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January 17, 2010

Creative Group Supervision - starting in the Spring

Would you like to experiment with using creative resources in your coaching?

Would you like to find new ways when either you or your client feels 'stuck'?

These are just two things that you will gain by engaging in a 12 month programme of creative supervision with me, starting in Spring 2010.

The group will be small - six coaches.
We'll have six 'short' days of coaching supervision in West London.

This will be an opportunity to enjoy personal and professional support, working with right-brained approaches on coaching issues and your practice, and give and receive feedback and reflect on the content and process of your work.

For more information, give me a ring on 020 8995 5485.

Posted by Alison at 03:18 PM | Comments (0)

As a Consultant, how am I doing as a Team Leader?

I've been struck recently by the difficulty that we as independent consultants sometimes have in leading a team on a client project. Even though we may coach our clients to develop their leadership capabilities, as an essentially 'free', independent spirit, I myself don't necessarily find it easy to collaborate or work effectively as a leader or team member.

It's not enough to presume that other consultants will want to work on a project with me just because it's guaranteed work, particularly and even in the current climate. There's a lot more at stake.

I've been revisiting Stephen Covey 'Seven Habits of Highly Effective People' and his chapter on 'Interdependence'. Here he talks of establishing the Emotional Bank Account when engaging a team in a new project.

To build up the bank account we need trust, respect, listening, and time spent in getting to know and understand each other and our respective values.

I realise that while I am fastidious about 'contracting' I have found myself drifting on occasion from his underpinning philosophy of a co-created "Win/Win outcome or No Deal" agreement.

Posted by Alison at 02:59 PM | Comments (0)

Creative Touch - Review of 2009

Happy New Year! Already we're half way through January and I'm only just getting started on 'blogging' for the year. Before looking forward to exciting projects in 2010, I wanted to spend a little time reflecting on one of the major initiatives that I worked on in 2009.

This was of course, the programme of Creative Touch Workshops and Master Classes that Louise and I ran for coaches and consultants.

Some of the things that stood out for me:

* Louise and I 'practised' i.e. facilitated each other in every exercise that we chose to use in our workshops, which of course gave us the experience of being a participant. This really helped us as facilitators, to empathise with the participants, to anticipate possible hiccups and to determine how best to set up the exercises.

* In our last workshop, by way of preparation, we invited people to consider what creativity meant to them instead of identifying a problem that they wanted to work on during the workshop. This made a huge impact on the engagement of the participants.

* A huge thank you to everyone who came and shared our learning. Without everyone being willing to disclose their nervousness about creativity, be willing to experiment and take risks trying new techniques, this programme wouldn't have been nearly so rewarding.

* With practice in using new and different resources, I came to appreciate that any nervousness that my client may feel about using creative tools may well come from my own anxiety or discomfort in applying them. So, while there are some resources such as picture cards that I'm very comfortable with, I know I hesitate to invite clients to draw or paint, because I personally don't feel so comfortable working with these methods. More practice!

Posted by Alison at 02:44 PM | Comments (0)