The Superbowl

This weekend will see the Pittsburg Steelers taking on the Arizona Cardinals in what is one of the most watched sporting events in the world. For all of those not familiar with the Superbowl it is the final of the NFL competition to find out who is the best team in American Football.

The reason I want to talk about it is because in the UK we don’t really put on sporting events anywhere near the magnitude and razzmatazz of the Superbowl. At our FA Cup final the biggest domestic cup match in football as we know it we will normally have someone singing the national anthem and possibly a fly over from The Red Arrows and this is seen as big.

The Superbowl on the other hand is a weeklong event. In the build up to the match there will be press days where the media can grill the players, there will be lots of events for the fans where they can try their hand at playing some American Football an there will be entertainment shows up on with live music in the run up to the event. Across the country it will be what everyone is talking about and what all the press organisations are reporting on. This is before we have even got to the match itself. When the match is on they will have fireworks, pre-game entertainment, music and more. Before the match starts all the players are introduced and welcomed on to the pitch, at half time the pitch will be turned in to a stage where a major international star will perform the half time show and then at the end of the game there is a ceremony for the winning team.

I think the UK need to take leaf out of the American’s book and really hype the big finals like The Superbowl. The bigger and more exciting you can make the game the more young people you can inspire to take up the sport. Cup Finals should all be about capturing the imagination of the audience and making memorable events where the country comes together to watch.

The organisations behind these sports need to use them to get young people in to sport. In the run up to the event they should be running events that encourage young people to get involved all across the country and not just in the host city. Sporting bodies should be capitalizing on the attention these events get and using it to get as many young people involved in sport as possible.

I will be staying up late in the UK to watch it and even if you aren’t a fan of American Football why not give it a quick view to see what I am talking about I have many friends who aren’t fans of American Football but will tune in to the Superbowl. The NFL do a great job of promoting the sport over here in the UK and I think is a blueprint for what the English FA should be doing to promote our sport abroad.


Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Knowledge of the job market

With the global credit crunch hitting harder and with more closures and redundancies being reported everyday young peoples knowledge of the job market is becoming increasingly important.

For the college student deciding on what course to study at University they now have to start thinking about what industries are making money and which are not cutting back on jobs. Now by the time they have graduated the job market may be a different place so they always have to be aware of what is happening and what they think will happen over the next three years.

For the education leaver who is going in to the work place there is less choice around. With low skill and base level job numbers shrinking it is becoming harder to get a foot on the bottom ladder of a company and work your way up. If you are just looking to get some money or some experience again these jobs are hard to come by as now companies only want to spend money on people they think will contribute to the company and not someone they have to invest a lot of time in.

For the University Graduate there are less graduate positions available so they have to find a way of making themselves stand out from the crowd. They have to have more knowledge than the other graduates looking for those jobs and do more research to get themselves to the top of the pile, it really is survival of the fittest.

For those currently in work it is time to be thinking of ways in which you can make yourself irreplaceable in your company. It is also a time for being prepared in case the credit crunch hits the company you are working for, know what your options are and what you can do if you are made redundant.

My advice to surviving this period is to try and really master a skill whatever that may be. Companies are always going to need skilled staff to keep their company going. So whatever skill that may be you need to start really working on it and make sure you can do that skill better than anybody else.

To give us your thoughts on the credit crunch and job market why not join in our topic of the week which can be found by going to:

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=644

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Appreciation

Actress Kate Winslet has been grabbing the headlines this week for her acceptance speech at the Golden Globes after winning two awards. Her gushing acceptance speech in which she forgot the name of fellow nominee Angelina Jolie has been seen the world over and it got me thinking about my topic for the blog this week – Appreciation.

To achieve great things in life we need a strong support group around us whether that be family, friends or colleagues. These people can help you in many ways from doing small jobs for you to save you time to focus n your goal to helping you improve in certain areas of your life or your talent.

