Meetings are our most important tool of persuasion. It is through these face-to-face interactions that we are most likely to persuade decision makers. Here we lay out a number of ways to make the most of meetings.
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Rory Stewart’s bid for Conservative leadership, and to be this country’s next prime minister, is causing quite a buzz. Not among his Tory selectorate or among his colleagues in the wider Conservative Party – the Conservative Home website has him backed by only seven of his fellow MPs this morning. And the voting public doesn’t seem to be particularly impressed with him either: a Com Res poll has him only winning 51 seats for the Conservatives, while the leading candidate Boris Johnson is projected to win 395. I think Johnson’s numbers are inflated and Stewart’s depressed by their relative name recognition, but even so that’s not great for someone who wants to be chosen to fight the next general election.
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Policy makers at all levels know what it’s like to watch a scheme that’s have done well at pilot stage fail to succeed when scaled up. What works for 30 children in Loughborough may not work for 1000 in Lagos. Or even London.
That’s not because the ideas were poor in the first place, or because the pilots themselves were poorly run, but because scale affects projects in different ways and as such needs a different evaluative approach.
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Change UK’s all-but-demise is hardly unexpected. It was a poorly conceived and inadequately run outfit from the start. Given that it was apparently planned for months in advance, that it was so shambolic throughout its short life was even more telling of the failures of those who ran it. Yet even though I didn’t expect it to succeed, I never expected it to fail that badly, that quickly.
I was never going to vote Change and I would never have suggested anyone else do so. I want a socialist government and I vote for a socialist party. But I want that socialist government to be internationalist in its outlook, and an essential part of that for me is campaigning to keep us in the EU.
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There’s no spinning this – these elections were a disaster for Labour. We bled votes almost entirely to Parties who supported Remain and halved our representation in the European Parliament. That’s ten excellent Socialists who will no longer be fighting on the international stage for Labour values.
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Spending time with a newborn child is usually a privilege and a pleasure for new parents. But it is also one of the most difficult and stressful times of their lives.
Mothers and fathers who take this time away from work to learn and grow with their children generally report that it has made them more confident — better parents and partners. And increasingly equal involvement for both parents is showing huge dividends in homes and workplaces.
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Drawing the line takes place in a room that looks rather like a school gymnasium. Between that and the fact that the ‘line’ is literally represented by a thick piece of rope suspiciously like those we were made to climb as children and this show started by evoking some bad memories.
Thankfully, despite there being plenty of school style activities to take part in, including chalk drawing, building blocks and an interesting take on dodgeball, this was the last moment I felt that choking fear that anyone was going to make me climb anything.
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This is such a beautiful and moving piece of work celebrating the lives and commemorating the deaths of those who have been lost to AIDS. The beautiful, diverse and talented cast were a stunning ensemble and I would be hard pushed to single anyone out. Each delivered something a bit different from the others, and each contributed to the whole.
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If you were to sit down and devise a piece of immersive theatre design to exactly coincide with my life and obsessions, you couldn’t do much better than Crisis, What Crisis.
A political drama set around the vote of no confidence in the Callaghan government you are a group of Labour advisors working at a secret location to solve the labour (and Labour) disputes that are bedevilling the government and putting your wafer-thin majority (just the vote of the speaker in it) in danger of collapse.
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Flabberghast Theatre have created a stunning world for The Swell Mob. The world of an 1840 den of iniquity, it is dark and colourful, bejewelled and cheap, murky and fascinating.
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‘I am already in love with your body.’
In an era of #MeToo, that’s a bold thing for a man to say to a woman he’s barely interacted with on a dating app. I think I’m supposed to be flattered. But when it’s the third sentence in, and both the others have been about his love for big women, you know this man isn’t talking to you – he’s talking to his fixation.
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I was recently lucky enough to attend an open rehearsal for Say It Again, SorryCompany’s new production. It’s a sort of meta take on Wilde called The Importance of Being…Earnest?, where the audience not only get to see the behind the scenes drama – every bit as hilarious and farcical as the play itself – but also, through a range of devices, take part.
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Like You Hate Me is a play full of raw honesty and emotion. The relationship between the two characters (the play is a two-hander) jumps dizzyingly between the past, present, and future of a soaring-then-failing love affair, as the highs of desire are steadily replaced with bitterness and regret and then acceptance and even nostalgia.
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Following David Lammy's recent comments comparing the European Research Group (ERG) to Nazis, and the ongoing dispute over the dismissal of government adviser Roger Scruton for appearing to make what Downing Street described as "deeply offensive" comments, some people have been invoking Godwin's Law. This is the internet “rule” that the longer an argument goes on the more the likelihood that someone will invoke the Nazis and that then shuts down all debate.
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First of all, I should declare that I am a ‘Legend of the Forest’. This means that at various events throughout the year that Waltham Forest is the London Borough of Culture, I rock up in bright pink gear and help out. When I heard there was going to be an immersive experience as part of the festivities I was delighted, Then I found out it was for parents and children only (no adults allowed without an accompanying child) I was determined to volunteer to find out what Atomic 50 was all about.
What it’s all about is tin. Tin in it’s many forms. Making things with tin, making a case for tin as an environmental alternative to plastic, making children’s imagination run wild when it comes to all things tin.
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