About Derbhille 

 

I am writing this blog to introduce myself, to tell you about my role in Louth LEADER Partnership, a little bit about my background and why I’m interested in being a Co-trainer on the Innovating Communities Programme.

Currently I am the Project Animator for Louth LEADER Partnership’s, Rural Development Programme working alongside Mary O’Neill, Manager of the RDP programme, and my colleagues, Tony, Mavis, Phyllis and Gene. We work from our office based in Ardee, Co. Louth. I live in Sandpit, just outside Drogheda, for the last 18 years now.

My current role involves primarily supporting all the training programmes that are upcoming in the LEADER Programme, by creating an awareness through our social media channels, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other traditional marketing channels such as email campaigns, press releases, and radio. I am also responsible for creating the tenders for the training courses and liaising with the trainers regarding scheduling and all administration pertaining to that. In addition to that I am the coordinator for the Innovating Communities programme for the Louth area, and I have also become a Co-trainer on the programme.

My background prior to joining Louth LEADER Partnership was in Training and Development working as a Training Consultant and Business Coach, delivering various training interventions to both public and private sector organisations and companies across Ireland.

I have over 30 years’ experience in sales, customer service, leadership and management development, learning & development, coaching and 10 years in Wellness. I gained 11 years business experience, in various roles including Management, Sales, and People Development, Training design and delivery and Coaching with Dell Computers. My projects have included developing and delivering induction training, conducting Training Needs Analysis, developing Training Plans, development and roll out of the relevant training solutions. 

As a business coach I helped sales teams and entrepreneurs achieve their targets and goals.
For fifteen years, I ran my own successful training & coaching business, Clarke Training, working
with corporate clients and SME’s in Ireland. A key focus in my work was improving performance in Leadership, Sales, Customer Service, Personal Effectiveness and Personal Development. 

In 2010 I joined forces with An Post to deliver Sales, Customer Service & Coaching to their Post Office network across Ireland. Since 2003 I have been involved with the study of the mind, body, and spirit connection and I was involved in delivering Wellness Seminars to corporate clients within the Healthcare Industry in Ireland for Aviva Healthcare and then when they became Irish Life Health. 

I also worked for ten years with Trinity College on their Staff Development programme, delivering various training interventions, to their staff across campus. In 2016 I worked with the Student Enterprise Programme for some of the Local Enterprise Offices’ in Meath and Co. Cavan. In 2017 and 2018 I subsequently worked with two Training Company’s in the role of Training Programmes Manager and Training Consultant/Business Development respectively. In the latter I delivered L’Oréal’s Business Training suite to their staff in their Dublin branch.

In my free time, I offer a holistic wellness and coaching service to clients from my home in Co. Louth, where I have a room dedicated to this purpose. I also teach groups on holistic therapies and wellbeing, using various modalities, tools and techniques which I have studied and gained certification on over the years.

I became a Co-trainer on the Innovative Communities programme as I am passionate about helping other people to be the best versions of themselves that they can be, to achieve their goals in life whether business or personal, either on a one to one basis or with groups or organisations. My background in facilitation, training delivery and coaching will also help me to help the groups of people who will be working together on the various local challenges over the period of the Innovating Communities programme through 2021 to 2022. 

I am really looking forward to meeting you all and starting to work on all the local challenges that come in, and working through the Design Thinking process as the creative tool for finding the solutions to these challenges.