London
1 Harley Street, London W1G 9QDBy Cavendish Square, a short walk from Oxford Circus and Bond Street.
Coaching for executives · London · Birmingham · Online
Coaching for executives
For executives who are paid to deliver and rarely asked how they are coping: targets, restructures, a boss to keep on side and a team watching how you react. Private coaching at 1 Harley Street, in Edgbaston or online, kept entirely separate from your employer.
What executives bring to coaching
An executive salary suggests you should have everything handled. The pressures underneath tend to go unspoken, at work and often at home as well.
Results expected, support assumed
You are measured every quarter and expected to know the answer, yet there is rarely anyone above you who asks how you are holding up. Coaching gives you 90 minutes that are about you instead of your numbers.
Presence in senior meetings
Being heard by people more senior than you, speaking with authority and holding steady when someone challenges your figures.
A bigger job than the last one
The first months in a larger role, surrounded by sharp colleagues and quietly wondering whether the interview panel got it right.
Restructures and politics
Keeping your footing while reporting lines shift, budgets move and colleagues compete for fewer seats.
Travel and long days catching up with you
Early flights, late calls across time zones and a creeping sense that your health is paying for your career.
Deciding whether to stay
A headhunter’s call, a stalled promotion or a growing feeling that the company’s direction no longer matches yours.
How I coach executives
Each session starts from a real situation in your week: the meeting where you lost your thread, the director you can’t read, the decision on hold until you feel more certain. You go through what happened, what you were telling yourself at the time and what you would do differently, then pick something to try before the next session.
Presence is often taught as posture and voice. Those matter, but in my experience the bigger shift comes from dealing with the doubt underneath, so the confidence you show in the room matches how you feel walking into it.
NLP techniques help with the moments that throw you, such as a hostile question from a senior colleague or a presentation to the board. If stress or sleep has become the bigger problem, hypnotherapy is something you can choose, never something you have to do.
For the full service, read executive coaching. If the way you come across is your main concern, executive presence coaching goes further, and my article on building executive presence covers the basics.
Between sessions
The work carries on between appointments. You test the agreed actions in real meetings, notice what happened and bring it back. If something comes up before a big presentation or a tricky one-to-one, a short email or text keeps you on course. Over a package, those small experiments add up to a different way of operating that colleagues notice before you mention it.
How to become a strong leader
In this three-minute video I set out how executive coaching works on leadership and confidence: getting to the root of the doubt, then building the habits and presence that help you lead well. It gives you a sense of how I approach the work with senior clients.
Captions are available on YouTube.
Keeping coaching separate from your employer
Executives sometimes worry that asking for help will be read as weakness, or will end up on a file somewhere. These arrangements keep it private, and nothing about the sessions passes through company systems.
- Off the record. There is no report to your line manager, HR or anyone else in the business. You book and pay directly, so the sessions belong to you.
- Early and late slots. Sessions run from 9:00 to 18:30 on weekdays, so you can take one before your first meeting or at the end of the day, with weekends on request.
- Wherever you are that week. Meet at 1 Harley Street, a short walk from Oxford Circus and Bond Street, or in Edgbaston, or connect from a hotel or a borrowed meeting room on Zoom, FaceTime or phone.
- Help before the moments that count. Email or text me ahead of a performance review, a board presentation or a tense call, and again afterwards if it went badly.
Problems that often sit behind this page include stress and imposter syndrome. If you lead other senior managers, coaching for senior leaders looks at that side of the job, and the article on signs of burnout in executives is worth reading if you feel close to exhaustion.
What changes for executives
A voice in senior meetings
You prepare differently, speak earlier and keep your point when someone pushes back. Colleagues start coming to you for a view instead of waiting for you to agree.
Pressure you can carry
You recognise your own warning signs, from irritability to broken sleep, and change something before the strain shows in your work or at home.
Confidence in a bigger role
The fear of being found out fades as you collect evidence of what you do well and stop putting it down to luck.
Career choices made deliberately
Whether you stay, push for promotion or leave, you decide on your own terms instead of reacting to the latest reorganisation.
Typical patterns
These are common patterns, not individual client stories. Details always differ, and nothing about any client is shared.
The newly promoted executive
Stepped up into a much bigger role and now sits alongside people they used to report to. Sessions on authority, preparation and handling scrutiny.
The executive after a restructure
Kept their job when others lost theirs and now carries a heavier load with less certainty. Sessions on workload, loyalty and deciding whether to stay.
The high performer running out of energy
Hits every target and dreads every Monday. Sessions on boundaries, recovery and what they want the next few years of work to give them.
Coaching for executives in London, Birmingham and online
Birmingham
Quadrant Court, Calthorpe Road, Edgbaston B15Close to Five Ways, a short taxi ride from New Street.
Online
Zoom, FaceTime or phone, anywhere in the UK or abroad, with the same structure as sessions in the room.
Format and fees
Sessions last 90 minutes, longer than the usual coaching hour, which suits deeper work on confidence or a career decision. Fees are published below and are the same online or in person.
Free call
30 minutes
By phone, before you commit to anything.
Discovery session
£165
One 90-minute introductory session, with no obligation to continue.
Five, eight or twelve sessions
£975 to £1,980
Every session 90 minutes, with support between sessions.
Payment plans
By agreement
Spread the cost of a package. The same fees apply online.
What clients say
Reviews published on this site, word for word.
I highly recommend Stuart. 10/10 experience. Right from the beginning he made me feel so comfortable and he seemed to genuinely care about what I had to say.
Having already had talking therapy previously I found Stuart’s approach fresh and efficient.
Qualifications
- Advanced Master Practitioner of NLP (DNLP)
- Master Practitioner of NLP (MPNLP)
- Psychotherapist (MNACHP)
- Master Hypnotist (DMH)
- EMDR Practitioner
- PSY-TAP Practitioner
- ADHD-CCSP
- Enhanced DBS
Questions executives ask about coaching
Will my employer find out I’m having coaching?
Not from me. You arrange and pay for the sessions yourself, and I have no contact with your company. What you say stays confidential, with the one exception of a serious risk to your safety or to someone else’s.
Is this the same as executive coaching?
It is the same service, described for people in executive jobs. The executive coaching page covers senior work in general, including chief executives and directors. This page focuses on what executives below the very first chair usually face: targets, politics, presence and the next move.
I’ve just started a new senior role. Is it too early for coaching?
No. The first few months are when habits form and impressions settle, so it is a sensible time to begin. Sessions can help you plan your early conversations, read the politics and calm the nerves that come with a bigger job.
Do you help with presentations?
Yes, as part of presence and confidence. Sessions cover preparing for high-stakes presentations, staying composed under questioning and handling nerves. If public speaking is the main issue, the public speaking coaching page explains that work in more detail.
How often should sessions be?
Weekly works well when you face something specific, such as a new role or a difficult quarter. Fortnightly leaves more time to practise and suits longer pieces of work on confidence or balance. You can change the rhythm as your diary changes.
Start with a free 30-minute call
You describe the problem. I tell you whether coaching is the right tool and how I’d approach it. If it isn’t, I’ll tell you that too. No obligation, and I reply within 24 hours.
- You send the formName, number and a line or two about what’s going on.
- I reply within 24 hoursBy phone or email, whichever you prefer, to book a time.
- A free 30-minute callYou decide afterwards. No obligation, no follow-up pressure.
Still deciding?
“I highly recommend Stuart. 10/10 experience. Right from the beginning he made me feel so comfortable and he seemed to genuinely care about what I had to say.”