Intervention Descriptions

Thanks for exploring the Talaria website. The four documents on this page, together, provide a description of the two primary Talaria Intercultural Learning & Performance interventions:

1. The Talaria Intercultural Interaction Skills (TIIS) Workshop

2. The Talaria Facilitation Method (TFM) – TFM is the foundation of the TIIS Workshop’s Learning and Performance process. Talaria also offers a TFM Develop-the-Facilitator Workshop.

1. INTRODUCTION TO TALARIA INTERVENTIONS

This document outlines the background and rationale for Talaria’s approach. Contents include the following topics:

  • How do you respond to cultural difference?
  • Mind the gap.
  • What’s happening these days?
  • We need to see for miles and miles and…………
  • The vision
  • The workplace performance model
  • Common truism: It isn’t so much what you communicate as how you communicate it.
  • Reinart waxes eloquent (well, sort of) on the university model vs. the performance-based approach
  • Instruction manual for Love
  • Sweep out the eggshells!
  • What does inclusion include?
  • What’s the meaning of all this?

Introduction to Talaria Interrventions

2. TIIS WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION

The Talaria Intercultural Interaction Skills (TIIS) Workshop is a capacity-building and job-based performance improvement program. Participants accelerate behavioral intercultural competence through development of a specific and concrete set of culture-general and universally applicable interaction skills. These skills comprise the Talaria Intercultural Interaction Skills (TIIS) model, which is the foundation of the workshop. Skill application in the workplace leads to effective management of cultural differences within any multicultural context.

TIIS-based workshops include Multicultural Teams, Global Leadership, Global Diversity and Inclusion, and Working with Specific Cultures. TIIS-based individual coaching is also available.

Click below for a detailed description of the TIIS Workshop.

TIIS Workshop

3. TALARIA FACILITATION METHOD (TFM)

The Talaria Facilitation Method (TFM) is used to facilitate and structure the discussion phase of experiential learning activities toward workplace performance improvement. Applying the critical adult learning principles of experiential and problem-solving learning, it is a method that can be used with participant groups for any kind of human interaction skill development, including intercultural competence development.

TFM is a tool that I have used for many years in training trainers to effectively use the experiential and problem-solving approach. It is especially powerful when used by trainers and with participant audiences from hierarchical, indirect and risk-averse cultures. The elements comprising TFM systematically provide conditions whereby typical participants from hierarchical, indirect and risk-averse cultures learn how to safely and comfortably participate in an active, independent and assertive mode. A by-product of participating in the method is overall problem-solving skill enhancement. The following is a comment from Barbara Baker, former faculty member at the School for International Training regarding  TFM:

I see this product as being very useful to the general field of intercultural training. It strikes me as a simple, concrete tool that can be readily explained and utilized, and instrumental in effecting profound changes in training and learning styles…it provides a structured, non-threatening means to encourage and accept various opinions, to think about the consequences of different choices, and to experience creative problem-solving…..I see another application of the method with adolescent and young adult groups to encourage the development of responsible decision making.  

Click below for a description.

Talaria Facilitation Method

4. A GLIMPSE INTO THE FUTURE

The year is 2020. Suzanne, a journalist and intercultural organization expeditionary, has been invited to visit Apollo Productions, a large global organization reputed to have attained a high level of intercultural competence. Five years ago, they underwent a concerted effort to accelerate their individual and collective intercultural competence development. Suzanne is at Apollo’s offices for the day. Marian, Director of the Global Learning and Performance Group, is hosting Suzanne. Suzanne’s goal is to learn all she can about how they were able to accelerate their intercultural competence level. In particular, she wants to learn more about a key intervention she has heard about. This intervention, the Talaria Intercultural Interaction Skills (TIIS) Workshop was one of the key strategy elements five years ago and remains the foundation of their global learning and performance approach.

Click below for the complete glimpse.

Glimpse Into the Future

Thanks again. Proceed to the site’s Readings page for more content supporting Talaria’s approach.

Patrick Burns, Ed.D.