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The Next Generation of Mindfulness
Organizational Mindfulness is the next generation of modern mindfulness training. Rather than teaching mindfulness as a therapy for stress, it’s taught more broadly - as a process of neural training that produces an array of positive and predictable outcomes in human wellbeing, cognitive performance and emotional intelligence - which, in turn, can be applied to develop important individual and organizational capabilities.
From Stress to Performance Management
Stress management creates the conditions for performance improvement, but it’s only one outcome of mindfulness practice. The same spectrum of concepts and exercises can be applied to diminish the confusion of overload and overwhelm, the compulsion of digital distraction, the unconscious bias of discrimination, the automaticity of conflict and many more mental and emotional challenges. Mindfulness doesn’t have to be a hammer that treats every problem as a stress reduction nail - It’s a Swiss Army Knife with specific tools for specific purposes.
Enabling Peak Performance
Mindfulness has been incorporated into the daily training routines for the highest-performing individuals and teams on the planet, including the U.S. Olympics Team, the U.S. Navy Seals and Special Forces, the American Association of Neurosurgeons - and dozens of world-class athletes and professional sports teams. Organizational Mindfulness is designed to develop the mental and emotional skills that enable peak performance in the enterprise.
Embrace, Adapt and Extend
Organizational Mindfulness integrates the principles and practices of traditional mindfulness - the most current research in neuroscience, biology, psychology and medicine - b-school research in leadership and organizational development - and the lessons-learned and best practices from a decade of early-adopting corporate programs.
Course Objectives
You’ll learn the nature, science and practice of mindfulness, and how to apply its outcomes
to strengthen personal performance and important career capabilities.
Personal Wellbeing
Reduce chronic stress and anxiety
Reduce distraction and attention deficit
Performance Capabilities
Increase mental clarity and awareness
Increase focus, attention and concentration
Reduce compulsive or addictive behaviors
Increase reasoning and critical-thinking
Reduce rumination and depressive thinking
Increase motivation and on-task engagement
Cultivate a positive and growth mindset
Cultivate self-awareness and emotional control
Cultivate joy, happiness, care and kindness
Cultivate empathy and care for others
Cultivate positive relationships
Cultivate listening and communication skills
Cultivate mental and emotional strength
Become more organized and productive
Course Contents
IOSM Certificate courses blend live instruction with self-paced learning, daily practice,
unlimited group coaching and community support
Assessments
Pre-and-post course assessments
Live Classes
8 weekly instructor-led classes
Self-Study
8 weekly self-study lessons
Progress
8 weekly progress exam-lets
Daily Practice
8 weeks of daily email videos
Coaching
8 optional coaching sessions
Final Exam
A comprehensive final exam
Certification
Certificate and digital badge
Associate Access
IOSM resources, tools and events
Lifetime Access
IOSM Global Alumni Community
Anytime Help
Phone, chat, text and email support
CEUs
ICF recertification credits
Course Outline
You’ll learn the nature, science, and practice of mindfulness, and how to apply its outcomes to strengthen
your wellbeing and essential performance capabilities
Pre-course Assignment
Students are invited to log into the learning portal for a comprehensive course overview, a primer on mindfulness with curated links to important resources, and “getting started” information and links to IOSM content, coaching and support - and, before the first live class, we encourage you to complete the pre-course questionnaire and assessment.
Week 1. The Science of Mindfulness
Our 2 million year old brain is programmed for automaticity, negative bias, and instant reactivity to threat. The mind is filled with transient mental phenomena that keep us lost in thought. This class explores the mechanics of the nonconscious brain, and how the process of mindfulness can intentionally shape it.
You will learn:
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How the brain has evolved to understand its world, and operate automatically, below the level of consciousness
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How mindfulness can intervene, switch us out of autopilot, and give us a process for intentional and objective choice
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Practices for noticing, decentering, present awareness, and observation
Week 2: The Essential Attitudes & Exercises
Mindfulness is a series of mental and emotional skills that can be intentionally applied to produce specific and predictable outcome. This class explores a framework of practice that maps mental attitudes and exercises to specific outcomes, that strengthen specific individual and organizational capabilities.
You will learn:
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The science and process of neural training
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To match mindfulness practices to specific outcomes and applications
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Mindfulness practices for awareness, attention, emotional imprinting, and insight
Week 3. Resolving Stress, Anxiety & Burnout
The perfect storm of a multi-year global pandemic has tipped decades of increasing overload, overwhelm, exhaustion and burnout into a full-blown mental health crisis at work. This class explores strategies and practices for effectively managing acute and chronic stress, anxiety, exhaustion, and burnout.
You will learn:
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The evolutionary wiring and triggers that create and perpetuate acute and chronic stress
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How mindfulness is applied to interrupt and reframe worry, rumination, self-critical and depressive thinking
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Mindfulness practices that reframe and reduce stress, and increase mental and emotional resilience
Week 4. Increasing Focus & Attention Control
Information overload, workplace distraction, attention deficit and digital addiction are steadily eroding our attention spans and capabilities to do deep work. This class explores practices that physically strengthen brain networks associated with directing focus, sustaining concentration, and attention control.
You will learn:
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The sources and science of overload, overwhelm, distraction, digital addiction and attention deficit trait
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How to apply mindfulness to suppress distraction, and increase focus and attention control
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Mindfulness practices that strengthen attention in the moment, and build attentional networks in the brain
Week 5: Navigating Change and Uncertainty
Our brains are wired to fear change and loathe uncertainty - yet we live in a world and workplace that is undergoing volatile and rapid disruption. How can we reconcile our resistance, to welcome and embrace change? This class explores mindfulness as a catalyst for individual and organizational change.
You will learn:
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Why and how change triggers fear that destroys concentration and hijacks our emotional state
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How mindfulness helps us understand, accept, and consciously navigate through continual change
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Mindfulness attitudes and practices for embracing impermanence and uncertainty
Week 6. Cultivating Emotional Intelligence
Science has proven that self-awareness, empathy, compassion and social grace aren't immutable traits, they are trainable skills that can be intentionally developed through neural exercise. This class examines the visceral power of social and emotional intelligence, and how to strengthen these foundational inter-personal capabilities.
You will learn:
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The framework and competencies that comprise emotional intelligence
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How mindfulness strengthens each foundational quality, in turn
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Mindfulness practices for self-awareness, emotional regulation, empathy and compassion
Week 7: Communication and Collaboration
Chronic stress, anxiety, social and workplace conflict, remote and hybrid work, all have an impact on team dynamics, and can impair effective collaboration and teamwork. This class explores strategies and practices for greater positivity, creativity, and communications across the team.
You will learn:
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How to establish and work within an environment of psychological safety
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How to connect closely and cooperatively with others
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Mindfulness practices for acceptance, inclusion, and relationships
Week 8. Building Mental Strength, Grit & Resilience
The capabilities for managing stress, anxiety, distraction, conflict, exhaustion and burnout are critical professional competencies in a rapidly changing VUCA world. This class explores mindfulness practices that strengthen our mental and emotional skills, perseverance, and ability to bounce back.
You will learn:
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How to intentionally manage your attitudes and mindsets for positivity and personal growth
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How to create the energy, motivation and engagement for peak performance
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Mindful practices for self knowledge and purpose
“Transforming our culture ultimately means transforming what we have long recognized as our most precious resource: our people. The more that each of us fulfills our individual potential, the more we can tap into the massive collective potential that we have to change the world for the better.”
Charles Morris, Director of Global Learning and Development, Microsoft