In Your Shoes - Liz Oliver - Rethinking

Liz came to Dundee in 1984 to study architecture. A few years after completing her degree, inspired by her experience of recovery from chronic illness, Liz decided to leave architecture behind to build a career personal development and wellbeing. From the early naughties. Liz ran fitness classes, facilitated personal development night classes and did some one-on-one psycho-therapy before joining Insights, Dundee’s global learning and development company, in 2004.

In April 2016, Liz decided to set up her own business, Rethinking, to provide clarity and support on how to change direction either personally or professionally. She still maintains a close relationship with Insights as a consultant, whilst building the foundations for her new business venture.

Life through my window

This morning started with a short fitness routine at 5.30am – this is definitely not the norm. I got up to find my partner had just put on his PACE DVD and I thought ‘well why not...’ I like to embrace Nike’s ‘Just Do It’ motto and as I don’t have much of a routine, it’s great to be free to follow an opportunity when it arises. However I did go back to bed again to recover.

Having got up a second time and done my five step commute from breakfast table to home office, I wrote some notes from a recent coaching session before diving into an intensive period of marking papers. The papers are from people who have completed an Insights Discovery Accreditation, which is all about personality preferences and building effective relationships. I’m all done and out by 2.30pm to attend to some family errands.

Staying warm

My main focus of the day has been on creating a workbook to accompany my ‘Big Change’ programme. Even though I completed the online modules 3 months ago I’m only just getting round to this as I wanted to finish writing the first draft of a book too. As a one-person business, decisions about priorities are a moment-to-moment necessity.

By mid-afternoon I’m all cosied up by the fire, thinking a little more freely and wondering about what to put on social media.

Life in balance

I was delighted to get the workbook finished, converted and uploaded to my online store without any swearing. Getting a handle on all the online marketing and trading technology has been a steep learning curve.

I was rewarded on my lunchtime walk by a magnificent view and a refreshing blast of cold fresh air and sunshine. It was a much needed break from a day in front of the computer screen. My aim is to embrace a ‘working soft’ approach (to counter the more common ‘working hard’ epidemic); it’s the only way I manage to make sustained progress on my various projects.

The afternoon involved making a short video update to send out to my mailing list and putting the finishing touches to a workshop design on Confidence.

Out and about

I started the day attending a Chamber event at the DCA – the 59 minute design challenge run by the V&A team. If you’ve not done it before, I can highly recommend it. It’s a fun, fast-paced and interactive experience.

From there I went to deliver a one-on-one coaching session, had a brief lunchtime catch up with a friend before having a therapeutic massage for a frozen shoulder.

As I was in town, I tagged on some Christmas shopping and the traffic was at a standstill by the time I headed for home.

The last but most important thing…

Friday included plenty of downtime, my end of month invoicing and some preparation for next week. I’m going to be away from home delivering a 4 day training programme and even though I’ve delivered it many times, it’s always useful to bring it back up to the front of my mind. I concluded the day with a conference call with an international group that I’m involved with on a voluntary basis. We were discussing simple ways to get psychological and emotional support to adults and children in crisis. We’re in the process of putting together information on self-support and how to give support to friends or family without needing any special skills or qualifications. The intention is that this will help people cope until professional help is available.