Have you ever noticed that you think more creatively while walking? Maybe you’ve spent hours thinking over a problem or a project, only to go out for a walk and come up with the solution.
Walking can have a profound impact on our brain function and creativity, stimulating cognitive processes, boosting our mood, and enhancing creative thinking. As an NLP coach, I’ll often lead in-person coaching sessions while walking. The change of scenery can be a great way to help clients access new ways of thinking about a topic, change their state, or get around mental blocks.
The effects of walking on cognitive performance
Studies have shown that walking promotes the production of neurochemicals such as serotonin and dopamine, which are responsible for regulating mood, reducing stress, and enhancing cognitive function. Walking has been shown to increase blood flow to the brain, leading to improved cognitive performance and enhanced problem-solving abilities.
Walking can also improve our ability to think creatively. A study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition found that individuals who walked while performing a creative thinking task produced more creative ideas compared to those who were seated. The study suggests that walking may enhance the ability to generate novel ideas by increasing the flow of ideas and associations in the brain.
Walking has been found to enhance the connectivity of brain regions involved in creative thinking. In a study published in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, researchers found that walking improved connectivity between brain regions associated with the default mode network, which is involved in creative thinking and imagination.
The benefits of walking coaching sessions
Walking coaching sessions are an excellent way to leverage the benefits of walking for cognitive and creative enhancement. NLP walking coaching sessions involve a coach guiding a client through a session while walking – ideally, somewhere with a great view, which we’ve got in spades here in Cornwall! Just like in a regular coaching session, the goal isn’t to instruct the client, but to facilitate their own creative or problem-solving process.
During a walking coaching session, we’ll use various NLP techniques such as visualisation, anchors, and language patterns to help the client towards their desired outcome. Each session is different, tailored specifically to an individual’s needs and goals.
Walking coaching sessions may also include elements of goal-setting and personal development. By combining the physical activity of walking with the mental focus of NLP techniques, clients can improve their ability to achieve their goals, overcome barriers and work towards their desired outcomes.
Feeling stuck? Try walking it off
While often overlooked as it’s something we do every day, walking is a powerful tool for enhancing brain function and creativity, enhancing cognitive processes, accessing new ideas, and improving creative thinking. Walking coaching sessions are an excellent way to leverage the benefits of walking and NLP techniques for cognitive and creative enhancement. So, next time you’re feeling stuck or need to come up with some creative ideas, take a walk and see what it does for your brain!
A large proportion of our working life is spent in communicating with and attempting to influence other people.
On this course, you will learn how to use Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) to enhance and improve the skills you already have.
Over 700 people have completed the NLP Business Practitioner course over the last 20 years and we have now updated this life changing course to make it even more effective.
The course is solution based so you can apply the learning immediately to improve your leadership, motivation, goal setting, selling, buying, presenting, performance management, confidence, state management, stress levels and understanding of yourself and others
NLP in a Business Environment
All business success relies heavily on the successful interaction of people. NLP skills can dramatically improve these interactions with a series of tools, techniques and methodologies which can be used effectively in all situations.
For Example
Negotiations become much more effective with improved rapport building skills, better understanding of participant’s needs and influencing techniques.
Presentations become much more effective, enjoyable and understandable to any audience.
More effective meetings and better teamwork also result from improved communication and understanding.
Recruitment and Selection becomes more effective as interviewers become more skilled at rapport building, asking ‘clean’ questions to obtain more accurate and detailed information.
Workplace Stress is becoming a major issue affecting all organisations. Stress is a physiological response to a situation. Individuals perceive situations differently, this perception is what drives their emotional state and behaviour. This is why some people are more affected by situations than others. We help people change their perception which has a knock on effect to their emotional state and behaviour.
Employees will dramatically improve their ability to learn quickly and effectively. The management of change becomes easier through increased learning, improved communication and the ability to break out of the circle of cause and effect.
What will you learn?
