About Caroline Toll

Experience

For the last 20 years I have successfully and enthusiastically been designing and tutoring on workshops for:-

• The Industrial Society, where I worked for many years. I worked on public courses with managers from all sorts of organisations. Subjects included stress management, counselling skills, assertiveness, change management and training trainers.
• A team training Welfare Officers in the Civil Service
• A firm training people in large organisations such as a water board and a large insurance company on stress management
• Most recently a housing association on basic counselling skills
• In the past I have had successful careers in public relations and subsequently personal development in many different kinds of organisation including airlines, fashion, chocolate manufacturing; also higher, comprehensive and special education.
• I now work in the West Country

Qualifications

• Experience of many different kinds of workplace and many different kinds of people
• A Masters in Manpower Studies at Birkbeck College, London University largely about the relationship between people and work which sparked an interest in stress management in particular

Publications

• Co-author with Eve Warren of "The Stress Work Book - How individuals, teams and organisations can balance pressure and performance" published in association with the Industrial Society by Nicholas Brealey Publishing 1993, latest edition1997, translated into Danish and Chinese.
• A chapter on "The Stress Factor" in "The Corporate Healthcare Handbook" edited by Helen Kogan and published in Association with the Industrial Society by Kogan Page 1997

Personal

In my working life I have developed an understanding of how people can contribute best in the workplace and what gets in the way of efficiency, cooperation, creativity and effectiveness in general. The constant factor is the relationships that are demonstrated and encouraged by organisations however large or small. All my experience has made me want to encourage individuals and organisations to practise the skills that contribute to long term success both personal and financial. This is a mixture of the pragmatic and the personal.

My private life has included many interests and activities including being married, now widowed, bringing up a stepdaughter and a son as well as travelling round the world twice. I volunteer as the Chairwoman of the East Somerset Branch of Carers UK, which involves attending many meetings as a carers’ representative in both the NHS and Social Services; and as a group leader and support worker for Cruse Bereavement Care, for whom I am designing two workshops for managers and teachers. I am also a trustee for Soundwell, a local charity that provides music therapists for people with mental health difficulties and their carers.

I live in a lively village and am involved in the group that puts on the flower show and open gardens day each year. I am an enthusiastic gardener, which I liken to training people. My other interests include music of many kinds including classical, folk and jazz; poetry; travelling; wildflowers; but above all people. I even enjoy people-watching when waiting at airports!