Index |
| MC |
| Gwen Watkins |
| Guest speaker |
| Douwe van der Zee |
| Participants |
| Iris Francis |
| Helen Playdon Gresham |
| John Peter Gernaat |
| Rahma Mire |
| Vasintha Pather |
| Sue Vermaas |
| Bronwen Shaw |
| Marietta Hindy |
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| WIF is a membership-driven organisation that promotes opportunities for individuals and business owners through networking, mentorship, training, collaboration, entrepreneurship development and support.
One of the benefits of the organisation is a networking event, the WIF Hot Tables event.
The idea of these evenings is to offer attendees of the event an inspirational discussion with an expert in their field in an intimate small group environment. The invited experts stay at their allocated table.
The attendees gravitate to the table of their choice over a 3 course dinner depending on the expertise they want to gain or the business linkages they want to make.
| Please join us for our next Hot Tables event |
| Date: |
27 July 2010 |
| Time: |
17h30 - 21h30 |
| Venue: |
Microsoft: |
| Cost: |
R250 paid up Members of WIF / R295 non paid up member of WIF |
| Includes networking and 3 course meal, soft drinks, 2 bottles of wine per table, tea and coffee. |
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| 24th August: MC and Guest Speaker |
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| MC |
| Gwen Watkins |
| Conference & PR |
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Gwen Watkins has addressed South African and international conferences and workshops on Event Management; Selecting Speakers; Budgeting for Events; and Risk Management in Events. She holds commercial and government workshops on Management of Diplomatic Events; Corporate Event Management; Business Writing; and Professional Secretarial Practice.
In May 2006, Gwen addressed Venue chapters of SAACI in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth, Durban and Johannesburg on “Managing Risk at Venues”. In August, she addressed SAACI’s national conference and the Cape Town Chapter meeting of EXSA on “Management risk at exhibitions” in October.
Gwen is a qualified NLP Master Practitioner (Society of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Southern Institute, Florida USA.) She is a Coaching Genius (International Society of Neuro-Semantics) and has a certificate in Project Management “X-Sim – Managing by Project.” She has diplomas and certificates in public relations, marketing and sales.
She has her Train-the-Trainer course (Distinction) and is qualifying as an Assessor and Moderator through the ETQA.
Gwen has lectured in Consumer Behaviour, Marketing Information Systems, Creative Strategy and Advertising Agency Management for Diploma students of the Institute of Marketing Management.
She was Damelin Education Group’s national subject head of Conference & Event Management from 2004-2005 and lectured Advanced Office Management; Business Entrepreneurship; Conference & Meetings Planning; Event Management & Special Event Management; Exhibition Management; Risk Management; Sales & Communication; Tourism Marketing; and Computer Skills for both the Diploma and Certificate courses since 1999. Gwen lectured on journalism for Diploma students at Damelin.
Gwen lectured part-time on Event Planning and Project Management at Tshwane University of Technology from February 2006 – November 2007.
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| Douwe van der Zee |
| Author and Professional Player |
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As coordinator of oceanographic research with the National Research Foundation my frequent and intensive reading on science in general promted me to start questioning the very foundations of science – It boils down to the simple question, “What is life?”
As a voluntary counselor with Life Line Pretoria I found in the work of Carl Rogers and in group process more potential for solving our environmental problems than in the science that my career entailed. I resigned my position with the NRF and, trusting life implicitly, joined the former director of Life Line in an organisation called the ‘Build South Africa Foundation’. It was during this time that I did a workshop with Fred Donaldson, play specialist, originator of the concept ‘original play’ and author of Playing by Heart. Later I did several more as I coordinated his workshops in Gauteng and joined him in playing, and for about six years I played on a semi-professional basis at several schools.
I found in play answers to the inadequacies of both religion and science. The more I played, the more I literally started looking at nature – and life – in a different way, realising both how common play is in nature, and that play has nothing to do with ‘survival of the fittest’. There is no competition and no conquest in original play. It is simply the expression of life itself. This also had profound effects on my work as wilderness trail guide for the Wilderness Leadership School.
In my book From Intellect to Intelligence: A Radical Natural Human Alternative I integrated my lifelong searching and experience to put forward a mode of being already inherent in us all that is based on spontaneity and joy – the essence of play, but also on the necessity of dealing with pain. I am about to publish a new book, Childhood: Heaven or Hell?, a less ‘intellectual’ and more practical approach to the critical importance of early childhood as the key to transforming our culture. In my books I relate the sometimes profound transformative effects that play had on my teaching.
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| 25th August: Participants |
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| Iris Francis |
| Care clown & joy facilitator |
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Steve is on the start-up leadership team of Bizniz@Play and the Gauteng coordinator of The UPliftment programme (UP) which has been rooted in South Africa since 2003.
The Upliftment Programme has as its main purpose to Share the Healing Power Of Joy and to actively inspire a more joyous South Africa by UPlifting the corners of all mouths.
