Speaking

JOHN AMAECHI AT THE UNIVERSITY OF BRADFORD

Posted on December 2, 2011 by admin Posted in Personal, Photography, Speaking | 5 Comments


Basketball is my sport. It has been ever since I walked in to a sports hall, aged 11, to watch my brother Keith training. The coach (coincidentally also a wedding photographer!) threw me a ball and taught me how to do lay ups. I never looked back and loved playing right the way up to national league level over the next decade.

Keith was a much better player than me, making it to the professional British league, and it was during this time that I first heard of John Amaechi. At that time he was riding high as one of the first British players in the NBA before returning to the UK to play a short stint in the BBL and set up the Amaechi Basketball Centre in Manchester. As a young British basketball player, John Amaechi was a real inspiration.

John AmaechiWith my love of basketball in one hand and camera in the other, I assumed we’d have loads to chat through during the very quick portrait shoot but it soon became clear that John moved on a long time ago. In fact, while many professional athletes struggle with life out of the limelight and away from their passion, John is enjoying quite the reverse. Since leaving basketball he has become a psychologist, New York Times best-selling Author and social entrepreneur working in both the US and the Europe. He clearly hasn’t looked back.

 John AmaechiJohn Amaechi

He was in Bradford as the keynote speaker for the Rosa Parks Symposium, celebrating the International year for people of African descent. He was well received by the audience who were keen to hear his unique perspective and experiences of race, discrimination and diversity.

You can find out more about John at Johnamaechi.com

 

 

 

John Amaechi

BEST MAN’S SPEECH

Posted on November 6, 2011 by admin Posted in Personal, Speaking | Leave a comment

Starting my Wedding Photography journey, along with getting engaged last month, has led me to reflect on my own involvement in weddings. Rache and I are currently enjoying ‘the wedding years’ with invites to almost a dozen friend and family weddings in the last couple of years.

Amongst these weddings I’ve been lucky enough to be best man for two good friends. First up was my old school friend Dan, who now lives in California, where he is an academic at the California Institute of Technology. Dan and his wife Danni got married in America and I was asked to speak at their celebration here in the UK. The fact that Danni’s parents weren’t at the party mean’t I could embelish a great little story about staying with them in Seattle without fear of too many blushes!

You can see my speech below:

My second “gig” was really special as it was for my sisters wedding. My sister (also called Rach) met Gavin through me and I had great fun winding him up about my appeals to “keep his hands off my little sister” during the speech! I had a few more duties as best man this time around but enjoyed the great party once the speeches were all done.

PROFESSIONALLY SPEAKING

Posted on June 4, 2011 by admin Posted in Speaking | Leave a comment

Do you have your slides? I suddenly realised that if I wanted to make it as a speaker, I probably needed to carry around a selection of slides like a DJ might carry round a small selection of his favourite tunes. I was being invited to speak and we were still only in the car park!

This was all new to me, and so I didn’t have the obligatory USB stick, but I knew how to get my slides online. With that I was all set to present my five minutes on the crimes against email at the Professional Speakers Association North East Region meeting. The presentation was poor by any standard but that wasn’t the point, I got up and gave it a go.

I was at the meeting at the invitation of Paul (The Bulletman) Kerfoot who had seen my presentation at a recent Bettakultcha event and wondered if I had ever considered developing my skills as a speaker, maybe even professionally. I hadn’t, but I wasn’t about to miss this great opportunity. Paul introduced me to Richard McCann, the President of the North East Region, in the car park who kindly gave me the opportunity to say a few words as a warm up to two great speakers, Nigel Vardy and Rick Armstrong.

The evening left me filled with ideas and inspiration and I look forward to returning to future events.

The Seven Keys to Success

The next night I got the opportunity to see Paul deliver his Seven Keys to Success presentation at a Bmedia event in Bradford. The session was thought provoking to say the least and I particularly enjoyed the lack of slides and use of props which meant that the evening soon felt like one great big discussion. Paul went from presenter to curator as we shared our own thoughts and experiences on what it takes to be successful.

At the end of the evening, everyone got to take away a pack of cards with 52 potential keys to success, reinforcing the idea that every one’s keys to success are different. Here’s mine:

I spend too much time channeling my passion in to day dreams about what success might look like. Instead I need to take small steps and build relationships. I’ve come to understand that spending hours ‘researching’ things online is not the same as taking action that will give me the experience I need. This doesn’t come naturally to me so I’ll have to be brave and persistent to succeed.

 

Image: Paul (The Bulletman) Kerfoot’s Seven Key’s to Success