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Online
Session Date-Application DeadlineProgram Fee$4,800Faculty ChairProgram Director
Executive Certificate: This program is a core program in the Public Leadership concentration. This program can also be used as a third program for any concentration in the Executive Certificate series.
Program Overview
To make the changes you want to see in your life and in the world, you must persuade key decision-makers to act on your ideas. Identifying those stakeholders, forging a genuine connection, and delivering a message with clarity and impact are central to this process.
Persuasive Communication: Narrative, Evidence, and Impact, our two-week online program from Harvard Kennedy School Executive Education, empowers you to develop and refine essential skills—writing, speaking, and presenting—through an engaging forum enriched by peer feedback. This immersive persuasive communication training leverages persuasion theory to boost your ability to craft compelling messages.
In addition, Faculty Chair Lauren Brodsky will help you understand communications within the context of a broader policy landscape. What’s the most strategic way to approach a situation? How can communications play a role in achieving your goals? Join us to learn the answers to these and other key questions.
PROGRAM CURRICULUM
Before Persuasive Communication: Narrative, Evidence, and Impact begins, you’ll participate in a one-hour onboarding session. Pre-session readings and videos will also be provided so that you can enter the program fully prepared.
Over two weeks, expect to invest around 12 hours per week, divided among live faculty sessions, persuasion training activities, and group assignments. This hands-on curriculum integrates practical exercises in data visualization, evidence-based argumentation, and business persuasion training methods—ensuring you gain the confidence and techniques to deliver concise, high-impact communications in a variety of contexts.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
In Persuasive Communication: Narrative, Evidence, and Impact, you will:
- Engage in a curriculum that blends knowledge acquisition with direct persuasive communication training
- Write and receive expert feedback on your opinion piece to refine your persuasive communication skill
- Create and deliver a short presentation, harnessing business persuasion training strategies
- Elevate your use of data, applying persuasion theory to enhance credibility and clarity
- Strengthen data visualization techniques to communicate evidence effectively
- Build robust arguments that resonate with decision-makers
- Examine the media’s influence on policymaking and learn to position your narrative for maximum effect
Application Information
Persuasive Communication: Narrative, Evidence, and Impact is designed for public- and private-sector officials in mid- to senior-level roles who are responsible for communications, public relations, human resources, and corporate social responsibility.
This program would be ideal for individuals including:
- Senior leaders in the public sector
- Elected or appointed public officials
- Communications and public relations professionals
- Policy and advocacy advisors
- Nonprofit leaders
- Foreign and U.S. diplomats
- Military and defense professionals
- Public health, education, and social service professionals
- Union leaders
- Leaders of social movements
- Corporate leaders working with or for the public sector
View the draft program schedule. Note that module titles, speakers, and sequence may change.
WHAT PARTICIPANTS ARE SAYING
“The Persuasive Communication program opened my eyes to an array of approaches I’d never considered. I found myself simultaneously stimulated and inspired, eager to apply what I had learned to solving my organization’s communications challenges.”
Hear From the Faculty Chair
Learn more about Persuasive Communication: Narrative, Evidence, and Impact from Faculty Chair Lauren Brodsky, Lecturer in Public Policy.
Faculty

Lauren Brodsky

Austin Bogues

Alex Green

Jon Haber

Hong Qu

Eric Rosenbach


Jeffrey Seglin

Allison Shapira
