For employment and community service organisations, EAP providers and employers, this will lead to improved employment outcomes. For the individual, it means gaining the ability to forge a personal and professional life they can find fulfilment in. It also means living life “on my terms”, rather than on someone else’s.

Marc de Bruin offers 3 main programs that can be effectively utilised in your organisation:

• the Four Corners Program
• the Integrated Personal & Professional Development Program
• the Small Business Start Up Program

Four Corners Program

The Four Corners Program is a community / individual focused personal and professional development initiative.

Its aim is to empower jobseekers, professionals and other individuals to discover their inner values and drivers, so they can start charting their own course, rather than being “swept away” by the wind and waves of today’s stormy ocean of life. It is all about simplifying life.

The four corners relate to empowerment and well-being on mental, emotional, physical and spiritual levels of our lives. All the areas need to be evened out to experience “balance”.

As such, the Four Corners Program can be used by EAP providers and other organisations to as a brief intervention program to eliminate barriers (employment and/or otherwise), and to increase resilience and self-efficacy.

More specifically, The Four Corners Program will:

• Assist clients with determining personal and professional goals and visions
• Assist in eliminating many, if not all, of the existing barriers in clients’ lives
• Provide 1-1 counselling and coaching on many aspects of life (financial, health, relationships, personal development, etc.)
• Allow a place for sharing issues in a safe and supportive environment
• Give HOPE. Hope is the ignition to starting a new phase in life, previously deemed impossible to reach.

For other organisations, working in the employment, career coaching and workplace fields, the Four Corners Program can assist with developing employability skills, aptitude testing and empowering people to live a fulfilling and prosperous professional life.

Integrated Personal & Professional Development Program

The Integrated Personal and Professional Development Program is the result of Marc’s experience as a life coach, counsellor and executive business mentor since 2005. This holds true for the work he has done with his own private clients and through working as the lead-coach for some of the world’s greatest internet marketers/business builders.

The Integrated Personal and Professional Development Program is also the result of Marc’s own journey in life, from his career as a litigation lawyer in the Netherlands to his current vocation as counsellor, coach and mentor with professionals, business owners and other individuals from all walks of life.

The Program has its roots in pervading “natural laws and universal principles” which we are all subjected to (the Laws of “polarity” and “cause and effect” are two of the bigger ones).

The Personal and Professional Development Program provides a powerful “change model” that will effectuate lasting neurological change in people, whether they want to use the skills acquired for personal or professional purposes. It is specially designed to assist and effectively deal with (amongst other things):

• Small business start-up issues, whether practical or more mental-emotional (NEIS providers could benefit from this)
• Career development or career transition topics
• Business acceleration and promotion topics
• Issues to do with confidence, anxiety, depression and self-esteem in personal and professional settings
• Ruminative thought patterns that keep generating negative emotions
• Overpowering negative emotions that prevent individuals from moving forward
• Accountability and time management issues
• Perception and interpretation troubles that hold people back and/or have them experience their existence more negatively than is useful.

Your organisation can benefit from this program as an all-encompassing foundational tool that will assist with both personal and professional development of clients from all walks of life (the program will be tailor-made to suit each specific client).

Small Business Start Up Program

The Small Business Start Up Program is a model for people who would like to kick-start their self-employment journey, and find themselves lost in many of the start-up details. It can be delivered as a 1-1 program or a group based experience within your organisation.

Based on Marc’s personal journey as an entrepreneur since 1997, combined with his role as lead business mentor for some of the world’s greatest internet and business acceleration companies, the Small Business Start Up Program will assist budding entrepreneurs with “getting the basics right”.

The Small Business Start Up Program will be most useful with topics like:

• Putting together a business plan
• Business finance and money management
• Setting up the business (from business cards to finding an accountant)
• Marketing and sales strategies
• Developing a Unique Sales Proposition and Unique Personal Proposition
• Business acceleration techniques and time management
• Social Media engagement
• Customer/client retention and after sales tools
• Website building and promoting
• Work-life balance questions

Starting off on the entrepreneurial journey is both exciting and terrifying for most people. The prospect of having the “freedom of being self-employed” is offset by the “shackles of self-responsibility”. This can lead to mental, emotional, physical and spiritual turmoil. Marc’s experience as a coach, counsellor, mentor and entrepreneur will greatly assist clients to move through these phases gracefully and effectively.

General Comments

The tools and techniques used in the Four Corners, Personal & Professional Development and the Small Business Start Up Programs have a strong foundation in both Western neuro-science and Eastern philosophies. Modern research has found that “Mindfulness”, a state of awareness often promoted by Eastern philosophies, has measurable benefits on the size and structure of the executive functioning parts of our brain. Combined with powerful perception-change and cognitive restructuring strategies from more western, evidence based modalities, a powerful mix for lasting change in a person’s life is available. More specifically, The Programs use techniques from, and are heavily focused on:

• Neuro Linguistic Programming and other (verbal and non-verbal) language tools
• Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)
• Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
• Mindfulness integrated CBT
• Positive Psychology
• Solution Focused Therapy
• Myers Briggs Type Indicator and Keirsey Temperament Sorter

Marc de Bruin has been trained in, and has specialised in the above modalities and has been working with Employment Service Provider Campbell Page since early 2011. Initially (2 years) delivering Employability Skills Training to groups of jobseekers across all Streams; since 2013 delivering counselling services to barrier affected jobseekers and working in his private practice with a predominantly international clientele.

He holds the following certifications:

• Master of Counselling (UniSC)
• Master NLP Practitioner
• Certified Life Coach
• AusIDentities Personality Types Facilitator
• Cert. IV in Small Business Management
• Cert. IV in Training and Assessment
• Diploma of Counselling
• Diploma of Community Services
• Graduate Diploma in Mindfulness integrated Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (this is a level 8 training on the National Qualifications Framework; the same level as Bachelor Honours)
• Master of Laws (the Netherlands)

For more information, please get in touch.