The most important thing family, friends and colleagues give is their emotional support. When you are feeling down they pick you up and when you are doing well it is their encouragement which spurs you on and makes it all worthwhile. These people are there to offer support and advice when you need it the most and to offer it from a point of view which is one of wanting you to succeed. It is their love and belief in you and knowing that you have their love and belief which helps you handle going in to interviews, auditions or trials when they can’t physically be in the room with you, when you are alone or when it all rests on your shoulders.

When you are trying to achieve your dream some of your support network may put their life on hold for you or at least rearrange all their plans so they can help you. This is why it is so important that you show them everyday that you appreciate them. You may not be able to thank them on TV with millions of people watching but you need to find ways in which to know they are appreciated. Some people may not help you if they don’t feel appreciated but most will help you without the need of being appreciated however this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t show them that you appreciate them. Showing you appreciate someone can really make their day and help inspire them in their own life.

So go out and make someone’s day go and show them that you appreciate them.

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Starting the Year off Right

So you are now back at School, College, University or work and already one week of the year has passed us by. Gone are the parties and the fun of the Christmas / New Year period and if your like most you wont have a clue what you are going to do in 2009. You have probably already made new years resolutions with many people already breaking them and you may have put a few pounds on over Christmas but now is not the time to look back now is the time to start the year off right.

A lot of what you do in January can dictate how the rest of your year is going to go. Now is the time we need to get our attitude right for the year, get focused and get that determination going. We need to start setting ourselves goals and go about achieving those goals, forget about what you did or didn’t achieve last year just focus on what you can achieve this year and how you can achieve what it is that you want to achieve. If we can’t get that determination and that focus going now its going to be harder for the rest of the year and if you do manage to find it later on you will have already wasted so much time.

Now is the time to get your diary out and plan your year. Start putting in all the things you have planned and if you don’t have enough things planned start planning things. To succeed in 2009 you are going to have manage your time and make the most out of every minute you have.

As we start the year it is time to cast off all those things about us which are stopping us from achieving and making those changes in our lives and in our attitude that will help us become more successful. This is the year to make the changes in your own life that make a big impact.

What are your plans for the year? We want to know what goals you have set yourself and you can let us know by joining in our topic of the week which can found by going to:

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=631

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Christmas

In our final blog of the year before Talented Young People closes its doors for the Christmas break I thought it was only fitting this week that we talk about Christmas.

Now to me Christmas is a time of relaxation but deserved relaxation. If you put in one hundred and ten percent all year around to achieve your dreams your batteries need to be recharged with a week’s rest. With companies and a vast percentage of the population slowing down and closing up for Christmas it makes sense to get your rest and relaxation in when it is hard to get anything done.

Christmas is also a time for reflection. To think about what you have achieved this year and what you should have achieved. It’s only when looking at a year as a whole and matching we achieved against what we wanted to achieve that we can see if it has been a success or not. It is so easy to get caught up in the craziness which is the modern world and life so times like Christmas where everything shuts down are needed to get true perspective.

Christmas is about remembering what is important in your life. Spending time with family, friends and loved ones around Christmas can really bring home to us the importance of the people around us. It is a time where we make an effort to connect and reach out to people and a time where we can be overwhelmed by the generosity of others as well as feeling the warmth of making the time special for someone else.

If you want to hit the ground running in 2009 you need to make the best of this season to put to bed 2008 and to put you in a great position to start 2009.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from all of us here at Talented Young People Ltd.


Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Miming

Britney Spears has launched a press and PR assault on the UK this weekend with an appearance on X-Factor and a 90 minute supposed bare all interview which was broadcast on Sky One this week. People should be talking about her new album which she is here to promote but this week many people have been left talking about her alleged miming on her so called live performance of here new track “Womanizer.”

People have been miming for years and this isn’t a new thing for music artists to do but when big names do it, it gets headlines. This week I ask when is miming acceptable and even is it acceptable at all? Should TV companies and music companies be doing more to make sure they perform live? And should we be told before an act performs if they are live or miming?

