I had an interesting experience over the weekend in Redding, CA. I drove up on Friday to pick up our last Arabian mare to come home. While I was there Friday I went to a TSC store to pick up grain. We had shopped in that store the first weekend there and purchased a few supplies for the trip home with the new “girls”. The staff in that store had been very friendly and helpful and their prices were better than what we could find here at home, so we thought why not buy our grain while we’re there!

I pulled up in the truck and trailer and ran through the rain to make my purchase and here’s where things got interesting. The store manager, TSC Bill, asked what I was doing in Redding. I recited the above information except for the Arabian part. He continued to be friendly and asked what kind of horses they were that we’d purchased. I shared ”Arabians” and the look on his face, his body language and tone changed as he said simply “Oh” and turned and walked away…. Quite clearly he was not impressed!

How many times do we do this to our customers and clients? He was very clearly offended or just not impressed that we would drive 11 hours to purchase Arabians. Maybe he’s had a bad experience with an Arabian, maybe one hurt him, he saw one behave in a dangerous way or simply has heard people talk badly of the breed… I actually don’t know and quite frankly it doesn’t matter. The reality is that that one interaction changed my experience and impression of his store! Will I go back to that store? That’s a good question since I don’t live in that community, however, I can’t say that I won’t be back through there and I don’t know that I would stop. I expect I would seek out a different solution to my needs at this point.

You see, TSC is a company that serves farm, livestock and horse owners. It’s not only an American Quarter Horse store; it’s for ALL horse owners. So my point is that his personal prejudice affected his company and the customer’s experience! How often does this happen? I suspect many of us have had an experience like this. We may have let it slide or not returned to do business with the store, either way; we probably shared the story and had an impact on that business.

So what if the shoe was on the other foot? What if it were OUR business that was affected? What if TSC Bill worked for us and un-intentionally ran off a customer who’d just spent several hundred dollars in purchases? How do we create an accepting and understanding culture from top to bottom with our staff?

It’s all about communication and that doesn’t just mean the words that come out of our mouths. Actually, that’s the least of it. Remember- 55% is body language, 38% tone and 7% is words. That’s huge! So when we set ourselves and our employees up to be the best they can be, remember this story and the value of WHOLE BODY communication and how it really works!

May all your client interactions be as positive for them as they are for you!

Cathy Huddleston

Home for the new Arabian mares! The challenge-U retreat site!

We are excited to announce that the Southern California Equestrian Directory has selected Challenge U as the September Featured Business of the Month! Below is Challenge U’s Featured Business article as it will appear on socalequine.com this September.

Challenge U, LLC is an experiential education based company that has been in business in Southern California since 1996.   Challenge U specializes in personal and professional team and leadership development programs via experiential formats. The experiential formats include The Extraordinary Team using the ropes course, The Samurai Game® and the DiSC® Learning Instrument, as well as customized programs.  Founder/Owner Andi Burgis is excited to announce the addition of Equine Experiential Learning, or EEL.

Andi started her horse career with Morgan horses in Pennsylvania then moved to Scottsdale, Arizona and began working for Lasma Arabians. She continued her horse focus in a variety of roles for several other large Arabian horse operations until 1986. In 1986 her second son came along and it was time for a change, so she left the horse world behind to raise a family.  When Andi recognized the importance of the horses as another component of the learning formats she wanted to bring to clients, she found the Epona approach to be the right fit to her already existing philosophy.  The Epona Approach was developed by Linda Kohanov, Author of “The Tao of Equus”, and Kathleen Barry-Ingram, therapist.  These women were pioneers in the development of EEL as we know it today.

Sampson and Andi

The Epona Approach focuses on the horses as equal facilitators in the education based process of EEL.  The horses, because of their innate ability to sense emotion and incongruence at extremely high levels, utilize emotions simply as information. They then model the ability to be present in the moment, making them living, breathing, sentient “biofeedback machines”.

