For the last few years I’ve been to see different live classical duo’s with my Grandma. Despite our large age difference, we both love live classical music. These trips give us time to connect and create lasting memories.

This year, as in previous years, it was a pianist and a violinist playing in a cocktail lounge at sea. The pianist was exceptionally accomplished. However, I found myself drifting off during her solo performance. I had to concentrate to stay engaged, despite the beautiful music.

I didn’t particularly have a lot on my mind so my thoughts drifted at random but this bothered me, I had enjoyed and been captivated by the music the year before so what was different this time? It certainly wasn’t her talent or her personality, she had a fantastic personable way of connecting with people between her pieces and between sets.

I drew the conclusion that she favoured Chopin so that was the majority of what she played and perhaps I hadn’t realised before but I just wasn’t really that into Chopin.

When Performance Lacks the Performer

When I returned home, I had tickets to see Tokio Myers, the pianist who won Britain’s Got Talent in 2017, but due to illness I was gutted not to be able to make it.

To make myself feel better – or possibly worse – I watched some of his performances online.

As soon as I watched him play the initial notes on the piano instantly the hairs on the backs of my arms stood on end. My whole body was captivated and swept up in the beauty of the music and I was left even more regretful that I hadn’t got to see him live.

I was curious so I found some Chopin online too, and again, watching it I was captivated. So what was different? It struck me, that watching Tokio Myers and the Chopin performances online in both cases the performer was feeling every note they played, they were emotionally connected with the music.

Remembering back to the performance I saw with my Grandma the performer was so accomplished at playing these pieces she could even hold short conversations with the odd passer-by and at times she looked like she was stargazing herself, all without missing a beat.

The passion was missing!

The performance lacked the performer and however accomplished, was worse off for it.

Bringing Your Whole Self to Work

I have recently been working on a big roll out management development programme so I’ve delivered the same two days of material several times over the course of several months with different groups of people each time.

This has given me a valuable opportunity to really think about how I make the material accessible for the participants. The feedback from the participants has been consistently very good but I know some workshops impacted the participants greater than others.

VA Consultants programmes are notable for their experiential, interactive style. As a facilitator, you are part of the programme, not just delivering it.

Each group brings a different level of engagement. However, I noticed a clear pattern. The more of myself I brought into the session, the deeper the engagement from participants.

How much I used real life examples, worked through my own real life issues and discussed these honestly and transparently affected the atmosphere for development and the depth of learning.

It was tempting at times to reuse a real issue from a previous workshop, that was no-longer live for me, or to use old examples instead of fresh recent ones and although they worked and people related, reflected and grew, my “performance” was missing ALL of the “performer”.

A Question for You

• What does it mean to you to bring your whole self to work?
• What do you hold back and why?
• What can you do to stretch and challenge yourself to bring more of you into what you do?
• What can you do to encourage others to be themselves and bring themselves to work?

Written by Becky Viccars, Head of Corporate Services and Consultant at VA.