execo executive coaches and consultants

A reference from a Chief Executive

Martin first worked with me as a personal coach and we have continued this relationship for the last 3 years. As we demerged from our parent company, a number of senior managers, including me, were first assessed and then offered a personal coach to develop their leadership skills in the harsher commercial realities of life outside the Group. Since that time, as well as continuing the personal coaching, I have also engaged Martin to help with the development of my Management Board.

Martin and I have regular 121 reviews where we have discussed leadership style, coaching style, personal development and work-life balance. Martin has facilitated these discussions with surveys of my team members, formal coaching on approaches that I might adopt and a range of academic and practical articles and extracts to stimulate my thinking. His approach has been advisory and thought provocation rather than chalk and talk.

Martin has joined my team at a number of off-site sessions and has helped us to gain a greater shared understanding of individual and collective goals, of the ways we work together, of the things that go well and the things that could be improved and of how we can create a more effective team. Again his style has been to observe, to intervene with worked through examples of an alternative approach we might have taken and to challenge when he perceives people to be disengaging or over-compromising their personal position.

I guess my perception of the value of his personal support is evidenced by the fact that we continue to work together three years on! He has helped me to look at issues from a range of angles and to adapt varying styles according to the demands of the situation and the individual. Martin helps me get to clarity around complex management and personal issues. He keeps up to date with a range of reading and is able to keep me in touch with articles of relevance to the issues that I face.

My team was created from scratch in 2002 and has created a successful business. We have delivered for both our customers and our shareholders. Martin's contribution to this success was that in the early days he helped me to get to the core issues and then he helped me to get the team focused and aligned in driving business performance.

I have always been confident of Martin's discretion and integrity. I can share my personal feelings and objectives with Martin and be confident that they won't be shared with other parts of my business. I can be equally confident that he will challenge me to properly define what I am trying to do, to communicate more fully than is my natural tendency and to fully live the our corporate values of open, clear, bold and trusted.