April 2019

I recently had an experience where someone took me flying and nearly killed me!  I am a pilot and regularly fly in our North East home, and I am fortunate enough to experience flying frequently.  The pilot in charge was very experienced in terms of operational procedures but unaware to me, had real issues with the runway we were using that day...

I continue to find that I need to separate the differences between the two labels that are coaching and training as they continue to be miss-understood. The boundaries between coaching, training, mentoring and counselling continue to confuse everywhere I go. Every time I deliver either a training course or a coaching course I separate the differences at the start, and...

Lately, in my blogs, I’ve been concentrating a lot on the skills and techniques around training such as motivation and engagement.  This is because I’d been doing a lot of Ski training in the Austrian Alps where I’d had to try and work through some real inner ‘demons’ to meet the standard of an intensive course.  On reflection, I’ve had a hugely...

I want to share a recent experience which happened to me.  As I am sure, you can appreciate being a trainer within a training company we use hotel and venue facilities regularly.  The majority are, in my opinion, good and offer an excellent service and reasonable value for money; I want to point out that I am always the first to comment...

I thought I would continue with some blogs on coaching for managers. If anything it will help you consider/reflect on what you do compared to what you think you do. Where could you change? Coaching sessions need to be valued; they need to be prepared for and not just ad hoc. There has to be time given to prepare and...

In my life, I’ve had many moments both personal and professional where I’ve perhaps lacked a bit of self-motivation; you know those thoughts that manifest themselves as a limiting self-beliefs. - We tell ourselves, “I can’t do this” and what happens next? Precisely what we manifested; we more often than not fail in our task!  What though can happen if we add...

One of the critical areas of our management development courses is the elements we cover on understanding behaviour.  We get so many comments regarding this aspect of the training including the fact that we may be using some ‘dark art’ regarding how we can understand how a person operates or how they behave and communicate. Unfortunately, there is nothing dark about...

What do you do when a coachee is sitting in front of you with their view on the world where you may see a different view in the way they are talking. How do you question this? Should you drive the direction? Questioning is key to a good coaching session; how do you guide and get the coachee to think...

Every time I travel and especially when visiting the larger metropolitan cities, it always staggers me how much people exist in their own little micro ‘bubble’ letting the world go by in ignorance.  Smart devices and social media haven’t exactly helped of late, but it’s not just in recent times that this has been the case: I remember as a child...