Team Training & Workshops
Custom sessions to help teams think clearly, speak honestly, and move forward together.
Custom sessions to help teams think clearly, speak honestly, and move forward together.
“Pete Mackey led a Gettysburg College leadership workshop that spoke directly to our biggest headwinds. His thoughtful, practical approach is helping us navigate the challenges we and so many institutions of higher education face about cost and relevance, and why fundraising matters. The session provided a clear path forward. I’d strongly recommend Pete and Mackey Strategies to institutions confronting similar challenges.”
Bill Heyman
Partner, FHS Capital Partners; Gettysburg College Trustee
“Pete Mackey led a Gettysburg College leadership workshop that spoke directly to our biggest headwinds. His thoughtful, practical approach is helping us navigate the challenges we and so many institutions of higher education face about cost and relevance, and why fundraising matters. The session provided a clear path forward. I’d strongly recommend Pete and Mackey Strategies to institutions confronting similar challenges.”
Bill Heyman
Partner, FHS Capital Partners; Gettysburg College Trustee
“Pete Mackey led a Gettysburg College leadership workshop that spoke directly to our biggest headwinds. His thoughtful, practical approach is helping us navigate the challenges we and so many institutions of higher education face about cost and relevance, and why fundraising matters. The session provided a clear path forward. I’d strongly recommend Pete and Mackey Strategies to institutions confronting similar challenges.”
Bill Heyman
Partner, FHS Capital Partners; Gettysburg College Trustee
“Pete Mackey led a Gettysburg College leadership workshop that spoke directly to our biggest headwinds. His thoughtful, practical approach is helping us navigate the challenges we and so many institutions of higher education face about cost and relevance, and why fundraising matters. The session provided a clear path forward. I’d strongly recommend Pete and Mackey Strategies to institutions confronting similar challenges.”
Bill Heyman
Partner, FHS Capital Partners; Gettysburg College Trustee
Leadership teams don’t need more meetings. They need the right conditions to do their best thinking.
We love helping teams succeed. We have lived the challenges from inside that they confront. And we know higher ed urgencies can raise the stakes. With a focus on each team’s particular goals, we design and guide high-impact workshops for boards, cabinets, and leadership teams across practically every portfolio facing complex decisions and competing demands. We create space for candid discussion and then provide structure to help turn that dialogue into team unity and practical action.
Whether the challenge is strategic prioritization, changing a brand, confronting financial or structural predicaments, or strengthening how teams communicate and lead, our workshops are built to help teams develop clarity and confidence about their priorities and the steps that will achieve them.
Signature Offerings
Leading Through Change
A focused, on-campus working session for teams navigating consequential change.
When an institution is preparing for or actively facing a major shift, it can be as difficult as it is important to think freshly about what’s required. This half-day seminar brings the rigor of The Future Sessions into a focused, on-campus format designed around your institution’s specific challenge.
Led by Pete Mackey and informed by his decades of experience working with leadership teams across numerous institutions, this program focuses on creating the conditions for productive conversation and shrewd decision-making.
Pete works with you in advance to shape the agenda, then facilitates up to a full day of structured dialogue aimed at helping your cabinet or team find alignment on priorities, the changes that will make the greatest difference, and the key communications steps to guide internal and external outreach.
Best for: Cabinets, communications teams, or leadership groups navigating significant change, inflection points, or strategic resets.
Strategic Prioritization for Communications
Helping communications teams move from service to strategy.
Communications teams are often asked to do everything—and too busy to prioritize anything. This workshop introduces Mackey Strategies’ proprietary approach to strategic prioritization, designed specifically for the realities of higher education communications and marketing.
Informed by our decades of experience working with communications teams at institutions large and small, this program focuses on helping teams identify true strategic priorities, make intentional choices, and navigate the challenging conversations prioritization requires. Content is tailored to your institution’s situation and leadership goals, with absolute confidentiality as a core principle.
Participants leave with a shared framework for decision-making, a shared language about what matters most for their operational success, and practical tools they can use to strengthen collaboration with campus partners.
Best for: Communications and marketing leadership teams seeking greater clarity, focus, and strategic impact.
Strategic Storytelling for Advancement
Turning everyday campus moments into donor-ready narratives.
