Team Thinking Asia

Thanks again to the extended leadership team from Grand Royal Group International in Myanmar for a day of reflection and practice on Friday.

We called the workshop Leading with Influence.

Practical, not theoretical, working on real challenges and future ideas.

Early in the day I asked: “If the data was enough, would every new idea get approved by the CEO?” and of course, the group shook their heads.

At a senior level, decisions aren’t just about logic. They’re about risk, timing, reputation, competing priorities, trust and relationships. You can be right with the data and still get a no.

So we worked only on real situations. Lots of writing, plenty of thinking and hopefully, a fair bit of challenge too.

We explored:

- a conversation they’ve been avoiding
- a relationship that needs strengthening
- an initiative that needs buy-in from above

No case studies or hypothetical situations, just reflection, discussion and practice in pairs, threes and small groups.

The groups presented their new ideas and others challenged their thinking. What would the CEO or stakeholder question? What could go wrong? Who might resist it and why?

We finished with four personal commitments and set them up with accountability partners who’ll check in with them in 3 weeks time.

- one conversation I’ll have is…
- one relationship that I’ll strength is…
- one behaviour I’ll improve is…
- one habit I’ll stop is…

Training has to be challenging. It’s easy to design training that makes people smile (I think we had smiles during the day too!), but reality based design is harder, but that’s what senior leaders want. Not theories.

If you’re running programmes at a senior level, think about the work that they do and design around that with real actions to take away.

Thanks to Mi Mi Thet, Chief People Officer for inviting us back again to work with the group.

Only a few places left on next week’s Coaching for Managers workshop in Yangon.

25th February at Inya Lake Hotel and run by Ian Davies, one of our Directors and accredited Coach.

A highly practical day where Ian will be helping everyone explore how to have more effective coaching conversations. Not too much theory, just useful skills to implement straight away

Message us if you’d like to join or use the link in the chat to book.

If there is one thing we’re encouraging managers and leaders to do in 2026…it’s to have more informal conversations with their team, to find out what makes them ‘tick’.

We’re working with individuals, not generic robots. We’ve all got different motivators, energy levels, behavioural preferences, levels of introversion and extroversion.

If you want to build trust and understanding, so you can manage people in a way that works a little bit more for them, start speaking.

Ask a few questions over coffee:

“When do you feel most energised and proud in your work here?”

“What tends to drain your energy or motivation at work?

“How do you prefer to receive feedback or important information?”

“What helps you do your best thinking and decision-making?”

“What’s one thing I could do differently as a manager that would help you stay motivated and engaged?” (Yes, this questions required you to be open to some feedback and make some changes)

The key is to make people feel safe to contribute. If asking these types of question, we suggest always starting by saying that you want to get to know the person better, so that you can help them be more successful and manage them in the right way.

We would also suggest showing some vulnerability and be open, sharing your own answers to the questions. Remember, it’s not an interview!

So have a go. Grab some face to face time, in relaxed setting and start creating a clearer picture of the type of humans you work with.