Author: Trevor Sherman

Trevor Sherman: Author, Blogger and Coach. What do I do? I develop leadership training material and personal learning modules. I am the owner and operator of this Blog. I coach senior executives for their development and role transition. I am based in Northamptonshire UK and operate globally - in person and through technology.

Leadership Interview: Hans Augusteijn ‘My Coaching Journey’

We follow the fortunes of a senior leader in Northern Europe over a three year period as he learns and applies his newly acquired coaching skills and ends up a senior director spreading the coaching gospel to his direct report leaders.

I first started working with the Top Team at Maersk Northern Europe Liner Operations Cluster (NEULOC) in Rotterdam when I visited them to kick off the Coaching Master Class program in December 2012. At that time Hans Augusteijn was a Senior General Manager, a member of the senior management team and starting out on his coaching journey. Here he reflects on that journey three years on. What has he learned along the way? What can we learn from his experiences?

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Leadership Interview: Morten Mortensen ‘Checking the Temperature of Employee Response to Change’

Successful leaders recognise they have a crucial role to play during organisational change.

The recognised wisdom about organisational change is that we do not change people – they choose to change for their own reasons. This means the unit of change in this process is ONE. It is not about one-way briefings or team sessions – it is about the individual. This means the ‘real’ dialogue about change is about ‘What’s in it for me’ (WIIFM) and takes place in private in short structured sessions between a colleague and his/her Leader. In 2013 I interviewed Morten Mortensen, APALOC Head of Contract Management for Maersk Singapore, about how he was coaching for change leadership and checking the temperature of employee response to change.

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Chilcot Report: Decision Making Lessons for Leaders

There are decision making lessons for leaders in the Chilcot Report into the 2003 Iraq war which has been published this week. I map these lessons back to key leadership competencies and look at Judgement, Execution & Influence.

Parliamentary copyright images are reproduced with the permission of Parliament.


This is the week that the long awaited Chiclot Report was published. Sir John Chilcot has presented his findings on the UK’s involvement in the 2003 Iraq War. The report covers UK government policy decisions made between 2001 and 2009. There are hard lessons to be learned from this report for politicians, their advisers and civil servants. I have taken a look at key findings and asked what leaders can learn from them.

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Preparing & Planning for Coaching – 2

Need some inspiration on preparing for a forthcoming coaching session. Coaching doesn’t just happen. Get more value out of your coaching by asking your Coachee to prepare ahead of the session. There is preparation that you, as the Coach, can do. This was covered in the blog post ‘Preparing & Planning for Coaching’ from May. This is about preparation you can ask your direct report coachee to do. I’ve prepared a list to inspire you. Now you add to the list with your comments and inspire others.


What are the factors you need to consider when preparing for running a coaching session or series of coaching sessions with a direct report? Unless it’s a coaching on demand session, coaching doesn’t just happen. This means there is preparation for both of you to do ahead of the coaching session. This article covers the preparation you can ask your Coachee to do. An earlier article – ‘Preparing & Planning for Coaching’ from May – covered your preparation as the Coach.

Continue reading “Preparing & Planning for Coaching – 2”

Executive Presence

Executive Presence is about conveying a leadership image that commands respect and attention from others. How does a leader achieve this presence or gravitas?


Executive Presence is about conveying a leadership image that commands respect and attention from others. Leaders who display this know how to react when confronted with challenging situations. They are calm and measured. Passionate yet deliberate. Engaging and focussed. They inspire their peers and subordinates. They are in control of themselves and assert their intentions. How does a leader achieve this presence or gravitas?

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Celebrate Team Success

How will you determine if your team is ready to celebrate its success? How can you assess your direct reports are aware of what they need to do to contribute towards team performance and team process?


As the team leader you are always looking for and leveraging opportunities to motivate, celebrate and reward successful team performance. But your team is made up of individuals. This means you need to spend time understanding the makeup and motivation of the team members. It’s not just the skills, experience and knowledge that each team member provides; but how that person makes a productive contribution within the team, and interacts with other members in a positive way that will ensure the team is effective. When you understand and observe this you will have something to celebrate. But what are you looking for? How can you test this? What are the coaching questions you can ask?

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The Influencing Leader

Being assertive and influencing. What is the difference for a leader? Triggered by a request for resource material about assertive from a friend I decided to investigate.


How would you describe what a leader does to get things done through others? Is it assertiveness or influencing? A friend of mine asked for some coaching resource material on ‘assertiveness’ and this got me thinking.

I have known John for over 30 years. We are fellow consultants, although we have never done any work together. We work in different areas and in different industries. What we do however is regularly exchange ideas and share resource material with each other. Continue reading “The Influencing Leader”

Measuring the Progress of Your Coaching

Need some inspiration on measuring progress of your coaching sessions? There are things you can put in place when you are planning and contracting coaching. Paying attention to these early on will ensure you have the means to measure your coaching progress and your return on coaching investment. I’ve prepared a list to inspire you. Now you add to the list with your comments and inspire others.


What do you need to consider when planning and contracting coaching to ensure you have the means to measure your coaching progress and your return on coaching investment? Continue reading “Measuring the Progress of Your Coaching”

Preparing & Planning for Coaching

Need some inspiration on preparing for a forthcoming coaching session. Coaching doesn’t just happen. There is preparation that you, as the coach, can do. There is also preparation you can ask your direct report coachee to do. I’ve prepared a list to inspire you. Now you add to the list with your comments and inspire others.


What are the factors you need to consider when preparing for running a coaching session or series of coaching sessions with a direct report? Unless it’s a coaching on demand session, coaching doesn’t just happen. This means there is preparation for both of you to do ahead of the coaching session. This article covers your preparation as the coach. A later article will cover coachee preparation. Continue reading “Preparing & Planning for Coaching”

Understand to be Understood

Need some ideas on how to be better understood as a leader? The key is to first work hard on understanding your audience; then tailor the presentation of your ideas to what you discover. Here’s how.

What is Impactful Communication?

Benjamin Franklin, American Founding Father was quoted as saying: “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”

Impactful communication is about listening and expressing yourself in a way that creates insight and understanding, builds trust and inspires people to take action.

When you listen to and understand your audience you can adjust your tone, language and emphasis to capture their attention. You can then teach, involve and inspire. You can influence. You can coach. Continue reading “Understand to be Understood”