Communication Archives - Smart Coaching and Training | Business Support, Consultancy, Mentoring

19/10/2025 By David Rigby

Because it’s important – “Towards a future without racism”

“Hacia un futuro sin racism ” “Towards a future without racism” Madrid October 2025

“Because it’s important” was the response when I asked Smart Coaching & Training associate Mahmoud Assy why he had arranged, promoted and paid for an event in Madrid called “Hacia un futuro sin racism” “Towards a future without racism”

No need to ask further questions

There was no need to ask further questions of the man who had arranged 15 speakers for this event. I could identify representatives from communities as diverse as Philippines, India, China, South America, Morocco, of various religions and the local gypsies. He can do this because he knows them And all of them spoke in Spanish and most work in Madrid.

The kind of people invited to be associates

This kind of event and belief systems is very characteristic of the kind of people who are invited to be associates. They tend to have many years of practical experience but also come with some sort of spirituality. This is regardless of where they were born or where they live now. Many people ask and few are accepted, That kind of commonality enables them to get to know each other quickly, and moreover to gain trust. So when opportunities arise we can be quick to respond as a team because the time has already been invested in the community,Learning from each other

I have been fortunate to have been invited to events which I would not have known about if it hadn’t been for Mahmoud,

Opportunities shared with associates

Similarly I organised for me and associate Clair Aghassipour to meet interculturality guru Fons Trompenaars in Amsterdam. And this week Clair represented Smart Coaching & Training in Netherlands for three meetings in the same week. Jessica Breitenfeld and Ian Gibbs represented SCT meeting the owner of a Saudi Arabian training organisation in Barcelona. They can’t do this unless they are well briefed and trusted. We would not have known SIETAR if it hadn’t been for associate Pari Namazie

JEDI Justice Equity Diversity Inclusion

Back to Mahmoud: JEDI Justice Equity Diversity Inclusion are his topics. Mirroring the many Diversity topics SCT is capable of supporting. See Diversity

*Mahmoud Assy and David Rigby at FELGTBI event in Madrid*

*Fons Trompenaars and Clair Aghassipour exchanging books*

*David Rigby with Papa Baba Ndong president of SIETAR*

Smart Coaching & Training works with over 30 associates, in four continents speaking 14 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

21/07/2025 By David Rigby

That’s Nailed it! Do Politicians get their nails done?

Pictured: British Politicians Hands – all currently in Parliament except one. (and the right hand of Putin)

I am writing from Madrid in the second half of July. Everything has stopped until September – certainly no meetings. And come August half the shops and cafes will be closed for the month.
So it comes down to “Where am I going to get my nails done ?”

Where am I going to get my nails done ? you are going to learn some of the tricks or skills they learnt to get to the top.

I have never understood the passion for getting your nails done. This may be a male thing – but the longer the nails, the falser they are and more overly designed the nails are the more vacuous I think the wearer is.

Haven’t people got anything better to do with their time and also their money? My assumption is it to do with the therapy you getting from sitting there and someone is paying attention to you and the conversation is either innocuous or gossip.

It is Me time which you could also get by sitting, having a nice cup of tea, and if you felt like spoiling yourself, you could have a biscuit. And that wouldn’t make using a phone or keyboard tortuous.
In the good old days you could spend hours under the dryer with your curlers in and achieve the same result.

Do you trust British Politicians – their nails suggest you should.

I thought I would do some research and look at the nails of British politicians and see if you can guess who the nails and hands belong to. With two exceptions all are current parliamentarians; one is the hand of Putin, the other is too famous to be left out.
Not a false nail in sight. Of course this is Britain, where false teeth are designed to look like real teeth. The British do not shout out : I have got the money to spend on making my teeth look unnaturally pearly white and perfect – and it’s the same with nails. It may not be the same in other countries.

Fat lips and chiselled chins

I see lots of adverts to have fat lips and chiselled chin and feel sorry for those who think these improvements will make you more confident or attractive – they don’t. Spend your money developing your personality – it last longer. It takes personality to be charming enough to go to the barbers and say ‘yes’ to the question “Anything for the weekend, sir?”.

Anything for the weekend, Sir?

Smart Coaching & Training works with over 30 associates, in four continents speaking 14 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

12/11/2023 By David Rigby

Roads were invented so that men could drive to work

The myth of the fifteen minute city

“Roads were invented so that men could drive to work in their cars” -and therefore are bad. This was the quote I remembered when I listened to BBC Radio 4 podcast – Future Cities – in which Tori Herridge was listening to Katrina Johnson-Zimmerman . (I can’t describe it as interviewing – more like curtsying). She appears to be in Philadelphia and by the time she got to Phoenix at the age of 20 it was her first exposure to a city..

