Greetings one and all,
I’ve recently completed my stint training the troops with Birmingham City Council housing departments and it has been both a challenge and a super-rewarding experience. A big thank you goes out to all of the usual suspects who have supported my endeavours and I’m looking forward to seeing how the staff put their learning and development into practice.
The two and a half day’s training were created bespoke for Birmingham. I absorbed myself within the lives of the residents of Birmingham. The trials and tribulations faced by people under threat of homelessness or living in poor, rundown conditions. The perils of private landlords who are not wonderfully supportive. The list is endless. The staff were certainly impressed with the level of my research plus the case studies, my training films, interviews and knowledge of the local area. It pays to do your research folks!
Birmingham City Council is going above and beyond to equip its staff with both knowledge and compassion. It’s a loooooong journey that they’re embarking on, and do you know what? They’re doing it. They’re making a difference and doing things differently.
Here is a smattering of the 100% positive feedback I received from last week’s session. I was suitably impressed with all who attended and took part. I’d especially like to shout out to Shamsun (Sam) who has the unenviable task of working alongside teacher (as there was odd numbers on training) and she showed me what a superb human being she is, going above and beyond for the residents of Birmingham and her colleagues. Excellent work.
Onward, ever onward, to new adventures.
“Steven delivered a thought-provoking and inspiring course over the past two and a half days. The course has challenged my own communication skills to allow a new approach when working with residents. I particularly enjoyed listening and responding to the case studies, Ryan, in particular, is a wonderful individual, brave enough to share such a raw account of his own personally journey through life so far. His journey provoked many thoughts and how a range of communication approaches can empower an individual to improve and create healthier life choices. I look forward to attending further training delivered by Steven.”
Nina
“The three-day course was very insightful and informative. The Six Step Change Plan was extremely helpful for myself because it enabled me to map out certain improvements and changes, I need to make in the workplace. Going forward I will use some of the techniques I learned such as paraphrasing and summarising. Overall, I enjoyed the course and Steven’s acting deserves an academy.”
Brendon
I found this course fascinating and helpful, and I can already see how I’ll be able to use my new skills and knowledge with my residents. I liked the mix of group activities, explanations, and videos. It kept the sessions engaging and is much more useful that 2 days of PowerPoints! It was really nice to hear customers’ real stories, particularly Ryan who spoke about his own experiences. Hearing how he has turned his life around is inspirational. Steven himself is obviously very knowledgeable and passionate, and that comes through in his teaching. His anecdotes and stories really help to cement the things that we were learning into real life.
Stef
“I Loved your training. Keep up the hard work going. Ryan was brilliant too, hats off to him.”
Sophia
“Thank you again, Steven, for a fantastic interactive training session. I have got so much out of these last 2.5 days. Your compassion for the case studies you supplied is awesome. You are someone who clearly knows your stuff and you deliver it all with such passion and gusto. I look forward to working with you again, for any future training needs at BCC.”
“Steven delivered this learning with such passion, with smatterings of comedy too to make everyone feel at ease. He involved every member of the group at all times, made it fun and I felt that everyone engaged well. I know I certainly did. Steve was very receptive to our comments and his openness towards the group ensured that he was received well. His approach is laidback, whilst maintaining professionalism at all times. All the learning resources that Steve used, were valuable and certainly refreshed my learning from many years ago.
The case studies that he chose were also very informative and made me realise that we certainly should not make assumptions on people’s lives. I know we all know this, but it is very easy for us to make judgements and enforce our own opinions, sometimes. It brought back home that there are many people out there with far far worse situations and puts our own issues into perspective.
I came into this job with a view to helping those in society who need our support;
Steve’s presentations and training certainly reinforced that for me, most especially because he himself showed such compassion and understanding for those people who have had a rough start in life, or who have fallen onto hard times.
I felt very comfortable getting involved in this type of interactive training.
On a personal level, Steve instilled a sense of confidence in me , by giving me positive feedback.
I would be happy to go on all training provided by this gentleman. 😊”
Sam
“Considering the training was on zoom for 2 and a half days I found the training accessible and engaging. No role play was good and the video’s were helpful to give real life examples of what was being discussed. The complex nature of some of the clients we will come across and how to deal with them were well communicated.”
Jon
“I found the training well-constructed and Steven offered a unique method of training with sense of humour and easy going. There was lot to take in over the 3 days but the content was very valuable and feel when this is put in practice would indeed demonstrate the confidence in understanding client’s needs, perception and offer the right help and support. I do feel this this training would be better conducted in a classroom base rather then over zoom to achieve greater outcome and understanding. hank you for the training. It was truly valuable and will certainly will help in the performance of job.”
Mohammad