One of the riskiest times in a person's career is when they step into a new role that has a significantly different level of responsibility, expectation or visibility, because adapting to a new role and working environment takes time, whereas there's often an expectation that you will "hit the ground running", because of course, that's why they hired you.

Here's an example in the words of one client, a Director of Sales Development in a well known Global IT Services company...

Mentoring is a valuable addition to the Learning and Development capability of any business, yet very few experienced staff are ever trained in how to be an effective mentor. Rockwell have invested in their people and protected their intellectual property by rolling out a mentor training program.

Aston and Fincher is one of the UK's oldest and most respected specialist wholesalers, supplying products and education services to the hair and beauty industry since 1934.

A 6 month management development program, custom developed by modelling their high performing store managers, has set them on the path for increasing turnover by 50% in 3 years. 

Fitness Industry Education had a problem. When they checked sales income, it had dropped dramatically. Their new sales consultant just wasn't working out. But rather than replace him with a 'better' sales person, they decided to give him some support and see if it would help.

The first question I asked: "How do you know that sales performance has dropped?". The answer was interesting, to say the least.

Jackie Williams is the HR Advisor for RSSB (Rail Safety and Standards Board) and has worked in her current role for two and a half years. Jackie and her team are responsible for a personnel of around 180 people. A recent performance review identified a need for Jackie to be more challenging in some of her communication with senior management. Jackie’s manager recommended coaching as a direct and effective way for Jackie to deal with these communication issues. 

Parker Hannifin is the global market leader in hydraulic control systems, with 45,000 employees worldwide and over 2,000 in the UK alone. 

The UK Learning and Development Manager first explored the idea of coaching with us over two years ago, and we have worked since then to put in place a program to run alongside their existing management and leadership development programs. The culture of the organisational is quite traditional and was, at first, wary of coaching which seemed new and unproven. 

Mace is one of the world's largest and most diverse management and construction companies, with a reputation for finding the best solutions to complex property and real estate challenges. 

One of Mace’s challenges, in common with many organisations, is finding new business and developing commercial relationships. The personal challenge is therefore how to continue to deliver high quality projects whilst at the same time growing the business. 

KKP is one of the UK’s leading management consultancy practices specialising in sport, leisure, culture, regeneration and land-use planning. Much of KKP’s business comes through public sector tendering, and the bid presentation is a vital element in KKP’s ability to secure new business, being the main opportunity for KKP’s consultants to differentiate themselves from their competitors and it is therefore vital that they perform consistently at their best. 

Simon Polledri, Director and co-founder of Corporate Sports Management, first met Peter at a conference where Peter was speaking about coaching. Simon was impressed with Peter’s performance and could see the value that the coaching techniques could bring to Business Managers and Directors at all levels. Simon had never enjoyed giving presentations but it was something that he wanted to learn to do well and recognised the advantages this would bring to the business. Having maintained his relationship with Peter since the original seminar, Simon decided he would be the ideal person to coach him. 

Since 1981, FGI World has been developing and delivering employee assistance, disability management and cross-cultural services for employers in North America and around the world. 

Peter developed a sales training program for FGI’s annual sales conference in Canada, focusing on developing personal leadership and purposeful relationships. Following this, we delivered sales coaching for a number of staff from the Canadian and North American sales teams, team managers and the VP for Sales.