Learning By Doing: Creating Your Templates

While in the car yesterday, an interview about emergency services and police training caught my attention. Gerard Bailes, a forensic psychologist who trains police in hostage negotiations, was sharing with listeners that in recent years professionals who wouldn’t normally receive emergency services training (like teachers) are having to extend their skill set.

When it comes to training people in how to negotiate during stressful, potentially dangerous situations, Bailes recognizes that, ‘You can’t write the script for every scenario, but you can give people the skills’.

I think that this approach is key – whether you’re learning how to negotiate under crisis or in the boardroom. Following a script or a map may give comfort to some negotiators, but building up your skill set so that you can easily adapt to circumstances as they change is important. Over reliance on scripts and a rigidity in approach are sure to lead to weakened results.

Just as emergency personnel have to learn while they’re on the job, so do business people. As Bailes puts it, we’re ‘building our own templates as we go’ – and it’s this catalog of templates that will serve us in the future.

.

Do you prefer to follow a script? What experience has most shaped your ‘templates’ when it comes to business?

.

.

Devon Smiley is a Negotiation Consultant, who guides teams through the preparation and execution of negotiations with a distinct Corporate + Creative approach.

Explore Negotiation Consulting here, or get in touch at devon@informedstyle.com to learn more.