Christine DeGrasse is a Human Resources Professional.

"It's been exactly two years now since I knocked doors in a north London suburb, pausing between one well paid job and another.
After seeing the advertisement I'd made the assumption that the training would consist of equipping me with a set of 'magic tools' with which to entice and dazzle my clients. Of course there would be workshops dedicated to snappy sales sound-bites and role plays where I would learn to engage the less than enthusiastic client.

This quickly proved to be something of a misunderstanding of the way TLFC works. Asking for something from someone who has no obligation whatever to give came to me as quite a challenge. Without the right preparation I could have become disheartened, disillusioned or angry. This preparation is a unique training programme which does not indoctrinate the trainee or teach the trainee to indoctrinate the client but which allows the required skills to reveal themselves to the fundraiser over a period of time as a result of their own experience. This allows each individual to develop their own particular way of applying the training. It gave me the opportunity to remember the importance of listening to my own intuition. This in turn encouraged me to work creatively within the very clear guidelines that are laid down about ethical ways of behaving towards the public.

This revealing period challenged and enriched not just my working life but my whole life. It caused me to think about how I communicate with everyone. In a way, because of the very innovative training I received, I taught myself the things that matter to me personally as a communicator and so I am completely unable to ever forget them. As a result of the generosity of the donors I found I also raised a respectable amount of money for a very good cause."