Services

Interview Skills

We help smart people make brilliant presentations.

The Johnston Framework Interview Skills program achieves results through personalized guidance and solutions that enable A/E/C technical professionals to overcome the barriers holding them back.

Every program includes an assessment and interviews with each participant before the first working session to fully understand his or her specific challenges, including content development and delivery skills. Video feedback helps our clients generate dynamic presentations and understand how they did it.

This – in combination with Accelerated Learning techniques – helps people learn quickly. And because they are learning and growing together, participants built trust with each other and become stronger as a team. 

More than 1,000 professionals at architecture, engineering, construction, and law firms have gained the skills they need to facilitate groups and present effectively through the Johnston Framework Interview Skills program. Empower your novice and seasoned team members with the knowledge and skills they need to become outstanding interviewers, facilitators, and presenters.

“Teaching presentation skills to contractors is no easy task. Scott custom built workshops where we modeled real presentations, giving our managers new tools and skills that will result in FORMA acquiring work in developing markets. Scott’s style and experience allows him to provide the necessary feedback, making the sessions efficient and very valuable.”

—Drew Philips, VP, FORMA Construction

Interview Coaching

Johnston Framework enables A/E/C teams to put their best foot forward in project interviews—and strengthen their interview prep process permanently.

We start with a full understanding of both the client needs and project goals, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the team. Together, we create unique and memorable content, and practice and refine with video recording and playback. Teams learn strategies to create and manage interaction, answer questions effectively, and use visuals to support, not lead.

Design-Build Interview Coaching

Design-build interviews requires a different type of preparation, one that emphasizes even more interaction. Architects and engineers that partner with contractors must demonstrate that they will be a united, seamless team throughout the project. Johnston Framework equips teams with the skills to manage group dynamics and facilitate positive discussions that are critical to making a connection with and being selected by design-build selection panels.

“Scott did a great job bringing new team members together and helping the individual team members hone their presentation skills. His coaching across the spectrum of the big picture all the way down to the most subtle details helped get our team ready and our interview preparation was instrumental in winning the project. Well done Scott.”

—Greg Hill, Former Principal, Stantec

Navigate Difficult Communication

The pandemic has reduced our ability to communicate in-person, especially for young people. Zoom and Teams are great option to have, but they cannot replace the real thing. While team interviews and business development conversations are often the highest priority, we help many of our clients equip their people with the skills to navigate situations such as:

  • Overcoming generational, gender, or other differences.

  • Managing group dynamics to build trust and gain consensus.

  • Resolving conflicts between team members or partners.

Programs are always highly customized to address the specific situations our clients face. Participants role-play to practice the strategies learned in a positive environment to build confidence one step at a time.

“In this business there is always an emergency and it’s easy to get wrapped up every day in the doing without taking time to think about how you are doing. (Johnston Framework) helped us stop and look at how we were doing what we do. They offered concrete ways to make our internal and external communication clear and our work more efficient."

—Andy Klemmer, Founder, Paratus Group

Business Development

Building long-term relationships with clients is essential because they want to work with people they already know and trust. That trust is built one conversation at a time.

Being able to initiate one-on-one conversations and manage them effectively is an essential skill for all professionals. But it doesn’t necessarily come naturally to technical professionals, because many of them assume business development must be forced and contrived – like a salesperson with a quota.

By using our nonmanipulative relationship marketing approach, technical professionals learn that they can develop business effectively – and even derive satisfaction from these activities.

Results

  • In one engineering firm, 18 participants generated more than $1 million in billable work by the end of the four-session program.

  • A group of eight project managers and superintendents for a construction company made and kept 17 appointments in the three weeks between the first and second session.

  • Four years after a training program in business development was completed for an architecture firm, all eight participants were still meeting the goals they established during the sessions. The group generated millions of dollars in projects for their firm.

“When we scheduled our training program, we had no idea how much the BD landscape would change. After rescheduling several times due to COVID, we proceeded with the training. While so much has changed, many principles remain the same, and we are very glad to have trained every single staff member in both basic and advanced business development skills.

Establishing goals and practicing these new skills with Johnston Framework has accelerated our COVID-era business development strategies. Our team has challenged themselves, with new leaders emerging and developing business, and this will carry our firm successfully through the uncertainty of the next season.”

—Emily Meyer, Client Engagement Manager, Bernardo|Wills Architects