I have been self-employed since 1997. I left an enjoyable job as an instructor with people with disabilities to move 200 miles across the country to a situation where I had no job. I took a year off work (began my Master’s during that time and gave birth to my son) and in 1997 decided to embark on the self-employment route as a freelance IT trainer. I got lots of work…mostly by referrals and repeat business but soon found myself slipping into the horrible trap of working crazy hours. Eventually after nearly getting burned out I decided to change. I cut back my hours, increased my prices and began to get a life. As with most entrepreneurs, I soon found myself looking for a new challenge and was directed to Coachville and began training there as a coach. I have trained as a coach but was drawn to Vision Reach when it came up for sale by the quality and quantity of its content and the vision to make it a truly great resource for small businesses.

Your style of working
I like to pose as a village idiot, you know, asking those questions that children like to ask. I believe in the power of humour to ease a situation. I believe in the importance of telling the truth. I believe in the power of my intuitive inklings (which I share with clients). I like working collaboratively with others in the belief that we all have blind spots (both to our strengths and weaknesses)

Fee Range
On application.

Contact
anne@vision-reach.com

I'm a storyteller working with business owners to tell their stories as effectively as possible. For over twenty-five years I have coached business leaders in marketing/communications on designing and facilitating programs for personal and organizational development in the areas of vision, identity, and voice through both the power of live communication and the use of electronic media and new technologies.

I've been a writer and director of plays, films and videos, a small business owner, and have always been, at heart, a coach. Most recently I've pursued this more formally by integrating the New Ventures West's Integral Life Coaching training program to my communications work. It focuses on the importance of moving towards balance in the intellectual, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of life. In addition, I have been credentialed as a Master Certified Coach by the International Coach Federation. I learned early on that my passion is to work with individuals to present them as all they can be. Our work together includes clarifying a vision (story) for individuals or groups and translating that into an effective and powerful marketing strategy with marketing tools that help them to realize their goals. I've worked with small business owners, individual professionals, government senior managers, and business executives.

Some recent workshops I've presented to small business owners include: Secrets of Voice and Effective Communication, designed to fine tune the business and personal narrative; Know Who You Are and Go for It, designed to clarify identity and to develop a strong marketing strategy and plan; and, Give Voice, a program designed to build an authentic, strong voice for individuals and/or businesses.

My professional background includes a Master of Fine Arts degree in theatre and English, a Bachelor of Arts degree in speech and English with concentrations in television and radio, Master Coach Certification with the International Coach Federation, and Integral Life Coach Certification through New Ventures West in San Francisco, CA

Your style of working
I like working on collaborative ventures. I begin by clarifying the purpose of our work together and identifying what it is the client wants to have happen as a result of the work. I utilize deep listening skills to provide a background for an original assessment of the work we'll do together. The coaching plan provides an opportunity for the client to see issues in a new way. A typical program will introduce practices that will support the client in moving towards his/her goal. Most of these ventures include situations in which the client will encounter "barriers", or "stuck" points that hold him/her back from easily implementing goals-that's where coaching comes in. It's a way of freeing the client and enlarging his/her vision of what's possible and being able to implement that. All programs and projects have a regular "feedback" and evaluation components. I work individually with clients or with small groups.

Fee Range
Fees are based on the program design, but typically average $400-$500 per
month (U.S. dollars).

Contact
ellen@vision-reach.com

Graham is a professional coach working across Business and Personal Sectors.

Before establishing as a full time coach Graham assembled an impressive record in Coaching, Business Facilitation and Consultancy with major corporations including IBM and AT&T where he worked with businesses in all sectors and size ranges.

Passionate about mobilising the maximum potential of individuals and teams and enabling them to achieve exceptional results, among his favourite achievements are driving a multi-national cross disciplinary team to the successful deployment of a major pan European infrastructure, international business re-organisation and managing dynamic change in one of IBM’s fastest growth divisions

Now focused on coaching people through the challenges and demands of establishing, growing and managing dynamic businesses in the SME sector his coaching skills are supported by specific experience from consultancy in the Business systems and IT industries.

“Working in the small business sector increases the immediacy of the impact of coaching on results, so working with owners and key professionals in this arena is a real joy”.

Accredited by the Rivas Palmer Foundation, a member of the International Association of Coaches, Graduate School of Corporate Coaching and School of Small Business Coaching, he also holds a Masters degree in Business Management Systems and has designed and delivered numerous seminars and has contributed articles and features to press and specialist journals including for the CBI.

Outside work Graham is married with two young children of whom he is unreasonably proud, a love of travel and, having flown (or jumped out of) most things which fly, now enjoys an irrational pleasure in being aboard almost anything that floats!

Your style of working
I’m passionate about the power of the coaching process and its specific value to independent businesses, where there are scarce opportunities to have your creativity and thinking really pushed, or to find space to fully explore and create clarity over your objectives and opportunities, things which differentiate the truly successful enterprise.

“As coaches we never lose sight that success is your achievement and responsibility. My job is to challenge and stimulate you to harness the full depth of your talents and resources to maximise that success, helping you to stretch your goals, overcome obstacles and to enjoy doing it!.”

I work with a broad sphere of clients from entrepreneurs to actresses, but the common characteristics are a desire and commitment to seek challenge and a real openness and willingness to implement positive change.

Love them or hate them, systems, processes, information and e-business technology are at the core of the modern business whatever its size, and ignoring them both risks disaster and misses huge opportunities.

Coaching in this field is immensely valuable as it provokes the clarity over needs, approaches, options and solutions, which can turn a necessary evil – into real added value. If you implement your own solutions you will do so faster and with more assurance, if you retain a supplier you will become both more able to articulate your needs, more creative in your requirements and more confident when confronted by those “technology specialists” . And believe it or not this technology stuff can really be great fun.

