Brief Narrative Practices for High Stakes Conversations: Short Stories for Moving from Conflict to Collaboration

Workshop Description:

Brief Narrative Practices offer “quick streamlined access” to help that is characterized by rapid engagement. They provide a time-sensitive, rather than a time-driven approach. They are well suited for addressing high stakes conversations by offering help that people need, when they need it. Providing consultation through brief narrative practices is about adopting a different set of assumptions about how to work with people and how people change. It calls into question the taken-for-granted, “more is better” discourse that is pervasive throughout mental-health services. There is an emphasis on forming a meaningful partnership between the professional and people seeking consultation, incorporating their feedback into every step of the therapeutic journey.

The ability to navigate high stakes conversations lies at the heart of constructive change. In this interactive workshop we will explore a range of brief narrative practices that are beneficial when facilitating these crucial conversations. High stakes conversations are often characterized by conflicting opinions and heightened emotional intensity. They can have painful and disturbing effects on the quality of the relationships of those involved. The emotional distress that people experience during these discussions can be viewed as expressions of their longing to maintain an association to their strongly held values, beliefs, hopes, dreams, commitments, and purposes. The intensity of the distress can be seen as a reflection of the degree to which people continue to maintain a commitment to those strongly held values. These critical discussions occur in a range of circumstances such as, when working with individuals in distress, couples experiencing conflict, communities experiencing hardship, organizational disputes, struggles in mental health care and more.

Narrative practices help people to separate from divisive conflictual stories and develop counter stories of collaboration and connection. Instead of approaching difficult conversations as arguments to be won based on the influence of dominant narratives, these conversations are viewed as opportunities for learning what is possible to know and do to move toward a preferred futures. Brief narrative practices help to explore the powerful influences that the surrounding social/cultural context has on peoples’ identities and relationships. By locating the history of the conflict within the broader social/cultural discourse those influences that shape peoples’ stories become more visible and dominant narratives can be called into question.

By adopting a curious posture, asking invitational questions, and offering clear scaffolding, these conversations become fertile ground for pivotal moments. These moments can open space to spark realizations in understanding and a shared sense of purpose. They are pivotal not only because of their potential to reduce the influence of conflict, but because they can elevate the of sense of who people are, making the pathways forward more visible.

Through clear presentation, experiential exercises, session recordings, case discussion and a comprehensive handout package this interactive workshop will focus on the development of brief narrative practice skills for constructively navigating high stakes conversations.

Participants will explore:

• A range of key brief narrative practices for addressing crucial conversations

• How to encourage relational narratives of increased understanding, respect, and cooperation in the face of conflict.

• Ways to ask meaning generating questions that open space for people to find new pathways forward in their lives.

• A variety of conversational maps for beginning, continuing, and completing high stakes conversations.

• Generative scaffolding questions that help people to become reacquainted with the knowledge and skills of their lives that are relevant to addressing their concerns and problems.

• A variety of understandings and skills that you can immediately apply to your practice with high stakes conversations.

Workshop Hours

Saturday, February 21, 2026 – 9:30 AM to 4:30 PM (US Central Time). Includes 2 short breaks and one hour long break.

Registration Fee

Super Early Bird Fee: $125.00 (Register before November 30th, 2025)

Early Bird Fee: $150.00 (Register between December 1st and January 31st, 2026)

Regular Fee $175.00 (February 1st, 2026 and after)

Student Fee: $100.00 (Must show proof of status with a student card if requested)

GROUP Discount of 15% available for group registration of 5 or more. Please email training@jstinstitute.com for more information.

Cancelations

Full refund minus $30.00 cancellation fee until January 31st, 2026.

50% refund between February 1st and 20th, 2026

No refund after February 21st, 2026.

NOTE: Zoom log-in information will be provided to the email you registered with close to the workshop date.

JIM DUVALL, M.Ed.

Jim Duvall is Co-Director of JST Institute and Editor of Journal of Systemic Therapies. His experience as a therapist, educator, consultant, speaker, editor, and author spans over four decades. He has spent over 300 hours studying and collaborating with Michael White in training, writing and community projects. His work aims to integrate time-sensitive narrative practices within social justice principles.

In addition to numerous articles, book chapters, Jim co-authored a policy paper (Duvall, J., Young, K., Kays-Burden, A., 2012), No more, no less: Brief mental health services for children and youth. His co-authored book (Duvall & Béres, 2011), Innovations in narrative therapy: Connecting practice, training and research, WW Norton and Company is the first book to integrate training and research with narrative therapy resulting in compelling practice-based evidence. He is the co-editor (Beaudoin & Duvall, 2017) of Collaborative therapy and neurobiology: Evolving practices in action.

He has offered hundreds of workshops, courses, and keynote presentations with organizations throughout Canada, US, Australia, Asia and Europe. Other times Jim can be found playing music with his friends or boating on the Gulf of Mexico with his partner, family and their dog, Sailor.