NLP – an introduction
Definitions
History
Possibilities
Presuppositions
Outcomes
Effective goal setting for your self and others
Chunking: Discovering whether people need ‘the big picture’ or the detail
Using this to get your message across successfully
Representational Systems
The difference between perception and reality
How we think and represent the world around us
How to discover the way others think
Rapport
Building and maintaining rapport
Calibrating
Calibrating the Body Language of others
Perceptual positions: Understanding the world from another’s point of view
Submodalities: The ‘building blocks’ of perception, beliefs and behaviour
Using and changing submodalities to attain your goal
Meta model: Understanding and removing the deletions, distortions and generalisations common to language
Challenging to obtain the ‘deep structure’ of language and ideas
Milton Model: Hypnotic language patterns
Metaphors and nested metaphors
Strategies: How people do what they do
How to elicit people’s strategies
The Course is held over 6 months with time to practice in between the one-day sessions.
What Some Delegates have said:
“If you would like to understand more about yourself, change the direction of your life and career then this is the course for you. I know it sounds corny but it changed my life, took my career in a new direction, made me more successful and increased my happiness levels. I would recommend this course to anyone that wants the self belief that they can change anything they want to, have the ability to do anything in life and that they have a choice to or not.”
Q: What makes this course different? A: This course is specifically focused on the business applications of NLP
Q: What support will I get during the Course? A: You will have access to the Trainer outside of the course sessions if you have any questions or problems, or need some help applying some of the learning
Q: How Experienced is the Trainer? A: Martin has been delivering NLP Business training for over 22 years, has worked with delegates from every conceivable business background and is an accredited NLP Master Trainer.
Interested?
You can book your space on Eventbrite.
Spaces are limited, so don’t too long.
If we are not selling a product or a service we are selling an idea or a point of view or even yourself. The Presenter’s Toolkit equips you to design and deliver winning presentations, whether that is a 90-second elevator pitch, a long conference presentation, a short review meeting with your team or even a written piece.
It is common to feel nervous when presenting – but you don’t need to. When you have the right tools you can feel confident and actually enjoy it.
Let us help you stay calm and engaged – but also have fun when presenting!
What you will learn
During this one day workshop, you will learn a number of helpful strategies as well as learning a simple and effective structure which will help you to perfect your delivery – even if you only have a minutes notice.
You will learn:
How to control your nerves
How to manage your state
How to Swap anxiety for confidence
Some specific body language techniques to gain the right response from your audience
How to structure your presentation to ensure your key messages are heard and understood
And you’ll learn 10 ways to avoid Death By Powerpoint!
Who is it for?
This workshop is tailored to help people from different industries at various stages in their careers. You may be a graduate or you may have 40 years experience. This doesn’t matter. The skills and techniques we will be teaching are transferable.
Are you trying to find a job to help you take that next step in your career?
Are you trying to grow your business by finding new clients?
Do you want to cement yourself as a thought leader and share your ideas at conferences?
Then you really shouldn’t miss this workshop!
Past client testimonials
“It went way beyond what you would normally expect in a presentation skills course – this is more than that. It’s about understanding how to structure a presentation. How to engage the audience on a deep level and how to be really impactful with your messaging.” Nicky Luke – Unlocking Potential – Recruitment & Talent Manager
“The tools and techniques I learned then have stayed with me in my future roles and I have used them in many ways consciously and unconsciously.” Carl Fitzsimons – Ecolab – Vice President HR
“What can I say about Martin? He not only has a huge range of tools in his developmental toolkits, he has the uncanny knack of knowing which tool is right for the job and the personal qualities to deploy each tool to best affect..“ Nik Green – Imerys – Learning & Development Specialist
Following a background in Manufacturing and R&D, Martin Crump has spent over twenty years as a training and development professional working at a strategic level with individuals within organisations throughout the UK.
He taught Management Development at Manchester Metropolitan University and is an NLP Master Practitioner and Certified NLP Master Trainer. Recently, he co-authored ‘’How to Build an Ark’ A guide to project leadership in the 21st century.’ And ‘Evolve or Die. The ultimate self-help book.’ Both these books are available to buy from Amazon.
