Founding Partner
Ivy 100 Education
Chaoyang District, Beijing, China
I took an opportunity in China because I wanted to try teaching, to travel and see whether I could handle living in a challenging country. I had a hunch it could lead somewhere interesting. I value the skills that I picked up from the experience – the ability to think on my feet, tailor my communication style for different audiences and hide my nerves when speaking in front of large groups of people.Communications As a teacher, literally I became a pro at communicating and connecting with people. I often found myself standing in front of a group of kids with very little common language, and with all the responsibility for teaching and keeping them engaged for an hour or more.Communicating involved more than just knowing how to creatively express my thoughts, but more or less understanding how to express things diplomatically and tactfully, without offending or upsetting anyone.Leadership As a teacher I felt that I was more than just a person standing in front of the classroom writing on the whiteboard and giving lessons. I thought of my self as more of a leader in my classes.I had to know how to inspire my students, how to manage difficult students, how to keep individuals and the entire class on track to complete a task on time, and how to keep their cool when things got a little out of hand.