Countdown to Success
Like a lot of people, I probably spend too much time on my phone playing games. A long-term favourite has been ‘The Chase’, but just recently I’ve been getting into Countdown, based on the long-running TV show. Having tried Countdown once or twice on the ‘hard’ setting and being totally humiliated by a computer (I […]
Teaching Offline Social Skills in Online Trainings
Preparing the Completely Unprepared There are many reasons why online learning is amazing. You can learn from anywhere in the world and connect with folks you would never have the opportunity to meet in real life. All you need is an internet connection and you can learn anything from anywhere. There are thousands of amazing […]
Soft skills: preparing the leaders of tomorrow
Leadership programmes are failing the soft skills test, but L&D has a golden opportunity to help teams prepare for the future. Rapid technology-driven changes in connectivity, knowledge, communication and geographical reach are forcing organisations to change the way they conduct their business. The problem is that our leadership development programmes are not keeping up. The […]
Soft skills: creating a good communications culture
In order to drive continued success, organisations need to learn how to turn soft skills into the hard stuff of success. “The skills and ingenuity of our people are at the heart of prosperity,” said the opening statement of the 2017 CBI/Pearson Education and skills survey, a report which goes on to reveal that more than […]
How to Upgrade Your Professional Consciousness
“Consciousness is your operating system. Mindfulness is the upgrade.” Imagine for a moment that you were a computer. What sort of error messages would you have seen already today? SYSTEM ERROR: Information overload. Status: critical. SYSTEM ERROR: You are attempting to relax. This function is not permitted. SYSTEM ERROR: Anxiety detected. Processing may be haphazard. […]
How accurate is our ability to self-evaluate? Are you as good as you think you are?
Research published in 1999 revealed the existence of what’s known as The Dunning-Kruger effect. This is a cognitive bias of illusory superiority, where people judge themselves as better than others in all manner of areas, e.g. leadership, skills, performance. The reasons for this are many and varied. For example: we all have pockets of vulnerability […]
How to set up bespoke internal training plans
Training is not just an important part of personal career progression, through effective training you can improve the skills of your whole workforce, in turn making your business more productive and your employees more satisfied. The type of internal training programs your organisation can benefit from will strongly depend on your goals, resources, amount of […]
How to improve employee satisfaction amongst staff
According to a survey by Personal Group, 55.6% of all UK workers are dissatisfied in their current role. This is an overwhelming percentage especially considering the fact that dissatisfaction accumulates over time and is arguably easy to avoid. Understanding what causes employee dissatisfaction The first step in tackling employee dissatisfaction is being aware of how […]
Changing Fixed Habits On Horseback
As some of you will know from previous blogs, outside of work, one of my great joys is spending time with my horses, who are currently in livery on Dartmoor. I have two; one who is 25 and (officially) retired, and another that I trained from scratch, who will be 10 this year. My ten […]
3 Ways To Improve Your Learning Potential At Work
Whether you’re working on a degree, continuing education in your career or just wanting to brush up on some information at your current job, you need to figure out some ways to hack your learning. This will not only shorten the time it takes for you to learn the material, it also deepens the impression […]
The real reason we’re so busy: six ways to reclaim more space and time
It often feels as if we’re on a treadmill, life is getting busier and busier and we are having to run faster and faster just to keep up. We are so busy we feel we can never slow down, for fear of falling off the treadmill and life imploding in one cataclysmic bang. So, instead, […]
Time to Scrap Topic Specific Courses?
I got very excited recently when I read that Finland is set to become the first country in the world to get rid of all school subjects. From 2020, for children over 16, there’ll be no more science lessons, no more geography, no more history and no more boring maths! What!? Have the Finn’s, respected […]
Trump’s Feedback
In a week when I was launching a new training module on giving feedback, it was perhaps ironic that President Trump was in the news again for his unusual method of firing staff. This time it was Secretary of State Rex Tillerson who apparently discovered he’d lost his job when Mr Trump announced his replacement on Twitter. If […]
Soft skills: how to teach the missing basics to today’s young talent
Just imagine the impact you could have if you were to spend time every week systematically building up the soft skills of your team. You will send a powerful message, week by week. You will make them aware. You will make them care. You will help them learn the missing basics one by one – one […]
Six steps to achieve real behaviour change at work
Changing our behaviour is hard, even when we know what we want to change about ourselves. We have to recognise that desire to change is often not enough. That’s because the emotional centres of our brain learn from ‘doing’, not just ‘knowing’ what we want to change. And if we don’t practice behaviour change constantly, […]
How to influence in the overwhelming world of communication
How can you influence your employees in the overwhelming world of communication? Presentation coach Simon de Cintra reveals his top tips. The art of effective communication is so critical in this modern, ever inclusive world, with the need to connect and engage effectively across countries, languages, religion, ages, gender and more. To get the best […]
3 Tips For Better Training And Productivity
When you need to make sure that your small business is thriving, it pays for you to set up some parameters that help everyone succeed, improve through training and set up processes that help you all stay productive. With a small business, it’s crucial to set up a nucleus that will continuously grow. It’s important […]
How to Simplify Your Leadership in 7 Steps
Being an effective leader ultimately comes down to two things – leadership and communication. Of course, successful management is multi-faceted and often tricky, but at its core remains a simple truth – leadership is about an ability to influence and motivate other people, and to do this we must be able to clearly and effectively […]
3 Keys To Building A Killer Team
Without a doubt, you need a solid nucleus of stars to help you achieve your goals as a professional or a company. No one does anything alone, and you’ll go much further aligning your energy, creativity and resources with others who are joined together for a common goal. Napoleon lays out this mastermind group philosophy […]
Team types – which one are you?
Six years ago my colleague Lois Burton and I identified five different team types – this was not an academic exercise – (goodness knows, there’s enough theory about teams out there to last a lifetime) – but one based on our experience of working with numerous leadership teams across all sectors over a ten year […]
