Coaching the coach

I was really inspired by a course that I attended this week. It was without doubt the best course that I have attended for many years. The topic was “Coaching in Leadership”, and was facilitated by a guy called Joe Lafferty.

His style and the topic appealed to me in equal measure. I guess that the coaching approach fits naturally with my approach – although there are still lots of things to learn and develop.

During the practical exercise, the facilitators had to join the small work groups to make the number work, and Joe joined the group that I was in. Being a bit slow on the uptake, I let my colleague go first, then I realised that this meant that I would be playing the role of coach for the coach. (Must learn to think ahead a bit more!) Actually it went fairly well, and Joe was complimentary about my efforts.

During these exercises we were dealing with real issues for each of us. While I’m not going to break the confidentiality agreement, using the coaching approach with Joe’s problem triggered some thoughts for me. There will be developments in the near future – check back over the next couple of days for more info.

Friday photo: thrupenny bit

A terrible thing happened at school today...

... don't panic - it's not real.

Dolly D attended a stage make-up workshop as part of an 'activity day'. The results are quite impressive. So impressive that she had to go to her cello lesson like this! The Fish Wife had to go in first and warn the teacher that it wasn't real.

Activity days!! Call that education... when I was a lad we actually learned things at school (but try telling that to young people nowadays).

Inspired - first tentative steps

I started to write an entry last week and interrupted myself... several days later I've remembered what I was going to write about.

A friend lent me a book a while back (which I will return soon), which really inspired me. It was called Doorposts by Timothy Botts. The basic idea is that he has taken passages of scripture and presented them as calligraphy. Now my talents are significantly less impressive, but it inspired me and I've made some tentative steps of my own (see below). It kind of links to my thoughts on Praying in Color and also Richard Rohr's idea of having a current mantra. Anyway I'm finding it quite useful and therapeutic and challenging and inspiring. I may show some of my further attempts in due course.

It's also prompted some thoughts about motivation, which I'll come back to later.

Friday photo: Arbroath marina

Inspired #2

This wasn't what I'd planned to write about tonight, but...

It was a beautiful drive to work this morning. I was a wee bit early and the traffic was a wee bit lighter. The sky was clear, the sun was shining, and as I approached Arbroath the sea was shimmering and glistening before me. So, I took a slight detour, down to one of the harbours and spent a few minutes taking photos. It was so lovely, and still, and inspiring - a really good start to the day.

This was the scene shortly before 8 a.m. this morning.


And the rest of the day went pretty well too!

Inspired

Last week I was at a conference for a day. To be honest I wasn't really looking forward to it much. Aye, I expected some interesting presentations; and, aye, it would be good to catch up with people that I only ever seem to see at these sort of things; and, aye, a wee bit of time thinking about the 'bigger picture' rather than the day-to-day minutiae of Sleepy Hollow would be good. But there was that nagging doubt about priorities and the added value of a day out of the office etc, etc.

I should say that I'm normally a big advocate of cpd activities, so this was an unusual mood for me. Especially since a friend of mine was taking on the role of President of our association at the conference. But I was giving up a role that I've held for a couple of years, and while I'm glad to be released from the responsibility, I guess I will miss it (a wee bit).

Anyway, the first session was one of those "in conversation" things. Famous presenter talks to someone with an amazing personal story etc, etc, etc.

It was brilliant - and snapped me out of my truculent mood. The presenter - Sally Magnusson - was superb. Probing, insightful, well-researched and deft of touch - lightening the mood when emotions were heightened.

But the subject was truly inspirational. He's a guy named Jamie Andrew - he's a mountaineer who got caught in a storm at the top of a French alp in the middle of winter for five days! His climbing partner died and Jamie had such severe frostbite that both feet and both hands had to be amputated. He told his story with humour and insight - aware that what he did was risky, but not overly risky in his view. The remarkable part though is how he has recovered. He has climbed again, including ice climbing; run marathons, completed an iron-man triathlon; snowboarded; skiied; and adopted an incredible, positive attitude. You can find out more at his website, which also contains links to the charity that he has co-founded.

Amongst other things that he talked about:

"The flame of passion [for mountaineering] hadn't been extinguished."

"It's a hugely important part of being a human being to push oneself."

"There's always a solution out there."

"Make the most of your strengths and work around the weaknesses."

An amazing story and an amazing man - truly inspirational. I'm glad that I went to the conference!