Navigating Washington for Embassy Professionals

October 20-21, 2026 | Washington, D.C. | In-person

Two-day Applied Program | Open to professionals from any embassy

Turn your country expertise into an effective Washington engagement strategy.

Newly arrived in Washington? Taking responsibility for a new embassy portfolio?

You may already understand your country, your policy priorities, and the institutions you represent. But advancing those priorities in Washington requires an additional capability: identifying the right stakeholders, creating a compelling reason for engagement, supporting senior diplomatic meetings, and turning access into sustained progress.

This practical two-day program helps foreign mission personnel become effective in Washington more quickly.

Participants leave with an embassy-ready 90-Day Washington Engagement Plan tied to a current national or mission priority.

Reserve Your Place Download overview (PDF)

Enrollment is limited to support discussion, application, and facilitator feedback.

What participants will learn and practice

Participants will learn to:

Translate a national or embassy priority into a clear Washington objective
Map decision-makers, influencers, validators, connectors, and blockers
Prioritize engagement across government, policy, commercial, and public channels
Develop stronger outreach and meeting requests
Prepare ambassadors and senior officials for high-value engagements
Conduct more purposeful stakeholder conversations
Build a structured follow-up and implementation plan

Program Details

Dates: Tuesday to Wednesday, October 20–21, 2026
Time: 9:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.
Location: Washington, D.C.
Format: In-person and highly interactive

Washington requires a distinct operating approach

Influence in Washington rarely moves through one institution or formal channel. A single embassy priority may involve the administration, Congress, trade associations, think tanks, companies, state governments, diaspora organizations, media, and trusted intermediaries.

The challenge is not simply securing more meetings. It is determining:

Who matters to the objective
Why they should engage with the mission
How stakeholders influence one another
What the embassy needs from each engagement
How meetings will be converted into continued action

This program provides a practical method for answering those questions.

Why this matters — even after foreign service training

Home foreign service institutes provide essential preparation in diplomacy, policy, reporting, protocol, leadership, and national procedures.

This course complements that preparation by focusing on the practical realities of operating within Washington’s distinctive influence environment.

Participants learn how to translate national priorities into focused engagement objectives, navigate formal and informal centers of influence, prepare senior officials for purposeful conversations, and sustain momentum after meetings conclude.

This is not a general introduction to the United States. It is an applied program for advancing mission priorities in Washington.

Program Agenda

Understanding formal and informal pathways of influence
Identifying and prioritizing relevant stakeholders
Converting national priorities into engagement objectives
Building a stakeholder and influence map
Applied embassy-priority workshop

Creating a compelling reason for stakeholders to engage
Developing stronger outreach and meeting requests
Preparing ambassadors and senior officials
Conducting purposeful stakeholder meetings
Building the 90-Day Washington Engagement Plan
Participant review and facilitator feedback

Joining this training opportunity is easy:

Register

Show up & participate

Join the facilitated program that includes scenario-based exercises and networking

Apply

Participants leave with frameworks and an approach to boost engagement

Who should attend

This program is designed for:

Political and economic officers
Trade and investment personnel
Public diplomacy and communications staff
Congressional or government-relations personnel
Ambassadorial office and executive staff
Senior locally engaged embassy personnel
Officials beginning or recently assuming a Washington assignment

Recommended experience level: Mid-career to senior

Recommended embassy participation: One to three participants from complementary sections

Missions sending multiple participants can begin building a coordinated, cross-section engagement approach during the program.

This is a working program — not a conference

The course is built around application, facilitated discussion, and practical exercises.

Participants will:

Apply the course frameworks to a current embassy priority
Build a Washington stakeholder and influence map
Evaluate realistic engagement situations
Develop and refine outreach language
Prepare for a senior-level meeting
Participate in an engagement simulation
Receive peer and facilitator feedback

Sensitive operational information does not need to be shared with the wider cohort.

What your embassy takes away

A completed 90-day Washington Engagement Plan

Each participant will develop a practical plan containing:

A clearly defined mission objective
A stakeholder and influence map
A prioritized engagement list
A proposed outreach and meeting sequence
Thirty-, sixty-, and ninety-day milestones
Follow-up actions and progress indicators

Participants also receive a Bonvalet Academy workbook, planning templates, and digital tools for continued use within their mission.

The value to the sponsoring mission

The course is designed to produce more than individual professional development.

The embassy gains:

A focused Washington engagement plan tied to a current priority
Stronger preparation for senior-level meetings
Better coordination across embassy sections
A repeatable process for outreach and follow-through
Clearer evidence of progress for leadership and headquarters

The program helps missions demonstrate that their training investment produced a defined capability and an immediately usable operating asset.

Frequently Asked Questions

No. The program is also valuable for personnel assuming a new portfolio, expanding their responsibilities, or seeking a more structured approach to Washington engagement.

Home foreign service institutes provide essential diplomatic, policy, reporting, protocol, and leadership preparation. This course complements that training by focusing specifically on how embassy personnel operate within Washington’s distinctive government, policy, commercial, and influence environment — something that can only be trained by professionals immersed in the environment,

No. The course is designed for both newly arrived personnel and experienced embassy professionals who want to improve how they identify stakeholders, prepare engagements, and sustain follow-through.

Absolutely not. Participants can work at an appropriate level of detail and are not expected to disclose classified, restricted, or sensitive operational information to the wider cohort.

Each participant will leave with a completed 90-Day Washington Engagement Plan, a stakeholder and influence map, planning templates, a participant workbook, digital tools, and a Bonvalet Academy Certificate of Completion.

Yes. Missions are encouraged to send personnel from complementary sections. Multiple participants can use the course to begin building a more coordinated embassy-wide engagement approach.

Yes. Bonvalet Academy can deliver a customized version for one embassy, incorporating the mission’s priorities, team structure, and engagement objectives. However, the six attendees is the suggested minimum.

To eliminate administrative issues, the safest approach to enroll is to process your registration using the registration links below. However, arrangements can be made for Bonvalet to provide an invoice and documentation for embassy or ministry approval.

Participant substitutions may be made before the course begins. Cancellation, transfer, and refund terms will be provided during registration.

Become effective in Washington sooner

Equip your personnel with the relationships, judgment, and operating approach needed to advance mission priorities.

Individual Enrollment

$1,195.00

1 year of access

For one embassy professional attending the full two-day program.

Includes:

Two full days of in-person instruction and facilitation
Bonvalet Academy participant workbook
Washington stakeholder-mapping tools
Outreach, meeting-preparation, and follow-up templates
Development of an individual 90-Day Washington Engagement Plan
Digital course toolkit
Bonvalet Academy Certificate of Completion

Embassy Team Enrollment (save $600)

$2,985.00

1 year of access

Designed for three personnel from complementary embassy sections who want to build a more coordinated Washington engagement approach.

Includes everything in Individual Enrollment, plus:

Three full participant enrollments
Coordinated work around a shared embassy priority
Cross-section stakeholder and influence mapping
Facilitated alignment of outreach roles and responsibilities
Development of complementary 90-Day Washington Engagement Plans
A shared team implementation summary for continued embassy coordination
Recognition of each participant with an individual certificate