Among the organisations with whose executives I have worked are Marsh, Zurich, Sodexho, QinetiQ, Mowlem, GenRE, News International, Maersk, BT, Cable & Wireless, many medium-sized manufacturing and service companies, and a number of Government departments and agencies, including the HMRC.

TESTIMONIALS

"I don't think you really know what an impact you have!" JS, HRD

"Profound. Almost taught me too much!" TY, MD

"I would gladly give you a reference any time. Our 'chats' were on the mark every time. Your observations astute. And, even when I put you on the spot, I knew I could trust you." DF, CE

"You're a one, you really are! A real challenge at times - and it was tough, but what an outcome. And I'm sure we've not stopped yet." MS, CE

"Your way of looking at things, and way of feeding them back, baffles me. You manage to make me aware of home truths, but I feel encouraged at the same time." PW, MD

"At the time, we did some really good work together. You brought vision and insight, and helped me challenge myself. But the real impact is happening now. Quite simply my life and relationships are totally different." RM, CEO

"I was ready to give up. Frankly, I had. I never expected to look back after five years and see how much more I could achieve and how my life has unfolded." JT, TD

"A friend. But one who doesn't get angry when things don't go the way you know they could, but instead is there to keep things gently moving forwards." BS, S

When you get to know me, you will realise that I prefer to work behind the scenes.  However, I also realise that the first step to working together is for you to have confidence in the relevance of my experience.  Hence, these notes...

Having received my PhD in behavioural science, from the University of Bristol, I spent 15yrs working in mainstream management consultancy specialising in organisation development - primarily focused on corporate "Excellence" and creating exceptional places to work. 

Training as a psychotherapist, a little over ten years ago I began to grow my one-to-one leadership development practice.

Along the way, I have authored 8 books, was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in Industry and Education, and regularly travel internationally giving keynote presentations, chairing conferences, and compering events, on various aspects of leadership, emotional and spiritual intelligence (EQ and SQ), governance, climate adaptation, corporate responsibility, futures, and strategy.

I write many articles and short essays, am on the editorial panel of one business journal, and judge some of the awards of the World Council for Corporate Governance.

What does leadership coaching embrace?

Most management effort revolves around the normal daily themes that businesses have to cope with. Yet, leadership is about achieving more than the norm and coaching should reflect this.

Relationships, emotions, agendas, intrigues, politics, cultures, and power... If leading was easy, everyone would do it. Sometimes the answers lie deeper than we are used to digging. Leadership qualities (including emotional intelligence, spiritual intelligence, authenticity, and engagement) are hard to define and difficult to develop, yet they are often cited as reasons why one person achieves their best and another gets left behind.

The world needs people who dream, and it needs leaders to transform those dreams into reality. Leaders draw on their coach, turning their vision into plans, and finding ways to implement and accelerate them. While goals, processes and procedures, techniques and financial incentives may have their place, between 50% and 88% of sports performance is determined by psychological factors. Business is the same.

Every top class athlete has a coach. So does every top class leader, although you may not be aware of us because we work behind the scenes.

LET ME CALL YOU BACK

My conversations with leaders involve meeting monthly, for a one-to-one conversation, typically lasting 1¼ to 1¾hrs, held in complete confidence. My clients are leaders (actual, aspiring or potential) from a wide range of different organizations and industries.

Together, we look at your role, yourself, your drivers and attitudes, your impact on those around you, constraints you impose on your success, and the potential you could aspire to.

We deconstruct situations and use a variety of tools to help you understand yourself and evolve alternative strategies for the future. Working in this way for over a decade, most of my clients see our conversations as a significant part of their ongoing personal and professional development.

Naturally this depends on creating the right sense of trust and confidence if we are to work together effectively. To help this begin to develop, I always offer the first session together at no cost. It is an opportunity for you to assess whether I am going to be able to offer you anything.

Once we begin working together, I expect my clients to commit to a minimum of six further monthly sessions. While I am happy to be flexible, and understand the real-world constraints that we all work under, my clients are sufficiently senior to have enough control over their own diaries to prevent regular intrusions on our work together.

You have nothing to lose and a lot to gain; complete the form above or give me a call NOW.

The following abstract illustrates typical situations that arise in the course of my work with leaders - it should go without saying that permission to quote has been given, names have been changed, and a few details tweaked to preserve confidentiality.

Wake up calls can happen at all kinds of times of our lives. Evan's came one summer Sunday. He'd driven back from holiday that morning, and the kids and his wife were unpacking the car. He'd sat on the patio recovering with a beer after the long drive from the ferry from France. It had been a great holiday. But as he sat there, he felt a dread rising in him. Instead of looking forward to going in to work the next day, he was thinking of all the problems he just knew he was going to encounter. Over the last fortnight, there'd been a few messages on his Blackberry, but they weren't too problematic, but now he was beginning to worry that his team had been shielding him from the bad stuff until he got back. He knew this wasn't right, but he simply didn't know how to shift it.

Evan's PA is a star. She really does manage his world for him. He'd been a bit reluctant to take her on initially. Whereas most of the people put forward by the recruiters were young, vibrant, and positive, Ellie was far older, had been working for a senior civil servant beforehand, was more serious, but projected the personality of someone who was completely unflappable. When he'd gone off two weeks before, protocol meant he had to leave the 'reins' to the FD but, actually, he'd got far more confidence in Ellie.

It really felt as though he had to drag himself into work on the Monday. By mid-morning he was seething. The FD had managed to avoid dealing with some extraordinary shenanigans between two of the divisional MDs and as a consequence one major customer was seriously angry, two significant bids had folded, and one of the Deputy MDs had left a sealed envelope for him tendering her resignation. Ellie went into his office and shut the door. "Look, I know this probably seems the wrong time, but I really think this would be a good one to think about yourself and what's right for you before you get involved and try to sort everything single-handed. You're having lunch with someone, he's been recommended by my old boss. He's not exactly a coach; he's not a consultant; he's not a shrink; he's sort of bits of each of those." It was an interesting introduction!

That lunchtime, Evan discovered a different side to himself. That afternoon his two MDs discovered a different side too. Strangely, to some, they have found a new appetite for the business. The new Deputy FD has transformed the focus of the Finance Department and she is clearly on a fast path to becoming a great all-round Chief Executive. Evan has elevated his own playing field. He's now got the time he needed to engage with his industry on a wider platform, and has already led one successful take-over of a niche competitor.

Evan (added 16/06/10)