The last week has been just so jampacked !! From the moment the plane landed on Monday afternoon it has been meeting after meeting briefing after briefing. We did a very large introduction to coaching event here in Bucharest and had some amazing people.

Then we flew to the northern city of Iasi in Moldova. This was a first for me and I had been looking forward to it quite a lot. I was not disappointed, the city is so incredibly beautiful with dozens of magnificent churches , Museum’s, palaces etc

We stayed at the Ramada hotel and did another ” Introduction to Coaching” event.

What an eye-opener !!! We had so many people arrive we didn’t have enough chairs or space and had to do some rearranging ( very quickly) the response to what we are offering is just magnificent.

So it looks as if I shall have to go back to Iasi on a regular basis.

 Then we flew straight back to Bucharest just as a large three-day Mind Body and Spirit exhibition started. We had a large exhibition stand there and have about 12 of our team helping.

I ran a workshop on Friday afternoon on ” Spiritual Coaching” the room was full.

This week we also had our first coaching support group meeting in the city of Timisioara (29 people came to that first meeting) this is run by our new coaching support leader Vali, what a great job he has done.

 I have to say huge thanks to our country head here in Romania, Valerica Cojucaru , she is doing a magnificent job.

Where do we find these incredible people ???

 Well, I have to go now to catch my plane to Warsaw.

Lots of love

Gerard

My three boys made my wife a beautiful full cooked English breakfast and brought it to her in bed early this morning accompanied by lots of presents ( lots of chocolate actually) .

 Then, we got up and my wife and my young son Michael and I went for a long walk through the fields, and the forest nearby, beautiful weather, bright sunshine, could see the sea in the distance, very picturesque.

 I’m taking everyone out for lunch later this afternoon to place called the ” Springhead” in the beautiful village of Sutton Poyntz http://www.sutton-poyntz.co.uk/

The pub restaurant itself is very beautiful, in fact I used to live about 200 metres from it.

Later today I have to put together a workshop on spirituality.

I have been asked to deliver this next week in Romania. The problem is I have so much material and so much I want to tell people and help them experience that deciding what to leave out is the huge issue  !!!!

I guess I will just allow myself to be guided by my intuition. And it’s never let me down so far.

I hope you are all having a wonderful day.

Love

Gerard

 It was cold when I arrived at the airport this morning, -6° and has continually got colder throughout the day

.So I did what any good self-respecting life coach would do, I took myself off to my favourite café in Warsaw,

The Karma café just off Konstitution Square and had a couple of hot mulled wines while I read my latest book.

 Come to think of it my meeting today was spent in a nearby Thai restaurant. Does that mean that most of my business life revolves around restaurants and coffee ?? And if it does is that a bad thing ?

It’s snowing outside now, my first snow of the year, in fact it makes it feel just like Christmas. I’m looking out of my hotel room window down the length of Konstitution Square and it looks really lovely and festive with all the Christmas lights.

Tomorrow I’m doing a large introduction to coaching event here in Warsaw, looking forward to it very much.

There was a large storm over the weekend and it appears that some of our telephone wires attached to some sort of telephone pole near our office has come down.

So, it looks as if we will be without telephone connections for the next 24 hours.(according to the experts at British Telecom, who are about to leap into action, and come to our aid :-)  )

When it first happened, it was very interesting, I had this mild sense of rising panic, how will I possibly get by without the telephone?? And yet as today has worn on, it has actually turned out to be really nice.

I have managed to get on with my e-mails, some of my writing work and actually founded time during the day to do some proper studying.

The rest of the team have also managed to have quite a productive day. Strangely enough we still have all of our Internet connection, so everyone has been on Skype talking to people that way.

Actually it’s worked out really efficiently. Perhaps I ought to make it a regular thing – No telephone Monday’s ?

A bit like Naked Friday’s but not as much fun !

Gerard

The e-mails have been coming thick and fast today as soon as I deal with a bunch of 20 or so, another bunch comes in.

 Spoke to Gordon Piggott today, general manager of Westminster Indemnity Insurance, ( http://www.westminster-indemnity.co.uk/ )I’m flying over to Orlando with him at the end of this month.

They provide a specialist indemnity and liability insurance to the whole of the coaching world.

 We are both going to the ICF ( International Coaching Federation) annual convention in Florida. We go together every year.

This time I’m taking my wife and children with me so that they can have a good time in Disney World etc while I’m working and at least I get to spend some time with them in the evenings.

The plan is that we will then have the second week together as a family in Florida, although to be honest we haven’t planned anything yet other than booking our return flights and hiring a large seven seater car for the whole two weeks.

So I guess I need some ideas about where to spend week two ??

