Janie Van Hool graduated from The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1987 and spent 12 years working as an actress in theatre, film, TV and Voiceover – both in the UK and internationally. She started presenting professionally in 1997, facilitating and speaking at large-scale corporate events and loved it, shifting her focus from playing other people, to being herself, and combining her skills and experience. She now teaches others how to create presence and make a powerful and lasting impact.
Janie’s postgraduate research focused on enabling people to communicate effectively using verbal and non-verbal communication skills. These academic studies, combining psychology with the creative instincts of a performer have enabled her uniquely to transcend challenges in communication and help people effortlessly to re-evaluate their approach to communicating with confidence. She is passionately committed to offering pragmatic, speedy solutions and tools to inspire others.
Her work has broad appeal. She leads a range of personal impact and influence workshops and provides one-to-one coaching on executive presence and confidence for blue chip companies. She also has an extensive list of private clients from all areas of professional life including actors, barristers, journalists, business executives and consultants.
As a voice and accent specialist, She has taught voice and dialect in the top drama schools in the country and worked extensively in London theatre and the regions. Her accent reduction method has been used to great effect in business and drama schools alike, allowing native and international speakers of English to modify and improve their accents, increasing clarity and confidence.
She is co-author, with Pam Jones, of The Impact and Presence Pocketbook (2004) and is qualified to use the HayGroup ESCI instrument to assess individual and team emotional intelligence.