Background and Experience
I have worked as a trainer for 33 years in workplace settings across all three sectors. I design and facilitate bespoke courses for small and large organisations.
Areas of expertise include teamwork, leadership, conflict transformation and cultural change for counsellors and non-counsellors.
I have also designed and delivered stress and resilience workshops within the private sector, charities, and educational settings.
Training provides a creative relational space where participants can be themselves without the fear of being judged. Forming a trusting relationship with participants and honouring diversity are key to groupwork. I appreciate that each participant will work at their own pace, bringing unique experience and a distinctive perspective.
Participants have the opportunity to experiment and express themselves in fresh ways. Each bespoke programme is well-researched. Delegates have described my style as direct and playful. We laugh and cry together. People are inspired by the depth of the work where they find an enhanced confidence to be self-compassionate and authentic.
Trainer Practice description
Trainees feel safe and supported in the relational training space where they can be themselves without the fear of being judged. Forming a trusting relationship with participants and honouring diversity are key to groupwork. Each participant will work at their own pace, bringing unique experience and a distinctive perspective.
Creativity is utilised to help participants experiment and express themselves in fresh ways. I research my topics well and have over three decades of experience of designing and delivering training groups. Students have described my style as direct and playful. We laugh and cry together. People are inspired by the depth of the work where they find an enhanced confidence to be self-compassionate and authentic.
If your training needs are not listed below then I can negotiate with you to design training on your unique needs. I have confidence with most topics that are around relationships and working together.
Training Areas include:
- Team building
- Leadership
- Conflict Transformation
- Working with anger
- Responding to aggressive customers
- Culture Change
Previous course examples:
For a pharmaceutical company, I worked with a team of laboratory managers where there had been serious conflict that had affected performance. I used creative arts and storytelling techniques, inviting participants to write an imaginary radio broadcast. The one-day workshop helped delegates to identify and feel confident about their own managerial style.
Outcome: A three-month follow-up from HR reported an end to the conflicts and an increased team effort. Staff said that they felt happier working under a more cohesive management structure.
In the IT services industry, 200 staff of a FTSE 100 company had difficulty understanding and integrating the business unit’s strategy into their roles. To resolve this issue, I created a training programme to be delivered by a team of performance artists from Central School of Speech and Drama.
Outcome: After the event, the participants reported a 90% satisfaction rate in finding a new understanding of the strategy. A year later, the unit achieved their strategic goals. Follow-up reports showed other positive changes in culture, as a result of the training event, with an increase in job-satisfaction and morale.
IT services: I was engaged for a second time to work with the above company and a team of IT workers who serviced a website for central government. Using creative media we worked on utilising performance arts to enhance their website. Participants learnt presentation skills from TV, film and theatre. A primary concern was their ability to reach a diverse cross-section of the UK population, including traditionally marginalized groups.
Outcome: Their new enhanced website was benchmarked against The American Customer Satisfaction Index and was found to give a customer satisfaction rating of 92%, which was higher than Amazon’s score of 88%.
For a central government department, I carried out research with a small team on how we could make the work permit system easier to manage.
Outcome: After six months we were able breakdown data from the interviews to help the government department outline proposals for new software that would make the process of permit checking more accurate and efficient.