No need for transport as everything is walkable

She explained her concept of the 15 minute city where anyone could walk or cycle in 15 minutes to everything they could possibly need. And that any road with more than one carriageway should be reduced to one to allow cycle-paths. Not a mention about the need for fast cheap and reliable public transport because clearly you don’t need it as ‘you ain’t going nowhere’.

The fifteen minute village

Now I live in a small village by the sea in Spain. Some of it is 500 years old and so clearly is not high rise. It’s quite possible to walk from one end to the other in 15 minutes. There are at least 10 supermarkets and local stores such as butchers, fruit-shops and pharmacies. And there are two health centres and community centres. And maybe 50 cafes and restaurants for the tourists.
A lot of the centre is pedestrianised. So far so good. I chose to have no car. It’s 300 steps from the beach, transport and main shops to my house. While I am not young, I am still able to carry my shopping but could not contemplate using a bicycle and neither can most other people, and I wonder for how long I can continue to walk.

Why escape ?

Still, everything I could possibly want is there. So why is it I continually want to escape?

I need intellectual stimulation. Most of the old folk’s conversation is about what they had for lunch.
I want to experience good original food from many different cultures not touristifed.
I want to see the Art Galleries, attend good music events, and spend face to face time with friends and colleagues who are stimulating – and go to meet people for work.

None of this is available where I live. So II spend my time between the cities of Valencia, Madrid and Barcelona. It takes 2-3 hours on public transport to travel the 60km to the nearest mainline train and then the trains are frequent and cheap and that 2-3 hours is a reason I will move.

15 minute cities Lincoln Nebraska USA, (courtesy Getty Images),Hong Kong and Dubai (several)

Worldwide experience of fifteen minute cities

Prior to this I worked in 22 counties including

Lincoln, Nebraska – a fifteen minute city which closes at 1800 every day. I rented a car and escaped every weekend it was so boring.
Hong Kong – a fifteen minute city because everything of interest is within one square mile. And you can go on a pub crawl by going to several bars on different floors in the same building. Escaped by boat!
Dubai a fifteen minute city insofar as within 15 minutes of anywhere is everything, high density high rises everywhere. But despite the tram system and buses they need 10 lane highways not the least because the Emiratis and the elite still insist on driving everywhere in their SUVs and expensive sport cars. And in summer after 10 minutes outside you need a shower. There were places I would not live such as Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai Marina or near Burj Khalifa because they were the most likely to get bombed.

The ultimate case for the 15 minute city is that your enemy can bomb it easily – let me think of an example close to Israel. Katrina Johnson-Zimmerman didn’t mention that point.

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

Meet Author David Rigby at Professional Speakers Association (Spain) , convention in Barcelona November 18th.

28/10/2023 By David Rigby

Getting your fill of Interculturality

Food and Interculturality.

Last week I thought I would go for some foreign food – so I found a cultural ghetto and chose some typical food of the ghetto. It always helps to be familiar with local ghetto food.

Mushy Peas ?

So I chose Fish & Chips with Mushy Peas accompanied by Tea with Milk. Where was I? Benidorm, Spain inside the English ghetto. Potato Chips (French Fries) made from real potatoes without emulsifiers etc, And most British wouldn’t know what Mushy Peas is.

Ghetto Restaurants

Most places in the world have cultural or food ghettos. What do you do if you are invited to a ghetto restaurant by a client from that country, or indeed elsewhere?
Forget the “I know what I like, I like what I know “ brigade. Your client is entertaining you and it’s incumbent on you to know what you are ordering and to eat it.

*Ghetto Food in Spain: Fish Chips Mushy Peas Tea*

Two Choices

You have two choices – either understand the menu and make your own choices or ask your host to choose. And in all cases take into account you or your host’s religious restrictions. Whatever you receive you better know the custom and eat all of it to show appreciation or leave a little or the host will order more on your behalf.

Building Intercultural Relationships through food

This is how good relationships are formed. And that can lead to business. So what can you do to make this a success ?

Learn to understand the menus. This is crucial. Spanish dishes have names from which you cannot tell the ingredients nor the way they are made. So do Philippine ones. I ordered enough for 6 in a Filipino restaurant in Dubai.
Learn how many dishes to order – the size of the portions. In Europe: Starter – main course -desert – cheese. (except in France where the cheese comes before the dessert). In Spain they have Pinxos, tapas, Media Raciones, Raciones and that’s just for the starters or instead of a main course. In Britain Spaghetti Bolognese is considered a main course, in Italy it isn’t. It’s what you eat before the main course. In Italy, as a guest I requested a second plate of delicious home-made pasta, then had to eat two more main courses to not insult the chef.
Learn who you might or might not meet. I was privileged to be invited to the home of one of my Pakistani clients. While I never identified what the food was, it was delicious,. The chef, who was his wife, I never met because that is the custom.
Understand Cutlery. Some people eat with their right hand. Learn how to do it as you may not get an option. Some people, likewise, eat with Chopsticks. Learn how to do it. In Spain and Italy you get one knife and fork no matter how many courses (I went to an Italian dinner with 14 courses – I ate all of the first 7, some of the next three then fell asleep). In UK you get an array of cutlery learn what to use. And use the fork in the left hand to put food in the mouth, Americans use a fork in the left hand to cut the food and then transfer the fork to the right hand to eat.

