Organizations

Horses as Coaches

FEEL (Facilitated Equine Experiential Learning)® is a powerful teambuilding and corporate training tool. During a FEEL session, participants have an opportunity to move beyond everyday experiences and rise to the challenge of learning new skills in a different environment.

Working with a horse as a group teaches problem-solving skills, levels the playing field and brings out the unique talents in each individual involved. Through observation of herd dynamics and interaction with individual horses, attendees also learn relationship-building skills. Sessions with horses are highly interactive and provide an ‘in the moment’ learning experience: teaching skills that can be difficult to acquire in more traditional settings.

FEEL activities take place in an interactive environment; increasing our awareness and ability to read situations. People learn by doing – at least 80 percent of new ideas heard in a seminar, are quickly forgotten. At Horse Spirit Connections participants immediately put into practice what they are learning.

Horse coaching guides your business to the next level of success!

We offer individual programs:

What a Leader Is (two days)

Teamwork Synergy (one day)

Influential Communication (one day)

Effective Supervisory Management (one day)

Strategic Leadership and Creativity (one day)

Or a totally customized approach for your management goals.

What a Leader Is

  • Experience the difference between leading with confidence utilizing a partnership model, or leading from fear and domination.
  • Identify and experience the impact of personal leadership styles and approaches.
  • Feel leadership that is authentic, respectful, and confident
  • Change in the moment; that instant biofeedback from horses can result in noticeable permanent changes in behaviour.
  • Recognize passion in yourself and others
  • Learn what motivates you

Teamwork Synergies

Horses are herd animals and consequently teach participants that everyone depends on each other to survive and thrive

  • Understand more effective ways to be present with team-mates
  • Develop collaboration skills – maintaining personal integrity
  • Create mutual trust
  • Appreciate how intentions, motivations and body language impact others
  • Move from conflict into resolution and agreement more quickly
  • Define as a team what signifies success
  • Determine effective goal setting
  • Understand the meaning of congruency – walk your talk
  • Experience the art of listening


Influential Communication

The horses help us be aware of what we are communicating on every level- verbally, mentally, physically, and emotionally. Participants learn how to listen and give clear directions from the horses’ immediate feedback

  • Recognize non-verbal communication – the silent but powerful language
  • Utilize effective and clear communication.
  • Understand the importance of delivering consistent information so that others experience their leader as safe, supportive, clear and responsible for self and others.
  • Team problem-solving through communication
  • Understand active listening as key to communication
  • Learning what leadership style is appropriate in a situation


Effective Supervisory Management

  • Learn how to manage less and lead more
  • Understand what a ‘leader’ does
  • Learn to motivate people to a higher level of personal responsibility
  • Learn the art of delegation and giving direction
  • Demonstrate effective authority
  • Improve results through better time management
  • How to give and accept feedback
  • Coach others to take initiative
  • Expect the unexpected


Strategic Leadership and Creativity

  • Enhance the skills of current leaders
  • Learn when and how to take risks
  • Think critically and problem-solve when the unexpected happens
  • Develop and trust your intuition
  • Create and support effective planning
  • How to gain respect and empower others
  • Discover how to recover from a ‘screw-up’

Horses as Leadership Coaches

In these highly interactive and engaging learning experiences, participants learn the power of the horse perspective as a coach. Horses are highly intuitive in their leadership and team assessment. Authentic leadership styles emerge while interacting in a series of experiential activities. Breakdowns in team synergy, communication, and planning will show up very quickly as participants work together to ‘problem solve’ with their equine partners. As animals of prey, horses require strong and focused leadership.

Working with horses first and foremost expands nonverbal awareness. Internet relationships, computer games, cell phones and tablets encourage excessive reliance on language and surface appearances. Modern humans are literally mesmerized by words, yet psychologists have determined that less than 10 percent of our communication is verbal. Vast nuances of information arise from behaviour, emotional import, intent, and more subtle energetic exchanges, qualities so totally downplayed in post-industrial society that people are losing their ability to function fully and authentically in the moment.

The horses engage us in Experiential Learning – learning by doing. It is a process through which individuals gain knowledge, acquire skills, and enhance values from direct experience. FEEL activities reinforce the perceptions of change and promote integration for individuals to make the learning practical and meaningful.

Horses help people move forward by requiring them to be present in the moment and not rely on outdated thought patterns or opinions. In other words, horses rely on actions being more powerful than words.

Because it is impossible to make a horse do anything, they teach us the difference between willingness and compliance. From this, we understand that it is just as difficult to force employees to produce quality performance.

Most importantly horses make great coaches because they have no investment in the outcome of our relationship with them, they don’t lie, and they have no egos or master plans. Horses simply are who they are, clearly, purely. That’s why the information they give us about ourselves is so powerful. They are perfect mirrors for us to observe how we are creating our current reality.


How does this work?

Participants engage in safe and fun groundwork exercises with horses in a controlled setting; where there is no riding involved. How the horse reacts to their communication, behaviour, and body language provides them with clear, instructive feedback we can utilize to identify opportunities for individual and team leadership development

Each exercise is a combination of demonstration, hands-on exploration, and guided discussion. This allows participants the opportunity to experience, observe and reflect on how attitude, body language and intent impact what we communicate and the results we get.

Participants who attend a workshop at Horse Spirit Connections, return to the office energized, motivated, and inspired by their work with the horses; they have insights about their own and others’ behaviour which make a real difference in how they perceive, evaluate, and choose to respond to each other.

If we lead ourselves effectively, others follow naturally

Please inquire for more information by emailing andre@horsespiritconnections.com
or calling 416 520 6276.

Personal Development
Spiritual
Organizations
Leadership
FEEL Certification

Unlike any other workshop I have attended before, this one cut to the ‘chase’ and made you ‘feel’ how to be a better leader rather than teaching you. This is the most powerful leadership experience I have had!!!!

EL, Rogers

My big learning was understanding power and presence. Understanding that different styles of leadership are needed in different situations… and with different people.

SF, RIM

That you can lead with non-verbal communication. That trust is an important component of leadership, trust in yourself and others.

JG, 407ETR

I registered for this workshop at the suggestion of a friend. It is not something that I would have done on my own. The experience far exceeded my expectations. Although the workshop is promoted as leadership training, for me, it encompassed much more and provided me with a very compelling visual of the impact my presence has on others. This visual came from experiencing and observing the interaction with the horses and it is easily transferable to my everyday interaction with family, friends and the workplace. You don’t have to be a horseperson to participate but you will come away with a new appreciation of the intuitive nature of these animals that will influence your understanding and interactions with people you encounter on a day to day basis.

RH

That being a leader doesn’t only mean what you do but how you do it. Different people should be approached different ways when leading them. Confidence is key when being a leader. If you don’t’ believe you can do it, no one else will either!

FP, BMO

WORKSHOPS

FEEL Training Program

Starts March 13, 2024. Register today!

Horse Spirit Connections
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