Personal and Professional Management Development in English, in France.

Posts made in May, 2009

French Universities and Strikes

By on May 15, 2009 in Tonyversity View | 0 comments

I’d better put my neck ‘on the block’ I suppose… I don’t like strikes. They strike me as a failure in the system of managing change. But how else can one express a strongly-held view when the other party is not listening, has little or no intention of moderating its stance and is evidently trying force through ill thought-through, half-baked ideas? In the early 90s, new to university lecturing, I resisted being called out on strike (I wasn’t a union member then anyway), because I had been very strong on making a ‘professional’ contract with my students: I would invest in instant feedback, availability for consultation and support between classes, swift return of work if, for their part, the students would attend, participate, work professionally and meet deadlines. I felt that if I then instantly threw all that up in the air I would never regain my credibility with my students. I felt I was right at the time – and I was, in principle, but I don’t think I had fully appreciated the changes the British government was about to impose on the Higher Education sector and the consequences that would produce in terms of poorer staff-student ratios, less class contact time, massively overworked students trying to invest fully in a degree whilst holding down a significant part-time job to be able to pay the dramatically increased fees and claw back against the inevitable student loan (after the withdrawl of grants). Neither had I foreseen what the pressure for universities to generate their own income would do in marginalising teaching: the ‘gods’ became revenue-earning (consultancy / applied research) and pure research to up the research rating of the University and teaching appeared to be fast becoming a tertiary activity. I should have seen that that was worth manning the barricades for. Some 20 years on and the fiercely independent and collegiate academics in French Universities find themselves on the cusp of the same agenda. Those who are research-focused don’t seem to mind the prospect, but I doubt they have seen all the picture. The Universities remain state-funded but now, under a law from 2008 have a significantly greater measure of autonomy. Naively the Vice-Chancellors felt that this much...

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Professional Development

By on May 14, 2009 in Featured, What we do | 0 comments

A service specifically for individuals wanting to develop and enhance their own management capabilities to be able to advance in the labour market through promotion or seeking higher-level opportunities elsewhere. [This facility is also available to companies who might require such training inputs and support for key individuals or small teams as part of a Professional Development Programme.]  This may involve:- Working with you on your cv and covering letter design, development and production for the global Anglophone market. Interview strategy development and rehearsal Development of higher-level capability in English applied to your particular business context, projects and priorities Development and enhancement of presentation, negotiation, strategic management and relationship-building skills Coaching, mentoring and advisory service – support and expertise from ‘outside’ the corporate ‘box’. English language and inter-cultural capability training to enable managers to apply and capitalise upon their existing language fluency in English in situations such as: Multi-cultural team participation and leadership Written and oral presentations in English Relationship-building and negotiation Interviews Adapting to life and work in the Anglophone world. Recently I have found myself working with: a manager seeking a career-change, preparing cvs and covering letters in English for multinational corporations where the working language is English.  This also incorporated the development of interview strategies and repeated rehearsal against the particular requirements of Job Descriptions and Person Specifications. a junior manager seeking a significant promotion who needed both to hone his English and to sharpen some aspects of his management capability. a leisure service manager and successful French actor needing support to take up the challenge of a TV series anda significant part in improvisational comedy play where he will need to think, speak, act and react in English and within a distinctively English context. These are, as you will see, each very different situations with very different requirements which lie beyond the realm of Management or English textbooks.  This is where Tonyversity experience ‘scores’ in being able to tailor things very much to client requirements. Links: An Illustration of a Tonyversity Learning Programme and its outcomes. Learning with Tonyversity: how we work...

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Route 1. From the centre of Mulhouse

By on May 14, 2009 in Directions | 0 comments

Route 1. From the centre of Mulhouse. Head South up the hill to the Zoo and follow signs towards the the Emile Müller Hospital on the ‘Munchberg’. Pass the hospital on your right keep straight on towards Bruebach (about 2km) Straight on at the mini-roundabout, down the hill into Bruebach, [Be careful – the village is all ‘Priorité à Droite’]! past the Auberge restaurant on your right, slow down when you see the church on your right Turn RIGHT opposite ‘The Horseman’s Store’: Rue de l’Eglise (sign Mairie / ACL). Almost immediately (20m or so up the road to your left) you will see an ochre coloured traditional Alsacian Farmhouse in the fork of Rue de l’Eglise and Rue de la Natte. That is Tonyversity @ No 2 Rue de la Natte. Fork LEFT round the courtyard and up rue de la Natte and park on our forecourt (first on your...

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Privacy Policy

By on May 2, 2009 in Uncategorized | 0 comments

Présentation du site Tonyversity Tonyversity est la propriété de M. Tony Jolley. Le Directeur de Publication, le webmaster et le responsable éditorial du site tonyversity.com est M. Tony Jolley, gérant de Tonyversity. Les utilisateurs du site peuvent contacter les responsables du site par e-mail : tonyversity@gmail.com ou par le formulaire de contact Le consultant qui a conçu et réalisé la structure du site est Haider Alleg. (www.rushology.fr) La rédaction est réalisée par Tony Jolley lui même. Le site est hébergé sur les matériels informatiques de OVH. Le site est un blog corporate donnant accès à d’autres sites appartenant ou non à  son représentant, susceptibles de disposer de leurs propres notices légales, qu’il convient de consulter et de respecter. L’utilisateur du site reconnaît disposer de la compétence et des moyens nécessaires pour accéder et utiliser ce blog. La configuration minimum requise est la suivante : Ecran : Résolution 1024×768 Navigateur : Internet Explorer (version iE 7.0) ou Firefox (recommandé) De plus, la bonne utilisation du site et des services en ligne suppose l’activation des cookies et du langage JavaScript. L’utilisateur du site reconnaît avoir vérifié que la configuration informatique utilisée ne contient aucun virus et qu’elle est en parfait état de fonctionnement. L’utilisateur reconnaît également avoir pris connaissance de la présente notice légale et s’engage à la respecter. L’utilisateur reconnaît avoir été informé que le site est accessible 24h/24h et 7 jours/7, à l’exception des cas de force majeure, difficultés informatiques, difficultés liées aux réseaux de télécommunications ou difficultés techniques. Néanmoins, pour permettre le bon déroulement des opérations de maintenance et de sauvegarde de notre site Internet, nous procédons à des interruptions momentanées de certains services en ligne. Afin de vous éviter de subir ces désagréments, une page vous informe sur les interruptions prévues. L’administrateur s’efforcera d’en avertir les utilisateurs. Tony Jolley et ses partenaires ne sauraient être tenus pour responsables des dommages directs ou indirects qui pourraient résulter de l’accès ou de l’utilisation du site, y compris l’inaccessibilité, les pertes de données, détériorations, destructions ou virus qui pourraient affecter l’équipement informatique de l’utilisateur, et/ou de la présence de virus sur son site . L’utilisateur déclare que le coût de l’accès et de la navigation sur le site est à sa charge exclusive. Dans l’hypothèse où...

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