Bios
Jerome Deroy, Chief Executive Officer / Training Program coordinator
After studying in Spain, the UK and France, earning a degree from one of Europe’s top business schools (EAP-ESCP), I began to see what my future would be like: I would be rewarded by an attractive offer from a global corporation.
In 1999, that’s exactly what happened. I started to work for the bank BNP PARIBAS’ Asset Management department in Hong Kong.
Unbeknownst to most of my work colleagues, I became a DJ and met a talented photographer with whom I produced 2 short films while keeping my day job. These ventures sparked my creative side and ignited my passion for film.
So much so, that in 2003, I decided to quit my job and move to New York.
Shortly after arriving in New York, I started to work for Oscar®-nominated filmmaker Murray Nossel, Ph.D, first on the international distribution and promotion of his films, then as his production manager.
One day, as we were driving to New Jersey, Murray told me about Narativ, his company that was all about story. Murray said: “You’ve got a business degree, right? Can you take a look at some of the data I’ve collected over the years?” Sure, I said.
The next day, Murray brought me a shoe box that was full of papers. I took everything out and started to read. Every piece of correspondence contained stories, and it was like reading a book or watching a film: I was hooked.
Finally, here was an opportunity to combine my creative aspirations and business background. I became CEO of Narativ, and have since worked towards bringing storytelling training to corporations, individuals and educational organizations.
Murray Nossel, Ph.D. Director / Founder of Narativ, Inc.
Murray Nossel Ph.D started out in corporate training in Southern Africa in 1983; he has subsequently practiced as a clinical psychologist and earned a doctorate in anthropology at Columbia University where he taught Life Histories and Narratives at the post graduate level. In addition, he has been nominated for an Oscar® as a documentary film-maker and is a founding member of the internationally acclaimed storytelling performance, Two Men Talking which recently completed a run on London’s West End.
Storytelling is the common thread in Murray Nossel’s 25 years of professional experience. Through his company, Narativ Inc., he is delighted to bring to the corporate environment, a unique ethnographic methodology aimed at creating listening environments™ and transforming individuals, teams and organizations through the simple, timeless and universal art of storytelling.
Clients have included Disney, Time Warner, Bellevue Medical Center and Columbia University Business School where he is an executive coach for MBA students.
Murray Nossel’s documentary films have screened in dozens of film festivals across the world, including Sundance, Full Frame and IDFA Amsterdam. In 2003, he received an Academy Award® nomination for Why Can’t We Be a Family Again? which also received a Henry Hampton Prize.
He was awarded a Cine Golden Eagle for A Brooklyn Family Tale which aired on PBS in 2002.
His critically acclaimed feature-film, Paternal Instinct, received 6 festival awards including Best Documentary and Best Film, aired on HBO and the BBC, and screened in over 40 film festivals across the world.
Nossel’s latest film is Turn to Me featuring Nobel prize winning author Elie Wiesel. In 2005, Nossel received a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism
Paul Browde, Co-Founder
Paul Browde, M.D. is a psychiatrist and Executive Coach based in New York City. He is Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at New York University. He is co-founder of Narativ, Inc and is a founding member of the critically acclaimed show Two Men Talking, which is currently in its fifth month Off-Broadway in New York City after having been performed around the world, including on London’s West End.
Paul Browde views individuals as the experts of their own life stories. Having spent the past twenty years engaged in deep listening, he brings a wealth of experience to Narativ’s corporate training, with particular expertise in the reciprocal relationship between listening and storytelling.
Dan Milne, Consultant
I have always been faced with many possible directions.
After Cambridge University when it was finally my turn to decide which way, my first choice was Paris to study physical theatre. This area that had been an interest of mine, but as fate would have it, I missed the deadline! I chose instead to do a postgraduate acting qualification at the Drama Studio, London, and this was where I met Paul Browde. I knew him as a South African doctor training to be an actor, a man of humour and insight - I had no idea where meeting him would take me...
By 2000 I was established as an actor in the UK, working for companies such as the Young Vic, The National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, and I was beginning to work as a director developing my own projects. I had also begun working in the corporate sphere coaching people in communication skills. Here I was, interacting with a new and seemingly alien world, with a diverse range of clients. Quickly I realised that I had readily transferable skills that could add real value - what began as a sideline soon became a central part of my work.
It was also in this year that I met with Paul and his friend Murray Nossel in a cafe in New York to discuss TWO MEN TALKING. As they described their ‘ personal storytelling’ piece to me, it was one of those moments where I knew I had to work with them. I felt I had an immediate understanding of what they were trying to do and shared a profound belief in the essential power of Story. My first instinct, and one that remains key to this day, was to simplify and authenticate the telling. Over the first few years of our work together I realised that personal story resides not just in the words and memory, but in the body. For me this connected to my early interest in the physical dynamics of theatre and confirmed my feeling that directing this piece was the right place for me to be.
The journey of discovery-through-performance continues. As someone who has worked for many years as a Communications Consultant for large corporations, Narativ gives me the opportunity to bring together two important sides of my work, my theatre work and my consulting work. These two distinctions are gradually disappearing. When convergence like this occurs it seems to say - there are no longer many directions, there is only one.
Nadiya Nottingham, Yoga Instructor / Consultant
Nadiya Nottingham came of age in Ireland in the 1970s. Growing up in the beautiful seaside town of Sandycove, she was inspired to meditate by the sea from early childhood on.
By the time she was in her twenties, her family's emotional dysfunctions and the repressive social atmosphere in Ireland called her to a new life. A friend told her that “touching the ground in New York City is like an electrical charge,” and with those words she was off. In the 1980’s Nadiya worked in fashion, leading the high life. She smoked and drank and used drugs, and saw many friends die of AIDS. Inevitably she herself became very ill, at one point weighing 98 pounds. In 1992 she ended up in the hospital with a collapsed lung.
Her sister introduced her to yoga at The Integral Yoga Institute. From her first class she realized that this was the path she had longed for, something which would help heal her physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Yoga restored space and clarity to her life, deeply resonating with her days by the sea in Ireland, and eventually she began teacher training.
Now, sixteen years later, she has incorporated the ancient Chinese practice of Qigong into her work and leads classes, workshops, and retreats in the US and abroad. For her and her students, combining yoga and qigong has led to a synergistic enhancement of what it means to practice. In 2002, Nadiya ignored a doctor’s prediction that, because of a spinal disorder, unless she had surgery she would soon become partially paralyzed. With a fierce determination not to believe someone else’s version of her story, once again she transformed her body through her practice. "When I look back now on my days of smoking and hard living," Nadiya says, "I see that I was trying to find my way back to what I had and then lost as a child, a sense of wonder and effortless connection to nature. I realize now that everything I went through served a purpose. It helped me grow, and therefore it was all for the good."
This background of self-healing brings an authenticity and joy to Nadiya's teaching that is palpable.
