Inspiring Diversity Speaker For The Deaf & Blind In The Workplace
England
United Kingdom
Ronald Ligtenberg is an inspirational speaker and organiser of remarkable events unlike any other. He is a specialist in working and inspiring people with disabilities.
Ronald is the co-founder of the Open Senses network: a group of sensory practitioners and experts that organised a festival in London, including a symposium, workshops, multi-sensory club nights and installations, happening in 24 venues like V&A museum, National Gallery, and Truman Brewery. www.opensenses.org. He uses his expertise to create multi-sensory brand or user experiences.
He wrote a book (in Dutch) about Possibilizing. It includes 10 stories around 10 values about how to use a limitation as a source of inspiration.
His personal journey has brought him to the world of Social Entrepreneurship via the Experience Economy, which is all about Imagineering and on to Disability Policies.
His lectures make audiences see beyond boundaries and challenge themselves to see problems as opportunities. Ronald’s story reveals the unexpected results that pop up when you take a ‘limitation’ as a source of inspiration. He calls it ‘possibilizing’: to think and act on possibilities, in any circumstance.
As the founder and CEO of the Skyway Foundation, Ronald organizes music events for deaf people all around the world in which the audience is treated to aromajockey’s, vibrating floors and invited to experience taste sensations. He also organises workshops using body language to communicate to deaf people. His 3 1/2 hour workshop has deaf people functioning as communication experts for corporate managers.
For blind people, Ronald sets up photography projects. His diversity in the workplace programmes has been delivered with great success to many companies including Barclays, Deloitte and the How To Academy.
Do you want to develop? Cause a problem! Failures, Problems, Limitations, Breakdowns:
“All our life, we are trying to avoid them. Our whole way of life is organised to work ourselves around problems or to prevent them. But what if you just dive in, or even cause them deliberately? It might just be the start of unexpected growth!”
Ronald is passionate about inspiring people to explore, grow and meet new challenges. He is available as a speaker to share his experiences and learnings from his own journey, conquering problems and creating new ones to solve. Ronald originates from Holland and is now located in London.
"The credibility of the deaf trainers is beyond any reasonable doubt. The fact that the interaction between the trainer and the participant goes through an interpreter, makes the trainee much more aware of what they are going to say and what they are going to ask. So the effectiveness of what they say increases immediately."
“For Barclays, this was an extremely beneficial training, I would recommend to anyone who would like to gain creativity, open horizons and learn how to communicate better!"
“Skyway Foundation was approached by Rabobank to provide a workshop around ‘Positive Bias.’ Skyway Foundation conveyed this theme through a very practical application. The managers received feedback from a deaf communication expert. The feedback from these experts was a revelation for everyone! The fact that managers learned something from deaf young people, who are normally considered as people who can ‘not’ do something, led to a change in how they viewed disabled people. The reactions of the managers were very positive! The workshop caused them to think more thoroughly!”
“The training with Skyway Academy had extremely high marks in the evaluation by our participants. It was a huge eye-opener to realize that communication encompasses much more than content. Delivering this experience to our professionals provided us with a more open-minded attitude and helped promote inclusive leadership. From a learning perspective, this intervention had such a mind-blowing effect that we will undoubtedly continue working with Skyway Academy in the future.”
“Mr Ligtenberg provided personal stories and insights which motivated our students in altering their views and ways of thinking. His speaking sessions encouraged our international students to think out of the box and reflect on their own talent and abilities and what they can possible make a difference in their environment and communities.”
"Ronald was one of the speakers at TEDxDamlaan in September 2013. With personal stories, sense stimulating presentations and a good sense of humor he could easily engage the audience. Ronald knows how to keep the level of energy high and delivers an attractive speech."
“Ronald Ligtenberg is a top of the bill inspiring speaker in our curriculum; he has a lot of experience as a (social) entrepreneur and he has the capability to reflect in a very authentic, practical and humorous way, with also having a sharp eye on the lessons to be learned. He is the most quoted speaker in our program.”
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