The Small Business Owner & Freelancer
Do you run a small business or work for yourself?
Do you find this lonely, at times?
Are you stuck in the operational rather than the strategic?
Are worried about the long-term sustainability of your business?
Do you often feel stressed?
Would you like your business to thrive whilst maintaining balance and harmony in your life?
I can help by providing a range of services that support both you and your business. Offering a regular touch point that helps you to identify and achieve aspirational goals, discover positive solutions to difficult challenges and develop a positive work-life harmony.
I work with a range of small business owners, leaders and freelancers to support them in establishing, growing and sustaining their business and themselves by providing a range of services and support.
I work with you to get to understand your business and explore your needs through a complimentary introductory meeting where we will design a package of professional, personal and business development that will support you in achieving both your and your business' goals in a world that is constantly changing and challenging.
Layering up development approaches, engagement and activities offers a personalised approach and depth to your learning, growth and development.
The services below are often identified as being of significant support to business owners/leaders and freelacers. Some people focus on just one service whilst others build a development 'package' which often moves beyond supporting just yourself but also your team, it is up to you!
Each service can be explored in greater depth on my service pages, by following the links as you read through.
It is not only the services that are built around your needs and ambitions but the timeframe too. There is not set programme of dates, we establish these together to work around your professional and personal commitments and preferences.
Services that small business owners/leaders and freelancers find beneficial are typically:
Coaching
I define coaching as:
A creative, challenging and thought-provoking process where the coach creates a psychologically safe space for the client to explore, unpick and reflect upon issues and behaviours to achieve ambitious goals and desired outcomes that are personally and professionally transformative.
Coaching is a thought-provoking, dynamic and transformational process and professional development strategy that creates space for you as a business owner/leader or freelancer to explore your personal,professional and business challenges, issues, skills, capabilities and behaviours.
Engaging in a coaching programme supports you in addressing challenges, achieving your and your business goals, enhancing your performance, and that of your team, and reaching your potential by taking a systemic approach that considers perspectives of a range of stakeholders whilst identifying ways of working that not only support but enhance oyur wellbeing.
Coaching provides the space for you to further develop your self-awareness, emotional intelligence and ability to effectively lead your business, ensure sustainability and think strategically to ensure you excel in business and achieve personal, professional and organisational objectives.
Coaching sessions are a safe space where we work one-to-one to explore, challenge and reflect. It is a space that enables you to focus on you, your business stategy and stakeholders rather than operational problems or issues that often take up so much of your time and headspace.
It is my role as your coach to offer an appropriate level of challenge, to listen intently to what you are saying and what is left unsaid, demonstrate compassion and care and to raise the bar when you thought you had reached it through using a range of relevant tools, techniques and questions.
Through this process, you will develop the self-awareness, skills, approaches and behaviours that will enhance your thinking and behaviours as a business owner/leader or freelancer whilst addressing any limiting beliefs that may be holding you back and ultimately develop the skills to self-coach.
Business coaching is for you if you own or lead a small or medium sized business or work for yourself as a freelancer. The sessions are shaped to your context, business goals and values and your aspirations and are led by you.
Common areas that business owners/leaders and freelancers bring to coaching are:
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How to improve performance, of themselves or their teams
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Moving from operational to strategic
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Leading change
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Leading people
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Positively approaching conflict
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Exploring new projects
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Developing and maintaining wellbeing
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Developing resilience
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Creatively exploring new markets
Below Sally, a small business owner, shares her experience of coaching:
Find out more about coaching packages here
Mentoring
The EMCC define mentoring as:
“... a learning relationship, involving the sharing of skills, knowledge, and expertise between a mentor and mentee through developmental conversations, experience sharing, and role modelling. The relationship may cover a wide variety of contexts and is an inclusive two-way partnership for mutual learning that values differences”.
Mentoring provides a space to navigate professional challenges, explore your business, create new ways of working, and respond to change, empowering you to lead a dynamic and sustainable business.
In our work together, I bring my people leadership experience and expertise, creativity and pragmatic positive solutions as well as an independent and external perspective to work alongside you in developing key aspects of your practice, mindset and behaviours that in turn support your business to develop and thrive.
Mentoring might be ideal for you if you feel you would benefit someone to work alongside who brings an external and fresh perspective.
Business owners/leaders and freelancers bring a wide range of topics to mentoring such as:
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Establishment of core business vision and values
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Re-framing an organisational structure, roles and responsibilities
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Creative recruitment and selection
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Effectively leading people
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Establishing a positive work-life harmony
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Leading through change and complexity.
To find out more about my mentoring packages and approach visit my mentoring page, here.
OnLine Courses & Recorded Masterclasses
As a business owner/leader or freelancer, spending money and ring-fencing time to engage in learning and development can be a barrier. Even with the best intentions diaries struggle to align and budgets don't allow resulting in investment in yourself becoming a thing of the past.
