Debbie Green, wellness coach and podcast host, said: “Our podcast topics give listeners a sense of resilience, kindness and optimism about the year ahead. We’re only in month three of a new year and already regularly hearing the words ‘burnt out’ and ‘overwhelmed’. We want to shine a light on the struggles many of us are facing daily and explore how we can protect ourselves and others from experiencing this at work and home. Too many of us forget to make the most out of our year, and we talk about why it’s so important to stop and think about what we want to achieve. By listening to our podcasts, we want our listeners to thrive, not just survive.”

January: Motivating goals & optimistic mindsets

The Secrets from a Coach team kicks off the year by taking a dive into how best to set motivating goals that focus on the opportunities all around us. By adopting an optimistic mindset, we can overcome any challenges that our own personal saboteurs want to throw our way.

The key to creating great goals is to first establish where you are now and where you want to be.  Then with a plan you can break down your overarching goals into smaller, manageable tasks to tackle one at a time.

Having an optimistic mindset and a can-do approach helps you strive towards your goals. An abundance mindset points the focus to growth and success, rather than limitations and obstacles. So, if along the way we’re faced with an obstacle we can view it as an opportunity for learning and innovation, so we can approach our goals with confidence and positivity.

February: Effective hybrid working

In February, Debs and Lau explored how we can be effective in a hybrid working world, manage our time efficiently and get the best out of ourselves and our teams. Time management has always been a ‘hot’ topic. Now more than ever being able to navigate our way through a mixture of in-person and virtual worlds is a skill we all need to master as it becomes our new normal.

It’s important to establish a daily routine that incorporates both remote and in-office work hours. Knowing what time you can allocate to key activities, such as meetings, focused work and breaks (super important to remember!) will help you to thrive. Empowering yourself to set boundaries, communicating your intentions when it comes to your schedule, availability and progress on tasks is key.

Special guest, Kate Maddison-Greenwell shares her research which suggests 76% of managers do not feel equipped with the skills for hybrid working. Balancing flexibility with the need to align and organise a team, Kate shares her framework which sums up the best practices that enable hybrid success. A must listen.

March: How to avoid burnout

Shining a light on burnout and overwhelm in March, the team explores how you can protect yourself and others from experiencing it. They discuss how to stay mentally well when your workload is high and how to have proactive conversations around workload.

Special guest, Alexis Neighbour, shares her observations about burnout indicators and measures to overcome them. It’s important to identify tasks that are overwhelming, understanding your priorities and being clear on what’s expected of you in your role.

The art of delegation and how it can significantly help alleviate overwhelm is discussed too. Prioritising our wellbeing and productivity starts with gathering the information that identifies what work may be able to be distributed among others. Being able to delegate less critical tasks to others means you’re able to focus on your priorities.

Lasting a snackable 30 minutes, making it ideal for the commute, lunch break or even a well-deserved break for self-care and development, Secrets from a Coach offers practical learning based on current realities. A brand-new episode is published every Friday lunchtime, focusing on positive actions to help you thrive and maximise your potential in the ever-evolving workplace, and in life.

Tune in to Secrets from a Coach podcast – via Spotify or Buzzsprout.

The post Secrets from a Coach podcast: Protecting ourselves from burnout appeared first on Wishfish.

Debbie Green, wellness coach and podcast host, said: “I’m excited about our podcast topics for this autumn – which include practical advice and brilliant insights from a series of guest speakers too. Supercharging your development with a clear-cut plan of action, managing stress better and boosting energy are all things most of us want more of in our lives! Authentically bringing D&I into our workplaces, in my view, is essential for everyone’s wellbeing, as well as business success. We wrap up the year by taking a deep dive into understanding our worth – and how we measure our intangible impact to get the best out of our working lives. Tuning in is a no brainer for people who want improved wellness and success at work – listen today!”

October: Stretching our comfort zones

This month is all about stretching our comfort zones. Pushing ourselves to boost confidence, energy and pride, but without feeling negative pressure and stress. From setting a Personal Development Plan (PDP) which is a great way to set stretch goals that enable a sense of progress over time, to tips and ideas for regaining our spark at work.

