Blog

In my previous career, I had to assure training to make sure what was being delivered was fit for purpose. This meant I was lucky enough to see lots of different trainers deliver lots of different lessons, but it also meant I got to see things I didn’t expect or want to see… When we deliver training, we often put so...

All of us have a book to write, and we all could write plenty of chapters. What a great experience to do this to find how your journey has evolved and where you are today. There will be highs and lows, but overall the positive from it needs to be congratulated. Think about how much success you have had in...

Quite a lot of people on our Train the Trainer courses who deliver training tell us they won’t or don’t train exclusively; it’s usually a secondary job in addition to their other job(s).  When you have a forced break from training or deliver irregularly, it’s very easy for you to get skills fade.  But when you can train correctly, do you really...

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...