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Leadership Coach & Mentor

Better judgement.
Better decisions.
Better leadership.

Working with SME owners, CEOs and leadership teams who need to think more clearly, decide more effectively, and execute with greater discipline.

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"He's direct, empathetic and genuinely challenging to work with. He's helped me as CEO work through plenty of issues I was stalling on."

Christopher Booth — Founder CEO, Findrs Recruitment

20+ Years senior leadership
10+ Years average client relationship
SME Owners, CEOs & MDs
SE England + Remote nationwide
The problems I work on

Most leadership teams don't struggle
from lack of effort.

They struggle because decisions are delayed, diluted, rushed, political, or poorly owned. If any of this sounds familiar, this is the work.

Important decisions sit unresolved for weeks or months — the issue is known but no one will call it.

A leadership team that looks aligned in meetings but isn't truly decisive or accountable outside them.

Things are agreed but not followed through. Accountability is weak and ownership is unclear.

Execution consistently falls short of intention — the gap between planning and doing keeps widening.

The CEO or founder is carrying too much. Unclear what to delegate, what to stop, or how to change that.

The business has grown but the leadership approach that got it here is no longer fit for where it needs to go.

How I work

Three ways to work together

01

Working with the Leader

1:1 coaching, mentoring and strategic guidance for CEOs, MDs and founders who want to think more clearly, decide better, and lead with greater effectiveness.

Find out more →
02

Working with the Leadership Team

Facilitation and decision-discipline work with leadership teams that need to align more clearly, move faster, and hold each other accountable with greater consistency.

Find out more →
03

Workshops & Programmes

Structured sessions around leadership judgement, decision quality and team effectiveness — designed around the specific group and context, not a generic agenda.

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My approach

Practical. Challenging. Grounded in experience.

Not a framework. Not a listening service. A direct engagement with the decisions and challenges that actually matter.

1

Clarify

Start with the real decisions and challenges — not an assessment tool or intake form.

2

Diagnose

Identify where judgement, clarity or ownership is breaking down.

3

Challenge

Surface assumptions and patterns. Name what is being avoided.

4

Build

Introduce decision discipline, clearer ownership, and stronger review habits.

5

Act

Connect every session to action. What changes, who owns it, how we will know.

What clients say

Trusted by leaders over the long term

Ian challenges and stretches my thinking in a way that doesn't allow me to run away from difficult issues. This is equally balanced with being one of my most supportive advocates.

Heath Gunn

Managing Director, Move That Mountain

His ability to really get under the skin of the business and guide you to find the best outcomes yourself is unique. Over two years he has become a trusted mentor and an integral part of our business growth.

Andrew Hancock

Managing Director, Alitex

Ian has been my mentor and coach for over 5 years. With his guidance he has given me the tools and confidence to take my business to growth of over 1000% in a little over 5 years.

Dexter Copeland

Managing Director, TSL (Topek Southern Ltd)

Read more client stories
Get started

If you're carrying too much, moving too slowly,
or leading a team that isn't quite firing —

Let's have a conversation. No pitch. No pressure. Just a direct discussion about what you're dealing with and whether I can help.

Book a Conversation
Work With Ian

Structured around your situation,
not a product menu.

Three clear ways to engage — each shaped by the challenge you're facing, not a fixed programme or methodology.

01 For the leader

Working with the Leader

1:1 coaching, mentoring and strategic guidance for CEOs, MDs and founders who want to think more clearly, lead more effectively, and make better decisions under pressure.

  • Decisions that feel unclear, delayed or politically charged
  • Leadership patterns and behaviours that are holding the business back
  • Strategic clarity — what to prioritise and what to stop
  • The weight of leading: overload, doubt, isolation at the top
  • Accountability — personal and organisational
Format: Monthly 90-minute sessions, online or in person. Between-session availability by phone and email. Duration determined by need, not a fixed package. Most relationships run for a year or more.
02 For the team

Working with the Leadership Team

Facilitation and decision-discipline work with leadership teams that need to move faster, align more clearly, and hold each other more accountable.

  • Decision rights — who decides what, and how
  • Alignment that is real, not just surface-level agreement in meetings
  • Challenge and debate that improves decisions rather than being avoided
  • Accountability that sticks between sessions
  • Execution drag — why things are agreed but not done
Format: Facilitated team sessions, strategic offsites, or quarterly reviews. Can be a standalone engagement or part of an ongoing programme with the leader.
03 For groups

Workshops & Leadership Programmes

Structured sessions for leadership groups or teams who want to build specific capabilities around judgement, decisions, and leadership effectiveness.

