Specialists in business presentation skills
This ‘about us’ section is really ‘about you’ – what we can do for you and how we can potentially help you, your organisation and your people.
secondnature is a UK-based executive training consultancy. We deliver world-class, professional, business presentation skills
is passionately committed to generating both immediate and sustained transformations in presentation confidence, effectiveness and performance. We provide high-quality, corporate training that is very different to many in the marketplace. It is business-focussed, hands-on, high-intensity and high-impact – tailored to your organisation and personalised to your people.
We are acutely aware that every training pound must add to the bottom line, and in our view training that doesn’t make a long term difference is not worth doing.
So our commitment is to both the individual and the business – raising individual performance and generating business success.
And therefore our philosophy can be summed up in just two words – Sustainability & ROI.
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This means that, unlike almost every other provider, we do not adopt a one-size-fits-all, cookie-cutter approach to developing people’s presentation skills.
We believe the more that we can help people to develop their own natural and authentic presentation style, the more they’ll feel 100% comfortable and confident applying the skills they learn in the workshop back in to the workplace (that’s why we’re called ‘secondnature’ because our approach helps embed skills that become…secondnature!). Ultimately, the greater the sustainability of the learning, the greater the return on investment for both the individual and the business.
In the same way that involving an audience can increase their message retention (research says by 400%), we believe that tailoring our programmes to fit our clients’ exact requirements (i.e. involving you) can exponentially increase the impact and sustainability (retention) of your learning. We do everything we can to sculpt our programs so that they meet the needs of your industry, your business, your people – and we do tailor and personalise at no extra charge (origination of custom-built programmes are an exception).
In the same way as we tailor a programme for your business, we also personalise our programmes for your people so that each and every individual receives highly individualised coaching (even in group workshops). We do this through our on-line self-evaluation and intention questionnaire which we ask all participants to complete a week before the programme they attend. We also ask wherever possible to receive a pre-briefing on the participants by their line manager or HR/L&D.
Much like driving a car, learning to deliver a presentation requires practice. For this reason we don’t have a ‘look and learn’ approach. Instead all our programmes are extremely hands-on and high-intensity. Typically they comprise two-thirds skills practice time together with individualised advice, guidance and mentoring on that practice. We believe that our programmes offer more practice time than any other provider we know. Not only that, but the practice is reality-based and business-focussed. As an aside our learning components don’t consist of nice-to-know, fashionable sound bites, but immediately applicable best-practice principles, wisdom and knowledge. Our experience has demonstrated that this combination of honed practice and applicable theory delivers the most significant and sustainable results.
Nerves and a lack of confidence are common traits amongst individuals presenting in high-stakes business environments. Our emphasis on practice, and individual advice, personalised guidance and 1-to-1 mentoring guarantees a very comfortable, safe and supportive environment where participants can experiment, learn and grow. Couple this with an approach focused on helping people to develop their own authentic personal presentation style and they don’t feel coerced or pressured into being someone they are not. This environment really enhances the confidence and ability of those we work with, and the impact and the sustainability of our training and coaching.
Very often ‘feedback’ simply refers to ticking off ‘do’ and ‘do not’ boxes. It’s formulaic, prescriptive and views everyone through ‘one lens’. At secondnature we have a feedback framework model that recognises every person is an individual with existing strengths that should be harnessed, and unique development opportunities to be addressed. With this in mind our feedback involves expert, accurate and constructive advice with individualised guidance and mentoring. We believe it’s our absolutely personalised feedback that delivers the transformational results for which we are renowned.
All secondnature programmes are run as client-exclusive, in-house programmes. We do not run public or ‘open’ programmes. There are 3 main reasons for this, all related to our overriding commitment to deliver transformational results in business skills performance:
– public programmes, by definition, cannot be industry (let alone company) specific, as attendees come from all sorts of businesses. This means the training that they receive can only be generic in its focus and so cannot deal with any aspects specific to either the industry, the team or the individuals present.
Confidentiality and business focus
– in a public programme it is very difficult to guarantee that there will not be participants who work for competitors. Business presentations are, very often, if not highly confidential then at least commercially sensitive – and therefore cannot be divulged in public with the possibility of competitors being present. Our belief is that if the objective for organisations investing in their people is to improve business presentation performance, then the practice must be on business presentations that the participants will actually use in their role.
