COURSES IN
Management
The following outlines are examples of Management training that we have provided to clients. All modules are fully customizable to your unique needs.
Credit courses can be offered for academic credit through Tacoma Community College.
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Customized Course Series Available
For many of our clients IPS creates a customized series of courses delivered on-site and in your timeframe. We work with you to fully understand your organizational training and development needs. The first step is a needs assessment working with your key stakeholders to identify managerial competencies that are key to your organization’s success. Utilizing our network of instructional designers, we select and customize the different courses that will develop and enhance those competencies in your managers to create a customized management development series.
Tribal Enterprise and Gaming Management (TEGM) Professional Certificate Program Customized Course Series Available
Invista Performance Solutions is dedicated to developing and delivering customized education and career advancement programs onsite for Pacific Northwest tribes. We work closely with tribal council and casino executives to create high quality and relevant learning programs for enrolled tribal members and enterprise employees. Each program is unique and customized to the needs of the tribal community. Our dedicated staff works with leaders to ensure all learning objectives are met and desired outcomes are achieved.

City of Tacoma – SMG Credit Course Series
As City of Tacoma employees advance into supervisory and managerial positions, they are required to have college degrees. Working with TCC, the City envisioned a program to both support supervisory and managerial practical skill growth and educational achievement. The SMG certificate program fulfills both those needs.
Non-Credit Course Outlines
Accountability
Some leaders create a vision and hope that others will follow. Successful leaders facilitate the development of a shared vision that builds commitment to the outcome. Participants learn the importance of setting SMART goals, how to enhance team performance by empowering action, and how to improve outcomes using process improvement.
Budgets and Financial Reports
Everyday businesses deal with budgets and financial reports in some form or fashion. Managers review budget numbers and run financial reports for decision-making and reporting to shareholders regularly. Participants will learn financial terminology and analyze financial statements. They examine the common types of budgets and the techniques used in the creation and forecasting of the budget.
Coaching for Performance
This course provides participants with knowledge and practical skills for coaching other employees to perform better and enjoy their jobs more by addressing two important issues that challenge many businesses: productivity and retention. Using a DiSC © personal style profile, participants gain valuable insight into their behavioral tendencies and perspectives on how they relate to others. Participants gain practical skills and techniques for conducting highly effective coaching sessions.
Communication Skills for Managers
Managers who can effectively communicate leverage their ability to connect and enhance their productivity and the productivity of their teams. Participants will learn the five key habits of effective communicators including: focus on the listener, remove barriers to understanding, create messages that are clear, concise and compelling, balance intent and impact and match mode and message. Learners then practice using them in context.
Conflict Management
Constructive conflict can increase performance, but destructive conflict can destroy productivity and morale. Participants learn how to recognize different types of conflict and how to resolve conflicts before they become destructive. Using the Thomas-Kilmann Model, participants explore five modes people use in dealing with conflict and how to determine when each mode is most appropriate or least appropriate. Participants practice a collaborative process for resolving conflicts.
Decision Making
Participants will identify and practice effective skills and techniques needed to make better decisions in the workplace. They explore their decision-making “preferences” in different situations (Command, Consensus, Consultation, or Convenience) and apply structured approaches to decision making.
Finance for Non-Financial Managers
Participants gain a basic understanding of financial management, how to interpret reports, draft budgets, cost products, and make informed financial decisions. Utilizing organizational financial reports, participants learn to read and interpret data from Income Statements, Balance Sheets, and Cash Flow Statements in order to make better decisions for their department and organization.
Generation Gap and the Workplace – Managers and Supervisors
This course is designed for managers and supervisors to develop their ability to coach, communicate and create an environment which makes the best of group and team diversity for the success of the organization. Participants will review the various generations present at work, understand what motivates them, and how to deal collaboratively with them daily.
Managing the Human Side of Change
Change is all around us, whether it is change driven by opportunity or change in the drive to improve productivity. For most managers, managing change is a constant. Many people, however, experience change as something inflicted upon them. This course provides managers tools to help build support for change and maximize the potential for success.
Managing Teams