Debs and Lau focus on the upside of familiarity in how it enables confidence and innovation rather than prompting a move to greener pastures. Like any successful long-term relationship, keeping the spark going takes honesty, commitment and a desire to make time count.

They also look at how best to steady our nerves and channel short-term discomfort into long-term growth and confidence. Guests include performance coach Karl Green, who shares his tips from a life on the stage for accessing a performance mindset, and practical advice for those stretch moments. The team also hears from Damien Hoadley-Brown who took the decision to move from a corporate project management role in a global PLC to teach his passion for Tai Chi as his full-time occupation.

November: Diversity & inclusion (D&I) in the workplace

Debs and Lau explore how we can take a genuine approach to D&I in our workplaces to create a thriving culture together. Equity, diversity and inclusion are big words for society in general which need to be carefully navigated to future-proof a successful team culture. To be different is to be human but we humans don’t always make it easy. The team shares top tips for leaders both current and aspiring about how to practise and encourage others to be inclusive.

Guests include the award-winning Nzinga Orgill MBA, CEO & Founder at RaCExpert Ltd to discuss practical advice for opening the safe, brave space that is required to be able to solve D&I problems and challenges. Plus, HR D&I expert Kate Maddison-Greenwell who explains how it’s not ‘just a HR thing’ and shares her advice on how to make work cultures more inclusive in practice. Particularly relevant for those organisations who are shifting away from ‘working from home as the default’ towards a more hybrid model.

December: Who I am is how I work

This month Debs and Lau take a deep dive into our identity and sense of self at work. How do we recognise and know our worth – and how do we measure our intangible impact on people and opportunities to get the best out of our working lives.

The team looks at how you keep the spark of excitement and motivation going at work. When the thrill is gone around performance mindset, confidence in your ability and success. What does success look like and how do we get it?

Lasting a snackable 30 minutes, making it ideal for the commute, lunch break or even a well-deserved break for self-care and development, Secrets from a Coach offers practical learning based on current realities. A brand-new episode is published every Friday lunchtime, focusing on positive actions to help you thrive and maximise your potential in the ever-evolving workplace, and in life.

Tune in to Secrets from a Coach podcast – via Spotify or Buzzsprout.

The post Secrets from a Coach podcast: what does success look like and how do we get it appeared first on Wishfish.

Wave has partnered with the company companiions, to provide an app that supports employees with external caring commitments, and Wishfish, a coaching and development provider, to help support employees in adapting to the changes involved with becoming a new parent.

Companiions app allows employees to source emergency caring

The companiions app allows employees to source emergency caring help for family members that they may not always be able to provide themselves, due to their work commitments. The app will support people in balancing work with growing children, aging parents and other unexpected challenges life brings that can lead to high levels of stress.

One example of this is if a relative needs a prescription collecting and delivering to their home. If the employee is in back-to-back meetings, the employee can request a half an hour slot on the app and a ‘companiion’ can go and deliver the medication to their relative.

The app has a rigorous vetting process (including DBS checks plus interviews) for any potential carers and allows users to video call and message their companiion, to provide the reassurance that their loved ones are in safe hands.

Hours of support are purchased by Wave and then banked to be used by employees as and when needed.

Wave understands that people are the driving force behind any business and that prioritising their wellbeing is paramount in building a supported and loyal workforce.

Jane Austin, Director of HR at Wave, said: “At Wave we understand that it can be difficult to juggle caring responsibilities with a career, and that often you can be called on for help when you least expect it. We want our employees to have a safety net in place so that should something happen and they are unable to be there, there is a solution. This will help people to navigate time constraints and ease the pressures of balancing their personal and professional lives”.

Support sessions for new parents.

In their mission to ensure expectant employees feel supported, Wave has also introduced support sessions for new parents.

Wave will provide coaching to parents before, during and after the start of their parenting journey. This ensures the transition from work to home and vice versa is as seamless as possible. Coaching support for new parents at work is available to all parents, including those adopting, and includes maternity and paternity support, preparing to go back to work, and ongoing support upon returning to the workplace.

