Line managers and directors
You manage people, performance, and pressure. This workshop helps you address interpersonal friction, difficult feedback, and misalignment before issues harden into formal complaints or cultural drag.
Public Workshop • 18 March 2026
Conflict Resolution Fundamentals
Stop managing the symptoms. Start resolving the system.
A one-day intensive workshop designed to equip line managers, HR professionals, and emerging leaders with the trauma-informed frameworks required to de-escalate tension and architect psychological safety in the workplace.
Built for
Managers, HR professionals, and leaders carrying people complexity.
Outcome
Practical scripts and frameworks for safer, more productive conflict conversations.
Format
One-day intensive with live facilitation, examples, and applied tools.
Quick facts
Date
Wednesday, 18 March 2026
Time
9:00 AM - 4:30 PM (AEST)
Location
Sydney CBD (venue details provided upon registration)
Investment
$895 + GST
What this day is designed to do
Help people leaders move from avoidance and policy-dependence toward calm, structured, trauma-informed conflict conversations that actually change behaviour.
The problem we are solving
The cost of avoiding the difficult conversation.
"The space between first tension and formal grievance is where culture is either protected or quietly damaged."
In every organisation, there is a gap between the moment a conflict begins and the moment it becomes a formal grievance. That gap is where culture is either built or broken. It is where trust is either strengthened through wise intervention or depleted through avoidance, mixed messages, and delayed action.
Most managers are promoted because they are technically capable, reliable, and high performing. Very few are promoted because they have learned how to navigate complex human emotion under pressure. So when conflict appears in the form of a defensive team member, a passive-aggressive peer, or a toxic team dynamic, the default response is often delay. We hope it settles. We move around it. We rely on policy to do the relational work that leadership itself has not yet done.
But avoidance is not neutral. It acts like a tax on performance. Unresolved conflict drains attention, damages confidence, increases attrition, and eventually hardens into highly formal, time-consuming complaints. By the time many organisations seek help, the cost is already visible in morale, productivity, and risk.
This workshop is designed to close that gap. It is not about teaching people how to dominate a conversation or win an argument. It is about learning how to create enough safety for difficult truths to be spoken without destroying the working relationship. That is the shift from symptom management to system resolution.
Curriculum
A trauma-informed approach to conflict capability.
This is not a theoretical lecture. It is a practical, evidence-based deep dive into the mechanics of human conflict, informed by Shiv Martin's two decades of live practice in high-stakes public sector and corporate matters.
01
Module 1: The architecture of conflict
The workshop begins by dismantling the common myths that keep workplace conflict stuck. Participants learn how to distinguish between a surface-level disagreement and a deeper systems fracture. Shiv explores what happens to the brain in fight-or-flight mode, why logic alone fails in escalated environments, and how leaders can diagnose the real issue before intervening too quickly. This module gives participants language for reading the room, identifying hidden pressure points, and understanding why the same pattern keeps repeating across teams.
Key takeaway
The ability to diagnose the root cause of a dispute before intervening.
02
Module 2: Architecting psychological safety
Once the dynamics are visible, the next task is creating a safe enough container for truth to be spoken. This is where many managers either become overly passive or attempt to impose authority too quickly. Shiv teaches the practical steps for shaping the physical environment, setting strong boundaries, framing the purpose of the conversation, and using trauma-informed language that lowers defensiveness rather than amplifying it. Participants leave with scripts, prompts, and a repeatable preparation process they can use in real workplace conversations.
Key takeaway
A framework for initiating high-stakes conversations without triggering defensive posturing.
03
Module 3: Expert facilitation in practice
This module moves from preparation into active facilitation. Participants learn how to guide entrenched parties toward shared reality without collapsing into blame, over-accommodating one side, or losing control of the room. Shiv demonstrates how to listen for underlying needs, reframe hostile statements into useful data, and regulate your own emotional response when the tension rises. The emphasis is practical: what to say, when to pause, how to name what is happening, and how to keep the conversation moving toward traction.
Key takeaway
Practical tools to facilitate agreement and rebuild trust between fractured colleagues.
04
Module 4: Sustainable agreements and boundaries
A constructive conversation is only valuable if behaviour changes afterwards. The final module focuses on how to convert insight into accountability. Participants learn how to draft clear agreements, set review points, define boundaries, and recognise when a matter has outgrown informal resolution and should be escalated to mediation, investigation, or formal HR support. Shiv shows how to protect both fairness and momentum so participants can close a dispute with confidence rather than false optimism.
Key takeaway
The ability to close a dispute and monitor ongoing compliance.
What you will walk away with
A practical framework for reading what is really happening underneath a conflict.
Trauma-informed language for opening difficult conversations with more safety and less defensiveness.
Facilitation tools for keeping emotionally charged conversations productive and bounded.
Decision rules for knowing when to resolve informally and when to escalate.
Audience
Is this workshop right for you?
This program is designed for professionals responsible for team performance, cultural health, and the quality of working relationships under pressure.
HR and P&C professionals
You are often the first point of contact when a workplace issue surfaces. The program strengthens your capability to support managers, triage complexity, and de-escalate complaints with a trauma-informed lens.
Emerging leaders
You are stepping into greater responsibility and want a foundation in conflict competence that will serve you across teams, projects, and stakeholder relationships for years to come.
Facilitator
Learn from lived expertise.
Shiv Martin is not a career trainer delivering generic workshop content. She is an active mediator and conflict resolution consultant who is called in when trust has already broken down and the stakes are high. For more than 20 years, she has worked across government agencies, national not-for-profits, and corporate leadership teams where the cost of getting conflict wrong is measured in people harm, operational drag, and reputational exposure.
Her practice is defined by a rare combination: rigorous systemic analysis alongside trauma-informed psychological safety. That means she can read the structural, policy, and power dynamics of a matter while also understanding what people need in order to remain regulated enough to do difficult relational work. It is this combination that has made her a trusted advisor to the Australian Public Service and state government departments across the country.
When you train with Shiv, you do not receive abstract theory detached from lived practice. You gain access to the exact frameworks, scripts, boundaries, and facilitation methods she uses in high-stakes rooms. The learning comes from the trenches, not the textbook, and it is designed to help participants return to their workplaces with tools they can use immediately.
Frequently asked questions
What people usually want to know before they register.
Final call
Secure your place today.
Spaces for public workshops are kept intentionally limited to preserve a high-quality, interactive learning environment. Do not wait until the next conflict escalates. Build the capability now, while you still have room to act early and well.
Public workshop investment
$895
Plus GST • Wednesday, 18 March 2026
Prefer to train your whole team? Enquire about in-house delivery.