When people pay to see a concert are they paying for a show? Are they paying for entertainment? Or are they paying to see the act perform live? Now I can slightly understand if you are going on to a TV show at last minute and they can’t set the audio production up properly for you that you wouldn’t want to go on live. With sites like YouTube if you give a bad performance its going to be plastered all over the internet and through one performance could ruin your image but when it comes to concerts you play in venues which are designed for gigs and in which you have the whole day to set up and do sound checks so to me there is no excuse for miming at a gig.

When an act goes on to a TV show to do an interview and a performance do you just see this as a promotion / an advert for the music or should it be held in the same position as a performance at a gig? With a TV show no fan or member of the general public has paid anything to hear you sing live so is it acceptable not to?

You play a dangerous game when you mime and try and pass it off as a live performance. If you youtube Ashlee Simpson and Saturday Night Live you will see what I mean as on live TV her track started before she was ready and within a few seconds left the stage in embarrassment. Or if like Britney you have one of these headset mics and then when you have to be interviewed after the performance the interviewer has to put their mic in your face. As much as a bad performance can be bad for your image getting caught miming can be equally as bad just ask Ashlee Simpson.

The whole miming side of the music industry helps reinforce the belief that many people have that pop stars can’t sing and all there stuff is just edited to sound good. This is a reason why I think more needs to be done to make people perform live because as long as people continue to mime people will continue to have these thoughts.

I think the problem lies in the overproduction of tracks when they are released. When an artist can go in to a recording studio and spend days just recording one song and record it in small chunks having hundreds of attempts of course it is going to sound a bit different when you have one take to belt it out live. I think the quality of the production of some of these tracks makes it near impossible for some acts to recreate live and this puts them off performing live.

Britney picked the worst show to do a mime on as the show is all about people who have none or very little professional training performing live every week and this is what has brought this in to the headlines. If Britney had mimed on a daytime TV programme I don’t think there would have been as much talk about it.

What do you think about singers who mime on stage? Do you think it should be stopped? Or do you just want to be entertained and not care if the act is miming or not? We want to know your view points on miming and you can share your views by joining in our topic of the week:

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=617

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com

Leadership

I haven’t done a blog on a sporting topic for a little while but this week my inspiration from this piece comes from the world of sport. If you like your football you will be able to guess what I am going to be talking about. I am a big fan of Arsenal Football Club and they have been all over the back pages this week following their Captain William Gallas making claims and statements to the press about trouble behind the scenes at the club. So this week it is all about Leadership.

In this world we will always need good leaders and leadership qualities are great to have. Now what does being a leader actually mean? Is a leadership someone who shouts the loudest and can get people to do things? Is a leader someone who leads by his actions? And should leaders speak out and act out on things which could have a detrimental affect on the group they lead?

To me a leader is someone who is considered but someone who can when it comes to crunch draw on their own experience and feelings to make a decision on how to lead. The important thing not to be when being a leader is a loose cannon. When some people think of a leader they think of someone who doesn’t bow down to anyone and leads based on their own opinions. A loose cannon is what William Gallas ended up being which is not the way to lead.

As a leader you need to put the group of people you lead before yourself and as a leader the way you act and behave will be seen as a direct reflection of your group by many people looking in. To be a leader you need to have the respect and the backing of your group without those two things even if you have the title of a leader you are not a real leader in the true sense of the word.

Even if you don’t want to a be leader when you grow up you never know when your leadership skills could be called in to question and when you will need other people to help you or do things for you so you always need to keep your leadership skills sharp. So when you are a leader never make a rash decision, always think before you act and always put the group first before yourself.

Adam Sibley
Founder of the Talented Young People organisation
www.talentedyoungpeople.com
"Envisage it, Believe it, Achieve it!"
”Shaking up the Youth of Today”

http://www.talentedyoungpeople.blogspot.com