Wave will also work with managers to ensure their people feel comfortable and able to discuss any issues both before and after maternity and paternity leave.

Debbie Green, Owner and Founder of Wishfish, says: “Wishfish is absolutely delighted to be partnering with Wave in offering coaching support for new parents at work to their people as part of their wider wellbeing initiative. This is such a pivotal time in someone’s career and creating a safe space to explore what this means for someone stepping into this stage of their lives is a real privilege.

“We are a friendly voice and connection, outside of work/family/friends to both parents, and they know that we are there for them. We help with the transition into parenthood and talk through their thoughts and feelings as they leave and embark on a new way of being. We help parents navigate their way through their thinking around how to maintain a career; what life/work now looks like; and equip parents with what they need to ‘hit the ground running’ when they return from their leave.”

Report by That Works For Me

According to a recent report by That Works For Me, 85% of new mothers will leave the full time workforce within three years of becoming a parent. This is largely due to a disconnect between parents and businesses because of ineffective processes, which results in the loss of valuable employees.

Jane continued: “Becoming a parent can be overwhelming and affects everyone differently. At Wave, we believe that every member of our staff is important, so we want to ensure they feel respected and supported through what can be a difficult time in their lives.

“Access to coaching will ensure people return to work fully prepared and supported, resulting in a stronger and healthier working environment. One of Wave’s core values is to ‘succeed together’, so it’s important that everyone feels valued and has access to benefits such as this.”

The post Coaching support for new parents at work as Wave launches unique benefits to support team wellbeing appeared first on Wishfish.

Debbie Green, wellness coach and podcast host, said: “The new series of Secrets from a Coach is not to be missed if you want to make the most of the next six months. If you’ve wavered off track slightly or a lot – now is the time to check in on your goals and wellbeing to correct your course and set yourself up to thrive this year.”

The team will also be discussing how to tackle difficult people and conversations, they will be reading four key mindful manager books to help you get ahead and will be noodling into our minds looking at how to manage an optimistic mindset, handling self-doubt and saying no in a positive way.

April: mindful manager

The April four-part series looks at key learnings from four influential mindful manager books. Ideal for those people who don’t have time to read but still want to learn. If you haven’t got time to think about these topics – now is the time to listen in and get a quick digest – with practical skills, tools and strategies to help you.

The books discussed this month include:

Surrounded by Idiots: The Four Types of Human Behaviour (or, How to Understand Those Who Cannot Be Understood) Paperback

– by Thomas Erikson

This book offers a simple, yet ground-breaking method for assessing the personalities of people we communicate with – in and out of the office. Helping you understand yourself better, hone communication and social skills, handle conflict with confidence, improve dynamics with your boss and team, and get the best out of the people you deal with and manage. It’s based on four personality types (Red, Blue, Green and Yellow), and provides insights into how we can adjust the way(s) we speak and share information.

Four Thousand Weeks: Time and how to use it

– by Oliver Burkeman

Four Thousand Weeks is an uplifting, engrossing and deeply realistic exploration of the challenge. Rejecting the futile modern obsession with ‘getting everything done,’ it introduces readers to tools for constructing a meaningful life by embracing rather than denying their limitations.

How to Talk to Anyone: 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Relationships

– by Leil Lowndes

This book explores how to perfect your people skills in a fun, witty and informative guide, containing 92 little tricks to create big success in personal and business relationships. In How To Talk To Anyone, bestselling relationships author and internationally renowned life coach Leil Lowndes reveals the secrets and psychology behind successful communication.

The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials Into Triumph

– by Ryan Holiday

The book draws its inspiration from stoicism, the ancient Greek philosophy of enduring pain or adversity with perseverance and resilience. Stoics focus on the things they can control, let go of everything else, and turn every new obstacle into an opportunity to get better, stronger and tougher. If you’re feeling frustrated, demoralised, or stuck in a rut, this book can help you turn your problems into your biggest advantages.

May: mid-year wellness maintenance check

In May the team takes a beat to assess progress so far this year and what needs to happen next to thrive in 2023. Each episode is joined by a special guest sharing their wisdom, expertise and advice.

