Business Leaders’ will be ‘Gone Fishing’ this Summer as Oregon Performance Training Consultants Revive the Art of Leadership Through Fly Fishing

A novel performance-training concept ‘Leadership through the Art of Fly Fishing’ has caught the imagination of clients of the Oregon based international management consultants, Boyle & Associates, Inc. From the July 26th – 29th business leaders from around the US will gather on the banks of the McKenzie River to develop their leadership skills while fly-fishing. Hosted at the Holiday Farm Resort, Blue River, Oregon the workshop is the first in a series developed by the newly established ‘McKenzie Leadership Academy’.

Oregon (PRWEB) July 10, 2004 -- Explaining the logic behind the concept, Kevin Boyle, of Boyle & Associates, Inc and founder of the McKenzie Academy said, “apart from obvious enjoyment to be had fly-fishing, its use as a resource to teach leadership skills is a well established concept. It’s a perfect tool to build on ones natural abilities, while in a natural setting. Like in fly-fishing, a good leader’s success depends on the ability to pull all of his, or her, skills, tools, knowledge, and creativity together to accomplish a particular set objective."

The idea of using fly-fishing as tool for teaching life skills may well seem a novel idea. However, avid fly-fishing enthusiast and former US President, Herbert Hoover used his fly-fishing skills on the McKenzie River almost eighty years ago, not only to relax, but also to facilitate difficult negotiations with adversaries. His notable success in applying fly-fishing skills as a tool to achieve resolution in difficult negotiations was seized upon by former Danish Prime Minister Uffe Elleman-Jensen, who in 1991 successfully used the concept to broker complex negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians for the ‘Oslo Agreement’. For Boyly, himself a fly fishing enthusiast, reviving the concept of using fly-fishing as a personal development tool was too much to of a temptation to resist.

Asked whether good leaders' are born, or developed, Boyle says, "Leadership is an intimate expression of who we are, while respecting the intimate expression of others. I believe we all have it inherently at some level to be good leaders’. However very few choose to explore where we have strengths and weaknesses in leadership, and fewer yet will develop new skills to meet the needs and evolving environment of the leader and their organization.”

The McKenzie Leadership Academy training facilitators’, Kevin Boyle and Mary Olsen, have both worked in global multi-national organizations; Boyle as a technician and internal HR specialist and Olsen as the chief operating officer and vice president of one of the Bell operating companies. Today Boyle owns and runs a global organization consulting and leadership development firm and Olsen is CEO of Airlie Winery in Monmouth, Oregon. They both contend that these leadership concepts work in the largest of corporations or in small family owned and operated firms, local or state government or in community change activities. Central to teaching leadership skills is the philosophy that leaders themselves must teach. “They can only teach when they are open to learn from those they lead. This leadership approach has proven to be the basis for change and success of many organizations globally. Leaders’ adapt and learn from all cycles of constant change. I can't think of a more enjoyable way to learn and understand these natural cycles than through fly fishing.” concluded Boyle.

For additional information and details on upcoming workshops log on to the Boyle & Associates website at www.workandlearning.com