Equine Guided Learning for business success

“I think there’s huge value in such a completely experiential learning session: ..Working with the horses, you have to enact your leadership style right there and then, so it becomes totally clear”*
Working with horses does something no other employee training can achieve in so concise a timeframe. In every session, we see people at all stages of their careers gain a deep understanding of their own behaviour and communication both conscious and unconscious. By working with our expert learning team of bodyworkers, psychotherapists and equine specialists, they are able to question and consider what implications this new understanding has for them in their professional (and personal) lives.
“It is great to see them learning about themselves, intimacy, trust and forming relationships through the horse. Many leave feeling humbled by what the horse can teach them and they are still reflecting on the impact of the workshop and how it relates to their personal and professional lives for a long time afterwards”*
Businesses tell us their staff leave with a deeper awareness and understanding of themselves and insight into how to build on this awareness to perform better in their professional life. In short, training with Equine Affinity has given them exactly the edge they were looking for.
Here are 8 key skills and areas we can help develop through this training:
- Leadership
How do you lead? Are you confident? Do you coach and coax or do you demand? Through working with horses, people discover how they encourage, or not, people to follow their will. Horses will react to body language and emotions and may or may not do what is asked of them, forcing someone to consider different ways of persuasion and leading. Horses also highlight your blind spots revealing aspects of your behaviour you might not even be aware of.
2. Team building and team participation
In the training a team will work together with the horses on shared exercises. Cooperation from all members of the team, including the horses, is crucial to success. The tasks encourage people to develop their team building skills, as well as to assess their own roles in teams — whether they are likely to be supportive, leading or challenging.
3. Communication
Excellent communication skills are essential to any leader or manager. But good communication relies on much more than the spoken words. Working with horses will enable you to understand your non spoken communication tendencies. The horse is unlikely to listen to the words being used but he will pay attention to your body language, tone and manner and react accordingly.
4. Confidence and self esteem
Bonding with horses in this work, and communicating effectively with them, can have an enormous positive result on someone resulting in increased confidence and self esteem. It can create a sense of achievement and well being.
5. Dealing with difficult situations
Difficult situations in the workplace can be challenging to deal with and it’s often hard to be prepared for them. Working with horses, and trying to persuade the horse to do something, puts you in a challenging (although controlled!) situation. You don’t know how the horse will react which forces you to think on your feet and try different options. This is a great metaphor for how you handle unexpected and difficult situations.
6. How to be in the moment
The importance of mindfulness is widely recognised. It can reduce stress and create a much more positive work life. Working with the horses ensures that you are in the moment. We can also build in bodywork to the sessions to offer further gentle reminders of how to get back in touch with bodily sensations and stay in the present moment.
7. Team bonding
Time spent working closely with colleagues in our equine guided learning programmes can be a great opportunity for team bonding. Team exercises will encourage people to work closely together and collaboratively and in turn help build relationships and trust.
8. Time out of the office
Finally, we offer a valuable opportunity to get out of the office, to have space and time to think about personal and professional development with fresh perspective and away from the demands and distractions of work, to spend some time in nature and to spend some time with our beautiful horses.
So, instead of sitting in a conference room learning theory, or in front of a computer screen following a digital training course, why not get outside into nature, work with our beautiful horses and learn in a truly practical way? It’s a unique and profound learning experience and one that we know stays with everyone for a very long time afterwards.
I’m interested, what training should I go for?
Rather than offer you a series of pre planned training options we tailor our offering to you based on your needs. We will take a brief from you then pull together your own equine affinity team and bespoke training solution to ensure that you have a programme that will meet your business objectives and budget, and answer your needs.
To talk to us further please contact us on info@equineaffinity.co.uk or visit www.equineaffinity.co.uk
*Quotes taken from previous client feedback
