Program Overview

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Centre for Continuing Education

The Centre for Continuing Education at the University of Sydney offers a diverse range of professional development short courses. These courses are designed to enhance career prospects and provide opportunities for personal growth.

Course Subjects

The Centre for Continuing Education offers courses in various subjects, including:

• Business and management
  • Business communication
  • Business strategy
  • Business writing
  • Cultural competence and diversity
  • Finance
  • Leadership
  • Management
  • Organisational psychology
  • Sales and customer service
• English
• HSC preparation (years 10-12)
  • HSC biology
  • HSC business studies
  • HSC chemistry
  • HSC economics
  • HSC English
  • HSC mathematics
  • HSC physics
  • Year 11 (Revision)
  • Years 10-12 study and essay skills
• Humanities and culture
  • Creative writing
  • Music
  • Philosophy
  • Psychology
• Information technology
  • Adobe
  • AI and machine learning courses
  • Data analysis and analytics
  • Google
  • Microsoft
• Language
  • Arabic
  • Brazilian Portuguese
  • Chinese
  • French
  • German
  • Greek
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Spanish
• Marketing
  • Digital marketing
  • Marketing communications
  • Product development
• Project management
  • Agile methodology courses
  • Change management for projects
  • Stakeholder and people management
  • Technical project management skills

Women in Leadership Course: Advanced Skills

This course is designed for women who have been in senior management or leadership roles for over two years. It aims to empower female leaders to identify their unique leadership attributes and use these to negotiate, lead, and mentor with confidence.

Course Description

Women with vision and purpose are stepping into leadership roles at unprecedented rates. Thriving in this space requires political acumen, resilience, and the ability to drive change despite systemic pushback. In this course, participants will learn to lead with impact and confidence and review their assumptions about what it takes to succeed as a female leader.

Course Aims

The course aims to empower female leaders to identify their unique leadership attributes and to use these to negotiate, lead, and mentor with confidence.

Course Outcomes

By the end of this course, participants should be able to:

• Challenge stereotypes about gender and leadership, so they can accelerate their success as a leader
• Maintain their focus, clarity, and resilience under pressure
• Eliminate habits which lead to burnout, so they can work strategically and lead with intention
• Drive positive culture change in their business
• Act as a role model for emerging female leaders
• Use their improved powers of influence to better negotiate
• Find solutions to real-life problems and challenges as a female leader in the age of ‘supposed equality’.

Course Content

In this course, participants will learn practical skills for addressing the issues which emerge for women as they advance into senior leadership roles. Each session will cover research findings that have implications for women in leadership. Participants will then explore specific steps they can take to address common challenges and thrive as savvy business leaders.

Challenging Myths about Women in Leadership

Research on the issues impacting professional women and female leaders is disrupting conventional wisdom about how to succeed in their leadership role. The course will discuss:

• Current findings on gender and brain function
• Differences between male and female communication styles
• What it takes to succeed as a female leader

Handling 'Glass Ceiling' Issues

As participants progress in their leadership role, they may face a number of challenges. Common issues include finding themselves in constant 'reaction' mode, feeling overloaded, overworking because of a perfectionist mindset, or facing pressure because they’re part of a ‘dual career couple’. This session provides a toolkit for addressing these issues. Participants will learn how to:

• Clear their schedule of low-impact activities or meetings
• Overcome imposter syndrome
• Get results through other people and manage tandem careers

Shaping Organisational Culture

Culture-building is a core responsibility of leaders. Their culture-building efforts can significantly impact the ladder of participation for professional women. Workplace culture also impacts motivation, engagement, and productivity throughout the business. Participants will learn how to create a dynamic, positive culture that capitalises on diversity and builds ‘positive deviance’. They will develop a personal action plan for standing out as a leader who drives change.

Becoming a Savvy Negotiator

74% of women feel uncomfortable negotiating in business contexts. What causes this? More importantly, what can they do about it? Participants will power up their negotiation skills so that they will feel, look, and sound confident at the negotiating table. This session will show them how to:

• Take on a success mindset so they can spot opportunities to negotiate (which many women fail to see)
• Prepare a backup plan, so they never say ‘yes’ to a bad deal
• Keep their negotiation on track by leading a conversation through four key stages
• Eliminate five habits that limit the success of female negotiators – so they can become a savvy woman of influence

Intended Audience

This is an advanced level course for women who have been in senior management or leadership roles for over two years. It is also suitable for men who wish to support diversity agendas in their organisations.

Delivery Modes

The course is available in two delivery modes:

• Face-to-face, presenter-taught workshop
• Online workshop via the platform Zoom

Delivery Style

The workshop is a highly interactive program for experienced leaders and senior managers. Participants will get the most from this course if they are:

• An experienced leader, who has spent two or more years working at a senior level
• Willing to contribute to group discussions about their success mindset
• Confident communicating verbally in English
• Comfortable participating in role-play style activities

Participants will learn through a variety of methods, including:

• Mini lectures
• Video presentations
• Q & A sessions
• Demonstrations by the facilitator
• Practical group activities
• Individual planning activities

Materials

Course materials are provided electronically using Dropbox.

Organisational Training

For groups of six or more, courses can be delivered to their team with the option to tailor content.

Meet the Facilitators

Eleanor Shakiba is an expert in positive psychology. She has taught over 50,000 people to think and speak in ways which build success. Eleanor started her career as a writer. Next, she discovered her passion for teaching and has since become a renowned facilitator.

What Others Say

Participants have praised the course, saying it is interactive and helps them digest and practice what they have learned. The facilitator is described as a great coach who challenges participants with the right questions.

Related Courses

The Centre for Continuing Education offers several related courses, including:

• Advanced Communication Skills for Leaders Course
• Advanced Leadership and Practical Management Course
• Coaching Skills for Managers Course
• Leading Responsible Innovation Course: Strategic Design and System Thinking
• Women in Leadership Course: Foundation Skills

These courses are designed to enhance leadership and management skills, providing opportunities for personal and professional growth.