Questions....

These are the questions I have that I would like to research and find a conclusion to with an answer that are relevant to my Professional Practice.

1. What does it take to become a Successful Professional Performer or Creative Artist?
2. Does making goals and achievements put pressure on a performer?
3. Would it become more successful if living in London?
4. How do Performers transition into Teaching and Choreographing?
5. Does having the ability and resources to be creative at a younger age help in later years or Does is experience the key?
6. Is the education in dance ever going to change? Not just in schools but in "Non-creative" minds
7. What do performers lack in? and What do I lack in?
8. Can we enhance Dance/Drama in the education system to be a compulsory subject? 

Brainstorming my Questions...

Recently I am beginning to develop my thoughts about my questions on dance and teaching. As a practitioner I seem to bounce between performing and teaching all the time, I am always learning and becoming more creative and stronger in my abilities but of course always have questions on how to enhance my profession. Reading through other blogs and finding out that nearly all the professions have similar enquires to myself which I find is helpful as we can analyse in depth and exchange thoughts with one another to come to conclusions. In particulars Sophie's has a similar in depth blog on her brainstorm.

What should already be part of being a Professional in my Sector of Dance? As a Professional I believe these are the key aspects a person should already have that is practicing their work.

• Self Discipline
• Knowledge on sector
• High Ability in the area studied
• Some sort of Qualifications
• Insurance and CRB
• Attitudes such as Determination and Goals
• Organisation skills
• Time Awareness
• Motivation for teaching and helping other Motivate
• Health
• Communication Skills
• Marketing Skills
• Business attitude
• Connections
• Professional Manners

All these aspects are in dance and teaching, improving these are the subjects continuously I have built and learn more on how to keep these subjects in tact.

What can help my creativity and practice?

• Knowledge on Dance and being able to have Teaching skills, Choreographing skills and Communications skills
• Observing the abilities of individuals who have experience in teaching and choreographing
• Taking classes to keep my technical abilities at the highest possible level for demonstrations
• Having the correct technology for music
• Preparing for classes as to know the Tempo, Ability and Standard of students
• Using various Business skills picked up from experience to advertise classes- Flyers, Business cards

What do I need to know more about to help my practice?

• Business and Fiance as to How to promote myself and classes? How to build professional connections? 
• Choreographing for different genres of dance, How can I be creative out of my comfort zone?
• How can I teach someone with Special Needs? Where can I improve of my communication and patience?

What do I want to know more about as a Professional Performer and Teacher?

• How can I improve my abilities to gain what I want to do as a Performer?
• How can I gain bigger networks and communications?
• Where will my next big achievement come from?
• Is what I think in the commercial industry what others think too?
• Are all commercial dancers wanting the same as me?
• How can I dance in the States and become successful?
• How can I teaching in High schools and GSCE level? Qualifications?

Developing my questions with my professional practice is all to do with what I would like to achieve.

I believe that all the information that I have created will help me to find out what are the real questions I would like to enquire about and can I come to conclusions within all of this.

Dance Education

Educating the world about Dance is a huge subject. Programmes like Strictly Come Dancing and So You Can Think You Can Dance help to educate the mind of people who are not as creative. As I have blogged about the fact in my culture dancing doesn't come under a profession for alot of my older genertaion family, however now I am working and making a living it has become accepted. Shouldn't this be accepted anyway?  I think that it is important to educate the minds of young people as so in later years to come it then becomes the norm for all generations.
Nicole has blogged about dance education and creativity, one subject has really capture my thinking is her thoughts on subjects that have no place in society i.e Surfing. I agree with her on not having a place in society. However there should be a place for all activities in all societies, I stated that in this current generation  is it extremely hard to find the "right" employee/employer. From experience on attending numerous auditions in dancing the person to stand out the best usually gets the job, is dance this is done by outfits or hair. This isn't as easy when attending and interview and every person applying for the job looks the same and as a suit on, but the aspect that will stand out about them is the creative activity on their CV. I believe it shows to an employer that the employee is not just a head strong person but can also take an activity and show different sides to them. At the end of the day you want somebody with an all round ability and if a person can do that bit extra then I find that should be the right person. Being creative is an Art and I believe if someone has the ability then why not take it all the way and make it a qualification. What do you think about this? Let me know your thoughts.....