Every institution has powerful stories. Skilled fundraisers know how to find and shape them for effective donor conversations. This workshop helps fundraising officers move beyond anecdotes to telling honest stories built to connect emotionally, clarify the value of investments, and inspire generosity.
Having helped colleges, universities, and other nonprofits raise billions of dollars across decades of working with advancement teams and campaign leaders, we build this session around a practical, repeatable approach to storytelling. This includes guiding participants through real examples as they learn to identify the essential material of a strong fundraising story, structure the narrative for donor audiences, and translate institutional priorities with compelling human-centered details.
Participants leave with tools they can use immediately in donor meetings, proposals, and campaign communications, along with a clearer sense of what makes a story resonate and why.
Best for: Advancement leadership, frontline fundraisers, and campaign teams seeking to strengthen donor engagement and fundraising effectiveness.
Public Speaking & Presence for Admissions and Advancement
Helping ambassadors communicate with confidence and credibility.
Admissions and advancement professionals are among any college’s or university’s most visible representatives, whether at college fairs, donor meetings, or public events. Yet many are asked to perform in these high-stakes settings without training in the psychological and professional techniques that would allow them to excel.
Led by Elise Partin, who has honed her skills as a public speaker in settings of every kind from the U.S. to Asia, this workshop helps participants strengthen their confidence, clarity, and presence when representing their institution. Sessions focus on techniques you can use immediately in building around your own strengths to connect with audiences, deliver messages with authenticity, and handle even the most difficult questions with poise.
Designed to be highly interactive, the workshop meets speakers where they are and provides proven and practical tools for success, empowering participants to best represent their institution and advance their careers.
Best for: Admissions and advancement leaders, admissions and advancement frontline recruiters and fundraisers, and other professionals who regularly serve as public-facing ambassadors for their institution.
Signature Offerings
Leading Through Change
A focused, on-campus working session for teams navigating consequential change.
When an institution is preparing for or actively facing a major shift, it can be as difficult as it is important to think freshly about what’s required. This half-day seminar brings the rigor of The Future Sessions into a focused, on-campus format designed around your institution’s specific challenge.
Led by Pete Mackey and informed by his decades of experience working with leadership teams across numerous institutions, this program focuses on creating the conditions for productive conversation and shrewd decision-making.
Pete works with you in advance to shape the agenda, then facilitates up to a full day of structured dialogue aimed at helping your cabinet or team find alignment on priorities, the changes that will make the greatest difference, and the key communications steps to guide internal and external outreach.
Best for: Cabinets, communications teams, or leadership groups navigating significant change, inflection points, or strategic resets.
Strategic Prioritization for Communications
Helping communications teams move from service to strategy.
Communications teams are often asked to do everything—and too busy to prioritize anything. This workshop introduces Mackey Strategies’ proprietary approach to strategic prioritization, designed specifically for the realities of higher education communications and marketing.
Informed by our decades of experience working with communications teams at institutions large and small, this program focuses on helping teams identify true strategic priorities, make intentional choices, and navigate the challenging conversations prioritization requires. Content is tailored to your institution’s situation and leadership goals, with absolute confidentiality as a core principle.
Participants leave with a shared framework for decision-making, a shared language about what matters most for their operational success, and practical tools they can use to strengthen collaboration with campus partners.
Best for: Communications and marketing leadership teams seeking greater clarity, focus, and strategic impact.
Strategic Storytelling for Advancement
Turning everyday campus moments into donor-ready narratives.
Every institution has powerful stories. Skilled fundraisers know how to find and shape them for effective donor conversations. This workshop helps fundraising officers move beyond anecdotes to telling honest stories built to connect emotionally, clarify the value of investments, and inspire generosity.
Having helped colleges, universities, and other nonprofits raise billions of dollars across decades of working with advancement teams and campaign leaders, we build this session around a practical, repeatable approach to storytelling. This includes guiding participants through real examples as they learn to identify the essential material of a strong fundraising story, structure the narrative for donor audiences, and translate institutional priorities with compelling human-centered details.
Participants leave with tools they can use immediately in donor meetings, proposals, and campaign communications, along with a clearer sense of what makes a story resonate and why.