Martin is committed to facilitating the realisation of the potential of individuals, and through those individuals the potential of organisations they are part of.
FAQs
Q. I have done a previous presenting course – what is different about yours? A. We introduce cutting-edge applied psychology tools and techniques to give you an edge. These include body language archetypes, how stories work at an unconscious level and the best way to use visual aids.
Q. Will I have to do a presentation on the course? A. No, there will be an opportunity to practice some of the techniques in pairs and in the main group but you won’t be put on the spot
Q. Is there any follow-up support? A. Yes, you will have the opportunity to tap into one to one coaching after the event to help you transfer and apply your learning
Q. Is lunch provided? A.Yes – please let us know if you have any dietary requirements
Book your tickets
You can book your tickets online through Eventbrite.
We have moved into a new office at the Health and Wellbeing Centre in Truro.
Ten years ago we were incredibly proud to move into the truly iconic Engine House in St. Agnes. The newly renovated building was a flagship project for Carrick District Council and the development was considered by them to be a “positive contribution to the World Heritage Status site.”
We successfully bid for shared tenancy with UKnetweb and we all moved in: Two businesses, one big happy family. We loved (and still love) this wonderful building as did everybody who visited.
However, it is fair to say that the building did not come without its problems. Before the renovation it had been roofless for over 60 years and it was never designed to be sealed and enclosed. It has been estimated that the walls hold approximately 40 tons of water so it is no surprise that damp was an issue from the start and visitors may remember that the building appeared to have a bad case of dandruff as we struggled to keep the paint on the walls.
Despite replacement pointing and the addition of an expensive air circulation system, the damp problem has become worse over time leading to extensive mould growth and, during certain weather conditions, water actually running down the inside walls.
So it is with great sadness that we have had to concede that the building is no longer a safe or healthy place to work and we have all moved out whilst we negotiate the best course of action with our Landlords at Cornwall Council.
Evolution is now based in The Health and Wellbeing Centre at Treliske. It is lovely to be surrounded by other, wonderful businesses and particularly nice to be warm and dry. We are considering this to be a very enjoyable sabbatical and hope to bring you news about the future of The Engine House soon.
If you are in the building feel free to pop in and say hello (unless we are out working with clients) otherwise you can continue to contact us on the same telephone number and email address.
Procurement has become an increasingly important function in a wide range of industries and business sectors.
It is seen as a strategic function, a function that touches and influences all aspects of a business’s operation. Procurement should facilitate, enable and empower but procurement is also often misunderstood and can lead to confrontation.
The language of procurement can be peppered with strange acronyms and it can be hard for people to hear past a wall of words studded with, “You have to…”, “We must…” and “You can’t…”.
And yet procurement is all about building relationships, relationships with suppliers as well as with departments and individuals within your own company.
NLP training can give Supply chain leaders and procurement managers the tools, skills and knowledge to use richer communication that will forge stronger relationships and add value to the process.
One example of just how effective this can be is Andy, Chief Procurement Officer at a large NHS Trust. He is responsible for a team of over 30 people who spend more than £150 million per year. Not long after he joined the Trust he was involved in a major project to enhance endoscopic surgery. This was the biggest project of its kind in Europe and his customer was a “prickly and vocal” Consultant Surgeon.
In fact, at the start of the project he was forwarded an email from this Consultant that simply said, “This is War!”, a rather forthright way of summing up the classic tension of two opposing philosophies familiar to many procurement professionals – the desire to spend and the need to save.
Choosing communication rather than confrontation, Andy used the skills he had gathered on one of our NLP Business Practioner courses to steer the project to a successful conclusion and at the end of that journey the same Consultant sent the following email to 150 NHS leaders:
Dear All
Re: Laparoscopic stacks – skills training
See enclosed photo – the new HD stack systems in the skills training room in the Radiology Academy – result!
