The Art of Agreement Creating Sustainable Personal and Professional Relationships

Week of April 8, 2023

Creating, managing and sustaining relationships is a critical aspect of health and the source of a great deal of disease. As a divorce mediator I know this too well. That work got me started and was a fertile learning laboratory for the work I’ve been doing over the last thirty years. Everything I do is in service of helping people get along well, an essential life skill, and the place the juice of life resides. I teach people tools for how to create effective personal and professional relationships, and how to sustain them with simple conversational tools for creating agreements and moving through differences and conflict. This series of programs will contribute to your emotional health and effectiveness.

Sustainable Collaborations: The Power of Agreements for Results
Most of us never learned what you need to talk about at the beginning of any personal or professional relationship. In this session you will learn about The Laws of Agreement, The 10 Essential Elements of Agreements for Results and how to engage in the conversations that will determine the success or failure of your project or relationship. You will come to understand how to create alignment and maximize your chances for success.

1. The Laws of Agreement
2. 10 Essential Elements of Agreements for Results
3. Agreement & Alignment
4. Yes / No ? Trust?
5. Application

Agreements with Yourself: The Power of Manifestation
Most of us have things we would like to do or accomplish that remain elusive: cleaning the garage; getting that advanced degree; losing 20 pounds; dealing with a difficult neighbor, relative or significant other. This session will get you on the road to what you have been procrastinating. You will leave the session with an agreement to accomplish what you want that has a critical “by when”. You will get the opportunity to share what you have created and get feedback that will allow you to fine tune your process. You will realize that by breaking the endeavor into manageable steps you will be able to engage, and get it done!

1. Laws and Essential Elements of Agreement
2. What do you want to accomplish?
3. Crafting the Agreement
4. By When, Value,  Promises, Metrics, At Stake
5. Sharing / Feedback

Essential Communication Skills and The Magic of Listening
Most of us have not taken the time to be more conscious of how we engage with others. Communication is how we bridge the gap between ourselves and others so that we can work and play together well. It’s not only what to talk about but how. In this program we will learn what communication is and the critical skills for connection.

1. Becoming Audience Centric
2. Emotional Intelligence – What, Why, How
3. The Toolbox
4. Whole Body Expressions
5. Listening Essentials
6. Knee to Knee Listening

Getting to Resolution: Turning Conflict Into Collaboration
No matter how conscious, mindful, knowledgeable and wise we are in our relationships differences and conflict will surface.  In this session we will explore, demonstrate and practice a simple three step conversational model for dealing with the speed bumps that get in our way. We will look at the Conflict Continuum; The Real Costs of Conflict; The Cycle of Resolution; Dealing with Emotion; Normalizing Conflict; Disagreeing without Being Disagreeable and Crafting New Agreements.

1. The Conflict Continuum
2. The Real Costs of Conflict
3. The Cycle of Resolution
4. Clearing Emotions
5. Normalizing Conflict

Everything I do is in service of helping people to get along well, a most critical life skill, and the place the juice of life resides. I share tools for how to create effective personal and professional relationships, and how to sustain them.

 

Stewart Levine is the founder of ResolutionWorks, providing skills and ways of thinking needed to build strong collaborations. He has been resolving conflicts and coaching people in collaboration for over forty years.

His book Getting to Resolution: Turning Conflict into Collaboration was endorsed by Dr. Stephen Covey; featured in The Futurist magazine and was a finalist for the Center for Public Resources book of the year. The Book of Agreement has been called more practical than the classic Getting to Yes. He co-authored Collaboration 2.0 and Curated and Edited The Best Lawyer You Can Be: A Guide to Physical, Mental, Emotional and Spiritual Wellbeing, published by The American Bar Association.

Stewart is an Honors graduate of Rutgers Law School; served as a Deputy Attorney General for the State of New Jersey and was a Law and Humanities Fellow at Temple Law School. He served as an adjunct member of the faculty at the University of California Berkeley Law School. He delivered workshops at the Esalen Institute from 1995 to 1999. This year he will publish a large volume of poetry. StewartLLevine; Pilgrims Path