With such a great need for sharing joy and taking life a little less seriously, we encourage volunteering and sharing joy with others.
We achieve this by training volunteers to become Care Clowns at hospitals and institutions, Community Laughter Groups and JOY sessions for management and staff of corporates and businesses.
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| Helen Playdon Gresham |
| Business & Personal Wellness |
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Helen Playdon founded The Care Co. in 2006. The company does management consulting with an emphasis on business and personal wellness. The company does projects primarily in South Africa and the USA. Helen has a master’s degree in business from Henley Business School in the UK. Her area of expertise is on general business strategy and planning. She also has a marketing qualification and 13 years of experience in this field. Helen is a qualified and registered pharmacist and has headed up businesses in the pharmaceutical, cosmetic, chemical and health care industries. She served on the board of a prominent South African chemical company, heading up one of their group companies for 8 years.
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| John Peter Gernaat |
| Laughter Coach |
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John-Peter has a passion to provide people the access to tools to enable them to reach their highest potential. Often the greatest stumbling block for people is simply dealing with the stress of life. Laughter is a powerful de-stressor and healer. Adding regular laughter into a person’s life creates a shift towards the positive. A new perspective can be gained and a more holistic outlook on life.
John-Peter, whose background is in Earth Sciences, became interested in laughter as a beneficial practice in early 2008 and has studied with Laughter Yoga International and the International Happiness Institute. He has added his interest in coaching and mentoring and the results of many years of study of personal development techniques.
He founded MIH Laughter Coaching ! to provide greater accessibility to laughter services and training in South Africa.
John-Peter is on the start-up leadership team of Bizniz@Play. He enjoys meeting people, networking and conversations. His hobbies include in ballroom dancing, amateur theatre and reading. He serves on the Board of Trustees of The Christian Community in Johannesburg and he is a Toastmaster.
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| Rahma Mire |
| HR Consultant |
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Rahma is an independent HR consultant who owns Pro-Dimension Human Capital. She has a wealth of knowledge and experience in HR management within Africa and has worked in multinational organisations.Rahma supports businesses of all sizes, from new start ups needing support to more established companies needing objective professional input to improve their efficiencies. This is achieved by providing practical, proactive consultancy services to deal with those key issues needing attention. The services she offers are :
∙ HR policies and procedures
∙ Learning and Development.
∙ Performance Management.
∙ Talent Management.
Rahma is part of the start-up leadership team of Bizniz@Play bridging her specialist HR knowledge and expertise with the benefits of play to improve Learning and Development, Performance Management and Talent Management.
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| Vasintha Pather |
Facilitator &
Effectiveness Coach |
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Vasintha is passionate about harnessing the power of groups to create solutions, enable effectiveness, enrich individual and organisation capability, and effect meaningful change. In 2006 she founded Inter-Arise (formerly The Process Practice) through which she provides Group Coaching and Facilitation Services. She has a keen interest in developing and applying creative processes to stimulate “whole-brain” and “whole-person” engagement and positive change. In 2010 she founded Bizniz@Play, a not-for-profit association of practitioners who utilise play – music, art, laughter, dance and other play modalities – to develop balance and to enhance individual and group performance and wellbeing.
Vasintha Pather is an internationally accredited and experienced Facilitator, Effectiveness Coach and Business Consultant. She has over fifteen years specialist experience in group facilitation, delivery management and transformation.
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| Sue Vermaas |
| Art Therapist |
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Art therapy is a component in the psychology field that’s focus is on the transformative power of nonverbal language. Because art therapy brings together the fields of art and psychology it integrates visual arts, human development, behavior, mental health, creative process, imagination and personality. It is based on the belief that the act of art creation can help us understand more of who we are, enhance lives, and lead us towards personal growth through self-expression.
ArtworX has developed excellent programs focusing on the development of creative thinking and problem solving skills for the individual as well as the group as a whole who work in the corporate environment. We focus on forgotten skills that were learned growing up but are soon forgotten and discarded. We believe that these skills are vital, not only in our daily functioning, but form part of problem solving and coping in any work environment. The focus is on moving participants towards the release of a "right brain" experience. This ability to see things differently has many uses in life aside from drawing or painting – not the least of which is creative problem solving. Our programs are designed to expose people to an alternate way of perceiving which uses observation, intuition and emotion.
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| Bronwen Shaw |
| AVIS Brand Manager |
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| Marietta Hindy |
| Healing the Human Mind |
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Well known by many, through 702 radio, Fair Lady magazine, and hundreds of devoted clients who refer her to their relatives, friends and co-workers. Marietta has had incredible results healing the human mind. She teaches at the General Hospital and has held seminars throughout Europe. Hypnotherapy is not just her profession, it is her passion as is seeing the incredible results she achieves. Nothing gives her more satisfaction than to introduce the power of the subconscious mind to her clients. She deals with all aspects of hypnotherapy and sicknesses, goal setting, counselling (company and private).
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