About Jim

Drama

I was born in London in the early sixties, and grew up the son of a blue collar worker.
After taking my A Levels [Art and Politics], I went to Roehampton Institute to do a degree in Art and Drama. I graduated in 1987 and formed my own Theatre Company - Arts Column. We went on to tour London’s poorer schools and Theatres; it was my first experience of making a positive difference to the lives of people who experience many forms of social exclusion.

As the 80’s drew to a close I was enjoying London life as a thespian and had developed quite a passion for Greek Tragic Drama, my personal idol was Steven Berkoff, and at the time I hoped to emulate his innovative and creative style. I went on to study Mime, Contemporary dance, Commedia dell’arte, Improvisation and African Dance. Whilst it was great fun and very exciting it was a struggle to make ends meet, so I started to think about other ways I could make a living.

Wales

In the early 90s I came to Wales for the weekend; it snowed and there were no trains back so I stayed. I’ve been here ever since. It is a beautiful country and I am privileged to count myself as one of its immigrants.

I have spent the last 20 years working for Housing Charities in South Wales. My first housing Job was Finance Manager for Shortlife Housing Cymru [later Foundation Housing]. In 2001 I moved to The Wallich as Head of Service Development and Communications. Whilst there, I had a varied portfolio including business growth, income generation, organisation development and PR. 

Solution Focus

I have spent the last five or six years, studying and developing Solution Focus Brief Therapy [SFBT] as a viable model of Housing Related Support. I have worked with Managers and front line staff facilitating the use of Solution Focus work in Wales. I did almost all of my SFBT training at BRIEF in London; culminating in the Diploma in Solution Focus Practice in 2009/10. 

I joined Caer Las, as the Executive Director in June 2010. since then we have introduced Solution Focus Practice into our front line services. I personally, still actively practice the approach, providing therapy and coaching to clients from Caer Las. I welcome front line staff to observe the sessions, providing the client is willing.

I am interested in adapting the principles of SF for coaching, staff supervision, clinical supervision, team building and development, running meetings and strategic planning. It is such a logical and obvious way of looking at the world; at its most basic a useful way to have a conversation, at its most sophisticated a potentially life changing personal development tool.

Why we moderate comments

Caer Las is an organisation that is absolutely driven by its values. We moderate comments in order to protect our supporters and ourselves from comments that could be interpreted as offensive; e.g. racist, homophobic, xenophobic, sexist or otherwise discriminatory. There is also a high prevalence of unwanted advertising that gets posted to blogs across the Internet. It is not our intention to inadvertently support distributors or suppliers of pharmaceuticals, pornographic material or other unwanted products.

Solution Focused Links

Guy Shennan Associates
http://www.sfpractice.co.uk/

Guy is an independent consultant who specialises in the conversational approach to helping known as solution focused practice. He uses it in his practice as a coach, counsellor, consultant and supervisor, and teaches people how to use it in the work that they do.

« Why does Solution Focus work? Does it really fix my problem? | Main | Why is Solution Focus a suitable tool for Support Workers? »
Friday
Nov252011

You just never know

DateFriday, November 25, 2011 at 4:02PM AuthorJim Bird
I have been thinking about stuff that can get in the way of a good piece of work with a client.
 
It seems to me that it’s one’s own well-intentioned investment that is the biggest problem.
You want it to work, you want to hear the client get something out of it, you hope it makes a difference. All these things are well meant, but to me, distractions, from what is a very disciplined approach.

When I studied at Brief, the tutors gave me a very helpful insight: The question you ask is the intervention, the clients thinking and answer is the therapy.

This is a good reminder to me, that just because the answer might sound like this is not doing the client any good at all, you just never know. Having worked very hard in two recent sessions, I was beginning to think; can SF help this person? what will progress look like? At the end of the sessions I always ask the client if they want to see me again. To my surprise both clients were very enthusiastic and said how much the conversations are helping them.

I guess you never know the power of some good, well placed SF questions. I am just resolved to trusting in the approach and its process and believing a difference can be made, even when it appears almost impossible to do.

Jim Bird-Waddington

 

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