Alison Clayton-Smith Alison works particularly with teams and individuals who need to
build confidence and skills in dealing with challenging relationships at work. She
has over 12 years' experience supporting individuals in their development. Following
university, Alison went on to work in the social care field with people with learning
difficulties. After a couple of years she decided to make a career change. She went
back to college to study for her CIPD, whilst doing a variety of temping jobs -
including an enjoyable stint over Christmas at the local Early Learning Centre.
She then successfully obtained a junior HR position at an international city law
firm. Alison remained with this firm for over 9 years, moving up and then across
after 4 years, into a newly created position setting up and managing support staff
development. Alison's role as a Training & Development Consultant subsequently changed
to cover designing and delivering training for all levels of staff, facilitation,
coaching, and team development. In her last six months there, she was also responsible
for extending the firm's Learning & Development services to its Central and Eastern
European offices.
As an independent consultant, Alison has worked within the legal sector as well
as in the engineering and non-profit sectors.
Aside from her formal roles, Alison has always been actively involved in voluntary
and community work. This has included acting as trainer for local groups of a large
international voluntary organisation, providing mentoring and coaching to managers
in the public sector, and being on the Community Affairs Committee at the city law
firm.
Alison is known for her integrity and enthusiasm. She believes in helping people
to build their own self-awareness so that they can see when and how they need to
do things differently. Although she uses a number of theories and models to inform
her work, she has a particular interest in the relationship between thought patterns
and behaviour.
Alison has an MSc in Organizational Behaviour, is a Member of Association for Coaching
and Chartered Institute of Personnel. She also has a Certificate in Coaching from
the Centre for Coaching and is a trained facilitator. She is qualified to BPS Level
2 for psychometric tools and is experienced in using MBTI, TMS, OPQ and SHL ability
tests. Never one to stop learning and challenging herself, Alison took up triathlon
2 years ago having not run since school. She has completed numerous sprint triathlons
and aquathlons even though she said her goal was to do just one! She has also discovered
an unexpected passion for gardening and keeps promising herself she will start her
saxophone lessons again. She is married and lives in Hertfordshire.