The month of November can typically see us working excessively with corporate events or winding down the business after a busy season. Dark days, cold weather can often lead to a decline in mental wellbeing. This year sees additional stress with the uncertainty that so many of us now face due to the pandemic and restrictions imposed that affect us both professionally and personally.
To offer some support to our alumni, we put together a 5-week series with practices, talks, tips and tools to offer you some formulas to help cope with and perhaps even flourish during this adverse time.
For each of the 5 Mondays in November, we had a 30 minute session at 09:00 – each session focused on a different topic.
Dani Sheil (class of 1993) is a Life coach EMCC accredited, a yoga and mindfulness teacher since 2001 and lead the first session with a presentation on Coaching Resilience through Mindfulness.
This 30 min talk explained some of the benefits to practicing mindfulness, some of the science behind mindfulness and 3 short easy practices that you can tap into to build your own resilience, help you through challenges and get you to savour the good.
Ciara Brennan (Class of 1994) set up Happy Food at Home in October of 2016, because she passionately believes in creating great flavour combinations for plant-based dishes. Happy Food at Home creates food full of love, adventure and surprise!
Ciara is passionate about healthy, seasonal food and the positive impact that eating non-processed food can have on our body and mind.
Grainne Carroll (Class of 1992) coaches top executives and senior leaders with a wide range of specific needs from transition coaching to change, behavioural and confidence coaching.
Grainne spoke about ‘Above / Below the line’ thinking as a base point and how if we change our mindset it can stop us feeling overwhelmed and allow us to take steps to change the situation or our feelings about it.
During these challenging times people may be behaving differently or more erratically. Panic, uncertainty and frustration can impact on the way a person interacts with another. Which means it is likely we are dealing with an increased number of disputes.
Fiona Sneddon (class of 1993) is an experienced Learning and Development Consultant and Certified Mediator. In her session she gave an overview on how Mediation techniques can help and how you can use some of these tips and strategies to help pre-empt dispute and resolve workplace conflict.
Conflict is a normal part of Life (or so they say) but when you are in the middle of a serious conflict, be it with a family member, workplace or community, it doesn’t feel that normal and the personal cost in terms of stress and financial loss can be enormous…
Taking simple steps to avoid conflict or resolve immediately can prevent many disputes from escalating. Employee stress, and many related health complaints can be prevented by managers acting quickly to pre-empt and resolve employees issues.
The hospitality sector has been one of the hardest hit .The level of uncertainty and lack of ability to give assurances to employees, customers and suppliers are among the issues escalating. This session gave an overview on how Mediation works and how you can use some of these tips and strategies to help you pre-empt dispute and resolve workplace conflict.
John Burke (Class of 1999) is the owner of the Armada Hotel in Spanish Point along with interests in other tourism businesses such as Hotel Doolin and the Fiddle + Bow collection. John was the first Clareman to ascend Mount Everest in May 2017.
He set up The Elevate Foundation after his climb to support the wellbeing and mental health of young people in Co. Clare. John like so many in this industry has had to be resilient during the familiar and ongoing challenges, which go hand in hand with working in hospitality and never more so than during the current pandemic.
In his 30 minute talk, John discussed the importance of resilience and strategies that can help bring us back from the most difficult of times.
“During some of my most challenging times on mountains I exposed some of my inner weaknesses around mindset and resillance, right now more than ever I need to rely on those lessons to keep my mindset and well-being in order”.
John Burke
For further information on any of the above sessions please contact Tracy Hegarty.
