Simon de Deney Director
As well as being an experienced trainer and role-player Simon de Deney is an accomplished actor, writer and theatre director. He has a MA in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from Oxford University and a diploma in acting from Webber Douglas Academy. He has over ten years of writing experience both commercially as well as for television, film and radio. He works as a trainer for companies internationally and in the UK, developing and delivering courses up to partner level.
The question that kept coming back to me at drama school was ‘Why aren‘t we taught all these breathing, voice and physical skills at our ordinary schools?‘ It‘s really interesting, if, like me, you do a number of different things. You‘re always faced with the dilemma of how you introduce yourself to people. I tend to choose the thing I‘m doing most of at the time. You get a very different reaction if you introduce yourself as an actor than if you choose director or writer. There‘s a sense that the emotional and physical skills that the job demands of you must separate you from the rest of humanity. Which is why helping people to overcome their fears, allowing them to communicate persuasively and confidently is deeply rewarding.
Julia Haythorn Director
Julia Haythorn is a highly experienced coach, facilitator and certified NLP Master Practitioner and Trainer and an International Teaching Seminars certified coach and member of the International Coaching Federation. She studied acting at East 15 Acting School, English Literature at Leeds University and is a Licentiate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama (LGSM).
She uses her background as a professional actress to make her coaching enjoyable and interesting. Her style is warm and humorous but with a clear understanding around how to hold clients to account. Her work over the last 18 years has allowed her to work in a coaching and training relationship with diverse nationalities, professions and people.
She‘s designed and delivered many team building, presentation skills and communication skills courses for a wide variety of companies throughout the UK and Europe.
“I spent several very enjoyable and admittedly bizarre years working for a murder mystery company running team-building events for businesses. I was struck how difficult a great many people found it to stand up in front of their colleagues and speak. They were very nervous, they didn‘t seem to know what to do with their hands or how to stand and they often spoke too quickly or quietly. I realised that I had been taught at drama school how to do all those things and that the skills I had learnt there and used in my acting career could be very useful to other people. It appeared that the techniques of communicating were a secret known only to a few people and that seemed rather unfair. I‘d been lucky enough to have some great training and now I love sharing the skills of being a great presenter with other people.”
Jude is a highly experienced leadership and team development specialist who spent 8 years working for Deloitte supporting Senior Managers, Directors & Partners. She is accredited through the European Mentoring and Coaching Counsel and holds a MSc in Organisational Behaviour from Birkbeck.
Through her work as an executive coach and facilitator she challenges individuals and teams to perform at their best through increased self-awareness and deeper understanding of the system they operate in. She believes in her clients’ inner resilience to find their own solutions and works in a way that creates the time and space to do so.
Jude’s clients are typically leaders who are juggling with how to be their best at work and at home. She has helped many technical specialists grow into themselves as leaders and works with them to build better relationships with their clients, teams and peers.
“There often seems to be a sense in corporate life, especially when you are the leader, that you should leave all your negatives at the door. But life doesn’t work like that, to be a good leader you have to lead from who you are. I work with my clients to integrate their home and work personas so they find a way to lead that is authentic, genuine and rewarding rather than draining. It is so much fun seeing someone get even more successful by emphasising who they are and not what others want them to be.”
After graduating with a BSc in Psychology, Tracy worked in marketing as a writer/researcher and then trained consecutively as a dramatherapist and actor. She has now been working as a professional actor and in training for over 20 years
As an actor Tracy has worked in theatre and film for organisations including the National Theatre. She originally specialised in physical theatre and relishes utilising her knowledge of body language and spatial relationships to develop presence and impact in others.
In training she has worked as an actor facilitator for blue chip organisations across all sectors and from graduate to board level.
“I particularly enjoy working with individuals to better know themselves and develop their abilities to face challenges in the workplace.”
Jessica has 15 years’ experience in the learning and development field as a training facilitator in all areas of impact and communication skills.
She qualified as an advanced practitioner executive coach in 2013 with the Academy of Executive Coaching.
She is currently undertaking the foundation year of psychotherapy training to support her work as a coach and deepen her understanding of how to unlock people’s potential.
Following a degree in Social Anthropology from Cambridge University, Jessica worked for commercial property development firm HRO International in Paris before retraining as an actress. She brings her experience of the corporate and acting worlds together in her approach to people development, with an understanding of the challenges and pressures of the corporate environment, and her own journey of growing self-awareness acquired through her training and work as an actress.
Over the years she has helped develop the communication skills of employees in companies ranging from major financial institutions, transport companies, pharmaceutical companies, to manufacturing and IT.
“My great belief stemming from my own life experience is that as humans we have great potential to change, and most of us aspire to work on and improve ourselves and our relationships with others. Oftentimes however, learned patterns of behaviour have become so much part of our sense of identity that we cannot see how they may no longer be serving a useful purpose, and instead hinder our ability to communicate effectively and maintain healthy work and personal relationships. I love to be alongside people as they grow their self-awareness and start to make different choices in what they do and how they do it, in order to achieve the outcomes they desire.”
