Coaching
Personal, business, and executive coaching
Coaching delves into the past as necessary, but concentrates even more upon the present, as well as future, directions that you wish to take. I am there to help you realize those goals and find a stronger sense of self and purpose–as well as fulfillment.
As a coach, I often work not only with individuals but with companies–and various institutions–in order to increase productivity and happiness among all concerned, from top to bottom.
If we decide to approach issues in this manner, I will make onsite visits and talk with various people, from bosses, to secretaries, and even custodial staff, so that I get a fuller, clearer picture of what is going on and how people perceive their workplace environment. I will note carefully discrepancies in perception.
Chances are, everyone needs a better understanding of the business or institution’s mission so that all can work together toward achieving common goals. By harmonizing our perceptions and expectations, we can move toward greater productivity and job place satisfaction.
Whether I work with you as an individual or in a group of people, I take a systems approach. We pay attention to the system you find yourself in. Because systems tend toward the status quo, that is, keeping things pretty much as they are, we must make adjustments in as many ways as possible, so that true and lasting changes for everyone’s good become reality.
Books and Editing/Publishing Services
With thirty years of college English teaching experience and many, varied, publications, including a popular memoir, Baltho, The Dog Who Owned a Man, two books of poetry, an acclaimed scholarly work, and a novel on the way, I am used to working with all kinds of writing and writers, from basic to advanced. I have taught business and technical writing, expository writing, and creative writing mostly at the university level (but some at high school as well).
For help you can email me your writing, from reports, to emails, to resumes, to creative work. I also offer individual in-person tutorials, with prompt suggestions for improvement so that you are guided to become better, more proficient, and confident in your skills.
You can invite me into your workplace, where I can present interactive writing seminars for your staff. If desired, such help can be combined with various other kinds of business, personal, or executive coaching.
Garden Coaching
I’ve been a gardener all my life. My mother’s family, the homesteaders and pioneers, and explorers instilled this love of the land in me. Trying to grow things on the prairie where we lived was not easy. I learned early to conserve water and all other natural resources. From early on I was green, learning to compost garden scraps and waste to be used to enrich our heavy, clay–or sandy–soils.
When I moved into my new home in 1998, in a new areas bordered by little private lakes all around, I decided to xeriscape. I planted fruit trees, plums, apples, peaches, apricots, pears, and cherries of various varieties. I put in raspberries and black berries.
Everywhere I planted perennials with an eye to having color starting in early spring with the crocuses and other spring bulbs, through the summer, and into the fall with the fall asters. Everywhere I planted perennials that perfume the air about them, roses, carnations, viburnums, daphnes, wafting through the open windows in the spring. Butterflies and bees have always visited my gardens. Here the bees never disappeared, as I heard so many people saying of their own yards
A more ecologically friendly time must take the place of aggression and war–on the environment and each other, animals and plants. We are, after all, part of a larger ecosystem of this planet. If we are to survive, we must really soak up this truth and live accordingly.
When we believe in something, possess expertise, and vision, we must fight through the obstacles. And yes, I use a war metaphor. It is akin to the notion that we must wage such peaceful campaigns just as some people wage war.
Now I consult others on their own gardening issues. I can help you plant wisely, enjoy color all growing season, and literally and figuratively enjoy the fruits of your labor. Gardening is a metaphor for life.
Without justice, not just for one but for all–not only the powerful, but the disenfranchised, those without voices, the poor in spirit and material goods–there can be no real or lasting peace.
View from my front door
Spring Crocuses