VDC services
Leadership development for the problem you actually have
A leader stepping into a bigger role, or a senior team that keeps circling the same argument. The work starts from the situation in front of you rather than from a programme that already exists.
Book a scoping callServices at a glance
Four services, and who each one is for
Each is shaped around the situation rather than delivered from a shelf. Prices exclude GST.
Executive coaching
For a senior leader whose role has grown faster than the way they lead. Most engagements start after a step up or a round of feedback.
What it involvesLeadership development programs
For an employer building capability across a group, rather than sending one person on a course.
What it involvesLeadership communication and executive presence
For leaders who know what to say and lose access to it in the room where it counts.
What it involvesLeadership team facilitation
For a leadership team whose meetings cost more than they settle.
What it involvesFormat, price and first step
Each service in detail
Executive coaching
For a senior leader the organisation wants to invest in, usually after a step up or a round of 360 feedback. Six months of fortnightly work on how they lead when the pressure is real, with the sponsor brought in at three agreed points so nobody is guessing.
- Format
- Twelve fortnightly sessions of ninety minutes over six months
- Included
- A 360 or Leadership Circle Profile, plus three conversations with the sponsor
- Price
- $9,000 + GST, assessment at cost
- First step
- Forty-five minutes with the leader, then fifteen with the sponsor
Leadership development programs
For an employer putting a group through together. The Capacity Program takes a cohort of eight to ten senior individual contributors or new managers, and measures at the start and the end so the sponsor has something to look at afterwards.
- Format
- Four live sessions over eight weeks, for eight to ten people from one organisation
- Measure
- A validated psychosocial safety instrument, reported to the sponsor
- Price
- $12,000 to $18,000 + GST per cohort
- First step
- A free sample session with the team, then a proposal
Leadership communication and executive presence
For leaders who know what to say and cannot reach it in the room. The work covers influencing people you have no authority over, carrying a difficult message, and speaking to a board. It usually runs inside a coaching engagement or a facilitated day rather than on its own.
- Format
- Built into a coaching engagement, or run for a group as a standalone session
- Focus
- Influence without authority, difficult messages, board and executive audiences
- Price
- Set on the outline, once the scope is clear
- First step
- A scoping call, then a one-page outline within 24 hours
Leadership team facilitation
For a leadership team of six to fourteen whose meetings cost more than they settle. A day on how the group handles disagreement and reaches a decision, then a follow-up six weeks later to see which practices held.
- Format
- One day in person, plus a ninety-minute online follow-up at six weeks
- Bought by
- Usually HR or L&D, sometimes the team's own leader
- Price
- From $5,000 + GST per day, settled on the outline
- First step
- A scoping call, then a one-page outline within 24 hours
For a single leader paying their own way, there is also Ground Up, a ten-week online group for senior leaders, open to individuals and to employers funding one place. See Ground Up.
A tailored process
How an organisational engagement begins
The design starts from the business problem, not from a workshop format that already exists.
Scope the need
What the challenge is, who it involves, and what would count as progress. Constraints and budget get named here rather than three meetings later.
Agree the approach
A combination of facilitation, development work and coaching, sized to the brief and written onto a single page you can forward to whoever signs.
Review what changed
Progress gets reviewed against what was agreed at the start, rather than against how many people attended.
What sits underneath
Six approaches, used when the situation calls for them
Rudi's work draws on adult development, adaptive leadership, systems psychodynamics and systemic constellations, somatic approaches, leadership communication and the Thinking Environment. Which one shows up depends on what is in the room. None is sold as a package, and none comes with a guaranteed result.
The Thinking Environment is Nancy Kline's work, set out in her book Time to Think. The work above draws on it and is not an accredited program. Systemic constellations are used to explore a pattern, never as a diagnostic test.
Rudi holds an ICF Professional Certified Coach credential, an INSEAD Executive Master in Change, Certified Integral Coach through New Ventures West, and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner. More about Rudi and the approach.
Before we speak
Questions that come up first
Can we commission something tailored rather than a standard course?
That is the normal case. The starting point is a conversation about the priorities, who would take part and what the environment is like. Scope and format get proposed after that, for the particular assignment.
Do you work with individuals, or only organisations?
Both. Executive coaching runs for individual leaders and for employers sponsoring one. Development programs, communication work and team facilitation are bought by organisations.
Can the work be delivered online?
Mostly. Coaching runs well online and the Capacity Program is built for it, which is how most of the international work runs. A facilitated day is better in person, because a lot of what the day works with is what happens in the room, though it travels when the brief warrants it.
What happens in the first conversation?
Forty-five minutes on the challenge, who it involves and what you want to be different. If it is the wrong kind of help you will hear that on the call, along with a pointer somewhere better. If it is a fit, a one-page outline follows within a day.
An honest limit
Where a single practitioner stops being the right buy
Nobody gets substituted in once the contract is signed and no account manager sits between the sponsor and the work. The trade is that a rollout to two hundred managers is beyond what one person can deliver. When that is the brief, you will get pointed to a firm built for it rather than sold something that quietly gets subcontracted.
Next step
Start with the leadership problem
A scoping call takes forty-five minutes and costs nothing. If you would rather write first, a few lines about the leader or the team and what has already been tried is plenty.