Anyone got any suggestions – ?

 Looks like I’m going to Cardiff next week to do a special ” Introduction to Coaching” seminar on Tuesday evening. That should be good, haven’t been to Cardiff for quite a while.

 Then I have got the residential at Eynsham Hall near Oxford a couple of days later ( http://www.eynshamhall.com/ )

It looks like we have people coming from many different countries to do their coach training programme.

The only problem is I am also booked to give a talk on both Thur and Friday at the “Business Start Up” at the Olympia in London.

Looks like I will have to split myself in two !!!!!

Not really, thanks goodness I have a really efficient team to do all of the training and administration

They did a most incredible show using a lot of drumming and other musical instruments and heavily involved in the audience.

On two occasions they dragged me up on stage and had me playing drums and percussion instruments, although I was a little bit nervous to begin with I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience and ended up having a great night.

The group were really fantastic and did a lot of improvisation on stage, I got to speak to them later and they were a really nice group of guys( despite the fact that they made lots of fun at my English earlier on stage — in front of the audience !!)

 The last few days have actually been very busy indeed.

Yesterday I attended the ARC – Association of Romanian Coaching conference.( www.coaching-guild.ro ) it was very well organized and run and it was great to see lots of Noble Manhattan students and coaches there.

In fact, the session I personally attended on the subject of niching ( whether to or not ) had over 50% Noble Manhattan attendees, it was great to see. A very lively discussion took place on exactly what was a niche and whether a coach should use this as a strategy to build their business and attract clients.

 Today is going to be very busy, something like eight or nine different meetings throughout the day but I’m really looking forward to tonight.

I’m treating about 12 of our great students and faculty to dinner tonight at the restaurant Casa Satya. It specialises in Ayurvedic food, one of the best in Bucharest

All the best for now

Gerard

I have to say, I think they all went very well. I am so lucky and blessed that I have such a great team of people to help to organise, administrate and run these events.
We have had some wonderful feedback from all of these events especially the ” Build Your Business Day” which we ran for a number of Noble Manhattan coaches and students, about 35 in total.
Here is just one piece of feedback
”
Hi Gerard
 A huge thank you to you and your team of presenters for giving your time today.  I cannot tell you how grateful I am for all the information.  Before I came along I my head had so many coaching business ideas and questions swirling around… through the knowledge and patience of you and your team I have come away with a clear action plan of how to begin my business and how to begin marketing my services.
Ali”

And from the”Introduction to Coaching”  event here is some more lovely feedback

Thank you so much for Saturday.  The Introduction to Coaching was great.  My husband said I was glowing when I got home and it is now Monday morning and I am still buzzing.  Your honesty and openness was so refreshing and I am sure we all wish we worked for a boss like you.  I am chasing up the resettlement people to get signed up.  I can’t wait to be part of the Noble Manhattan Family and will look for an excuse to be in Weymouth!  I am looking for an opportunity to deliver the workshop at work and have almost recruited one on my colleagues to sign up for the next introduction day!
 Thank you once again.
 Kind regards
 Kirsten

On another front, our new division
” Coach Radio International”

I have to admit to being a trifle frustrated. We are about a month behind schedule and it looks as if it won’t launch for another four weeks, mainly because of unforeseen IT and programming issues.
However, I guess I should be pleased because the final version will be so much better than even we had hoped.

Have to leave the office a little bit early today so that I can go home, pack ,see my family for a couple of hours and then head off for Sunny Bucharest in Rumania
I am looking forward to that, and seeing all my Romanian friends and colleagues again.
Until later in the week
Warmest
Gerard

I am here running the three-day residential part of our practitioner diploma course, to qualify people as accredited life coaches.  Today is the last day which is a shame because it has gone so incredibly well. The students here are from all over Romania, and they really are remarkable, so keen and dedicated and willing. Also their language skills are fantastic, in fact it is quite humbling.

I have a team of six people helping me to run the course, two of our senior coaches and trainers from the UK Aina Egeberg and Cherry Claus, and four of our qualified practitioner coaches from Romania .

The resort that we have chosen to run the course in ( Predal ) is quite spectacular. Set high in the mountains with views that are to die for.  We finish tonight at 6 PM and then I will head up to the north of the country to the town of Cluj in Transylvania where we have set up some new monthly coaching support groups to support and look after all of our coaches in that area.

I am looking forward to going back to Transylvania it is a beautiful part of the country.  Next week looks as if it’s going to be busy as well.

We have the 6 day mind body & spirit show in London followed two days later by the business start-up show in the Excel centre in London.

Juan Enriquez

Just watched.  Absolutely fascinating.