Many thanks to all being involved in this initiative to bring us out of the dark ages (literally!).
The stacks for the rest of the hospital to follow shortly.
A special thanks to Andy XXX, whose god-like skills in the laparoscopic stack tender have saved the Trust ~£600k
Andy and his team continue to add value and save costs for the NHS. For example, they recently made a saving of £1million on a £3 million annual spend through collaborative working with various teams within the Trust.
The Consultant Surgeon now champions procurement within the Trust and leads a commercial team in addition to his work in theatre.
At Evolution we have a particular understanding of how NLP can benefit procurement practitioners and we have delivered training courses on that to a wide range of industry sectors particularly in manufacturing and engineering.
If, like us, you see the benefits of building better relationships using clearer communication, then please get in touch and we can discuss your specific needs.
At the beginning of our lives, the responsibility for our development belongs with other people. Our parents and our family decide what we should learn and how we should learn it.
Then the Education System joins in and we are led towards knowledge and skills that the wisdom of the time decides that we will need.
The longer we stay in education, through school, college and university, the more we get to choose our own path but we are still within a system; a system that caters for millions each year.
In fact, society largely decides what we should learn and how we should develop and for most of us, focused development stops when our formal education stops.
But at that stage, many of us still have questions that we haven’t yet answered. What do we want to be? Who do we want to be?
And at that point, we move from being educated to having a career. We stop having classmates and start having colleagues. Our classroom is now an office, and often we have no teachers.
Is it any surprise that many of us drift from job to job without a coherent career plan? If we stay in one job, is it a surprise that any training we get or advancements that we make seem to be at the whim of the company?
The problem, the challenge and the opportunity is that we are all unique individuals. NLP helps us to see this, in ourselves and in others. It helps us gain insights about ourselves and use insights into others to build mutually beneficial relationships. NLP helps us to see clearly who we are, where we want to go and how we might get there.
So, when should you take charge of your own personal development?
When you are at a point in your life or in your career, that you have decided that you want to be happy, confident and successful.
When you are ready to decide where you want to be.
When you are ready to look closely at where you are now.
You answer those three questions and we can help you answer the next one, which is: What personal development do I need to get there?
Our NLP Business Practioner courses have helped hundreds of individuals achieve personal and professional goals.
We can help you take charge of your life. Let’s do that now.
Phone 01872555939 or email martin@evolution-development.com
We’re really pleased to announce our new partnership with Positive Purchasing. We are now their NLP delivery partners and will be delivering advanced, NLP based Procurement courses with them.
Positive Purchasing is a specialist training and consultancy business focused on transforming procurement capability worldwide. They help organisations realise dramatic results through the development of people and process, by establishing common ways of working using best practice approaches and by bringing their vast experience in purchasing and procurement.
We’re really looking forward to working with Positive Purchasing and will be running our first course with them in Holland at the beginning of October.
If your brain was a computer, metaprogrammes would be the software running on the computer.
Just as a computer has to take in and analyse huge amounts of data to produce something we can make sense of, our brains have to do the same. Without the software, a computer would be unable to do this task, just as, without metaprogrammes, our brains would be unable to sort, analyse and form a perception from the huge amount of data available to us.
These metaprogrammes decide what information we are going to take notice of and what we are going to delete; they decide how we are going to distort the information and what generalisations we are going to apply to the information we are processing.
This is why several people can have the same experience and respond to it in totally different ways. Looking at an audience in a presentation, some people may be hanging on your every word, some people may be bored, some may just not have a clue what you’re talking about.
Understanding metaprogrammes can help you in all areas of life including managing change, sales and marketing, improving communication, self confidence and relationships.
Martin is a Director and co-founder of Evolution. He is a certified NLP Master Trainer with a wealth of experience of working with organisations of all sizes and types across the UK.
We have recently finished a really interesting piece of work with the Diocese of Truro.
The Church of England, like many old established organisations is currently going through a time of massive change.