Niall’s interest in leadership began at school; reading Shakespeare, and being awarded an army scholarship, which meant a guaranteed place at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. After university, Niall’s career began with a year’s intensive leadership training at RMAS, followed by four years’ Commissioned service. Niall left the army to train for three years at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, followed by a relatively successful period as a professional actor – and yes he has been in ‘Line of Duty’. Since 2008, Niall has been delivering one-to-one coaching, and designing and facilitating experiential leadership development programmes, working with leaders at all levels, within the contexts of people, culture, and communication.
“I loved leading soldiers, but I was never much of a soldier myself, and I soon discovered my strengths lay in developing the individual and the team, rather than achieving military tasks. As an actor, I rekindled my passion for leadership development through role-play work. I subsequently found that being a coach and facilitator allowed me to play to my strengths. The people I work with now, respond well and benefit from my interventions, which is rewarding for everyone. No-one gets their boots wet, and no-one gets marched twenty miles in the wrong direction, whilst listening to me recite passages from Henry V.”
Ian McKechnie Coach
Ian is an ICF accredited career and leadership coach and workshop facilitator. He is based in London and works with international clients who need to drive performance in multi-cultural teams around the world – especially around communication issues in Europe and the Far East. He has over 300 hours practise and specialises in helping experienced businesspeople in major companies face challenge and change in the workplace and bring more of themselves to the role. Many of his clients are seeking greater confidence and purpose, and better ways to balance life with their ambition to perform well in demanding roles. A great deal of his work focuses on the mindset, motivation, beliefs and narratives people need to adopt to relate well to others and get what they truly want and deserve.
He has deep knowledge and experience around public speaking, influencing and Storytelling for business. He is licensed to use a range of diagnostic profiling tools including MBTI, Insights and Prophet for individual and team assessment.
Ian has a business background from senior marketing roles in the City where he worked for many years at Bloomberg and Thomson Reuters. He also holds a Masters degree in Strategic Marketing Management, which helps him get on the client’s wavelength and ask the questions that will move them quickly to action.
Kerrie Farrell Associate
Kerrie Farrell has more than 10 years experience in communications training. She has worked across many sectors both nationally and internationally – with large blue chip organisations, banks and investment companies. Clients include Goldman Sachs, Deutsche, Credit Suisse, GIC, Barclays, Rackspace, LinkedIn & Dropbox.
Following her degree in Theatre Arts Kerrie spent the first 20 years of her career as a TV actress – with lead regular roles in Brookside, Hollyoaks and Where the Heart Is.. She then diversified by taking a Post Grad in Broadcast Journalism at London College of Communication and presented radio news bulletins on local and national radio. She’s also presented many hours of live talk TV.
In addition to role playing she has designed and facilitated courses as well as written training films. She has worked in many areas including Presentation Skills, Feedback skills, Interview Skills and many other challenging work conversations. ‘As an actor I think I always assumed I’d be confident in all communications situations – standing up to present or having a high stakes professional conversation. I was really surprised when I started news reading and presenting how much more exposed I felt standing up as ‘me.’ It wasn’t that it came ‘naturally’ or I had some ephemeral ‘presence’ that made it possible. What helped was the practical skills I have learnt over the years – working with the body, voice, breath control. Being really engaged in the moment and listening as well as talking. And above all else practising or ‘rehearsing’ the bits that I find challenging until I feel at ease.’
Mark Thompson Associate
Mark is an experienced executive coach, member of the CIPD and a trainer with 12 years of facilitating experience. He originally worked in financial services, both for Lehman Brothers and Deutsche Bank before making a transition into acting. He studied at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School as a mature student and has been a professional actor since 2002. He’s worked in the corporate training and consultancy since 2005, when an MD in an infrastructure project management firm asked for help with putting together a successful pitch bid for a £1.1 billion PFI project.
He has worked across sectors and at all levels of seniority from graduate recruitment programmes up to the C-suite / Board and coaching blue-chip CEOs.
“What excites me is seeing real transformations in people and seeing change in how they deliver their message. I love being able to come at clients from a variety of approaches – whether as an actor and looking at someone’s physical presence and how they use their voice, as an executive coach where I can challenge their deep-seated beliefs and thinking patterns or as a trainer where I can introduce them to new ideas and concepts as to how they can approach their communication. For me, finding the key to making real, positive lasting change is what makes this job exciting.”
Sally Orrock Associate
Sally has been working as a Facilitator and Coach for over 15 years working with clients across all sectors including: Goldman Sachs, Barclays, Credit Suisse, FCA, BBC, Bentley, VW, BMW, Specsavers, Unilever, NHS and the RSPCA.
She has a degree in Psychology and Drama, a postgrad in Acting and a teaching qualification. As an actor she has worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company, performed in over 100 plays on BBC Radio 4 and is a prolific Voice Over artist.
“As I started to work in the corporate sector as a trainer it came as a shock me how vulnerable I felt being ‘just me’ in front of a group of people and how comforting the rehearsal process had been when working on a play.
Being able to combine my acting skills of relaxation, voice and storytelling with the tools I have learnt from my communications training has enabled me to create practical short cuts to access those skills. Allowing me to feel more confident.
Having experienced the huge impact this work has had on me and the people I train has made me passionate about creating a warm, fun, inclusive environment for people to work in. To present these skills in a useable way, that’s not a one size fits all, but to find the bespoke skills and tools for each delegate.”