  • Judgement and decision-making under pressure
  • Leadership team effectiveness and accountability
  • Navigating complexity and change as a leadership team
  • Ownership culture — moving from agreement to action
Format: Half-day to full-day workshops, or a short programme of sessions. Always designed around the specific group and context — not a generic facilitation agenda.

Not sure which is the right fit?

The simplest way to find out is a 30-minute conversation. We'll talk through what you're dealing with and work out together whether and how I can help.

Book a Conversation
About Ian

Not a theoretical coach.
A commercially experienced guide.

Background

Why experience matters
in this work

The most useful thing I bring to a coaching or mentoring relationship is not a methodology. It is the lived experience of having been in the room when senior decisions had to be made under uncertainty, with incomplete information, real pressure, and real consequences.

Over more than 20 years in senior leadership, I led, grew, and navigated businesses through the kinds of challenges I now help other leaders face. That includes the moments of strategic clarity, the decisions that proved wrong, the team dynamics that needed confronting, and the personal weight of being responsible for an organisation's direction.

When I work with a CEO who is stalling on a difficult decision, or a leadership team that is busy but not truly aligned, I am not applying a framework from a book. I am drawing on pattern recognition built through years of making the same kinds of judgements — and getting enough of them right, and wrong, to know what the traps actually look like.

My approach is direct, challenging, and commercially grounded. Clients describe me as someone who will name what they may be avoiding, challenge assumptions they have stopped questioning, and hold them accountable to the standards they set for themselves — while remaining genuinely on their side throughout.

I work primarily with SME owners, CEOs and managing directors, and their leadership teams, across a wide range of sectors across the South East and nationally.

How I work
01

Direct, not diplomatic

I will say what I observe. I will name what I see being avoided. That is the most useful thing a guide can do.

02

Commercially grounded

Every insight connects back to decisions, performance, and outcomes — not personal development in the abstract.

03

Long-term by design

The deepest value comes from a relationship built over time. Most of my clients work with me for years, not months.

04

Genuinely on your side

Challenge without support is just criticism. I hold both — the high standard and the genuine belief in your capacity to meet it.

Ian Price
Ian Price — Leadership Coach, Mentor & Strategic Guide

"Ian has been my coach and mentor for over 10 years. I can't recommend him enough as a balanced, credible, challenging, intelligent and fun person to work with."

Henry Green — Director, David Cover and Son Ltd

The right starting point is a conversation.

If you're curious whether what I do fits what you're dealing with, the simplest thing is to speak. No commitment required.

Book a Conversation
The Approach

Judgement is the core
leadership capability.

Not strategy. Not management. Not resilience. The ability to make good decisions under uncertainty — and to build a team and culture that does the same — is what separates effective leaders from struggling ones.

Most leadership teams don't fail from lack of strategy. They fail from inconsistent decision discipline — decisions that are delayed, diluted, rushed, political, or never truly owned.

Where judgement breaks down

Five patterns that cost leadership teams most

These are not character flaws. They are recurring, predictable patterns that most leadership teams exhibit under pressure. Naming them is the first step to changing them.

Avoidance

Important decisions are delayed indefinitely. The issue is known but no one will call it. Inaction becomes the decision.

Impulse

Decisions are made too quickly, under pressure, without sufficient thought or challenge. Speed masquerades as decisiveness.

Consensus Paralysis

The team seeks agreement rather than ownership. Decisions are diluted until everyone is comfortable — which usually means no one is responsible.

Data Obsession

More analysis replaces judgement. The team waits for certainty that will never come. The real decision is being avoided behind the request for more information.

Bias Blindness

Past experience, sunk costs, or strong personalities distort decisions without anyone naming it. The team's history works against its future.

The practical method

Building decision discipline — step by step

This is not a rigid framework applied uniformly. It is a set of consistent practices used with judgement, adapted to the leader, the team, and the specific challenge.

1

Define the real decision

What is actually being decided? Often the stated question is not the real one. Start here before anything else.

2

Clarify ownership

Who decides? Who contributes? Who must align? Ambiguity here is where most execution failures begin.

3

Surface the triggers

What signals will force action? What is the latest moment for a decision? Build deadlines in, not out.

4

Challenge and pause

What assumptions are being made? What is being avoided? What data matters and what is noise?

5

Check for bias

What distortions might be present? Which failure pattern — avoidance, impulse, consensus drift — is active here?

