From managing change to leading it.
Lead the Shift is a one-day experiential programme for senior leaders whose mandate is to drive innovation, inspire followership, and influence stakeholders across complex organisational boundaries. The programme is built on a single, well-documented insight: in modern organisations, positional authority is rarely sufficient for leading significant change. The leaders who succeed are those who have mastered influence by design, the deliberate, principled, and relationship-grounded practice of moving people toward a shared direction without relying on hierarchy or mandate.
Duration
1 Full Day
Primary Audience
Senior Leaders, Transformation Leads, Programme Directors
Delivery
In-person, cohort of up to 25
The programme integrates three domains of influence capability. The first is stakeholder intelligence: the ability to identify, map, and prioritise the stakeholders whose support, neutrality, or resistance will determine whether a change succeeds. The second is trust architecture: the ability to build and sustain credibility, reliability, and relationship depth across diverse stakeholder groups using a four-variable trust diagnostic and the REQ Assessment. The third is influence engineering: the application of six evidence-based principles of persuasion, a structured change adoption framework, and targeted communication strategies calibrated to each stakeholder's awareness and readiness.
The programme is completed by a live influencing simulation in which participants apply all three domains in a complex, multi-stakeholder scenario. This is not role-play. It is a structured simulation that produces real behavioural data and individual feedback, making the learning both rigorous and immediately applicable. Each participant closes with My Influence Blueprint: a 30-day action plan for their most pressing live influence challenge.
Every module produces a working output the participant applies to their live influence challenge. The simulation in Module 4 is not a practice exercise. It generates real data on how each participant influences under pressure.
Module 1: Stakeholder Intelligence
Participants identify and categorise their key stakeholders using a Stakeholder Mapping exercise, apply a Prioritisation Matrix to determine which stakeholders require the most sustained engagement, and use a Stakeholder Engagement Matrix to design tailored communication strategies for each. The module closes with a live mapping exercise in which participants work on their actual current stakeholder landscape.
Module 2: Trust Architecture and Relationship Effectiveness
Introduces the Trust Architecture Framework, a four-variable diagnostic examining credibility, reliability, relationship depth, and self-orientation, as the tool for assessing and improving current trust levels with key stakeholders. Participants complete the REQ (Relationship Effectiveness Quotient) Assessment to identify their relationship style defaults and gaps. The Identification Parade exercise develops the ability to read stakeholder relationship styles from observable behaviour.
Module 3: Influence Engineering
Covers four influence frameworks applied directly to each participant's stakeholder context: the Power and Influence Equation (mapping formal and informal power available to the leader); six evidence-based principles of persuasion applied with precision to specific stakeholder profiles; the Change Adoption Model (how new ideas and changes spread through groups, and how to work with different adopter profiles to build momentum); and structured communication strategies calibrated to stakeholder awareness and context.
Module 4: Live Influencing Simulation and My Influence Blueprint
Participants engage in a dynamic simulation in which they must influence a complex group of stakeholders with competing interests and varied readiness levels. The simulation is followed by a comprehensive debrief with individual feedback reports. The programme closes with each participant designing their My Influence Blueprint: a structured 30-day plan mapping their top stakeholders, the influence strategy for each, the trust-building actions required, and the first moves.
Lack of trust among key stakeholders: collaboration is formally agreed but substantively absent, and the reasons are rarely surfaced or addressed
Ineffective influence in large or complex change programmes, where leaders rely on mandate rather than persuasion and lose stakeholder buy-in before traction is achieved
Low adoption rates for new ideas and initiatives driven by insufficient attention to the stakeholders' awareness, readiness, and specific objections
Weak relationships at the senior level: technically credible leaders who have not developed the relationship architecture that influence requires
Leaders whose influence conversations are episodic, unplanned, and authority-dependent rather than systematic, relationship-grounded, and principle-informed
Leaders consistently influence without authority across functional and hierarchical boundaries, visible in their ability to build support for initiatives that require cross-functional ownership
Stakeholder adoption rates for change initiatives improve, with fewer resisters and more active champions among previously neutral or resistant groups
Trust Architecture scores improve with key stakeholders, measured through informal feedback, meeting participation rates, or stakeholder satisfaction indicators
Influence conversations are structured, principle-informed, and relationship-grounded rather than episodic, unplanned, or authority-dependent
These are the named outputs from the programme design document, not aspirational statements. Kirkpatrick Level 3 measurement is standard on every engagement.
Completed Stakeholder Map: A live map of the participant's current influence challenge, with stakeholders categorised by position, engagement level, and required movement. Becomes the primary reference tool for 30-day action.
Trust Architecture Diagnostic: Applied to three key stakeholders, identifying where credibility, reliability, relationship depth, or self-orientation are limiting trust, and specifying the precise actions required to improve each variable.
Personal REQ Profile: Each participant's Relationship Effectiveness Quotient, identifying their default relationship style and the adjustments required when engaging stakeholders with different style preferences.
My Influence Blueprint: A structured 30-day plan mapping the participant's top three stakeholders, the influence strategy for each, the trust-building actions required, the first moves, and the specific outcome they are working toward.
Every ProventusHR programme is designed bespoke to your organisation’s context. No two engagements are identical.
Explore Leadership Capability ›Lead the Shift is a one-day experiential programme that builds stakeholder intelligence, trust architecture, and influence engineering capability for senior leaders driving change and innovation across complex organisational boundaries. It combines stakeholder mapping, a trust diagnostic, a live influencing simulation, and REEL|Life cinematic reflection.
The Trust Architecture Framework examines four variables in every leader-stakeholder relationship: credibility (expertise and track record), reliability (commitment and follow-through consistency), relationship depth (genuine personal investment in the stakeholder), and self-orientation (the degree to which the leader's own agenda dominates the exchange). Leaders apply it to their live stakeholder relationships and identify specific trust-building actions.
The REQ (Relationship Effectiveness Quotient) Assessment identifies each participant's default relationship style and the gaps between their natural style and the preferences of their key stakeholders. It enables deliberate adjustments in how participants communicate, engage, and build rapport with stakeholders whose style differs from their own.
The simulation places participants in a complex multi-stakeholder scenario in which they must influence stakeholders with competing interests and varying readiness levels. It is real-time, structured, and followed by individual feedback reports, giving each participant precise data on how they apply their influence capability under pressure.
Senior leaders, programme directors, transformation leads, and senior managers who need to drive change, build coalitions, or influence across complex organisational boundaries. Particularly relevant for leaders whose agenda requires buy-in from stakeholders over whom they have no direct authority.
A completed stakeholder map, a Trust Architecture diagnostic for three key stakeholders, a personal REQ profile, a post-simulation individual feedback report, and a My Influence Blueprint with specific 30-day actions for their most pressing influence challenge.
Lead the Shift is ProventusHR's programme on stakeholder intelligence, trust architecture, and influence engineering for senior leaders driving change. It builds the specific capabilities needed to lead transformation across complex organisational boundaries - where authority is limited but influence must be total.
Every engagement begins with a diagnostic conversation. Tell us the leadership challenge and we will design from there.
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