We have been working with Truro’s Diocesan House to help them plan how they are going to help the Diocese manage this change and continue to thrive in the current climate.
We have so far used a mix of ‘Navigator’ (To develop the Strategy for change), coaching for the Diocesan Secretary, an Employee Survey (to set a benchmark and understand the initial level of employee engagement and a structured Away Day with the whole team to introduce the reason for change and the future approach to meeting the needs of the changing environment.
In the initial strategic sessions we used ‘Navigator’ to look at the current environment, behaviours, capabilities, beliefs and values and identity of the Diocesan House.
We then moved on to define the purpose of the team.
Martin is a Director and co-founder of Evolution. He is a certified NLP Master Trainer with a wealth of experience of working with organisations of all sizes and types across the UK.
I’m getting really excited about the NLP@Work Conference in Plymouth on the 30th March.
I’d like to introduce the speakers:
Nik Green
Nik is a member of the Evolution Team, has worked extensively with adventure training in a schools environment and is an NLP Master Practitioner and certified NLP coach.
Nik says:
Having returned to working in the outdoor education environment after a prolonged sabbatical in the corporate world I was keen to see how NLP tools and techniques could be applied whilst working with individuals and groups in the great outdoors.
The following questions immediately sprung to mind; “Do the techniques work as well with children?” ; “Can anchoring be used to subdue fear and enable participation in activities?” ; “Can the outdoor environment be used as a medium for personal change?”
I soon discovered as I grew in confidence and experience that the answer was obviously yes. I discovered that I was assisting children in building their confidence levels, controlling their anger and aggression and giving them a reference point for success that they could take away from the residential trips and apply to their lives.
I have had the privilege to work with some outstanding individuals who demonstrate best practice in relationship building, coaching and development activity. They also have no formal understanding or knowledge of NLP. It has been through modelling their best practice I have improved my own performance and through coaching also made them more conscious of why what they do works.
It is this improvement that has enabled me challenge and assist some of the children who have troubled backgrounds and lead chaotic home lives. This alone has made my NLP journey worthwhile and I look forward to sharing this with you at the NLP @ work conference.
A clip of Nik’s presentation
Andy McMinn
Andy is currently Head of Procurement and Logistics at Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust and is a qualified procurement and engineering professional with learned experience of lean and six sigma. Andy has worked in both the Public and Private sectors leading multi disciplined procurement teams and projects in fast moving, complex and challenged environments. He is currently responsible for a team of forty eight and in excess of £150m non pay expenditure.
Andy says “Many professionals from new disciplines such as Procurement and Marketing struggle when communicating ideas and proposals of how their skills can help improve the businesses they work for. Procurements message can be very technical and direct which when spoken can switch off the listener and break rapport. Many times have I heard emotive client statements like “Why do I need you, I can buy it from Tesco’s cheaper” or “I just want to buy what I want”. Others also told me they had experienced this same client resistance and struggled with communication difficulties for many years in their own organisations.
I often wondered “What strategies have other professionals like me developed to overcome these issues?”
About four years ago whilst studying Master Practitioner, I learnt about Metaphor and began to understand the power of indirect language. It was at that precise time that I had a “light bulb moment” and realised that Metaphor was the missing tool in my strategic leadership toolkit.
At the NLP@Work conference I will be talking about how the use of NLP Linguistic patterns and metaphor has improved the way I communicate and helped me translate the procurement message into a language that is easy to understand.
A taster of Andy’s presentation
Tony Finnigan
Tony is a medical practitioner based in Tavistock ,Devon and an educationalist at Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry in Plymouth. He is also a practising psychotherapist in Transactional Analysis analysis and a Master Practitioner in NLP
As an educationalist involved in training general practitioners and medical students for the past 25 years in conjunction with another master NLP practitioner we have now evolved a model integrating memory theory, learning theory and NLP that is producing stunning results in student performance.