Health, fitness and wellness expert, Matt Vale, joins Debs and Lau to discuss how to make the right decisions to consistently maintain your mental and physical wellness. They look at how we can sustain change, achieve goals and get back on track if we’ve lost our way. They’ll give advice about how to overcome a negative mindset, make the right decisions for you and share tools about how to do your own maintenance wellness check.

Lindsey Thompson Wright, joins the second episode this month.

Lindsey Thompson Wright, coach and facilitator, joins the second episode this month to share her advice on keeping fit and well in a corporate environment. Founded in the concepts behind Eric Berne’s Transactional Analysis (TA) theory, the team discusses how to look after your health and wellbeing while at work, both in the office or at home, and get the very best out of it. Looking ahead to the Summer and Autumn, they’ll tackle the best ways to deal with different personalities, how to improve the scripts we tell ourselves, and how to implement TA tools for better interactions and outcomes at work.

Jim ‘The Coach Guy’ Totczyk is on a mission

Jim ‘The Coach Guy’ Totczyk is on a mission to provide a better understanding of how to lead a healthy lifestyle, overcome personal challenges, and have better headspaces to improve life/work boundaries. All the while performing at the highest level. His view is that when you look in the mirror – that’s your biggest competition. This episode explores how to overcome restrictive negative thoughts and maintain good boundaries, while living a compassionate and harmonious existence.

Melanie Yea, joins Debs and Lau to explore inner wellness.

Facilitator & NLP Master Practitioner, Melanie Yea, joins Debs and Lau to explore inner wellness from an NLP perspective. How important is it? What are the unhelpful scripts we listen to? How is our inner critic sending us off track? They’ll share tips and tricks about how to dial up your own personal inner coach to live our lives well.

June: you and your mind

Following several recent coaching conversations with GenZ’ers, the team has found a surprisingly low optimistic mindset about their lives and emerging futures. In June, the team looks at why having an optimistic mindset is essential for a happy and healthy life, and how the way you see yourself and your personal level of accountability dramatically impacts wellbeing.

Key topics discussed include how to refocus to an optimistic mindset, handling self-doubt, saying no in a positive way, how best to achieve what you actually want in life, and how to transition from imposter to empowerment.

Lasting a snackable 30 minutes, making it ideal for the commute, lunch break or even a well-deserved break for self-care and development, Secrets from a Coach offers practical learning based on current realities. A brand-new episode is published every Friday lunchtime, focusing on positive actions to help you thrive and maximise your potential in the ever-evolving workplace, and in life.

Tune in to Secrets from a Coach podcast – via Spotify or Buzzsprout.

-Ends-

About Secrets from a Coach

Secrets from a Coach is a podcast hosted by wellness coach Debbie Green at Wishfish and TEDx speaker Laura Thomson-Staveley at Phenomenal Training, launched in September 2020, the podcast has over 25,000 downloads and 4.9/5 star rating on Spotify. A brand-new episode is published every Friday lunchtime, to help listeners thrive and maximise their potential in the evolving workplace.

Leaving you feeling motivated, supported and armed with practical tools and skills, Secrets from a Coach looks to help you maximise your confidence and success as we continue to experience the biggest work and career shift seen in our lifetime. It lifts the lid on the real foundations for success in this new world of work.

With over 100 episodes available to revisit anytime the podcast library archive includes discussions on resilience, change, leadership, careers, motivation, mental health, time management, hybrid working and confidence.

Tune in to Secrets from a Coach podcast – via Spotify or Buzzsprout

Follow us on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram

For more information visit: www.secretsfromacoach.com

The post Secrets from a Coach podcast takes a mid-year wellness check in appeared first on Wishfish.

Each week the podcast will explore the importance of setting yourself up well for the year ahead and knowing that you’ve got what you need in your team toolkit to thrive.

The topics for January, February and March include:

January: start as you mean to go on

The January four-part series explores how to set intent for the now, the near and the future.

By being able to identify what’s important to you to create a plan that enables a sense of freedom and focus, within a framework to keep you on track, as you navigate your way through the new year. Rather than function on autopilot, they’ll discuss how setting your intent gives you choice, opportunities and possibilities as you head into 2023 and beyond.

