Training

Understanding people, relationships and systems in complex conflicts – and staying able to act.

Day 1 – Understanding people and conflict systems: perception, culture, relationships and systems

• Leadership begins with perception – perception, experience, values, identity, cultural imprint and implicit assumptions. Exercise: a personal conflict map from different perspectives.
• Understanding leadership in relational systems – systems thinking instead of linear explanation: actors, relationships, interests, power, feedback loops, trust and mistrust. Practice: system mapping and identifying leverage points.
• Asymmetry, interests and hidden dynamics – positions, interests and needs; formal and informal asymmetry, dependencies, recognition, belonging, institutional and cultural expectations. Exercise: stakeholder and power mapping.
• From leadership to intervention strategy – group work: conflict → actors → relationships → dynamics → leverage points → possible intervention. What do we need to understand before we try to resolve a conflict?

Day 2 – What happens to people and relationships under pressure: stress, trauma, safety and communication

• Trauma and stress in fragile contexts and conflicts – stress and threat responses (fight, flight, freeze, fawn), the window of tolerance, individual, collective and intergenerational trauma, and their effects on trust, authority and communication.
• Psychological safety and de-escalation – safety, predictability, recognition and dignity; active listening, Nonviolent Communication, regulation, slowing down, boundaries and clarity. Practice in groups of three.
• From stress reduction to strategic negotiation – interests and positions, BATNA, power asymmetries, emotional triggers, cultural differences, trust and adaptive negotiation: connecting strategy, presence and conflict sensitivity.
• Multi-party negotiation – a simulation observed along interests, power, culture, stress and trauma, relationship and strategy; structured debrief and peer feedback.

Day 3 – Mediation and conflict transformation: from understanding to professional practice

• Mediation as a relational process – the mediator’s role and stance, neutrality and multi-partiality, clarifying the mandate, a safe process, trust, interests and needs, power asymmetries, cultural sensitivity and trauma-informed mediation.
• Deadlocks, escalation and difficult situations – dealing with deadlock, attacks, blame, withdrawal, silence, strong emotions, power games and cultural misunderstandings. Micro-simulations on reframing, slowing down and restoring the capacity for dialogue.
• Multi-stakeholder conflict simulation – a complex case with actors from business, administration, civil society and the local community, integrating systems analysis, culture, power, trauma, communication, negotiation and mediation.
• Integration and transfer – a personal conflict and leadership action plan: What do I see differently now? What happens to me under pressure? What will I do differently in my work? Peer feedback and closing.

Three questions run through the course: What kind of human and societal system are we trying to strengthen? What is our role, direction and strategic choice within it? How do we organise collective action so that it learns, adapts and lasts?

• Day 1 – Strategic leadership: leadership purpose and the system under pressure · systems thinking, diagnosis and positioning · case analysis and strategic choice · direction under uncertainty.
• Day 2 – Strategic project management: from strategic diagnosis to project logic · governance and strategic project architecture · risk, monitoring, adaptation and simulation · action planning and transfer.

A learning pathway in four movements: grounding – seeing systems – acting strategically – holding dialogue.

• Day 1: leadership compass and conflict prevention · strategic systems thinking for conflict prevention · case lab: from system map to prevention strategy · reflective strategy and leadership integration.
• Day 2: trauma-informed dialogue and cultural humility · strategic negotiation and empowered decision-making · mediation simulation lab · action planning, monitoring and learning, and professional transfer.

The exercises work with a fictional scenario: a city preparing a large infrastructure project, with residents fearing displacement, civil society raising concerns about consultation, youth mobilising online, authorities worried about public order – and a fragile dialogue process.

Conflict analysis and conflict styles (Patfoort, Galtung, Lederach, Thomas-Kilmann); the non-violent approach – conflict as an opportunity for growth; trauma and recovery (Levine, van der Kolk, the Harvard Program in Refugee Trauma); dealing with the past at the level of society, and restorative justice.

• Meadows, D. H. (2008). Thinking in Systems: A Primer. · Senge, P. M. (1990). The Fifth Discipline.
• Heifetz, R. A. (1994). Leadership Without Easy Answers. · Uhl-Bien, M., Marion, R. and McKelvey, B. (2007). Complexity Leadership Theory.
• Ostrom, E. (1990). Governing the Commons. · North, D. C. (1990). Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance.
• Patton, M. Q. (2011). Developmental Evaluation. · Ramalingam, B. (2013). Aid on the Edge of Chaos.
• Lederach, J. P. (1997). Building Peace. · Galtung, J. (1969). Violence, Peace, and Peace Research.
• Fisher, R. and Ury, W. (1981). Getting to Yes. · Rosenberg, M. B. (2003). Nonviolent Communication.
• Herman, J. L. (1992). Trauma and Recovery. · Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory. · van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score.
• Argyris, C. and Schön, D. A. (1978). Organizational Learning. · Edmondson, A. C. (1999). Psychological Safety and Learning Behavior in Work Teams.