Welcome Back!!

Hey Guys,

Welcome back! Hope you all had an awesome summer!

This all feels slightly daunting to start this again as we have had such a long period of time off.

This is all about personal professional practice and ways to start thinking about developing questions for professional inquiry. As my practice is dance, I have said before in past blogs throughly thinking about my work is difficult, however become easier with time. Being very practical, adjusting to using speech and written work to help my practice is slightly strange for me. Dancers usually just go to "class" or "work out" to strengthen their abilities so crictally thinking is not of nature shall I say.

With just recently having a phone call with Alan Durrant I have had some time to brainstorm about what has been going my head throughout the summer and what work have I done using my new ways of thinking learnt throughout module one.

As my professional practice is a developing dancer and dance teacher I lead a busy lifestyle, reflecting thinking about my practice is not at the top of the agenda. Our conversation led to, conversations within the industry with other fellow dancers and teachers about their practice and concluding that I never really speak to anyone about how to build up my career.
However, in some aspect I do talk to my fellow dance friends about going to classes but this never leads onto teaching.

Over the summer I choreographed for a local dance school for ITV with a given a time limit of 4 weeks. When I was asked to do this, a slight hesertation came over me as this was a bigger project than used to. I used my critical thinking and ideas used in Module one to help me overcome my fear. When choreographing my piece, I noticed I used alot of written expressions to develop my dance piece by breaking down the sections, the movements and musical breaks and developed my thoughts through my laptop. Then gradually developing the movements when practicing my written thoughts. This allowed me to use this to reflect on how I am beginning to work as a dancer/teacher.
This leads on to a question on how can I create a piece with a smaller time barrier? Creating, Developing and Moving...? If I am given another task how can I improve the time it takes me to CDM?

This is just a start of my inquiry but I'll see where this takes me to finding new questions for my line of work...

Concepts of the Professional Network

Looking deeper into Cooperation and Game Theory I was interested in Axelrod's questions.
When should a person cooperate, and when should a person be selfish, in an ongoing interaction with another person? 
In the entertainment industry competition is extremely high. Some negative and some healthy. I believe that every working surrounding should be slightly competitive but healthy as I believe this makes us work harder and strive for bigger and better experiences. 
As some aspects of this are looked, at not giving too much away if not reciprocated. In my professional practice as a dancer, giving too much away can lead to negative effects, whereas closely cooperating in a suitable manner will give just enough away. I have accounted these situations before and learn't from them, It's about getting the job in hand and many dancers are "in it for themselves"but then when others have some news or advice we tend not to extract that information to those people.
The "Tit for Tat" way is used by everyone nowadays, "You give to receive," as dancers and teachers if we are being helped then we help another- An experience with a friend in London, she lets me know whats going on down there regarding auditions and castings when I'm based in Manchester and so I help her with teaching and emailing people for work.
The questions bought to me were- Even though I believe that everyone uses Tit for Tat- Do they really? Are some people genially out to help? What do other dancers think of my beliefs? Are they selfish? I have experience uncooperative people before have you? Is there competition in every working surrounding?


Affiliation

Hofsted's has "argued that in individualistic cultures people develop social relationships in many and varied settings, but these relationships tend not to be particularly close. In collectivist cultures, on the other hand, people develop relatively few, but deep and long‐lasting, relationships"

This I believe is extremely interesting, as my grandparents originated for a collectivist culture but I live in a Individualist culture trying to balance is difficult. In my professional practice I become competitive and a individualist trying to be different and stand out but as a non dancer I am cultural. 

This has never occurred to me before without looking into it now, but I do think that many negatives outcomes can happen from these theories. 

What if you end up hurting a family member or a close friends whilst trying to get further in life? 

