Course Highlights
This advanced communication styles course will:
- Examine how the four Communication Jungle styles originate and establish that style tendencies are innate rather than acquired.
- Map all eleven style blends and the Chameleon, examining the characteristics and pressure responses of each combination.
- Examine what happens when each style’s core strengths are overused and how stress activates emergency behaviors that produce predictable conflict.
- Provide practical strategies for recognizing, responding to, and managing emergency style behaviors in oneself and in others.
- Examine the environments in which each style thrives, identify what poor-fit cultures cost each style, and introduce coping strategies for working in mismatched environments.
- Address what happens when one style dominates a team culture and provide the essential questions teams need to leverage their style diversity productively.
Course Overview
The Communication Jungle gives people a language for style differences. Jungle Expeditions gives them the skills to work with those differences at the level of complexity real teams actually operate at.
This half-day workshop is designed for groups that have completed Surviving in the Communication Jungle®. It builds directly on that foundation, moving from individual style profiles into territory the first course does not cover: how blended styles work, what happens when strengths are overused or stress activates emergency behavior, and how the environment itself either supports or depletes each style. The session closes with practical tools for identifying team style gaps, leveraging diversity, and asking the questions that prevent the friction mixed-style teams produce when their composition goes unexamined.
The course can be scheduled as a standalone half-day program or combined with Surviving in the Communication Jungle to create a full-day training session.
The following outline highlights some of the course’s key learning points. As part of your training program, we will modify content as needed to meet your business objectives. Upon request, we will provide you with a copy of the participant materials prior to the session(s).
Program Objectives
At this program’s conclusion, participants should be able to:
- Explain how styles develop and where they originate.
- Identify style combinations and apply strategies for working with different style blends.
- Recognize when a style’s strengths are being overused and anticipate the consequences.
- Employ tactics for managing emergency style behaviors in themselves and others.
- Identify style-compatible environments for each of the four primary styles.
- Apply coping strategies for working in environments not readily compatible with their style.
- Ask their team the essential questions for leveraging style diversity.
- Implement best practices for applying style awareness in a team setting.
Workshop Modules
Clues from the Early Years in the Jungle: Going Back to the Nest
Style tendencies are not learned. They emerge early and are observable long before a person enters the workforce. This module examines where styles originate and what they look like before the workplace has had any opportunity to shape them. Using behavioral descriptions drawn from early childhood, the group will examine what those patterns reveal about the people they work with today and discuss what it means to work alongside someone whose style was established before either of you ever met.
Style Blends: Adding a Little of This or That
Most people operate from a blend of more than one style, and the combinations produce characteristics, strengths, and pressure responses that are distinct from any single profile. This module maps all eleven blended profiles and the Chameleon in detail. Participants will identify their own blend, examine how their specific combination shows up in their current team interactions, and discuss the strategies that work best when working with the blends they encounter most often.
Emergency Mode: Super Powers and Power Zappers
Every style’s greatest strengths, pushed too far, become its most significant liabilities. This module examines the overuse patterns for each style and then turns to what happens when stress takes those patterns further still, activating the emergency behaviors that account for a significant share of the conflict most teams experience. Participants will work through a set of realistic case scenarios, identify the emergency behavior at work in each one, and develop the specific responses that address the situation constructively rather than escalating it.
A Fish in Water: The Environment’s Role
The right environment amplifies a style’s strengths and acts as an energy source. The wrong one depletes energy, increases stress, and generates friction that has nothing to do with skill or intention. This module examines the conditions each style needs to perform well, what poor-fit cultures cost each style in practice, and the range of strategies available to people who find themselves working in an environment that does not naturally suit them. The group will work through a set of cross-style mismatch scenarios and develop practical responses drawn from a toolkit of environmental coping approaches.
A Well-Oiled Machine: Working Better Together
When one style dominates a team culture, that culture rewards a specific set of behaviors and penalizes everything else. This module examines what single-style dominance produces — the genuine advantages and the predictable blind spots — before turning to the case for mixed-style teams and how to build them deliberately. The group will examine what each style-dominant culture looks like in practice, explore the advantages of having all four styles represented, and work through the essential questions teams should be asking regularly to ensure their composition is working for everyone in it.
1,2,3 Action: Practical Guidelines for Moving Forward
The session closes with eight specific best practices for applying everything the course has covered. The guidelines address how to deepen self-knowledge, how to use strengths without overusing them, how to read others accurately under pressure, and how to flex in ways that produce results rather than just effort. Each participant will leave with a personal Start, Stop, Continue plan tied to at least one team relationship they intend to approach differently the following week.
Target Audience
This workshop is designed for groups that want to:
- Deepen their understanding of how communication styles operate in team settings beyond individual profiles.
- Build practical skills for working with blended styles, managing emergency behavior, and adapting to style-incompatible environments.
- Develop the team habits and essential questions that allow style diversity to strengthen rather than complicate how the group works.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who should attend this workshop?
This course is designed for teams and individuals who have completed Surviving in the Communication Jungle. It assumes familiarity with the four primary style profiles and the basic adaptation concepts from that program. Participants who have not completed the first course will find the material accessible but will benefit most from it with the foundation in place.
Can this be combined with the Communication Jungle course to create a full day?
Yes, and that pairing is a common scheduling choice. The two programs are designed to work together, with the first program establishing the foundational framework and this one extending it into advanced team application. We discuss pacing and any content adjustments during the pre-session planning conversation.
Does this course work for teams where members completed the Communication Jungle at different times?
Yes. The session opens with grounding that brings all participants to a shared baseline before moving into the advanced content. For teams with significant gaps in when the first course was completed, a short review can be added at the start without disrupting the flow.
What is the emergency style content and why does it matter?
Emergency styles are the behaviors each style defaults to when stress pushes natural tendencies past their useful range. The module examines what that looks like for each style, why it generates conflict, and how to recognize and respond to it constructively. Most participants find this the most immediately applicable content in the session, because it gives them a name for patterns they have been experiencing without a framework for addressing them.
What does the team composition module cover?
The module examines what happens when a single style dominates a team culture, the specific advantages and blind spots that dominance produces, and the essential questions teams should ask regularly to ensure their style diversity is an asset rather than a source of unexamined friction.
What do participants leave with?
Attendees will leave with a clear picture of their own style blend and emergency style, coping strategies for style-incompatible environments, a framework for managing emergency behavior in colleagues, the essential team questions for leveraging style diversity, and a personal Start, Stop, Continue commitment tied to a specific team relationship they will approach differently the following week.