Example Topics

Duration: 60-90 minutes

Abstract:

We have our names on the door, the vacation home, and the envy of our peers. Our net worth may be well into the millions. Our spouse is visible and vibrant, and our do-it-all kids are headed for big things. Outwardly, we seem to have it all, but behind the scenes …

We spin in an endless cycle of obligations, lacking life purpose or peace. We feel driven to amass more wealth … because there is never enough. Our spouse and kids resent us for putting career ahead of family. We long for a spiritual connection, but don’t know where or how to begin. We have few friends or mentors who will tell us the truth. Our lives may look good on the outside, but inside we’re beginning to sense: I’m stuck … This isn’t working.

Jim outlines the “stages of stuckness” and presents the common symptoms, patterns and stories of leaders and spouses who are navigating challenging life transitions. He then paints the path out of the stuckness, built upon a commitment of realizing core-level life transformation.

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Duration: 60-90 minutes

Abstract:

“Everyone views me as successful, but my passion for life is quite low. I feel slow and sluggish. I’m going through the motions in my work and in my relationships. I don’t seem to have any energy. If I’m so successful (powerful, wealthy, significant, in control), why do I feel so empty? How do I feel good again?”

Conventional routes to success often leave high-achieving people drained, disillusioned, and cut off from loved ones – even if they achieve their “goals” – because the conventional road bypasses the inner journey. True, sustainable aliveness, grounded in an inner peace, can only be achieved by self-exploration, a commitment to total truth, and the intention to reestablish the precious flow of life through us.

This session presents the common ways energy, passion, and joy get drained out of our lives, how to get them back, and how to amplify the flow of life into us, through us, and out to others.

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Duration: Full Day

Abstract:

The morning session will focus on how to lead with clarity and courage, especially during times of crisis. Jim will share the stories and concepts that form the foundation of his recent book on life transition Facing Pain—Embracing Love: The Map to Authentic Living.

After this entertaining and eye-opening plenary session, members will self-select into forum-like groups for experiential, high-impact sharing about their lives. To deepen connectivity within the chapter, members will form groups with other members whom they do not know well.

The afternoon session is a blend of life-sharing, experiential exercises, culminating in small-group discussions on the major issues we face as leaders today. These issues include (1) connection with our sense of calling or destiny, (2) connection with the key people in our lives, and (3) connection with ourselves.

The day will offer varying tones, from serious self-discovery and group-level authenticity, to playfulness and creativity. Look for a high level of participation and interaction rather than passive “learning from an expert.” Prepare to be stretched.

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Duration: 45-60 minutes

Abstract:

Joyful, peaceful, serene, transparent, interdependent, fully present, timeless, aware … feeling loved, lovable, and loving.

Jim will guide you on the journey to this Holy Grail state of conscious and full-out loving. He’ll share his own story and draw from the stories of the thousands of YPOers he has guided at forum retreats and in transition seminars.

The afternoon session is a blend of life-sharing, experiential exercises, culminating in small-group discussions on the major issues we face as leaders today. These issues include (1) connection with our sense of calling or destiny, (2) connection with the key people in our lives, and (3) connection with ourselves.

Drawing from his recent book, Facing Pain—Embracing Love: The Map to Authentic Living, Jim will present the difficult trade-offs we face as we strive for both business success and intimate connection. These include competition vs. compassion, guardedness vs. forgiveness, and control vs. surrender.

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Duration: 60-90 minutes

Abstract:

The majority of YPOers and WPOers we’ve spoken with and coached since September 2008 are carrying a blend of anxiety, embarrassment, resentment, and paralysis related to the world economic crisis and its impact on their businesses, families, and personal lives.

One WPOer describes his blur of emotions as “an annoying, low-grade hum that’s always present in my head.” These unexpressed emotions drain energy, distort thinking, and blunt the innovation and decisiveness required to lead during troubled times.

These are not “head” issues. They are issues of the heart, psyche, and spirit. And from our experience at forum retreats and chapter events since September 2008, most YPOers and WPOers are either inexperienced or clueless on how to navigate their emotional paralysis, and lead with courage and clarity. They are scared and lost. Most have never been here before. They need help and don’t know where to start. This session offers specific, immediately usable tools for stilling the inner turbulence and reclaiming lost energy. In addition, the session will address:

This session offers specific, immediately usable tools for stilling the inner turbulence and reclaiming lost energy. In addition, the session will address:

• How to go into and through your own fears to a place of clarity
• How to acknowledge, grieve, accept, and move on from the losses (financial, dreams, relationships) you have incurred or will incur as part of the worldwide economic uncertainty
• How to face and release the relentless inner voices saying “I should have known,” or “Why didn’t I …” that drain energy, inhibit relationships, and reduce productivity
• How to be present for, listen to, and support others (family members, work associates, forum mates) who are struggling with their own emotional turmoil
• How to enlist support for yourself (guides, coaches, advisors, mentors)
• How to lead with integrity, calmness, and courage, when all around you are scared, blaming, or numb
• How to forgive yourself and others, learn from and release the past, and focus with confidence on your go-forward plan

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Duration: Full Day

Abstract:

In the more than 200 YPO and WPO forum retreats Jim has led, the following themes
dominate:

• What do these terms mean: purpose, mission, vision, fulfillment, calling, genius?
• How do I make a difference in the world, outside of the business arena?
• How do I move from disillusionment to destiny; from achievement to stewardship; from success to significance?
• What legacies, beyond wealth, do I want to leave my children and my grandchildren?
• I know what it’s like to be “in the zone.” How do I get this feeling back?
• What is blocking me from stepping into my destiny, and how do I get through these blocks?
• When all is said and done, what is my life for?

