Like most coaches, I have come to coaching as a second career.  When I’m not coaching, I run and manage Menzies Law - an award-winning specialist employment law firm based in Bristol, UK.

Being connected and contributing to society is important to me too. I’m a NED/trustee/governor on the boards of several charitable, public sector and not-for-profit organisations, all on a volunteer basis. I am Chair and co-founder of a charity providing mental health and resilience support to Bristol schools.

After receiving some powerful coaching myself as a client, I found myself being fascinated by the clarifying and transformational power of coaching. Having trained with some leading coaching organisations, I'm very keen to share its enormous impact with others.

What I bring

When I coach, I bring a lot of understanding about what the busy, demanding lives of business people, leaders, professionals and entrepreneurs. I also know a lot about how organisations operate, both large and small, and how their demands and cultures can impact on us.

I’ve been there. I’ve experienced the highs, the lows, great successes and, occasionally, a grand failure too.

Having been a lawyer for decades, I also really understand the particular culture, stresses and strains of the legal sector. This experience also helps me quickly understand other professionals and the working cultures they operate in, too. I’ve worked very productively with accountants, doctors, psychologists and HR professionals recently.

Somehow, I also have a busy personal life, with a large family - currently involving three teenagers. Since everything we do is connected and since we don’t leave our brains at work when we go home, or vice versa, I am also experienced in helping my clients explore aspects of their personal lives in our coaching work where they are happy to do so, such as parenting and relationships with spouses/partners. I operate on the assumption that everything can be relevant, and anything can be included, if you wish.

I aim to bring a supportive, affirming, inclusive approach to neurodivergence, gender, ethnicity, other social identity and to mental health issues.

I regularly help my clients work on stress, anxiety, being more psychologically flexible/resilient and the need to set healthier boundaries. Here my counselling, stress management, CBT and ACT (Acceptance & Commitment Therapy) training is very helpful and can provide therapeutic effects, although it remains coaching (see my Mental Health statement).

Feeback from my clients is that I create a warm, supportive relationship with them, with lots of empathy and understanding, while also being methodical and practical. It is this balance between facts and feelings, and allowing you a safe, confidential space to really open up and tackle the difficult stuff, that I aim to offer you.

Qualifications, training & professional practice

In the UK at the moment, coaching is unregulated and there are a large number of coach training courses of hugely varying levels of quality.  The most popular coach training is really quite basic. Anyone can call themselves a ‘coach’.  So, as a coaching client, you need to be careful and choosy about who you work with. 

As you might expect from someone who has been in working in the highly regulated legal services sector for many years, I decided to take the very best professional coach training available in the UK and have obtained a well-respected, internationally recognised coaching accreditation. I practice in accordance with the highest professional and ethical standards and am also always stretching myself to develop further, train more and learn more:

Coaching

• Professional Certified Coach (PCC) accreditation with the International Coaching Federation (ICF), working in accordance with its Code of Ethics

• Master’s level qualification in Executive Coaching & Mentoring (ILM Level 7) from Bristol Business School at UWE Bristol

• Co-Active Professional Coach Training with CTI (Co-Active Training Institute) - recognised as the global gold standard in coach training

• Certified Psychological Coach (CertPsychCoach) with the Centre for Coaching, London

• Certified Positive Intelligence Coach (CPQC) with Positive Intelligence, San Fransisco

• Certificate in Relationship Coaching with the Salus Academy

• ORSC (Organisational and Relationship Systems Coaching) Fundamentals course with CRR Global

• ICF Trauma series

• AC Crafting your Therapeutic Coaching Approach course

• Acceptance & Commitment Coaching course with Cognus Coaching

Psychological & Therapeutic

• CPCAB Certificate in Counselling Studies (RQF Level 3)

• Certificate in Stress Management with the Centre for Stress Management, London

• Certificate in Awareness of Mental Health (RQF Level 3)

• Several courses on ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy) with Contextual Consulting

• Diploma in Family Law Supervision with FLiP Faculty

• Member of the Association of Family Law Supervisors

• Vicarious trauma in the legal profession - various courses and reading

• TA101 Certificate in Transactional Analysis

• Introduction to Internal Family Systems (IFS) course with IFSUK

• Member of the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS)

• Associate with DISCsimple, allowing me to use the Everything DiSC® behavioural assessment tool with my clients, giving you access to the fascinating world of DiSC and Agile EQ

Neurodiversity

• Coaching for Gold - Working with Neurodivergent Clients with Gold Mind Neurodivesity

• ADHD for All with Gold Mind Academy

• ACT for Adult ADHD with Contextual Consulting

• Neurodiversity Awareness with Lunah Training

• Understanding Autism with The Open University

I regularly undertake CPD, continuing to broaden my training and skills, and have a highly skilled professional coach supervisor for my practice.

I hold professional indemnity insurance and am registered with the ICO as a data controller.

Before I came to coaching, I originally did a History degree and then several postgraduate qualifications in Law. I practised as a Barrister from 1996 and then as a Solicitor from 2008, which I continue to do now.

Mental health

I am not a qualified mental health professional, but my coaching style can help support good mental health and well-being, especially with stress, and my training in counselling and in ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy) helps me to work safely and usefully with people who may be struggling. My position on working with mental health is explained here.

Neurodivergence

Whether or not you've had an autism or ADHD assessment/diagnosis or anything else, if you think that any ND concepts may be relevent to you, I provide a neuro-affirming space for you, as a self-identifying ND person myself, to allow you to explore your 'mental wiring' and how you interact with the world. We will work at your pace and attend to your needs from coaching. See my Neurodiversity Coaching page for more information.

Hear/see me talk 

Visit my Videos page to hear me talking about coaching and useful tips for working more effectively, especially in demanding roles like law, other professional services and business leadership.

Next Steps 

For more information on how I work and the investment required, see My Coaching Approach.

I offer a free chemistry session which allows us to see if I could be of help to you and whether we’d work well together. Contact me here to book one.

What my clients say…