Best for: Advancement leadership, frontline fundraisers, and campaign teams seeking to strengthen donor engagement and fundraising effectiveness.
Public Speaking & Presence for Admissions and Advancement
Helping ambassadors communicate with confidence and credibility.
Admissions and advancement professionals are among any college’s or university’s most visible representatives, whether at college fairs, donor meetings, or public events. Yet many are asked to perform in these high-stakes settings without training in the psychological and professional techniques that would allow them to excel.
Led by Elise Partin, who has honed her skills as a public speaker in settings of every kind from the U.S. to Asia, this workshop helps participants strengthen their confidence, clarity, and presence when representing their institution. Sessions focus on techniques you can use immediately in building around your own strengths to connect with audiences, deliver messages with authenticity, and handle even the most difficult questions with poise.
Designed to be highly interactive, the workshop meets speakers where they are and provides proven and practical tools for success, empowering participants to best represent their institution and advance their careers.
Best for: Admissions and advancement leaders, admissions and advancement frontline recruiters and fundraisers, and other professionals who regularly serve as public-facing ambassadors for their institution.
Signature Offerings
Leading Through Change
A focused, on-campus working session for teams navigating consequential change.
When an institution is preparing for or actively facing a major shift, it can be as difficult as it is important to think freshly about what’s required. This half-day seminar brings the rigor of The Future Sessions into a focused, on-campus format designed around your institution’s specific challenge.
Led by Pete Mackey and informed by his decades of experience working with leadership teams across numerous institutions, this program focuses on creating the conditions for productive conversation and shrewd decision-making.
Pete works with you in advance to shape the agenda, then facilitates up to a full day of structured dialogue aimed at helping your cabinet or team find alignment on priorities, the changes that will make the greatest difference, and the key communications steps to guide internal and external outreach.
Best for: Cabinets, communications teams, or leadership groups navigating significant change, inflection points, or strategic resets.
Strategic Prioritization for Communications
Helping communications teams move from service to strategy.
Communications teams are often asked to do everything—and too busy to prioritize anything. This workshop introduces Mackey Strategies’ proprietary approach to strategic prioritization, designed specifically for the realities of higher education communications and marketing.
Informed by our decades of experience working with communications teams at institutions large and small, this program focuses on helping teams identify true strategic priorities, make intentional choices, and navigate the challenging conversations prioritization requires. Content is tailored to your institution’s situation and leadership goals, with absolute confidentiality as a core principle.
Participants leave with a shared framework for decision-making, a shared language about what matters most for their operational success, and practical tools they can use to strengthen collaboration with campus partners.
Best for: Communications and marketing leadership teams seeking greater clarity, focus, and strategic impact.
Strategic Storytelling for Advancement
Turning everyday campus moments into donor-ready narratives.
Every institution has powerful stories. Skilled fundraisers know how to find and shape them for effective donor conversations. This workshop helps fundraising officers move beyond anecdotes to telling honest stories built to connect emotionally, clarify the value of investments, and inspire generosity.
Having helped colleges, universities, and other nonprofits raise billions of dollars across decades of working with advancement teams and campaign leaders, we build this session around a practical, repeatable approach to storytelling. This includes guiding participants through real examples as they learn to identify the essential material of a strong fundraising story, structure the narrative for donor audiences, and translate institutional priorities with compelling human-centered details.
Participants leave with tools they can use immediately in donor meetings, proposals, and campaign communications, along with a clearer sense of what makes a story resonate and why.
Best for: Advancement leadership, frontline fundraisers, and campaign teams seeking to strengthen donor engagement and fundraising effectiveness.
Public Speaking & Presence for Admissions and Advancement
Helping ambassadors communicate with confidence and credibility.
Admissions and advancement professionals are among any college’s or university’s most visible representatives, whether at college fairs, donor meetings, or public events. Yet many are asked to perform in these high-stakes settings without training in the psychological and professional techniques that would allow them to excel.
Led by Elise Partin, who has honed her skills as a public speaker in settings of every kind from the U.S. to Asia, this workshop helps participants strengthen their confidence, clarity, and presence when representing their institution. Sessions focus on techniques you can use immediately in building around your own strengths to connect with audiences, deliver messages with authenticity, and handle even the most difficult questions with poise.
