At a time when creative program solving and innovation are seen as critical tools for modern business challenges, the arts can provide powerful tools for strengthening these skills in the workplace.

Through a series of interactive workshops, built in collaboration with arts instructors from the Academy and business leaders throughout the Lynchburg region, this program will help energize & engage your leaders and managers in problem solving differently and help develop abilities such as creative problem solving, team building, storytelling, and design thinking. 

Competencies:

• Negotiations
• Agility and navigating what you’re handed to achieve outcomes and drive results
• Problem solving & bringing clarity to complex challenges
• Collaborative leadership
• Building connectivity and trust with stakeholders and customers

If your role in your organization requires any or all of the elements above, then join Leadership Lynchburg for their exciting new partnership with the Academy Center for Arts for their three- part program, Leveraging Arts Concepts for Business:  Creativity Meets Commerce.

Learn how to transform thinking and problem solving to “What are all the things that could go right?” from “What are all the things that could go wrong?” 
 
This pilot program consists of three workshops: 
 
7:30-9 a.m., October 10
Creative Problem Solving and Team Building: How to Keep the Party Going
Session Location:  Academy Center for the Arts 
Through improvisation exercises, participants will learn the “yes and” approach. Great improvisational performers know how to take what they are given and use it for positive effect. A fundamental approach to improv is you are not allowed to say no to what circumstances you are provided. You must take what your partner or the audience throws at you and use it to make your audience respond. You also learn that you must work together as a team to accomplish your goals. Sounds pretty apropos to a successful business, doesn’t?  How might this help when you’re presented with a budget cut?   A “no” from a client? 
 
7:30 -9 a.m., October 30
Storytelling: Be the Guide, Not the Hero
Session Location: Lynchburg Regional Business Alliance
Great story telling is a skill. Understanding your audience, knowing how to structure the story itself, and knowing how to emotionally connect to your audience are key to a fantastic story. In the business sector, storytelling is crucial. It is crucial to making a sale, to building partnerships and coalitions, and can be key to employee moral. In this workshop we will learn how to tell a great story and how to use this in your day to day work.   How might storytelling turn a “sales pitch” into a key selling opportunity?  How might storytelling engage your workforce in deeper conversations about culture, performance and outcomes?
 
7:30-9 a.m., November 9
Design Thinking: Turning “the Worst” into the Best
Session Location:   Moore & Giles
This approach to idea generation and innovation has been taking the corporate sector by storm. Design thinking is a strategy that comes from the arts and the design process many artist employ. Get introduced to a powerful process for seeing products, services, and business models through the eyes of your clients. Activities will give you the skills to create hands on activities and spark collaboration on your team. How might this help your business development, customer relations managers and internal team leaders think differently about their stakeholders and their needs?

Cost is $350 per person and registration is limited to 10.  Please call (434) 845-5966 or email info@lynchburgregion.org to register.