Click links for course applications.

Contracting Methods and Practices Workshop

This workshop is a 24-hour workshop targeted for departments’ Contract Division analysts and line staff responsible for developing solicitation documents, statements of work, and evaluation instruments who have successfully completed the two-day Orientation to the Basic Principles of County Contracting Workshop and have between six months and two years of County services contract experience developing solicitation documents, statements of work, evaluation instruments, and contracts.

This workshop was designed by County subject matter experts from the Internal Services Department and County Counsel . In each 4-hour session, participants will have the opportunity to learn from and interact with both contract and legal experts responsible for County contracting processes.

Conflict Management & Negotiations

This 24-hour workshop is intended for managers, supervisors and professional/administrative staff who would benefit from learning conflict management and negotiation strategies.

This workshop proceeds from the premise that organizational conflict is inevitable and often leads to a breakdown in intra- and inter-team effectiveness.  The sessions concentrate on learning the techniques and gaining the skills needed to attain win-win outcomes.  Through scenario playing exercises, case studies, and living cases, participants learn how to understand and evaluate conflict situations, apply conflict management strategies appropriately, prepare for issue resolution negotiations, and select appropriate negotiations strategies and tactics.

Organizational Change through Appreciative Inquiry (AI)

This 24-hour workshop is intended for managers, supervisors and professional/administrative staff responsible for implementing organizational change in their work environment.

 This workshop provides a detailed understanding of Appreciative Inquiry, an increasingly praised approach for facilitating change in organizations, work groups, and stakeholder communities.  AI focuses on uncovering an organization’s “positive core”, using the findings to advance collaborative and strength-based actions. The sessions examine the essential elements of AI, detail the use of the 4-D cycle of AI, and demonstrate immediate applications.  Participants gain the skills needed to implement the AI process in their own work environment.

Designing & Managing Workplace Teams

This 24-hour workshop is intended for managers supervisors and professional/administrative staff who are members of a team or who supervise teams.

This workshop provides in-depth information on both the team development process and the inner workings of effective teams.  It answers the question, What allows some teams to achieve extraordinary results, while others seem to stumble or fail?  Using their workplace teams as exemplars, participants explore the four stages of team development and the leadership requirements of each, the design characteristics of highly productive teams, and the skills needed to facilitate the team process, including setting priorities and outcome measures. 

Creating & Maintaining A More Ethical Workplace

This 24-hour workshop is intended for administrative and professional staff and supervisors.

This workshop focuses on making the right choice under circumstances where there appears to be no clearly defined right or wrong answers.  At a personal level, participants (1) explore their individual framework(s) for deciding ethical issues, (2) determine how they apply organizational and personal values to their decision-making, and assess their skills and abilities to serve as an ethical leader.  Also, participants identify strategies for building an ethical culture within their work unit.  Extensive use is made of exercises, case studies, and diagnostic instruments.

Creating a Culturally Diverse Workplace

This 24-hour workshop is intended for managers, supervisors and professional/administrative staff who are responsible for creating and maintaining diversity in the workplace.

Serving a diverse multi-ethnic population of more than 9.7 million with people from about 140 countries, speaking approximately 86 different languages, Los Angeles County understands the importance of creating an organizational culture that promotes individual understanding of its employees and the public it serves. We must, therefore, insure an organizational culture that fosters individual understanding, and makes valuing diversity (or pluralism) a core organization value.

This workshop focuses on enhancing participants’ understanding of how to manage and develop an ethical, culturally pluralistic workforce to optimize the organization’s performance.

Topics covered include: gaining a self-awareness of one’s own cultural values, beliefs, attitudes, and how these may influence interpersonal behaviors and interactions; appreciating cultural diversity as a source of organizational effectiveness; and developing techniques for optimizing cultural pluralism in work units.

Ethical Decision Making in the Public Sector Workshop

This 24-hour workshop is intended for County Managers at the level of section head and above.

This workshop focuses on ethical decision making and conduct in public organizations.  It begins with a discussion of key ethical concepts, providing an understanding of the nature of ethical problems and how they emerge in the public sector.  Using case study examples, participants analyze typical ethical problems faced by public managers and formulate alternative courses of action. Additionally, the workshop examines characteristics of the organizational context in which ethical decisions are made that may encourage or impede action. The workshop explores case studies from participants’ County professional experience, using various instruments to help illuminate the ways participants typically think about ethical problems and the characteristics of the Los Angeles County organization relevant to ethical conduct.

Fraud Awareness & Prevention Workshop

This workshop is designed to educate managers and supervisors on how to detect symptoms of fraud, report suspected fraud, and prevent fraud in the workplace. This 1-day workshop is for all County managers and supervisor who are responsible for overseeing the work of County employees, procedures, and processes.

Cash and Cash Equivalents Fraud

Project Management Workshop

This workshop is intended for Managers and Analysts who are responsible for managing, leading or assisting in the coordination of projects.  This one-day workshop provides participants with an introduction to the fundamentals of project management with an emphasis on the skills and techniques required to plan and manage a project on time and within budget without compromising quality targets.