We have literally transformed the performance of failing students. Our present figures suggest a 95% success rate My presentation at the NLP @ Work conference will outline the core basics of this process. You will in a very short period of time be able to deliver significant performance change in an educational environment. The principles described work at school undergraduate, postgraduate, and in any business environment.
It may sound like magic- it isn’t, just allowing your brain to work for you
A short clip from Tony’s presentation
Neil Trigger
Neil has lectured internationally on his PhD subject of persuasion engineering and psycho-linguistics for change. He is a member of the chartered management institute and the chartered institute of marketing and currently works for a large Plymouth-based charity as well as having significant international business interests. Neil is an NLP practitioner and certified coach and also holds a number of other qualifications including certificates in hypnosis and other related fields.
Neil asks: “Why is it that words are so often misunderstood? Recent research shows that 50% of all email is not decoded by our brains to mean the same as the author intended. It’s only letters and white space, so why do people say “there it is in black and white” to explain something that cannot be misread when these marks are ambiguous at least half of the time!?
The answer is simple.
While text is black and white, the meaning within the text is not.
Think of the phrase “Happinessisnowhere”! It can be read as “Happiness is nowhere” or “Happiness is now here”. Both phrases are totally opposite, but the physical letters have not changed.
Text cannot possibly convey the meaning that we intend because it misses out so much extra information like tone of voice, timbre, volume, sarcasm, innuendo and a million other tiny inflections like a smile, a laugh or a cheeky nudge. Yet there are ways of adding these things back in. We have all seen emoticons )
Emoticons add back some of the missing emotion. But what happens in business when, firstly it is far too important to NOT have a message read correctly, but secondly there is no way we could add a smiley face without looking unprofessional or silly?
Join me at the NLP @ Work conference and I will explain how to change email and other work documents to increase profit by over 900%, how one company in Canada changed two words on their advertising and saw sales rocket, why you and everyone you know use words which stop you from selling and how to improve your email instantly to sell significantly more than you do at the moment.”
A taste of Neil’s presentation
Matthew Theobald
Matthew is a professional Project Manager who has been working on large scale projects across Europe:
He says, “I had spent some time been looking for ways to simplify projects. As part of this I had developed Project Fractures, which includes a series of 9 key questions to ask any project. The answers to these reduce the risk of project failure.
I tried out some of the NLP tools and techniques I learned on the NLP Business Practitioner course with several project teams. I was stunned by how much difference it made to the people in the room each time I used them and realised that NLP could really help in all manner of situations.
I began working with Martin Crump on Project Leadership in September 2010 and realised very quickly that it would make a real difference to the success of projects of all types and sizes.
By combining elements of NLP tools and techniques, Martin’s NLP based strategic planning tool, my Project Fractures, with Leadership theories, processes and skills a simple but effective process quickly took shape.
And this is what I will be talking about at the NLP @ Work conference – what the process is, how to apply it in your projects and how this approach means you never need to see another Gantt Chart!”
A clip of Matthew’s presentation
Fiona Crump
Fiona Crump is a founding partner of evolution personal and Corporate Development Ltd. and is Director of Personal Development. She is an NLP Master Practitioner and NLP Coach and has a huge amount of experience from working with a wide range of organisations across the UK.
She saya, “Now that March is here I’m really getting excited about presenting at the upcoming NLP@Work conference.
I use NLP at work all the time; when I am selling, in the training I deliver, during coaching sessions and when I’m working with therapy clients. However, for me, NLP extends way beyond those practical business applications and forms a part of how I live my life.
I have a particular research interest in Work-Life Balance and use NLP tools and techniques to find that balance in my own life. NLP is helpful for everything from setting goals to achieve the big things to managing life’s smaller irritations.
Join me at the conference to discover how NLP helped me to:
move both our family and our business 300 miles from Cheshire to Cornwall
walk 500 miles across Spain
run a successful business and still have time for family & friends, walks on the beach and the achievement of personal goals including achieving a first in my BSC (Hons) Psychology degree.”
I’d love to see you at the Conference which I know will be interesting and informative. For further information visit Conference
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