Designed to be highly interactive, the workshop meets speakers where they are and provides proven and practical tools for success, empowering participants to best represent their institution and advance their careers.
Best for: Admissions and advancement leaders, admissions and advancement frontline recruiters and fundraisers, and other professionals who regularly serve as public-facing ambassadors for their institution.
Signature Offerings
Leading Through Change
A focused, on-campus working session for teams navigating consequential change.
When an institution is preparing for or actively facing a major shift, it can be as difficult as it is important to think freshly about what’s required. This half-day seminar brings the rigor of The Future Sessions into a focused, on-campus format designed around your institution’s specific challenge.
Led by Pete Mackey and informed by his decades of experience working with leadership teams across numerous institutions, this program focuses on creating the conditions for productive conversation and shrewd decision-making.
Pete works with you in advance to shape the agenda, then facilitates up to a full day of structured dialogue aimed at helping your cabinet or team find alignment on priorities, the changes that will make the greatest difference, and the key communications steps to guide internal and external outreach.
Best for: Cabinets, communications teams, or leadership groups navigating significant change, inflection points, or strategic resets.
Strategic Prioritization for Communications
Helping communications teams move from service to strategy.
Communications teams are often asked to do everything—and too busy to prioritize anything. This workshop introduces Mackey Strategies’ proprietary approach to strategic prioritization, designed specifically for the realities of higher education communications and marketing.
Informed by our decades of experience working with communications teams at institutions large and small, this program focuses on helping teams identify true strategic priorities, make intentional choices, and navigate the challenging conversations prioritization requires. Content is tailored to your institution’s situation and leadership goals, with absolute confidentiality as a core principle.
Participants leave with a shared framework for decision-making, a shared language about what matters most for their operational success, and practical tools they can use to strengthen collaboration with campus partners.
Best for: Communications and marketing leadership teams seeking greater clarity, focus, and strategic impact.
Strategic Storytelling for Advancement
Turning everyday campus moments into donor-ready narratives.
Every institution has powerful stories. Skilled fundraisers know how to find and shape them for effective donor conversations. This workshop helps fundraising officers move beyond anecdotes to telling honest stories built to connect emotionally, clarify the value of investments, and inspire generosity.
Having helped colleges, universities, and other nonprofits raise billions of dollars across decades of working with advancement teams and campaign leaders, we build this session around a practical, repeatable approach to storytelling. This includes guiding participants through real examples as they learn to identify the essential material of a strong fundraising story, structure the narrative for donor audiences, and translate institutional priorities with compelling human-centered details.
Participants leave with tools they can use immediately in donor meetings, proposals, and campaign communications, along with a clearer sense of what makes a story resonate and why.
Best for: Advancement leadership, frontline fundraisers, and campaign teams seeking to strengthen donor engagement and fundraising effectiveness.
Public Speaking & Presence for Admissions and Advancement
Helping ambassadors communicate with confidence and credibility.
Admissions and advancement professionals are among any college’s or university’s most visible representatives, whether at college fairs, donor meetings, or public events. Yet many are asked to perform in these high-stakes settings without training in the psychological and professional techniques that would allow them to excel.
Led by Elise Partin, who has honed her skills as a public speaker in settings of every kind from the U.S. to Asia, this workshop helps participants strengthen their confidence, clarity, and presence when representing their institution. Sessions focus on techniques you can use immediately in building around your own strengths to connect with audiences, deliver messages with authenticity, and handle even the most difficult questions with poise.
Designed to be highly interactive, the workshop meets speakers where they are and provides proven and practical tools for success, empowering participants to best represent their institution and advance their careers.
Best for: Admissions and advancement leaders, admissions and advancement frontline recruiters and fundraisers, and other professionals who regularly serve as public-facing ambassadors for their institution.
Custom Communications & Leadership Workshops
Custom Communications & Leadership Workshops
Built to help you meet tough leadership challenges.
In addition to the signature offerings above, we regularly design and facilitate workshops tailored to specific institutional or departmental needs, goals, and team dynamics. Sample topics that we have addressed in these sessions include crisis readiness, managing hard constituent questions, cost-benefit strategic goal-setting, board-administration alignment, and managing leadership transitions.