The western society is seen to be all about "I" and "Me" but this is how we have survived and become one of the richest countries in the world. Does this make it right though? Is being selfish the way forward? 

Steph has commented about the Adam and Eve story, this is most interesting as we all try to build social relationships, and that many people find it abnormal to not have a partner/friends in their life.  I believe the more we affiliate and be social the more we gain from one another within every surrounding.

Developing my Professional Network

Networks are commonly used in my profession whether you are a dancer, a model, an actor or a singer. We all have the same foundations and then we categorise which type of artist we are. The main resources used are technology based however, there are some that are non-technology based. It depends on the most appropriate way to contact the person it is aimed at.


These are the resources I use to apply my professional networking:

Facebook

Twitter

Emails

Phone calls

Texts

Websites( Professional Profiles) Dancerspro/ Dance cast

Face to Face

Contacts

Mail

Agents- Log on

When using networks there are certain people who have established this and other who haven't. For example- If writing to my principle at my Ballet School, I would write her a handwritten letter and send via mail. However, if I was sending my Cv and Photos to an employer then this would be sent via email. Both are efficient but if the more experienced practitioner has not yet established technology (or I could be wrong) I find it out of respect to coincide with them how I think they would interact with other colleagues.


Generally I contact my friends with phone calls and texts but I am very reluctant to contact a producer or agent using this method. As many of the professionals feel they are being "hounded" by phone calls and prefer to email and contact you. Which is understandable, showing that you want the job is one thing but sounding desperate is another. The key is to be subtle.

In my line of work it is necessary to be part of a professional network or even a social network having employers as friends. Employers are always advertising auditions and casting on Facebook, Twitter and other web sites. Talking online is always easier than in person especially with someone you don't have a relationship with. Technology gives us that option to form a professional bond with someone and then hopefully gain some work. 

The current networks I am with are about building your profiles and having a CV, Showreel and photos on the site. This is so any employer can browse and chose the suitable artists for the job. Everyday things are always changing and the use of CV and photos sent via mail is out the window. The most efficient options are to use professional networks such as email. 

I think networking is a very important aspect in the entertainment industry. As I have blogged before, from my experience many of the dancers that are professional working constantly get work by mutual friends or contacts. This comes from experience in the industry as building contacts takes time. I try to keep in touch with all of my friends and contacts but it does become difficult with hectic lives. This is an aspect I need to work at, networking more contacts as mine are limited can only increased my chances of work in this industry. When networking you are also meeting new people, In Steph's blog she mentions about not wanting to have the attitude of "What can they do for me " which I agree with. Meeting new people should be for guidance and help, bearing in mind these people could have contacts elsewhere. Learning from more experienced people is a key feature as there are many things I do not know about this industry. I feel I am always learning and establishing my own network.

If forming my own network it would be both a social and professional one. I think when building relationship it is good to have the best of both. Always keeping professional at all times. I do agree that sometimes this becomes difficult, however I have learn't that having a friend relationship with someone makes you employable to everyone.

Facebook is simular to my idea but it is stated as a social network allowing different unprofessional items to be included.

Networking is the future. 

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11395

Inquiry

Through reflecting my profession I am starting to answer many questions and explore further.

What in your daily practice gets you really enthusiastic to find out more about?

Enthusiasm comes from enjoying an activity you enjoy. As mine is Dance and it just happens to be my job I always have questions about everything. My questions about teaching are- What if everybody danced, what would the world be? slimmer no obesity? Even more obsession with weight and image? Would people live longer as they would be more fit and healthy? Should it be a sport in the Olympics? As Ballet is a very technical and demanding genre of dance it helps- Posture, Alignment and Pose would people prevent injuries in older age and be stronger?

This is a very far fetch questions as not everybody loves to dance- but its the same as,
What if everyone played Football or Cricket? Would the world be different or would everyone clash having the same hobby?

What gets you angry or makes you sad? Who do you admire who shares your feelings or has found away to work around the sadness or anger?

