Victoria D

Victoria has a real passion for, and has extensive experience in, business and change.

Experience

Her experience in business change, in both public and private sector, has exposed her to a variety of change approaches in the workplace. She sees being flexible and responsive to change as paramount, particularly in a fast-changing environment.  The people-side of change was her particular strength; ensuring the workforce were included in the change journey, as they would be a driving force for success. Her expertise in change, is utilised extensively in her current role as a coach.

Victoria has worked in a number of industries in business and IT change environments, including manufacturing, aircraft service engineering and financial services, where she had strategic focus.  Her Executive MBA and her exposure in these industries have brought her commercial gravitas and therefore an ability to understand a variety of client needs.

Expertise

Victoria is an executive coach, change and resilience specialist, and consultant.  She is particularly skilled in behaviour change. 

Victoria believes that personal change, improved personal resilience, and wellbeing are essential for sustaining great performance in the workplace.

Victoria has 11 years of experience as an executive coach, and 20 years strategic business expertise, combined with 16 years as a Neuro Linguistic Programming  practitioner.  In addition, her expertise in mental health and wellbeing (underpinned by qualifications in counselling and resilience) have complemented her coaching capabilities, leading her to support her clients with their work/ life balance, wellbeing and mental health.

Victoria has successfully coached both public and private sector clients and typically works with CEO’s, directors, senior leaders and aspiring leaders.   She has frequently worked with teams and groups.

She has designed and facilitated action learning sessions (peer-to-peer group coaching) with numerous CEO’s involved per session, which have proved highly beneficial for board-level executives who want to overcome difficult challenges.  These sessions cover all areas of strategic business and personal leadership issues.

With the fast-paced changing landscape at work, Victoria recognises that her clients, more than ever, benefit from the headspace created by her coaching sessions.  She ensures that the valuable time invested is empowering, in order to help clients navigate obstacles, so they can learn, grow and move forward.

Victoria has successfully coached clients to –

• Gain and improve strategic capability
• Achieve career progression
• Attain behaviour change and create new habits
• Manage professional and personal change
• Deliver impactful presentations
• Improve communication / conduct difficult conversations
• Increase confidence
• Overcome imposter syndrome
• Eliminate anxiety, stress or overwhelm
• Improve work life balance (wellbeing and mental health)
• Tackle setbacks and build resilience in themselves and the teams they lead

Victoria belongs to a proactive global community of Resilience at Work practitioners, through which she keeps abreast of research in the field.

One of her key values is the importance of giving back.  In order to achieve this, she volunteers some of her time to delivering executive coaching for not-for-profit charities, who were severely impacted by the pandemic. 

Coaching style

Victoria has natural warmth, which means clients gravitate to her and she quickly builds trust.

She is an attentive listener and engages with her clients on a deep level of understanding - exploring their motivations, values and sense of purpose.   Victoria values openness and coaches her clients confidentially without judgement.

In order to uncover the hidden depths of client resourcefulness, Victoria applies her years of expertise, knowledge and various tools to challenge their thinking, beliefs and perceived limitations.   Depending on each client’s needs, she blends a range of her capabilities (such as neuroscience, Neuro Linguistic Programming, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and skilful enquiry)  toexplore  the client’s internal world, and guide them to expand their self-awareness.

She is a real advocate for change and supports her clients to have agency for their success.  In addition, she helps them build resilience; preparing them to thrive through future challenges.

Her style integrates knowledge of how the mind works, and therefore, through knowledge, provides her clients with opportunities to create and sustain resourceful habits and behaviours.

Qualifications

Business and change:

• MBA
• ILM level 7 Executive Coaching and Mentoring
• Change Management trained
• Lean Six Sigma qualified.

Mental Health and Wellbeing:

• NLP Practitioner certified
• Postgraduate Diploma in Integrative Counselling
• Resilience at Work qualified – (leader, team and individual resilience)
• Resilience and work – teams in trouble – conflict resolution

Coaching philosophy

Victoria believes that we all have our own key to unlock solutions to our challenges.  Obstacles we face are magnified by our thoughts about them, and they can paralyse us - preventing us from taking action.

Victoria has faith that when we engage in coaching to shine a light on a challenge and are encouraged to be curious, expand our thinking and are stretched beyond what feels comfortable, it is possible to discover the greatness in ourselves and in others which was not always apparent. 

Coaching is powerful when meaningful results are achieved by people who adapt their thinking and embrace change.