"Trouble-Shooting" - The Warsaw Voice

Trouble-Shooting

Grzegorz Nawrocki, "The Warsaw Voice", 26 marca 2000 r.

Picture this: during an official banquet in London, the Polish Ambassador had too to drink. Hę publicly announced that Poland did not want to join the European Union. A political storm broke out in the diplomatic corps. The ambassador's spokesman is to hold a press conference later today to answer questions and explain the situation.

Fortunately, this actually never happened. But it was one of the crisis management situations discussed by the participants of the English for Politicians Course, organized by The Warsaw School for Leaders in cooperation with the British Council Poland. Seventeen people working in government, ministries, parliament and other public institutions improved their skills in presentations, negotiations, speeches, and media relations.

The sessions conducted by Janet Bohdanowicz (Leon Koźmihski Academy) and Donald Sargeant (British Council) gave the participants a good theoretical back-ground in areas they need to address in their everyday work, "l think that courses like this one are very important," says one of the participants working at the Ministry of Justice. "First of all they teach essential skills that we need in our work, but they also help us to integrate and cooperate more efficiently in our official contacts."

The participants also had a chance to take part in exercises to give them insight into real-life situations. During the course, they met the British Ambassador John MacGregor, the Australian Ambassador Margaret Adamson, and The Warsaw Voice Editor-in-Chief Andrzej Jonas. The organizers say that due to the course's great popularity it may be repeated for another group of young political activists.

English for Politicians is one of many events organized by The Warsaw School for Leaders, which was established by an Oxford Professor, Zbigniew Petczyhski, and has been providing training to young political activists for a number of years now. So far it has trained several hundred people, many of whom hold responsible positions in the state and local government in Poland.