Network Learning Event 20th October 2011

The Network Learning Event took place at the award-winning Conference Centre at LACE, which is situated on the edge of Sefton Park in Liverpool.

The theme of the event was Enhancing Leadership & Performance at Work and was

attended by over 50 members of the scheme. Delegates consisted of both mentors and

mentees, representing both NHS and local government organisations within the North West

of England.

As delegates arrived, they were asked to sign in at the reception area and received their

name badge and the infamous “Icebreaker Activity”. Some great stories arose from that

activity including finding out that someone had saved the life of a dolphin and that someone

owns their own lake!

Following lunch, the Scheme Manager, Rob Booth, welcomed everyone in attendance and gave a short update on the scheme. Rob announced plans to run an ILM accredited mentoring program and talked about the success of recent Resilience for Managers training. Rob also shared the news that the scheme has successfully run NLP Diploma programs in conjunction with Bridge Associates.

Rob introduced the key speaker for the event, Vicki Espin, MA, Corporate and Executive

Coach and Co-founder and Director of The Corporate and Executive Coaching Organisation.

Vicki is a highly skilled, professional corporate and executive coach with more than 20 years’

experience of working with UK and multi-national organisations representing a wide

spectrum of business sectors. Acclaimed as one the UK s top executive coaches, her work

includes 1:1 coaching and team coaching with business leaders, the training of new coaches

within organisations and of professional coaches.

Vicki engaged delegates immediately by opening with questions about what each person

would be taking away with them from the day. Following a brief introduction, Vicki covered

the characteristics of leaders, their environment and detailing various behaviours. Vicki went

on to explore how different styles of leading people can directly impact on performance, and

used interactive cards and Fink Cards in group activities. Vicki then closed with an

interesting study question:

“Reflect on some of the major forces that have influenced your organisation’s environment over the past 3 years:

• Economic

• Environmental • Emerging Technologies

• People’s Expectations

How do your answers impact your thinking and actions as business leaders?” We would love to hear what you came up with and if you would like to share please email us at the scheme at nwmentoring@gmw.nhs.uk.

Rob came back to thank Vicki for her enigmatic and engaging presentation and delegates were given an opportunity to provide feedback and enter a prize draw from both the networking activity and feedback cards.

The networking activity prize was a pack of Fink Cards; coaching questions on cards which have been used successfully in mentoring sessions. The feedback card winner was very fortunate to receive a signed copy of Vicki’s book,:”Your Life Your Choice Building a Great Coaching Business77 habits of Highly Successful Coaches”, which she had kindly donated to support the event.

All in all the day was a huge success and the team would like to thank everyone who

attended and especially Vicki for sharing her enthusiasm, expertise and valuable time with

us.

The team would like to extend our gratitude to the members and stakeholders who have

helped The North West Mentoring Scheme to grow from strength to strength through your

participation and support.

We look forward to seeing you at the next network learning event!

Excellent56%

Very Good41%

Good3%

Event Overall

Excellent63%

Very Good31%

Good6%

Speaker

Excellent32%

Very Good47%

Good21%

Q &A Session

Excellent59%

Very Good38%

Good3%

Venue (inc catering)

Evaluation Summary

We received excellent feedback from this event and 32 evaluation forms were collected. These provided the Scheme with extremely valuable feedback/comments which can be found below and will be posted to the website and used to enhance our future events.

“A genuinely useful session with lots of

useful references that I will read up on.”

“It is an excellent event.”

“Really good speaker, made me think

and inspired me.”

“Really liked the enhancing performance

model”

“Vicki has given ‘food for thought’.

Presentation very good.”

“Very informative, lively”

“After 30 minutes at my first event, great

advice and some great contacts.”

“Got support from the group at my table”

“I have learnt more in this afternoon

session than many others on

leadership/performance.”

“Excellent session, thought provoking”

“Good reflective skills, new tools, new

network.”

“Enjoyed it, thank you!”

“A great event.”

“My first networking event and I found it

very informative and well organised.”

“Keep doing what you’re doing!”

“All sessions were very well presented.”

Feedback Cards: How has mentoring impacted on your career?

Winner: (won a signed copy of Vicki’s book: Your Life Your Choice Building a Great Coaching Business77 habits of Highly Successful Coaches)

“Home Life Balance - Stresses of being a full time working single mother are left behind the

line when entering the door to work. So the impact of my stressors does not relay onto the

team.”

Melanie Traynor, Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust

Other comments from the feedback cards include:

Given a focus to my role of developing others and clarity to my own direction both

professionally and personally. Sandra Edwards, St. Helen’s & Knowsley Hospitals

NHS Trust

It’s allowed me time to reflect on possibilities and career direction in a very

unthreatening way.

Developed my aspirations and promoted confidence in my ability resulting in

promotion. Cathy McGin, NHS Warrington

Given me insight into other people’s view of the NHS. Improved my feedback skills

to my team. Nick Hayes, Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust

It has provided me with reference guides and tools to enable me to develop and

reflect on my skills and development, and focus on my career.

Comments from Evaluation Forms:

What, in your opinion, worked well today?

Setup and balance of interaction vs powerpoint

Excellent content – things I can utilise at a later date

References to research

Single speaker with theme

Speaker used some great coaching questions throughout the session

What are you taking away from the day?

More awareness about benefits of mentoring

All factors that influence performance and how I can change to accommodate

A different perspective on improving performance

Fink cards idea & creative questioning

What could be improved next time?

Nothing, really good!

More time, maybe full day

Put ‘networking’ time on the break rather than at the end

All worked well – keep doing same

What would you like to see happen next?

I would like to attend more similar sessions

More of the same – high quality practising coaches/mentors

Looking forward to new website to see if there is good tools to access

Equally good speakers