Professor Neil Thompson provides such a wealth of insight into the topics he covers - drawing on years of expertise in practice, academia, and mentoring others. His approach is thoughtful and challenging, combining theory with practical insights. This enables reflection and growth, and is essential for leaders as well as those they lead.
The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed employee health and wellbeing as a priority over the past few years and Neil does his best to ensure that his specialist offering of ‘wellbeing’ concepts and the excellent training available can be understood; particularly their implications for social workers made clear. The strength of Neil’s work is the application of knowledge in an easy read style and covering clear and concise learning sections pertinent to professionals at all levels in their career. As we know promoting wellbeing can help prevent stress and create positive working environments where practitioners can thrive and work effectively. Good health and wellbeing can be a core enabler of employee engagement and organisational performance and I would have no hesitation in recommending Neil’s work as a ‘go to’ training source.
The world of leadership is infinitely inspiring and challenging. Inspiring because it is always about people. Leadership is the ability, art and skill to influence people and help them move to a certain place. This makes leadership also challenging because leading people demands perhaps a little more from the leader than the person being led. That starts with the leader having to get to know himself and show real curiosity for the unique people entrusted to him or her. Curiosity precisely when working together chafes, causes pain, necessitates change. Neil is a truly unique guide in the world of leadership. Like few others, he couples deep knowledge of various scientific disciplines that touch on leadership with broad experience in working with leaders and their organizations. Neil presents a sound of his own that helps leaders not only profess with their mouths that people come first, but also give those words hands and feet.
Professor Neil Thompson PhD, DLitt is an outstanding academic, leader and manager with an international reputation for his path-breaking research, training and education. He is extremely supportive both personally and professionally. He constantly makes a difference to people's lives and I endorse him in the strongest possible terms.
One of the stand out features of Neil's work, whether it be his writing (revealed in all his books), teaching, online courses and face-to-face work as a trainer, is his great ability to conceptualise the issues under discussion extremely clearly, think strategically and put all this into a coherent plan of action. His decision making and output over the past 40 or so years as a teacher is second to none. I have personally witnessed these qualities as his co-author of a number of book chapters and one major book, and worked alongside him as a tutor at a number of Open University summer schools. Students came away from his sessions often with glowing praise saying that Neil had transformed their learning, made difficult concepts understandable and had strategically given them new insights and inspiration. This combination of qualities underpinning Neil's ability to think strategically justifiably puts him into a category alongside the very best academics and, in my judgement, makes him one of the true greats of the profession.
Gerry Skelton MBEBelfast MetI am delighted to add my endorsement to and for Dr. Neil Thompson’s work, and considerable offering on his website. Neil first came to my attention many years ago for his extensive work on Anti-Discriminatory Practice. I later discovered his interest and work in other areas outside of social work, and the depth of his personal and professional commitment to the helping profession and beyond. In all of his writing, website resources and local, national and international contributions and impact (as his many accolades attest), Neil always starts from a base of humility and service. For such a prodigious narrator of how best helpers of whatever guise can meaningfully contribute to helpees, Neil possesses a sophisticated simplicity of approach that many legions of admirers (and there are many) find so welcoming and accessible. In all the years I have known him, Neil has always been friendly, approachable, supportive and generous; personally and professionally. I, like so many colleagues and students have benefitted from his wisdom across so many academic and practice disciplines and arenas; his kindness in sharing a plethora of resources (often freely); and lengthy, rich and varied insights to practice failures, improvements and pathways to progress to a much better world. I am also grateful and humbled that, in the last 10 years, I call him friend 😊
Dr Neil Thompson has taken his amazing insights in people management and translated these into a range of valuable services and resources that positively impact employee health and productivity. Neil is a valued contributor to our company's activities in the wellness engagement arena.
I have had the privilege of working with Neil Thompson for many years. I have observed his presentations and teaching. He is not only a scholar, but a gifted teacher as well. He has a clear, understandable delivery, infused theory and concepts into his lectures, and imbues a caring presence as he presents. He is a master teacher!
Neil is an excellent chair for group and committee meetings, and he knows how to facilitate discussion without intruding upon the group process. He understands group dynamics and is sensitive to the needs of those present, readily available as a resource when needed. Attending a meeting where he is the chair is always a pleasure.
Neil Thompson produces very useful and accessible resources to support students and practitioners on a range of topics. Some of the specific material looks at discrimination and oppression. He is, of course, known for the Personal, Cultural and Structural model which enables thinking more broadly on, for example racism, and his books on value-based working, taking account of religion and spirituality in social work, as well as on anti-racism for beginners offer material for reflection that can impact practice for the better.
