How does a book about dance relate to online learning? On the surface, it doesn’t. But dig a bit deeper and you will see that the author of Frou Frou to Fruition has never stopped learning, even though she has not taken any online courses.

I knew a very young Kym Degenhart and her family around thirty years ago. Then we moved away, they moved, and we kept up a patchy acquaintance with an annual letter and later a Facebook connection. Around six months ago, a pre-publication promotion on Facebook about a book written by Kym caught my attention.

How could I resist buying a book written by someone I babysat when she was three?

Transferrable Skills

As I read the book, I was reminded several times of Barbara Oakley’s message in Mindshift. How skills learned in one aspect of life or for one job can be transferred over to a new field. You don’t need to be a dancer to find this book useful. Written in a flowing, readable style, Frou Frou to Fruition incorporates a surprising amount of transferrable information. Although aimed at people involved in the dance industry, there are tips relevant to anyone trying to make a career as a performer, a teacher or a business owner. Kym Degenhart has done all three, culminating with an award from Canberra Women in Business (CWB) for Young Businesswoman of the Year in 2018.

Based on Kym’s own experiences as a dancer at the Moulin Rouge in Paris, and performing for other shows in various countries, the early chapters can help you define your own life goals, then set out to achieve them. Useful ways to deal with setbacks (unsuccessful auditions in this context) and how to cope with life in a foreign land are presented alongside Kym’s checklist for audition preparation. Many of these techniques can also help in other contexts. Think job interview instead of audition and you are on the right track.

Kym also describes her teaching qualifications and experience.

A New Challenge: Running a Business

Chapter six discusses running a business. Kym admits that she didn’t really know how to run a small business when she bought Bom Funk Dance Studio. It was a steep learning curve. She had years of performing under her belt and had completed Bachelor Degrees in Journalism and Arts as well as a Graduate Diploma of Education before becoming a dance teacher, but running a studio was a whole new experience. Even though the studio was an established business, Kym discovered the workload was heavier than expected. Many aspects of business ownership and responsibility are described. Again, plenty of the points discussed are also relevant to running a business in other fields.

With thoughts incorporating everything from parking availability, accessibility, and bathroom facilities to performance-specifics such as stage managing, costumes, and lighting, the chapter on event planning could be used by anyone organizing a large party or reunion. Just use the relevant points and ignore the rest.

Hard, Focussed Work and a Bit of Luck

Part autobiography, part encouraging text, this book can help you make the most of your opportunities. Kym clearly states that an element of luck helped her, particularly in her performing career, but there was also a lot of hard, focussed work along the way. While strong, sound advice was offered throughout the book, I found some chapters had an almost smug tone. Despite this minor irritation, I found Frou Frou to Fruition an interesting and inspiring read.

Each chapter ends with a “Time to Take Action” box which summarises how you can implement the major messages from that chapter. These entries reminded me of the “Now You Try” boxes at the end of each chapter of Barbara Oakley’s Learning How to Learn book for young people.

(Paperback copies of Frou Frou to Fruition can be posted worldwide, or a Kindle version is available from Amazon.)

A Final Thought

Many techniques needed for success in online study such as time management, organization skills, and others are also needed to succeed in fields as diverse as performing on stage, teaching, and running a business.

By Pat Bowden, published May 14, 2019.