetic Leadership.
These workshops are highly interactive, where participants learn through individual practice, 1-on-1 coaching, and group exercises. They are adapted from the frameworks by Marshall Ganz as taught in the Public Narrative course offered at Harvard Kennedy School. They can be integrated with:
- leadership offsites/retreats
- orientation programs
- conferences
- community-wide gatherings
- internal L&D for your impact-oriented organisation
Currently, I offer the following workshops in-person and online, with formats ranging from 1.5 hours to 2 days.
Enable leaders to communicate their why through a Story of Self, build group identities through a Story of Us and motivate people towards action with the Story of Now
Apply the Empathetic bridge to your current leadership challenges and use the case-method to reflect on your own experiences of loss, difference, power and change
🗣️ Public Narrative
Communicating as a leader is often reduced to the managerial, technical or analytical; this is simply not enough to inspire teams. It is no wonder that storytelling is widely acknowledged as one of the most important – and rare – skills in leaders.
Public Narrative is a storytelling practice that help leaders communicate their why, and motivate their people to act towards a shared purpose. It is rooted in the definition of leadership as the practice of enabling others to accepting responsibility to achieve a shared goal or purpose in the face of uncertainty.
A Public Narrative starts with the Self – narrating experiences that shape our own values and sense of responsibility, so that others may understand and relate to us. The Self connects with values of the Us, to make a sense of solidarity and community explicit and visible. These stories link together with a story of Now to motivate action towards a shared purpose.
Based on a course originally taught by Marshall Ganz at Harvard University, Public Narrative has over the last 25 years been the starting point of leadership programs, global summits and community campaigns. In addition to helping leaders come up with a wide applicable framework for storytelling, the experience builds trust, morale, and the EQ required to lead in today’s volatile world.
Examples
Introductory lecture to Public Narrative by Marshall Ganz
Barack Obama’s Public Narrative from 2004
A short and visual explanation of Public Narrative, by Rosi Greenberg
Workshop formats
- 3 hours for an Introduction; 1-day for the entire framework; 2 days to include showcase of completed narratives
- Can be facilitated online or offline
- Require a minimum group size of 15 for an organisational training
- For deeper impact, we bring in trained Public Narrative coaches for one-on-one practice and feedback
- To inquire about this workshop, please write in at animo.aditi@gmail.com
This may be a good fit if you are a…
- Social impact organization that wants to improve their leaders' ability to communicate their mission, build strong relationships and mobilize their team
- Conference or summit organiser looking to offer an immersive experience that fosters collaboration and leadership on shared interests
- Corporate organization that want to incorporate storytelling in their internal communication and leadership development programs
- Just a human who wants to bring storytelling to their people :)
Who this is for
- Reflective individuals. Anyone who struggles with creating their narrative - a story that truly speaks for you on your personal website or in a first conversation where you want to build a strong relationship
- Community builders. Anyone who has been wanting to start, manage or get involved in communities that grow when people are engaged and feel a sense of belonging, this is for you.
- Action-oriented leaders. Anyone who wants to communicate with story, emotion, and appeal to people’s internal motivation to take ownership & act with urgency, this is for you.
🫀 Empathetic Leadership
We look for leadership not just to coast us through the good times, but more importantly to guide us through the rough ones. We experience challenges in leadership not when our groups or teams face disruptions, but when they feel unable to act mindfully in the face of those disruptions. The purpose of leadership then becomes to help our people feel seen and understood, and to show that they have a choice in acting with purpose even in the face of grave disruption.
In this workshop, we will look at leadership challenges with four lenses: lenses of loss, difference, power and change. We will focus on the role that narrative – what we communicate and express – plays in enabling a group to overcome these challenges. The framework of the empathetic bridge is introduced as a narrative tool to enable mindful, agentic responses, and as we go through the sessions participants will learn to apply this towards their past or ongoing leadership challenges.
Examples
An example of the empathetic bridge in action: Michelle Obama, 2016
Another example of the empathetic bridge: Patrick Collison's email to Stripe employees after layoffs in 2022
Workshop formats
- 3 hours for an Introduction; 2 days for the entire framework with practice included.
- Can be facilitated online or offline
- Require a minimum group size of 10 for an organisational training
- For deeper impact, we bring in trained Public Narrative coaches for one-on-one practice and feedback [only Online, at the moment]
- To inquire about this workshop, please write in at animo.aditi@gmail.com
Who this is for
- Mission-driven organisations whose members could benefit from a path to to deal with deep losses or changes, and regain the motivation to keep going
- Managers who believe in equipping their team to independently deal with difficulties, rather than to solve them yourself, or protect them from it
- Leaders who want to be more emotionally responsive and connected to people in tough times, because you recognise that those moments define your leadership