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Graham Bennett – Presentation SkillsLeadership, Presentation and Relationship BuildingI lead a double life.I love developing people through the work I do at Impact Factory. And crucially, throughout the last 8 or more years, Impact Factory has developed me too. I have been an actor for over 26 years, and an occasional theatre director. In that world I am professionally known as Graham Christopher. In the last 3 years I have created my own theatre company, Daylight Players, to direct a production of "Romeo & Juliet" in Sweden, Denmark, England and Ireland throughout 2003/04, which led to an invitation in 2006 to direct "Twelfth Night" by Shakespeare for Gavle Folk Teater in Sweden - in Swedish. Both were enthusiastically received. As a result, I am now determined to realise an ambition to direct in the theatre for many years to come - one I previously thought impossible for me to achieve. For the last few years I have delivered Presentation Skills training to many clients - Merrill Lynch, Mastek, Herbalife, Raytheon, rpm, Pfizer, and numerous individuals. A central feature of that training is "it's not so much about what you say, as how you say it". This was never truer than when directing a play in Swedish! In fact what has fascinated me for years about the playing of theatre in daylight is the relationship between the player and the audience, how it affects eye contact, body language, tone of voice, the pace of delivery, the shaping of the story, and how playing with the careful balance of these components can make for a very different experience of Shakespeare's plays, and leave a memorable, fulfilling and somehow deeper effect upon an audience. This is also true in a presentation. For many years my double life included working with Globe Education at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, where I gave workshops and talks about how the communication dynamic works in the Globe Theatre. Inspired by my early training at Impact Factory I created a presentation about "Daylight Playing", which was interactive, lively and fun - just like all the work we do here. In 2000 I was invited to tour this presentation around schools and universities in the west coast of the USA. My recent directing projects are a fulfilment of ideas I have been experimenting with for years. The Leadership training that I have run at Impact Factory - for Barnet Council, and Swale Borough Council, amongst others - has reminded me to look for the numerous opportunities that can present themselves to put your "head above the parapet" and take an initiative in life; how to inspire and motivate; to see what's going on for everyone in your team - and to manage it; to self-disclose and to acknowledge one's own vulnerability in order to lead through difficult situations. All this has aided my leadership style in all of my work. I'm also an Improviser - by inclination and in practise. I've always had to do things my own way - that's another reason why I'm leading a double life. I used to improvise for a paying audience, as a performer. Then I ran my own improvisation classes. Now I'm doing it for a paying audience - as a trainer. I am an advocate of "keeping it fresh", keeping oneself on one's toes and the audience awake. This is the approach I have always taken in Presentation & Communication skills, Leadership, and particularly in building Customer Relationships and Client Relationships over the telephone as well as face to face - The Customer Response Advisors at Huntingdonshire District Council experienced that when we trained the entire new team in 2005. Now they are experiencing over 90% customer satisfaction. Inevitably, one aspiration I have for this coming year is to surprise, and to be surprised. I would surprise myself if I developed an Improvisation skills programme for Impact Factory. I want to apply the daylight playing experiment to a Scandinavian classic of Strindberg or Ibsen. I am determined to market myself as a theatre director in the UK, as well as in Sweden. I am determined to talk to my existing Impact Factory clients more regularly, wherever I happen to be in the world - and to make new clients for Impact Factory, wherever they happen to be in the world - so expect a call! This "biography" is a statement of intent to declare my double life to the world, and to enable my two worlds to collide. I said at the start of this ramble through my world that I love developing people at Impact Factory, and so I have developed our Train the Trainer programme too. But I must say that for me Impact Factory is "more than just training…" Leadership, Presentation and Relationship Building
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