Event Profile

Administrative Professional Certificate Level 2: All Four Days

Date(s):
March 19 — 22, 2019
Venue:
Hampton Inn & Suites Boise/Downtown
Description:

Note:

Online registration is currently closed, but spaces are still available. If you would like to attend this event, please call NWPPA at 360-254-0109, and our staff will be happy to help you.

Who Should Attend:

Administrative assistants, executive assistants, or employees in administrative or service-oriented roles.

Course Overview:

This is a four-day series of classes which provides utility-specific information directed toward administrative assistants and executive secretaries who want to become more effective in managing their tasks and in communicating with others. By registering for all four classes, you will receive a discount off the total registration fee.

Day 1: Critical-Thinking and Decision-Making Skills

This course is designed to help individuals develop and build critical-thinking, decision-making, and problem-solving skills. Participants will learn about various methods for assessing and resolving problems, and for understanding the role of inferences and assumptions. The class is intended to serve as a means for building confidence in how to ask the right questions and in overcoming the stress that sometimes accompanies making decisions. Participants will gain an understanding of how to be proactive, be more confident, decrease stress, and strengthen one’s ability to influence and persuade others. Additional topics to be covered include:

  • How to ask questions to get the answers you need
  • How to apply creative problem-solving techniques
  • How to build greater professional recognition through enhanced skills

Day 2: Positive Assertiveness

This course reiterates that there is a right way and a wrong way to state your case in a forthright manner. The answer is not aggression or passivity; it is positive assertiveness. This class focuses on how to be assertive by sending the right signals and encouraging the right responses. The session provides insight into how individuals can handle themselves without appearing either too shy or too pushy. Participants will gain insight in how to avoid certain pitfalls that get in the way of positive communication and how to operate from a more confident place. How to get their jobs done in a more effective manner through the careful crafting of a positive image will be stressed. Additional topics to be covered include:

  • Mistaken assumptions versus legitimate rights
  • Defining assertiveness: what it is and what it is not
  • Communication with power
  • Understanding gender differences in communication
  • Assertiveness techniques

Day 3: Organizational Skills; Time and Stress Management

Few would argue that life and work are hard enough without the complications surrounding self-defeating emotions, behaviors, and habits. The multiple forces that bear down on us every day can eventually take their toll; no wonder people often feel anxious, resentful, taken advantage of, and even trapped. This class is intended to help participants understand how to stay focused on their goals—whether work or personal—while ups and downs occur around them. Participants will gain insight into developing personal flexibility to deal with uncertainty and to find meaning in what they are doing. This course will focus on the important personal skill of self-control and self-determination. Participants will learn to recognize their personal stressors and to deal with stress. Over the course of the day, the class will learn how to make better choices at work and elsewhere, how to practice self-discipline, and how to prioritize. In addition, others issues to be covered include:

  • What stress is and when it occurs
  • The toll stress takes on physical and mental health
  • Identifying vulnerability to stress
  • Developing skills to respond to stressors, including organizational and time management skills such as establishing goals, analyzing how time is spent, controlling interruptions, improving meetings, and conquering procrastination

Day 4: Personal Strategies for Navigating Change

In today’s workplace, employees are experiencing tremendous changes in organizational strategies, in the way work gets done, and in the way people work together. These changes present new demands and challenges for every individual in the organization. Without personal strategies for dealing productively with change, employees can become overwhelmed and communication can break down. This module provides an effective approach to navigating change that people in any organization can use. Participants will explore skills that help them deal with change both individually and interpersonally, and they will develop strategies to deal effectively with a change that’s difficult for them. Other topics covered include:

  • Understanding the challenges of the changes being experienced at work
  • Describing common responses to change
  • Examining and learning from their behavior during changes faced in the past
  • Assessing and understanding the reasons for change
  • Working effectively and influencing others who resist change
  • Taking positive actions to make change successful, both individually and with others

Course Instructor:

Debra Ballard, Continuum Education + Training

Course Schedule:

Registration will begin at 8 a.m. on the first day, and the classes will run from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. each day. Lunch, along with morning and afternoon breaks, will be provided every day.

Course Location & Hotel Information:

Hampton Inn & Suites
495 S. Capitol Boulevard
Boise, ID 83702
(208) 331-1900

Room rate: $134 for a single/double

Please book your room as soon as possible, but no later than February 25, 2019, to secure this rate. Mention that you are coming in with the NWPPA group when booking your reservation, or book online using this booking link to receive the discounted rate.

Complimentary shuttle service is available to and from the Boise Airport beginning at 4:15 a.m. until the last flight of the evening. Please contact the front desk for details or for pick up.

Course Fees:

Utility Member Early Bird (ends 2/16/2019): $1,440
Utility Member Standard: $1,515

Associate Member Early Bird (ends 2/16/2019): $2,160
Associate Member Standard: $2,235

Non-member Early Bird (ends 2/16/2019): $4,320
Non-member Standard: $4,395

Cancellation Policy:

Cancellations are accepted, with full refund, if request is made at least 30 days prior to the course. Within 30 days, fees are as follows: 15-29 days, $100; 1-14 days or "no show," 100 percent of registration fee. When possible, please send a substitute instead of canceling. NWPPA does not charge a fee for substitutions.

Continuing Hours:

This course qualifies for 24 continuing hours. Certificates are issued upon full completion of the course.

For More Information:

To find out more about this event, or to learn about other events, view the Training and Event Catalog.