Just a few of the things to consider on the way to becoming interculturally competent while eating. Read more here

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

In conjunction with Professional Speakers Association (Spain) , SCT’s David Rigby will be present at the TEDx Marbella Spain event on June 9 focussing on Entrepreneurs

07/06/2023 By David Rigby

Design Thinking, Digital Skills and Leadership

by Smart Coaching & Training’s Marc Mekki

This is article is written by associate Marc Mekki international keynote speaker and trainer.

What do Apple, Ikea, Bank of America and AirBnB have in common? They have all relied on Design Thinking as a powerful methodology and mental framework for driving product and service development. So what is Design Thinking? Think of it as a mental upgrade; a piece of ‘mind-ware’ for teams tasked with assessing, prototyping and testing new ideas in their market, be that for the purpose of a commercial deployment as a for-profit corporation or SME, or to drive intra-organisational change and innovation as a public sector entity, association or NGO. Deploying Design Thinking within an organisation during a volatile era will save time, money and morale. Teaching people how to unlock their inner resourcefulness and quickly create simple prototypes driven by an empathetic grasp of real market needs is what makes this such a powerful framework. I’m an MIT Sloan Certified Design Thinking expert and have successfully used the methodology for 20 years. I’ve trained hundreds of people from corporates, non-profits, associations and startups. Digital Skills & Leadership Training Other topics I’ve covered for global companies in aviation, energy, mining, retail, hospitality and beyond:

Digital Transformation

The ins and outs of emerging technology, what to know, what to look out for and what to avoid. Deep dives into AR/VR, Cloud, Blockchain and AI. What is the difference between digitisation, digitalisation and digital transformation; how do you interpret and leverage the hype cycle; what new skills do you need to acquire? This is a highly immersive course for high potentials and even seasoned leaders looking to get up to speed in a brave but challenging new world.

Digital Leadership

Understanding the power, potential and pitfalls of new technology is one thing, having the leadership skills to navigate teams through unprecedented change another. Learn to leverage the power of an iterative, lean approach; find out how to launch and and foster an innovation lab; drive experimentation and rapid prototyping using state of the art new tools.

Virtual Collaboration

We live in a global, distributed world and no matter how many offices reopen, having the skills and knowledge to effectively collaborate digitally is indispensable. What are the tools and techniques to do this most efficiently? When do you use collaboration tools like Miro and Notion, or when do you put on the VR headsets and dive headfirst into VR collaboration. The digital transformation course is hands-on, highly practical and delivers greater efficiency and teamwork, no matter where people are located.

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here. Marc is currently delivering training in Dubai and managing projects in Neom in Saudi Arabia

In conjunction with Professional Speakers Association (Spain) , SCT’s David Rigby will be present at the TEDx Marbella Spain event on June 9 focussing on Entrepreneurs

Because it’s important – “Towards a future without racism”

No need to ask further questions

The kind of people invited to be associates

Opportunities shared with associates

JEDI Justice Equity Diversity Inclusion

Smart Coaching & Training works with over 30 associates, in four continents speaking 14 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

That’s Nailed it! Do Politicians get their nails done?

Where am I going to get my nails done ? you are going to learn some of the tricks or skills they learnt to get to the top.

Do you trust British Politicians – their nails suggest you should.

Fat lips and chiselled chins

Anything for the weekend, Sir?

Smart Coaching & Training works with over 30 associates, in four continents speaking 14 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

Roads were invented so that men could drive to work

The myth of the fifteen minute city

No need for transport as everything is walkable

The fifteen minute village

Why escape ?

Worldwide experience of fifteen minute cities

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

Getting your fill of Interculturality

Food and Interculturality.

Mushy Peas ?

Ghetto Restaurants

Two Choices

Building Intercultural Relationships through food

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here.

Design Thinking, Digital Skills and Leadership

by Smart Coaching & Training’s Marc Mekki

Digital Transformation

Digital Leadership

Virtual Collaboration

Smart Coaching & Training works with 20 associates, in four continents speaking 12 languages and raised and working in a wide range of cultures. See our associates here. Marc is currently delivering training in Dubai and managing projects in Neom in Saudi Arabia

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