FAQ's

The route to a coaching programme with Level Up is the same for every business.  First we sit together and draw out your Vision and longer term goals for your business.  That gives you – and your coach – a direction, and from that we can agree milestones and plans that you want to hit on that journey.

However, Business Plans have a great knack of sitting on the virtual shelf and gathering dust.  To prevent this from happening to you, then we start you off on a short series of coaching sessions to help you start implementing your plan.  Each coaching session lasts between 60 and 90 minutes, and can be face to face or online to suit you.  Here, we review activity and agree tasks to be done in support of your plan – we can train you in areas you are unfamiliar with, or give you simple tools to use to put into practice what you want to achieve.

If this works for you, you are welcome then to enroll on an ongoing coaching programme where we can meet regularly – and a frequency that suits you and your business needs – to continue to support the growth of your business.

All business ARE unique – they may do similar things for similar customers, but the reasons they do it the way they do it are as different as the people who own and run them.

One of the fears for independent business owners in seeking help and support is that they are going to lose what makes them unique, and get swallowed up by some sort of corporate consultancy monster.

That is the absolute opposite of what we at Level Up provide.  The support we offer is driven by the goals, aspirations and values that you hold dear to you.  If you don’t know what they are, we will help you articulate them – but they are yours, not ours or anyone else’s.

Level Up Support brings what you might not yet have in your business.  Accountability.  An Outside Perspective.  Experience.  Challenge.  A Sounding Board. A Critical Friend.

Level Up is truly sector-agnostic.  We believe that you have the best understanding of your sector (or have access to people who do) – however we know that we understand how businesses work, and that the challenges faced by business owners and leaders are common across all sectors, as are many of the solutions to those challenges.

There are some sectors, however, where you may be better advised to seek out specialist support – in particular regarding agriculture and property development.  

Otherwise, whether you are making product, buying product, delivering services, serving businesses or serving consumers, you will find the support you need with Level Up.

All meetings are held face to face – either remotely via MS Teams, Google Meet or Zoom, or in person on your premises or at a neutral venue.

Our support programmes do not just begin and end with meetings though – we are always available to support you with queries or issues as they arise via email, phone or video call at no additional cost.

To build momentum and start making a difference, you will start off on a Kickstart Programme, which combines visioning and planning, supplemented by some coaching.  The Kickstart Programme lasts between 4 and 6 months.

Beyond Kickstart, there is no minimum term for a coaching programme – fees are invoiced each month, and all that we ask is for one month’s notice to be given to suspend or cancel the programme.

There are two types of commitment you need to be aware of.

One is the commitment to the coaching sessions themselves.  These will happen regularly, and at a frequency that suits you and your business needs.  Generally Level Up clients are on programmes which vary from Weekly, to Fortnightly, Monthly or Quarterly.   Each coaching session is around 60-90 minutes and face-to-face, either remotely or in-person.

Secondly – and importantly – is your commitment to working ON the business between our coaching sessions.  We will agree actions each time we meet, and it is important for the success of your programme and of your business plan that you do these and review them with us as we go along.  This requires commitment of time, of resource and of transparency.

If you have never worked with a business coach before, then it is quite difficult to predict whether it is going to suit you or not.   

The best and easiest way to find out, is to take advantage of our free introductory business review meeting.  Here, you are going to be asked a number of questions about your business, and get to articulate what you think may be missing from what you are doing now.

Essentially through this meeting, you will be experiencing what it like to be coached – and if you enjoy it, and find it beneficial, then you can be pretty sure that coaching is going to work for you.

We would reiterate though – to be successful through a Level Up coaching programme, you are more likely to be

• Ambitious
• Open to change
• Willing to learn
• Positive in outlook

We focus our leadership training programme on middle- and senior management.  

It covers topics as diverse as Goal Setting, Managing People, Time Management, Change Management, Presentation Skills and Leadership Skills.  We also provide specialist training in Sales and Marketing for managers involved in those disciplines.

Level Up business support covers all aspects of running an independent business – from understanding finances, through sales and marketing, operational efficiency, systems and processes all the way to managing and leading people and teams.

We work in partnership with your other professional advisors such as accountants, bookkeepers, HR and marketing to ensure that you are giving clear direction and fully understanding the advice given.

Level Up business support covers all aspects of running an independent business – from understanding finances, through sales and marketing, operational efficiency, systems and processes all the way to managing and leading people and teams.

We work in partnership with your other professional advisors such as accountants, bookkeepers, HR and marketing to ensure that you are giving clear direction and fully understanding the advice given.

What Level Up is about is empowering business leaders to make their businesses a success – coaching them to become great leaders themselves.

As a result, our business support programmes start with the principals of the business – whether that is the founder(s), business owner(s) or Directors.   Without their full support, buy-in and participation, most interventions in an independent business are likely to fail.

Typically anything up to four senior leaders can be fully involved in a Coaching programme – but more common is simply one or two.

We do not currently offer open training courses for Management and Leadership. Each Programme is customised to your business’s specific needs, and delivered directly to cohorts of managers in your business.

We do this because our experience has shown that we get better outcomes where the learning can be applied directly in the business, and where managers can collaborate in their learning linked by a common understanding of the business.  It also improves accountability and follow up.

All our Leadership Training programmes are customised to our client businesses.  For each programme, there is a development cost and a delivery cost, and so the more people you can enrol on the programme the more cost-effective per head it is going to be for you.  We have successfully delivered programmes for 2 managers all the way up to 225 managers, with programmes lasting between 4 and 20 sessions.

Training cohorts can consist of 2 to 12 people.  Any more than 12, and the cohort becomes unwieldy and the benefit can be diluted.  That is because in our programmes, interaction and participation is key.  Too many people, and that interaction and participation drops away.

Leadership Coaching can be done on an individual or small group basis, and will often have a distinct and specific purpose, agreed between Senior Management and the coach.  These programmes can run upwards of 3 months, dependent on need.

Leadership Coaching is particularly useful if you are looking to utilise it to level up your management team as part of a succession plan.