I found the i4 Neuroleader Certification to be an extremely fulfilling learning experience. I thoroughly enjoyed how the course content was presented and delivered and found myself being able to easily engage with the process.
After working in high performance environments and holding leadership roles for many years, I was very much interested in how I can further optimise and develop my own performance and that of others I work with. I also recently made an important decision to pivot my career and launch my own coaching and advisory business.
Having completed multiple 360 assessments and leadership training courses in my corporate life, I was really searching for a course and content that I could completely relate to and apply in my everyday life going forward. I also wanted to be able to apply the concepts and learning in how I deliver content to others, hence me signing up to this program.
I have a preference towards visual learning, and I found the delivery methodology of using short video content and hearing from the About y Brain team members, practitioners, individual clients and client organisations a great blend that was highly engaging for me personally.
I believe the 360, or 720-degree assessment, also including friends and family, is a key differentiator. Why? Because I have a real desire to improve my own approach and self-leadership and I know this feedback will assist me doing that in all aspects of my life, not just those which purely focus on my 9-5 working environment. I have a young family and want to be the best version of myself for them, and to continue to learn and develop attributes to enable me to assist and nurture them with their mindset and behaviours.
With so much choice on the market, it is also important to make an investment decision that will work for you. When I found the i4 Neuroleader Model through desktop research, it immediately jumped out to me as something I was excited to understand more about. I was really drawn to the 4 key competencies and the 16 pillars and the vibrancy of the branding and material.
I consider myself to be intuitive and quite creative, and I have used these attributes throughout my life. However, at times I have felt that creativity and imagination were not automatically encouraged within corporate environments. Certainly, intuition was not regarded as an attribute to focus on.
You either had it or didn’t have it but there was zero understanding on how this attribute could be cultivated for even more use and insight. In recent years, in senior leadership roles, I found myself testing and learning with innovation, imagination and intuition but purely using my own judgement and exploring outside-in thinking to approach work challenges from a different perspective, whilst trying to encourage the teams I managed to also develop working practices that would assist them with their creativity, imagination and innovation skillset.
I have always believed that mental agility is needed to be successful and had presented at a conference on how the commercial discipline I was responsible for had to manage VUCA and move from a fragile to agile approach to deliver future workforce outcomes. So, I could completely relate to the ‘Brain Friendly Culture’ and ‘21st Century Leadership’ focus within the i4 content and this brought objectivity and validation to my motivation in this area.
For the 3 years prior to me commencing the i4 training, I had been delivering projects using agile methodology, whereby early release of value is important as well as being able to test and learn and to motivate teams to adopt a new mindset towards how they had traditionally undertaken their roles. Change readiness and being able to lead others through change and transformation whilst developing people capability and business outcomes was a huge part of my corporate role.
In doing so, it was always important to invest and maintain the well-being of yourself and those around you. There was certainly a time recently for me whereby I had moved to a new country for a senior leadership role, relocated my family and invested heavily in my work focus, to the detriment of other areas of my life.
I knew that I did not have the correct balance holistically in my life and had become fatigued. I had to admit to this and recognise my vulnerability. So, you can imagine my positivity levels when the i4 Neuroleader Certification explored the holistic approach and ‘whole self’ components in more detail, including recognising vulnerability and challenges.
It is this combination of being able to explain the understanding of how the brain works and the proven neuroscience research that makes the i4 Neuroleader Model even more objective.
Rob Halsall
I had followed neuroleadership for several years and was intrigued to better understand the science and research behind the brain. After listening & watching Silvia Damiano speak in her TEDx talk and seeing Silvia’s drive and passion for the content and in progressing our understanding, I knew this course was the right choice for me.
Silvia’s ability to articulate the approach and benefits was compelling and a breath of fresh air for me personally. So, I felt that it was almost meant to be that I would choose this course to proceed with.
In addition, and something I did not expect was to learn about the brain health and gut health and the brain body connection. Again, there seemed to be an air of serendipity for me in choosing the i4 Neuroleader Model.
My father-in-law is a doctor and my mother-in-law is a life coach. They are also both yoga teachers, play and record their own music and have helped me understand more about physical and mental health, including gut health, over the last decade.
So, again, when the i4 course content explored the connection between brain and gut, this was hugely insightful for me and the first time I had been exposed to the ‘Brain Basics’, ‘Neurobiology and Neuroplasticity’.
I knew very little on the different components of the brain and how this controlled and connected with other parts of the body. I found the delivery of this content by Silvia Damiano and Katharine McLennan to be invaluable and the training materials really helped bring this to life for me.
Lastly for me, the experience with the course administration, including on-boarding, 360-degree feedback and general support has been first class and user friendly. Relmi was very responsive and informative for me in making the choice and commitment to undertake this study pathway. I have very much enjoyed my overall experience.