Generally the main subject that gets me angry is unsupportive people. I have mentioned in previous blogs on Nicole's page that family members around me are negative and unsupportive. It feels like they think Im wasting my time and its not a "proper" job. If someone is happy shouldn't you just support them and be happy for them anyway? 

Repeatedly I have invited them to shows and numerous events but still as it isn't a full time job yet "9-5" it doesn't count as I job. Constantly I am explaining what I am doing and what it is for. The older generation are very traditional and backwards- So makes me question- How would they react if they were with the 21st century? or What if I made loads of money of one job? What would they do if one day I was famous? Again far fetched but just makes you think sometimes. I keep trying to say everyone starts somewhere and everybody is a nobody at first you it have to work hard.

I admire my immediate family and my partner as these are the people that are going to be around and really support me with what I do. They always say just keep trying and it will happen one day. I always have to vent to them on the negative feedback I get off others  and I admire what they give back to me. 

Several of my friends have moved to London and are away from home chasing their dream...Is this the next step for me? Will I gain more success moving to a different city?

What do you love about what you do? Who do you admire who also seems to love this or is an example of what you love? 

My passion is dance and being able to teach and choreograph my own work with other dancing is very rewarding. Most of my classes are teaching children aged 3-8, I love being apart of their learning ability as they are growing up. Especially teaching the younger children where they remember what I do and enjoy themseleves. The expression I love the most is when they are laughing and smiling, then most rewarding time is when they enjoy it. Defiantly dampens your methods when they get bored and tired easily. 

The person I admire the most with the same career as mine is my friend, Natalie who currently teaches dance and fitness to adults and children. She has a hectic life involving classes and training all year round, but loves what she does. 

Most dancers are all for themselves and don't help one another out, however she has been exceptional loyal and helpful to me. As she is slightly older than me, she has a head start and knows what she is doing so helping me is no worry to her with her already working and running a business.

Particularly in one area- Zumba is a new craze with everyone in the fitness industry, it is extremely popular and hard to get on a course. Natalie ask her trainer to hold a training day in Manchester and told me straight away to book, within 30 minutes the class was fully booked. There are no other training days for 6 months now.

I found this extremely loyal and kind, as this is a great help for myself with it bringing more work daily. Helping others make you feel better about yourself.

What do you feel you don’t understand? Who do you admire who does seem to understand it or who has found away of making not understanding it interesting or beautiful, or has asked the same questions as you?

Understanding is having knowledge. This industry is complicated, with many different rules for employers and artists. 

Having attended numerous auditions and castings many outcomes have occurred. With some being my height, skin colour, age and simply not right for the role. What bothers me the most is when the employers invite you to the closed casting or audition and then turn you away. This is very frustrating for me as travelling from Manchester to attend 99% of auditions and castings doesn't come cheap.

Finding out that many dancers are employed by either mutual friends or previous producers/directors from other jobs, I feel this is extremely biased and makes it more difficult for countless new dancers entering the industry.

Many of my friends understand the same as me but when sometimes not understanding makes it interesting. When you attend and try to figure out who the panel will pick. Then picking at your brain why they chose you or didn't. Makes life more interesting and makes you step your game up even more and become better in your field. 

However, questions always come to mind....

What would have happened if I had different hair? Different skin? If I was taller? If I wore heels? If I wore different clothes?

Has an event, experience or incident prompted questions that you would like to find out more about?

Having a recent conversation with a head teacher about education and sports activities. Combining sports, fitness and education together helps keep the minds active and gives them variety. It also helps them with their education and having fun at school so its doesn't seem like a chore for them.

It did prompt some questions for me:

Would teaching Maths and Science be more successful with combining with sports and dance?

Would combining a dance lesson with 45 minutes Maths and 45 minutes dance help faster success rates?

Do children use dance and fitness of a way out of standard education?

Do children think it is an easier career step? Everyone can me it?

The teaching and dancing industry are completely different aspects to my life. Prompting many questions for me I defiantly want to figure it all out and gain positive outcomes. 

How has everyone found their own inquiries?