Everybody is an entrepreneur according to Pieterjan van Wijngaarden. As 'community addict' and author of Entrepreneurship as way of life he shares the three key elements of successful cooperation by working together in communities. You can watch the video here . This talk...

Yesterday, we printed several kilos of paper; today, we stocked a lot of post-its; and tomorrow we will buy some Dutch dropjes. With these super useful handouts, tools and souvenirs we are ready to go off to Portorož. We (Kirste and Suzanne) will fly to...

This article is about a leadership program that supports managers in a large international retail organization in their development. In 2011, Kessels & Smit, The Learning Company was invited to redesign the program. During the past years the program received a lot of positive feedback...

3 new workshops in Johannesburg aimed at supporting people to prepare for a beautiful and wise 2018!

Vorige week organiseerden we een ‘Make a Difference Event’. Geen jubileum of lustrumviering, geen strategische conferentie, maar een experiment om ruimte te creëren voor collectieve reflectie en onderzoek - door onszelf en anderen uit ons netwerk - naar de vraag: wat willen en kunnen we nog meer neerzetten om bij te dragen aan het welzijn en leervermogen van individuen, wijken en organisaties.

Het vorige blog beschreef de aanleiding en focus, hier een impressie van wat er gebeurde toen 250 betrokken en bevlogen mensen in één ruimte samen kwamen voor drie dagen, en we ze uitnodigden om hun verhalen, ideeën, vragen en dromen te delen en om te zetten in creativiteit….

Last summer, the realization that Kessels & Smit, The Learning Company would turn 40 this year inspired a lively conversation within our group. Main question: what is our contribution and place in this current day and age and what do we want it to be for the next timeframe? What kind of company are we and do we want to be? What are our strengths, our DNA, our purpose and what doe those mean on a practical level in todays world? What can we learn from our past and how do we envision our future?

We soon realized that we didn’t want to investigate these questions by ourselves. So we decided to invite others with similar questions and aspirations to join us. Not to assist us in our search, but to engage in their own search – and thereby collectively creating a space for inquiry and creativity. We thought that would inspire us and challenge us to look beyond our own frames. Besides, the idea that we could use our own quest to inspire others in theirs, energized us. Could we use our own questions, rather than any answers that we might have, to create a space for learning and investigation?

Here we speak of the value of mentoring in support of more formal training and development programmes.

Seeking ways to move beyond the university crisis in South Africa - a network approach with deep listening