Participants begin with team development basics and move on to team processes, procedures and roles. The participants progress from the role of team managers to assessing their readiness to take on the responsibility and exercise the skills required in team leadership.
Performance Management
Performance Management is a strategic approach to ensuring the efficiency and effectiveness of an organization. Participants learn the basics of performance management including their responsibilities as a performance coach, their relationship to employee development and how to create action plans with their employees.
Training Skills for Managers
In today’s complex organizations, line managers and other subject matter experts are often involved in the training and development process. Participants review the learning needs of adults and the three most common models for workplace training-presentation, facilitation and active learning. Participants learn how to analyze learning needs, select the right training approach and specific tools and techniques for effective delivery.
Credit Course Outlines
SMG 101: Effective Supervision
5 credits awarded by Tacoma Community College as part of a 17-credit Supervision and Management certificate program.
This class provides participants with an overview of critical effective supervisory behaviors and strategies. Course content includes a review of the traditional “command and control” approach to managing people and the more current methodology: shared governance or participatory management. The intent is to enhance supervisory skills to improve supervisory effectiveness, improve employee engagement and retention, strengthen interpersonal workplace relationships, and improve organization climate and productivity. This course reviews the various roles, responsibilities, and challenges facing first-line supervisors in today’s changing workplace environment.
SMG 120: Managing Challenging Employees
3 credits awarded by Tacoma Community College as part of a 17-credit Supervision and Management certificate program.
This course provides participants with various strategies for managing challenging employees. Course content emphasizes the importance of both performance coaching and developmental coaching, in addition to implementing progressive discipline techniques in conjunction with HR to help change behavior and improve performance. Participants learn intervention techniques and use workplace employee problem scenarios to practice new skills.
SMG 201: Manager Communications
3 credits awarded by Tacoma Community College as part of a 17-credit Supervision and Management certificate program.
Managers learn to communicate more effectively improving employee satisfaction and heightening employee retention. Course content includes analyzing and practicing basic communication principles and techniques, and provides methods for overcoming obstacles to effective communication. Participants are introduced to effective listening techniques. Emphasis is on practical workplace application.
SMG 261: Dynamics of Leadership:
3 credits awarded by Tacoma Community College as part of a 17-credit Supervision and Management certificate program.
This course compares and contrasts the role of leaders, managers, and front-line supervisors in an organization. Participants will self-assess their own leadership style, and evaluate their effectiveness, after reviewing individual strengths and weaknesses.
SMG 264: Motivation and Productivity
3 credits awarded by Tacoma Community College as part of a 17-credit Supervision and Management certificate program.
This course examines methodologies used in the workplace to obtain sustained peak performance from employees. Course content reviews effective supervisory techniques and communication strategies. Participants examine alternatives to “command-and-control” and “management-by-compliance” management approaches. The concepts of feedback and intrinsic rewards are emphasized as the foundation for a highly motivational work environment. Emphasis is on the role of the supervisor and the interaction between supervisor and the employee in building a highly motivational workforce.
Case Studies

Financial Pacific Leasing – Management Series
Since 2010, we've helped Financial Pacific Leasing, Inc. (FPL) exceed their employee development goals through customized leadership programs designed specifically for their needs annually. With each iteration of the program, IPS worked closely with FPL to refine learning outcomes and the course focus to meet the specific needs of each cohort. Participants have ranged from experienced managers, to new supervisors, to high potentials.

P&J Machining – Manager and Supervisor Series
P&J Machining, an aerospace machining and manufacturing company, has experienced growing pains as many of their managers were promoted from within and needed the soft skills or management skills required to be a leader. We worked with P&J Machining leaders to identify and prioritize their training needs and secured a $34,000 Job Skills Program workforce training grant to develop managers, supervisors and team leads at P&J.

GMCR Supervisory Success Program
Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (GMCR) a recognized as a leader in the specialty coffee industry for its award-winning coffees and innovative brewing technology, experienced rapid growth and tripled its workforce from 2006 to 2010. This rapid growth through acquisitions and hiring of supervisors posed a challenge for sustaining the corporate culture. We worked to design the new Supervisory Success curriculum as a blend of GMCR content and our Supervision & Management curriculum. The curriculum was based on the active adult learning model where each learning experience is 10% workshop, 70% application and 20% coaching and feedback.