Recognising that employee engagement is a hot topic regardless of the time of year. The podcast will also discuss how employee engagement is a two-way street. Understanding your people, delivering on promises, being visible, clarity around vision and valuing each contribution your people make can help engagement to soar.

February: future proofing our human edge

The February podcast series looks at ways to continue to be your best self and on top of your game, regardless of the changes and new innovations that are coming your way in the workplace.

As Chat GPT takes over the world, the podcast focuses on the things we can do to maintain our everyday human-edge skills that cannot be replicated by robots. Looking at better ways to connect, innovate, engage and empower, February is not only a celebration of love but knowing how to get the best out of everyday conversations to build stronger.

Using our human skills of caring, creativity, collaboration and curiosity, Secrets from a Coach looks at ways to have engaging and motivating conversations. As well as how to develop, review and improve on ideas. No robot can do that quite yet!

Special guest this month is Dr Trudi Taylor a qualified professional coach, coach supervisor and Human and Organisational Performance Change Partner, who shares her wisdom and experience of creating collaborative conversations.

MARCH: all about the team

Exploring the world of teams, March looks at shifting conversations above the ‘drama line’ to setting a team up for success.

Now more than ever, we’re being asked to work at a fast pace, with less resources, so we need to know how to minimise politics and maximise pace. Whether you’re in a hybrid working environment, face to face or a mix of the two – matrix working is the new norm. Knowing how to empower our teams is a key skill for all leaders, but it’s down to each and every one of us to be accountable for clearly conveying a message.

Collaboration and showing care

It’s all about collaboration and showing how we care about others. So, whether you are new into your organisation or moved from another department – you will learn the skills to make or break the relationships through your words, actions, behaviour and attitude.

Discovering how to create a team that works together and thrives, regardless of the challenges or opportunities it’s presented with, means that work can be a place that enables you to be your best self and enables others to do the same.

Debbie Green, wellness coach and podcast host, said: “Secrets from a Coach looks to accompany and help you to get through your day in a way that is conversational, insightful and practical. We want to provide a space for you to stop and think about your current approach and see if you need to add, delete or tweak any of your current behaviours to be an even better version of you, at work or home. With wellness at the heart of everything we do, take some time to listen in, learn and enjoy!”

Lasting a snackable 30 minutes, making it ideal for the commute, lunch break or even a well-deserved break for self-care and development, Secrets from a Coach offers practical learning based on current realities. A brand-new episode is published every Friday lunchtime, focusing on positive actions to help you thrive and maximise your potential in the ever-evolving workplace, and in life.

Tune in to Secrets from a Coach podcast – via Spotify or Buzzsprout

For more information check out the Secrets from a Coach website.

The post Secrets from a Coach podcast helps listeners to start strong in 2023 appeared first on Wishfish.

Being grateful, noticing and caring, being mindful and present in the moment, these habits can all elevate our wellbeing, mood and attitude. It’s the equivalent of taking a moment to stop and smell the roses. Positive emotions make us feel good. And who doesn’t want more of that in their lives?

With that in mind, we’ve created a free ebook about gratitude. You can read it here.

Through this Attitude of Gratitude ebook, we’ll work on your gratitude, explain the science behind it, and explore rituals and techniques to strengthen your mindset. We’ll look at ways you can harness gratitude to become a healthier, more resilient, and happier person.

Being able to make gratitude a key habit enables you to strengthen your resilience and tackle challenges. It can significantly improve how you react to certain things in a way that enables you to emerge stronger, wiser and more capable than before.

Are you ready? Let’s get started! Read the Gratitude ebook here.

The post Attitude of Gratitude appeared first on Wishfish.

Two-hour Interactive Workshop

To help you get fired up and ready to grow as a team we’re offering a brand-new two-hour workshop. It includes three practical ‘neurobic’ workouts to energise and stimulate our brains as well as plenty of networking and discussion time.

It is facilitated in an inspiring, fun and focused style, creating a positive environment to stretch and fire up our team energy and spirit. The workshop includes:

1: Resilience – Tips for handling pressure, setback, disruption & challenge Celebrating success with STAR stories.