Andi, who is an Epona Approved Facilitator, has assembled a skilled and intuitive EEL team by bringing in Cathy Huddleston and Wendy LeRoy. Cathy is an advanced Epona Approved Facilitator who taught at the Epona Center and has been a professional horse trainer, riding instructor, relationship coach and lifelong horse lover. Wendy is an Epona Approved Facilitator who is also a life-long horse enthusiast and licensed counselor.  These three women, who bring over 80 years of combined horse experience, are a part of a much larger team that includes 12 horses who are trained in this field of work and bring to the table a diverse background in experiences, genders and breeds.

One question often asked is “Why Horses?”  Domesticated horses retain the thought and behavior patterns of their nomadic ancestors.  Interacting with these animals on their own terms encourages a fluidity of human thought, emotion, and behavior that sedentary twenty-first-century life makes difficult.  Horses also model the strengths of what are often referred to as “feminine values”; cooperation over competition, relationship over territory, responsiveness over strategy, emotion and intuition over logic, process over goal, and the creative approach to life that these qualities engender. The result of all of this is amazing formats designed to benefit humans through the teachings of the horses.

The basic EEL format is available in one day to five day workshops that consist of ground activities with horses.  These formats do not include any horseback riding and are appropriate for people with or without horse experience.  There are also formats available for equestrians, beginner through advanced, that help riders better understand and grow their relationships with their own horses through EEL.  These focuses include, but are not limited to, better communication and understanding of the horse-human relationship, learning how to create a like language on the horse’s terms, and learning how to understand and embrace fear simply as information after experiencing any kind of fear based experience with one’s horse.  The facilities provide the ability for equestrians to bring their horses with them. Or, one of Challenge-U’s highly qualified facilitators can travel to you and your horse at your location.

Challenge U would like to invite you to come and check out one of their programs at their new 12 acre retreat site in beautiful Fallbrook, CA.  Please go to the website at www.Challenge-U.com or call Andi Burgis in the Challenge U office at (760) 535-3052 for more information on any of these programs.  Please mention you heard about Challenge U on the So Cal Equestrian Directory and receive 10% off of your first workshop in EEL at Challenge U.

Last friday we had the opportunity to serve Quattro University on one of our ropes course programs. Their team was composed of the leadership personnel of their 6-month old company. So not only was this the first time most of us got to meet and interact with them, it was the first time for most of them too, which always adds something fun to the equation. However, as they requested we challenged them in both the team and individual leadership dimensions.

I was surprised and excited at the beginning of the day as they shared their goals and challenges in life. What a committed and vulnerable group of people! In some ways this is the dream group for a facilitator, and in other ways this was still talk and we needed to see what would happen when they actually had to walk-the-talk. So we went through our range of low ropes activities and by lunch time there had been enough laughter, frustration, excitement, introspection and most importantly learning and growth to exceed all expectations of the transformations that would happen during one of our ropes course programs. There was an interesting energy while they ate as many of them had real, life changing experiences with each other while they still were looking for each other’s name badges.

Catwalk

The afternoon on the high ropes course provided them a chance to take their new learnings to another level, one that happened to be 40 feet off the ground. Again they had to transfer their committed mindsets to their shaking bodies as they faced their fears inlife. The cool thing was I got to watch the Catwalk and Heebie-Jeebie elements from the top of the tower. It was such a cool opportunity to meet them as they finished their climb and then get a bird’s eye view of their walk across the element.

Heebie Jeebie

The best part was watching the founders of the company become brother and sister again and to watch co-workers become co-supporters in life doing whatever it took to help their partner to succeed.

The final high ropes element of the day was the Power Pole. It seemed like with every climb, new fears were being conquered, new benchmarks were being set in life and everyone was opening up to all the possibilities this life has to offer them. I think it might be best to hear this straight from one of the participants mouths…

How do I sum up the day? Transformational! I continue to be deeply encouraged by the committment and enthusiasm surrounding Quattro University. I acknowledge the leaders for the direction and the insight they had to bring in these key leaders for their company and I acknowledge these leaders for understanding that in order to support the world, they first have to be able to be supported by each other.

Thanks for the awesome day!

Keith Boone(facilitator), son of Andi Burgis(owner of Challenge U)