Course Description

Course Overview

This highly experiential and insightful 1‑day workshop helps leaders, facilitators, and OD professionals deepen their ability to “read the room” from the inside out. Through live experiments, reflective practice, and courageous conversations, participants explore how their own perceptions, bodies, and stories shape what they notice in groups—and how they can intervene with greater clarity, courage, and care.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this 1‑day workshop, participants will be able to:

• Develop the ability to read verbal, non‑verbal, and energetic signals in any group setting.
• Understand the science behind perception, bias, and somatic awareness.
• Practice observation, reflective questioning, and intentional intervention.
• Build a personal practice plan for continuous skill development.

1‑Day Workshop Outline

1. Arriving in the Room 

• Setting intentions for a soul‑searching, practice‑focused day.
• Establishing psychological safety and confidentiality for a mixed, public group.

2. Seeing, Feeling, and Interpreting Signals

• Verbal, non‑verbal, and energetic signals in groups: what you notice first.
• Perception, bias, and somatic awareness—how your body and brain filter the room.
• Guided somatic practice: tracking sensations and emotions while in a group.

3. Frameworks in Action: Gestalt, SCARF, and the Here‑and‑Now

• Gestalt lens: working with what is emerging in the here‑and‑now.
• SCARF: how Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness, and Fairness show up in rooms.
• Small‑group work: applying these lenses to real situations from participants’ lives.

4. Practising Observation, Questioning, and Intervention

• Structured observation drills: room scans, pattern spotting, energy mapping.
• Reflective questioning to test your read of the room without blaming or shaming.
• Intentional interventions: naming what you notice, adjusting process, inviting new voices.

5. Integration and Personal Practice Plan

• Soul‑searching reflection: “Who am I when I walk into a room?”
• Identifying personal triggers, typical moves, and desired shifts.
• Designing a simple practice plan: before‑during‑after habits for upcoming sessions.
• Closing circle: insights and learning commitments