Fee Range
$595 - $1137 per month for between 4 and 8 hours of coaching.

Contact
graham@vision-reach.com

For many years I ran my own business in the engineering and motor trade industry, and while I enjoyed the business side I found I enjoyed the dealing with and managing people side even more interesting. My business worked with a diverse section of people from the shop floor to the MD and working out how best to approach and handle the different types of personalities always fascinated me. Several years later I felt that I could improve the satisfaction I gained from my professional life and so decided to change direction and train as a natural health practitioner. After several years in practice I realised that I had a natural gift for building rapport with people and helping them find their way forward in life. This, added to my business experience, made it a natural progression for me to become a Coach. Over the last 15 years I trained in the modalities that I felt would give me a well rounded and extensive skill set to add the years of ‘hands on’ learning about human nature, what fires us, motivates us and makes us tick. Hence my training in the skills of NLP, Hypnotherapy and Coaching, bringing me knowledge in the human mind and adding to my more spiritual and physical treatments.

Your style of working
My style is informal but structured, I treat every client as the truly unique person they are, tailoring my sessions to their changing needs. My clients find me friendly and approachable, I am a great listener, objective, non-judgemental, well grounded and with my wide skill set have a wealth of knowledge and experience to draw from. I have a great liking for and interest in people and bring an abundance of enthusiasm to my sessions.

Fee Range


Contact
karen@vision-reach.com

I had many ambitions as a young woman and have managed to achieve most of them in the past decade. Even though I was never good at sport as a child, I have trekked in the mountains of Nepal, scuba dived with manta rays and sharks and snorkelled with dolphins. In a previous incarnation, I worked as a freelance journalist specialising in health and travel features and have been published in some of the country’s best selling newspapers and magazines. I gave that up to retrain as a life coach with the Coaching Academy in 2003 and have since done a range of courses on cognitive behavioural therapy, stress management, facilitation, small business coaching and psychological resilience. I also have experience in leading workshops, facilitating groups and training. I have a degree in psychology and so coaching is really going back to the reasons that I went to university in the first place - which was to learn about and to help people. I use my own coaching techniques on myself and so I know first hand how effective they can be! I truly believe my strapline – if I can, you can.

Your style of working
I use a range of techniques within my practice, but mostly base my coaching around a cognitive behavioural therapy framework. This involves looking at your thinking patterns and helping to change these in order to help you achieve your goals. These techniques are particularly appropriate and useful for issues to do with perfectionism, stress management, performance anxiety (such as giving that presentation), procrastination, and self-belief/self-esteem, and conflict management. Having been self-employed myself for a number of years, I am also aware of issues of motivation and time management and use a variety of techniques with these issues. I am quite a direct coach and don’t hold back from making suggestions when appropriate. Every client and small business is different and so I work with each client individually with whichever techniques are more relevant for them depending on their needs. I have a range of tools in my ‘toolkit’ to enable me to help my clients. I am particularly good at chairing/mediation and facilitation having worked in a small co-operative for the past eight years and have experience in marketing, press liaison (I am also a journalist). I can bring these strengths to working with small businesses and helping with decision making (using things like decision matrixes etc.

Fee Range
On application.

Contact
ruth@vision-reach.com

Wendy is credentialed by the International Coach Federation and also has her Certificate IV in Training and Assessment. She has served as a mentor with the NSW Government State and Regional Department, Women in Business Mentor Program and regularly gives presentations to conferences and organisations.

As a small business owner herself she really understands the challenges and rewards of starting and operating on your own. With her husband Paul, she also a founding director of Class One Productions Pty Ltd, which produces top-drawer audio programs for speakers and business.

Wendy is accredited in The Kolbe™ Method - a unique profiling system that measures and validates an individual's instinctive way of approaching life (their modus operandi or MO). She has found this an amazing tool for increasing individual and team productivity. Wendy uses Kolbe as an important aid to her coaching.

Wendy's client portfolio includes small business owners, coaches, executives, entrepreneurs, professionals and corporations

On the personal side, Wendy has been and done many things: secretary, feature writer, broadcaster, voice artist, business owner, laundry folder, wife (several times) mother and grandmother. She has also lived on a Kibbutz in Israel, hiked in the Sinai with Bedouins but no tent and to celebrate the millennium turned her "someday" dream of trekking the high altitude trail to Machu Pichu in Peru.

Your style of working
As well as information and skills, Wendy brings to her coaching the benefit of a life rich in experience, learning and transformation. She is the author of Ready Set Goal! , A simple and practical life-planning handbook published internationally

When I ask my clients what they got out of working with me, they often say I have the innate ability to listen and then hone in on the real issues that may be causing them struggle and standing in the way of success. I then guide them to achieving amazing breakthroughs in their professional and personal lives. I'd like to discuss how I could do that for you.

I coach mainly by phone, which is time and cost effective and meets the needs even of very "visual". I encourage my clients to acknowledge themselves for what they have already achieved before we get down to tackling what needs to happen next and set some firm and challenging goals.

If appropriate I use a variety of assessment tools to help you identify your natural style of operating in life and in business, and subsequently how to work with more ease and less stress.

I aim to build a personal relationship of honesty and trust that is at the same time challenging and supportive.

My coaching is client driven - I do not evaluate or advise without permission from the client and the responsibility for action is always with them.

Having said that, I love to come up with creative solutions to their challenges for them to consider and often implement.

Fee Range
$US 500 to $900 per month (4 x 1 hour sessions)

Contact
wendy@vision-reach.com