To offer a flexible, affordable, on demand solution, I have developed a range of online courses and masterclasses to support personal and professional development and suit any budget. Several of these courses and masterclasses centre around themes and topics that business owners/leaders and freelancers bring up in conversations with myself..
You can sign up for the courses online and access learning in bitesized chunks and engage with the masterclasses as and when you can. Many businesses also purchase these courses to support the professional and personal development of their team.
Topics include:
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Time Management
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Establishing Work-Life Harmony
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Leading Effective 1:1s...
The menu changes, but if there is anything that you would particularly benefit from do let me know and it may be something I can develop!
To find out more about online courses and masterclasses visit my courses page, here.
Breathwork
Professional development should always be complimented with personal development - the two work hand in hand.
As a business owner/lead or freelancer, you may find that work seems to dominate and time for investment in yourself often gets pushed back or set aside.
In the long-term a lack of investment in yourself leads to ineffective leadership as well as having negative impacts on your health, which affects you beyond your work.
In my work, I speak to many business owners/leaders and people working on their own for themselves who are finding their stress ;eve;s rising and their overall mental and physical health declining. This led me to introduce breathwork into my coaching work and then to become a breathwork practitioner.
As part of your personal and professional development engaging in breathwork may be ideal to support your wellbeing and help you to manage stress whilst also improving your sleep amongst other things.
The benefits of breathwork include:
I invite you engage in breathwork in a way that suits you and offer:
fortnightly 1 hour breathwork sessions online - an easy way to access guided breathwork on a regular basis and practice a range of techniques that support your overall health and wellbeing.
6-week breathwork courses where you learn a range of breathwork techniques across the 6 weeks and develop a breathwork toolkit to call upon as needed.
1:1 or small group breathwork sessions - personalised sessions that focus on supporting your needs. This is ideal to compliment coaching and mentoring or could be introduced to your business for all you staff as part of a wellbeing package.
You can find out more on my breathwork page, here and book online here.
Collaborative Power Hour
The Collaborative Power Hour is a monthly on-line protected space where people come together with one aim:
To Get Stuff Done!
The idea is simple.
You arrive, with a task to do and I invite you to engage in a short reflective/grounding activity.
We then spend around 45 minutes focused on our chosen task. This can be anything from writing a report, dedicating time to thinking about a new idea, reading an article, clearing your inbox or getting through the next things on your admin pile...
It is not about volume - it is about focused time.
There is no expectation to interact although I find the accountability of leaving your camera on helps!
After the 45 minutes of focused working I draw the power hour to a close.
Perfect to ring-fence time to get those tasks that you often don't get round to completing done!
Find out more about the collaborative power hour, and book your place here.
It is FREE!
Group Coaching
Group coaching is an alternative to 1:1 coaching and is easier on the budget.
Group coaching sessions tend, however to follow a programme across a series of sessions in a group of like-minded people. Group work, however, is not the intention. The intention is to create a protected and reflective space for you to engage in the group coaching focus. As a business owner/leader or freelancer you may find group coaching an ideal mechanism to not only progress your thinking but to protect space for you to develop yourself and your business and to network.
I offer a range of themes for group coaching and these include team development, culture change, leadership, identity and values as well as wellbeing. It might be that a group coaching programme suits your needs and offers you the space you need to focus on your own personal and professional development as well as your business'
Team coaching is different as this is working with an existing team. Whilst this would not be beneficial for your individual development it might be that it may be of use for your team as a whole and I can arrange a programme to suit your team - this might be related to a specific challenge or project.
For more detail take a look at my group and team coaching page.
1:1s
1:1s are one of the most powerful tools for transformation and the establishment of a positive culture within an organisation. Yet, all too often little attention is paid to the quality and value of 1:1s.
Most organisations offer 1:1s in some form or other but all too often these are not effective or impactful, and all too often are re-scheduled or cancelled when 'more important things crop up'.
As business leader/owner, you may resonate with this and would therefore be interested in how I can work with your teams to enhance 1:1s.
As a small business owner/leader, you may not benefit yourself from regular 1:1s, especially if you are the most senior person in your organisation. You might find it useful to book in a series of regular 1:1s with myself, to help you focus on your development, challenges and successes and to benefit from the accountability and motivation that 1:1s offer.
If you work for yourself or as a freelancer, you may miss the regular contact with a line manager or having someone to hold you to account, keep you on track and to check in with. I offer a range of 1:1 packages that enable you to continue to benefit from 1:1s even when working alone.
I can undertake 1:1s in person or face to face (dependent on location).
Find out more about what I offer with regards to 1:1s here.
Blog
My regular blog focuses on a wide range of topics that aim to inspire and provoke thinking as well as offers frameworks for you to apply to your own context.
As a small business owner/leader your time is precious and you probably already feel as if you have more than enough on your to do list?! That is why I keep my blogs short and practical.
Take a look at the blogs here.
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