We work closely with you in advance to clarify goals, understand context, and design a session that creates the right conditions for worthwhile discussion and actionable plans.
Best for: Boards, executive teams, or departmental teams facing a specific challenge that requires focused attention, sensitive facilitation, and experienced perspective.
Custom Communications & Leadership Workshops
Built to help you meet tough leadership challenges.
In addition to the signature offerings above, we regularly design and facilitate workshops tailored to specific institutional or departmental needs, goals, and team dynamics. Sample topics that we have addressed in these sessions include crisis readiness, managing hard constituent questions, cost-benefit strategic goal-setting, board-administration alignment, and managing leadership transitions.
We work closely with you in advance to clarify goals, understand context, and design a session that creates the right conditions for worthwhile discussion and actionable plans.
Best for: Boards, executive teams, or departmental teams facing a specific challenge that requires focused attention, sensitive facilitation, and experienced perspective.
Custom Communications & Leadership Workshops
Built to help you meet tough leadership challenges.
In addition to the signature offerings above, we regularly design and facilitate workshops tailored to specific institutional or departmental needs, goals, and team dynamics. Sample topics that we have addressed in these sessions include crisis readiness, managing hard constituent questions, cost-benefit strategic goal-setting, board-administration alignment, and managing leadership transitions.
We work closely with you in advance to clarify goals, understand context, and design a session that creates the right conditions for worthwhile discussion and actionable plans.
Best for: Boards, executive teams, or departmental teams facing a specific challenge that requires focused attention, sensitive facilitation, and experienced perspective.
“I have been part of many excellent programs like this during my career in both higher education and public service, and I found Pete Mackey’s workshop on strategic change management as valuable as any I have encountered.”
— Blake Thompson, President, Mississippi College
“I have been part of many excellent programs like this during my career in both higher education and public service, and I found Pete Mackey’s workshop on strategic change management as valuable as any I have encountered.”
— Blake Thompson, President, Mississippi College
“I have been part of many excellent programs like this during my career in both higher education and public service, and I found Pete Mackey’s workshop on strategic change management as valuable as any I have encountered.”
— Blake Thompson, President, Mississippi College
“I have been part of many excellent programs like this during my career in both higher education and public service, and I found Pete Mackey’s workshop on strategic change management as valuable as any I have encountered.”
— Blake Thompson, President, Mississippi College
Looking for a personal leadership experience?
The Future Sessions offer leaders and rising leaders rare time and space to step back from daily demands, reconnect strategy to purpose, and think clearly about action steps for success, all alongside peers committed to meaningful change.
Looking for a personal leadership experience?
The Future Sessions offer leaders and rising leaders rare time and space to step back from daily demands, reconnect strategy to purpose, and think clearly about action steps for success, all alongside peers committed to meaningful change.
Looking for a personal leadership experience?
The Future Sessions offer leaders and rising leaders rare time and space to step back from daily demands, reconnect strategy to purpose, and think clearly about action steps for success, all alongside peers committed to meaningful change.
Looking for a personal leadership experience?
The Future Sessions offer leaders and rising leaders rare time and space to step back from daily demands, reconnect strategy to purpose, and think clearly about action steps for success, all alongside peers committed to meaningful change.
Contact Us
We tailor our services to produce the work that moves your mission forward.
Contact Us
We tailor our services to produce the work that moves your mission forward.
Contact Us
We tailor our services to produce the work that moves your mission forward.
Contact Us
We tailor our services to produce the work that moves your mission forward.
© 2025 Mackey Strategies. All Rights Reserved.
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© 2025 Mackey Strategies. All Rights Reserved.
Our site uses cookies and similar tools that may connect your activity with your email to deliver relevant communications. To opt out, visit: https://app.retention.com/optout.
© 2025 Mackey Strategies. All Rights Reserved.
Our site uses cookies and similar tools that may connect your activity with your email to deliver relevant communications. To opt out, visit: https://app.retention.com/optout.
© 2025 Mackey Strategies. All Rights Reserved.
Our site uses cookies and similar tools that may connect your activity with your email to deliver relevant communications. To opt out, visit: https://app.retention.com/optout.