2: Teamship – The benefits of working well with different styles and characters The 4 Communication Styles – what’s our team mix?

3: Storytelling – The power of stories to connect, engage and progress change Frameworks.

The Wishfish Team will facilitate the sessions. Working with teams from all different industries, they are passionate about helping organisations thrive through empowered and confident leaders. Always with wellbeing at the heart.

We are living in extraordinary times. Creating a set of conditions that requires extraordinarily agile, confident and proactive teamwork. The more a team feels capable, motivated and inspired to take action, the more we can ignite opportunity and success in the year ahead.

For full details – click here.

Photo by Stephanie McCabe on Unsplash

The post Fired Up: Ready to Grow! appeared first on Wishfish.

How are you, really?

When you’re genuinely asked, “How are you?” and your authentic response echoes, “I’m doing great, thanks, Debs,” that moment is truly fantastic! Yet, in recent times, as I’ve posed this question to individuals, the replies have taken a somewhat divergent path.

Presently, what I’m hearing from people encapsulates a sense of a different emotional landscape. They express sentiments akin to, “I find myself grappling with a sense of diminished confidence. I yearn to be brimming with boundless energy, yet I’m mired in a state of apathy, and frankly, I can’t summon the enthusiasm!” If this resonates with your current emotional state, it’s essential to recognise that you’re not traversing this path alone. Such sentiments pervade the atmosphere noticeably at this juncture of time.

Through this free Hello Spring! Wishfish Ebook Spring Summer 2022 we’ll work on your confidence, on rebuilding your energy and on taking steps back into ‘ordinary life’ – whatever that is for you. We’ll have a go at some tried and tested practical exercises and we’ll have a look at some ways you can harness the energy of spring, and put a spring back in your step.

Are you ready? Let’s get started! Read our free ebook here.

Love Debbie.xx

Photo by Ray Hennessy on Unsplash

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What does winter mean to you?

Do the dark nights motivate you to cosy up and make your home sparkly and twinkly with candles and fairy lights, or are they oppressive and something to ‘just get through’.

Does the thought of Christmas bring excitement and cheer, or stress and anxiety about money, family clashes, and generally exhausting yourself ‘getting it all done’?

Is January an opportunity for you to reflect, reset and recharge or is it yet another stick to beat yourself with as you set New Year’s resolutions you know deep down you’ll never stick to?

The chances are, for most of us the answer is ‘both’. Winter can be wonderful, and it brings its own unique challenges.

Winter Wellness free ebook

And that’s why I’ve created this seasonal ebook for you to help you make the most of this special season. Think of this winter as the perfect opportunity to focus on warmth, wellness and wonder.

Sound good? Wrap up warm, get comfy, grab a hot chocolate and let’s get started! Download the free ebook here.

Love Debbie.x

You may enjoy our Ready for Change post and you can find it here.

You can also find out podcasts here!

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It’s rather astonishing how swiftly summer has arrived! It feels like a blink of an eye, doesn’t it? One moment, we’re contemplating the onset of warmer weather, and suddenly, here we are in the midst of it.

However, this summer might carry a distinct hue. Consider it: 16 months have drifted by with the omnipresence of COVID altering our daily lives. Despite the initial anticipation of lifting all restrictions back in June, here we find ourselves halfway through the season, still awaiting the arrival of the much-anticipated ‘new normal.’

In my latest ebook, “Summer Self-Care,” I delve into strategies for ensuring our well-being while navigating the complexities that arise from transitioning back to offices after spending 16 months working from home, managing children’s extended break from school, and experiencing vacations that may not align with our ideal expectations.

Understanding that change presents its challenges, I emphasise the idea that it’s a challenge you possess the capability to confront and conquer. Let’s take this moment as an opportunity, armed with the knowledge that change is inevitable. It’s a chance to reset our current situations and seize the advantages inherent in this latest shift in circumstances.

Love Debbie.x

Photo by Sean Oulashin on Unsplash

You may enjoy our podcasts and you can find them here!

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