6

Review and learn

What did we decide? What happened? What would we do differently? Decision quality improves through deliberate review.

What makes this different

Commercial experience meets direct challenge

Ian brings two things that most coaches do not. First, the commercial experience of having made the kinds of decisions he helps others navigate — which means he understands the cost of delay, the seduction of consensus, and the pressure of leading under uncertainty, not from theory but from having lived it.

Second, the willingness to challenge directly. Ian is not a sounding board. He will name what he sees, surface what is being avoided, and hold leaders accountable to the standards they have set for themselves. Challenge without genuine support is just criticism — Ian holds both.

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Results

What changes when
the work goes well.

Sharper decisions. Clearer leadership. Teams that hold each other accountable. Leaders who carry less and achieve more. These are the outcomes that matter — not the coaching hours.

Client voices

In their own words

Ian has been my mentor and coach for over 5 years now. With his guidance and ability to bring more out of an individual, he has given me many tools and the confidence to take my business to growth of over 1000% in a little over 5 years. Not only developing my business skills though, but my personal and family environment have also seen the benefits.

Dexter Copeland

Managing Director, TSL (Topek Southern Ltd) and Owner, Southern Scaffolding Supplies Ltd

Ian has been my coach and mentor for the last year. It's a year in which I've reassessed almost every aspect of my business and made some huge decisions. Ian has been phenomenally important to that process. He's challenged me when I needed it, and he's championed me when I've stretched myself. He brings real empathy and wisdom.

Bryony Thomas

Watertight Marketing

Ian has worked closely with me personally, my business and members of my senior management team, giving balanced and incisive assessments of our strengths and areas in need of improvement. His ability to really get under the skin of the business or an individual and guide to find the best outcomes yourself is unique. Over the 2 years I have worked with Ian he has become a trusted mentor, confidant, inspiration and friend.

Andrew Hancock

Managing Director, Alitex

Over the years I've worked with Ian I have come to value his empathy and genuinely considerate approach as much as the massive breadth of knowledge and experience he brings to each conversation. Ian challenges and stretches my thinking in a way that doesn't allow me to run away from difficult issues. This is equally balanced with being one of my most supportive advocates.

Heath Gunn

Managing Director, Move That Mountain

I've been working with Ian for over a few months now and I've become so grateful for our sessions. He's direct, empathetic and genuinely challenging to work with. He's helped me as CEO work through plenty of issues that I was stalling on. I look forward to working with Ian for a long time.

Christopher Booth

Founder CEO, Findrs Recruitment

Ian has been my coach and mentor for over 10 years. He has been a great support and has helped me focus on the priorities for me and our business. I can't recommend Ian enough as a balanced, credible, challenging, intelligent and genuinely enjoyable person to work with.

Henry Green

Director, David Cover and Son Ltd

Working with Ian is an absolute pleasure. He has helped me develop both personally and professionally. Regardless of the situation I am facing, Ian always seems to have the right approach to helping me find the most appropriate solution and action plan.

Michael Frisby

Managing Director, Vuzion & Cobweb Solutions

For me it can be incredibly lonely at the top. I've worked with Ian for about six years and he offers a totally different perspective. He enables me to get my jumbled thoughts organised and he pushes me to get things done. He's helped me manage some of the most challenging periods in my professional and personal life.

Sarah Alexander

Managing Partner, Lewis Brownlee Chartered Accountants

Sectors and experience

Who Ian works with

Ian works with owner-led and privately owned SMEs, typically with 20–250+ employees, at a point of growth, transition, or increasing complexity. Sectors include:

Professional Services Accountancy & Finance Technology & SaaS Recruitment Construction & Engineering Manufacturing Consultancy Property Marketing & Creative Healthcare & Wellbeing Retail & Distribution

Ready to have a direct conversation?

The best way to know whether this is the right fit is to speak. A 30-minute conversation costs nothing and commits you to nothing.

Book a Conversation
Get in Touch

Let's have a conversation.

The simplest way to start is a 30-minute conversation. No pitch, no pressure — just a direct discussion about what you're dealing with and whether I can help.

Contact details

Reach out directly

I work with leaders across the South East of England in person and nationally by video. If you're an SME owner, CEO or MD dealing with leadership challenges — or a leadership team that needs external challenge and perspective — I'd welcome a conversation.

Phone +44 (0)1483 201012
Email ian@ianpricenewplace.com
Based Sussex, South East England
In person South East England
Remote Nationwide