Profile – Philip Collett

Name: Philip Collett.

Job: Managing director, Motivational Systems,
provider of courses for unemployed and disadvantaged young people
to improve their confidence and self-worth.

How long in the job? Since 1990.

Career highlight: An unemployed young man did well on a
programme and become a trainer himself.

Career lowlight: I left school without confidence, became
homeless and took a dead-end job in a mail room for six
years.

Best training ever done: The Hoffman Process, an eight-day
course focusing on letting go of the negative past.
I didn’t get where I am today by: Blaming others and moaning. I
tried it for 25 years of my life and it didn’t work.

The best move I’ve ever made was: Going to America for two
years to learn about peak performance psychology and find out why
some people are successful and most are not.

I set up my company because: I wanted to share what I
learned in the US that there are no secrets to success. It is all
common sense, which isn’t always common practice.

The single most inspiring person I’ve met during my career
is: Steven Conway, a venture capitalist who funded a chain
of estate agents I set up in 1979. He helps others to become
successful and so becomes successful himself.

Me and my career: At Motivational Systems we work with
young people with low esteem. We help them begin to take
responsibility for their lives and understand they can achieve
more. Our motivation courses aim to build independence and inner
strength. Some young people come to us through Connexions, which
funds their training. By the time they come to us these young
people are not engaging with anything, and are not in education,
employment or training. I do some training myself and know what
it’s like walking into a room and seeing resistant young people,
with arms folded. But a lot of our trainers are talking from
experience and have a way of getting through and sharing practical
ways to improve lives. We also invite young people who have turned
around their own lives to come in and tell their stories. My main
role now is training the trainers, who can easily become burned out
and cynical. They need support too.

Curriculum Vitae
1990-current: Set up Motivational Systems.
1987-9: Studied psychology in US.
1979-86: Went into business with chain of estate
agents, Conway Collett.
1978-9: Estate agent.
1972-8: Worked in mail room, Barclays Bank,
London.
1972: Homeless.
1971: Left school at 16, no qualifications.