You have always been an achiever. Your philosophy of “short-term pain for long-term gain” has paid off. Your accomplishments have met or exceeded those you contemplated some 20-odd years ago when you launched your work life. It’s been a great ride and you feel you’ve had an impact. You’re pleased with most of the elements in your life, and you appreciate your tremendous good fortune.

But you still have energy. Regardless of chronological age, you’re young. Your peak is still in front of you. The relentless, burning “need to achieve” has you searching for ways to have an even greater impact. With your life at its midpoint, it’s a natural time to think about the past and plan the future. You may or may not be at a key “transition point,” such as a career change, the end of your marriage, or your youngest child leaving home, but you can’t stop wondering if “more of the same” will continue to deliver contentment and fulfillment in your life. By any measure you’ve been successful. But in your heart, mind, and soul, you ponder a greater calling, a sense of destiny beyond your current success.

We’ll explore these issues and yearnings in a confidential, one-day forum-like experience with your YPO peers. We’ll share, explore, discuss, and learn about the opportunities and issues surrounding Life’s Second Half.

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Duration: Full Day

Abstract:

This customized training is open to YPOers and WPOers who wish to enhance their skills in building small-group interaction and authenticity. “Small groups” includes your forum, your executive team, and your immediate family

This workshop blends forum best practices with Jim’s extensive work with YPOer executive teams. The workshop is 40% teaching and 60% experiential. You’ll have the opportunity to practice on “live” issues in your business or personal life.

The workshop will cover the following areas:

• Inspirational leadership: encouraging and directing others to execute on plans and initiatives.
• Team collaboration: sharing challenges, and brainstorming approaches.
• Taking responsibility for your life: noticing when you drift into debilitating drama; tools for shifting back into a mature leadership position; specific tools for shifting out of blaming and complaining, or rescuing and enabling.
• Surfacing and addressing difficult topics and conflicts. This is a foundational skill for all small-group and work-team environments. It is fundamental to authentic relationships. Participants will be coached in how to deal cleanly and directly with any issues that drain energy from the team or mire the organization or individuals in the past. In particular we’ll focus on how to initiate and conduct difficult conversations.
• Making clean agreements and repairing broken agreements.
• Offering and receiving feedback, criticism, advice. The primary take-home skill is the receiving of all forms of feedback with curiosity vs. defensiveness.
• Appreciating and inspiring team members. Most work teams (and forums) do an excellent job of criticizing and challenging, and a poor job of appreciating and celebrating. When a goal is reached, they briefly acknowledge the accomplishment and then they set the bar higher. The result: a demoralized team where “nothing is ever good enough.” Appreciation, gratitude, and fun are a way of life for inspiring leaders.

This full-day training interweaves all elements of Jim’s Authentic Relationships model, tailored specifically to YPOers’ relationships (forum, business, family).

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Duration: 1-3 days

Abstract:

Jim has led over 20 YPO and WPO chapter-level Presidents’ Retreats. These highly customized retreats have become increasingly more popular—and needed— with the large transition of YPOers into WPO through 2012.

Common Goals:

• A memorable experience
• Forum-level intimacy at the chapter level
• Stretch the participants (mentally, physically, emotionally, interpersonally) outside of their comfort zones
• Immediate take-home value from either education sessions or interactions with other members
• Get to know members outside your own forum, in depth
• Commitments to life change
• Go-forward commitments to the chapter (e.g., members “step up” to chapter leadership roles)

Possible Themes:

• Lasting Connections
• Get Connected!
• Courageous Connections
• Authentic Relationships
• Commitments to life change
• Go-forward commitments to the chapter (e.g., members “step up” to chapter leadership roles)
• The Whole-Life Audit; an MRI of your entire life
• Finding Meaning
• What’s Next?
• Enduring Excellence (as a chapter)
• Taking Charge of My Life
• Navigating Transitions
• The Stages of Life
• Celebrate!
• Leaving a Legacy
• Finishing Well (possible WPOer theme)

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Duration: 2-4 days

Abstract:

Navigating Transitions: Reclaiming Your Life  is a multi-day, personal-life audit for individuals and couples who seek transformation and renewal in their vocation, marriage, family, sense of life purpose, friendships, spirituality, and identity. Structured as a blend of experiential, life-sharing, issue-exploring exercises, this retreat gives participants deeper personal awareness and a no-nonsense, personal transition blueprint for transforming their lives from disillusionment to discovery to destiny.

YPO regions, chapters, and forums often contract with OnCourse International to organize and lead customized transition seminars for their groups. While four days is the recommended duration, shorter versions are possible.

Target Participants

• Yearn for a sense of purpose, passion, mission, adventure, fulfillment, meaning, destiny, connection
• Are willing to address and share both life background and difficult life-transition issues
• Are serious about developing a transition blueprint and “game plan” for their lives
• Many (not all) member participants have exited, are about to exit, or are considering an exit from their businesses

Format

• The seminar is a blend of plenary sessions (20%), small-group breakouts (60%), and individual planning time (20%)
• Significant take-home value comes from facilitated small-group interaction; ongoing friendships or accountability relationships often emerge from the small-group dynamics
• Attending spouses and guests are active participants in the entire seminar, addressing their own transition issues and developing their own transition blueprint

Common Issues among Transition Seminar Participants

All participants desire deeper personal awareness and a sense of meaning and passion in their lives. Small-group participants yearn for deeper community. In addition, participants face some combination of the following issues:

• I have no idea what is next in my life; I have only a vague sense of life purpose, mission, destiny, or passion
• My career is my identity
• I always have to be “on”
• My life is being run on a treadmill
• My marriage needs revitalization
• I desire deeper relationships with people who won’t judge me
• I need friends who will be truthful
• I need to make peace with my past
• I would like to explore the spiritual dimension
• I desire greater intimacy with my spouse, family, and friends
• I long to experience grace and joy

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