Someone heading for burnout
Still turning up, still competent, and running on something that is nearly gone. The point of coaching here is to reach them before an absence does.
1:1 and small group coaching · Six to eight weeks
For the one person a workshop cannot reach.
A workshop is ninety minutes to a day, and it is the right answer for a team. It is the wrong answer for the senior nurse who has been quietly carrying too much since March. That is a different piece of work, and it takes weeks rather than hours.
Six to eight weeksOne to one, or a small groupOnline or in personArranged directly, or by an employer
Who it is for
Usually one of four people.
Employers commission this for a named individual as often as individuals arrange it for themselves. Both work the same way, and what is said in the sessions stays in the sessions either way.
Someone coming back
Returning from a period of stress-related absence, where the return itself is the fragile part and the working pattern that caused it has not changed.
A manager with nowhere to put it
Holding a team together while carrying their own load, and with no peer they can say that to. This is the most common referral from an employer.
Someone who simply wants to change something
No crisis, no absence, just a working life that has stopped being sustainable and a wish to do something about it deliberately.
None of those quite right? A short conversation is usually enough to tell.
Ask whether coaching fits ›What it is made of
Four strands, woven together.
A taster is ninety minutes. A half day is four hours. Coaching is the one format with enough time to change a habit rather than introduce one.
Clinical insight
Over two decades in healthcare, ten of them in mental health nursing. Every technique comes with the physiology behind it, so you understand why it works rather than being asked to take it on faith.
Breathwork and meditation
Practical nervous system work you can use in the moment. Not twenty minutes on a cushion you will never find time for, but things that fit inside an actual working day.
Habit design
Most people already know what would help. The work is building it into a week that is already full, which is a design problem rather than a motivation problem.
Someone in your corner
Regular sessions with the same person, who remembers what you said last time and will notice when you go quiet about something.
The same five bodies the team workshops are built on, taken one person at a time.
See the 5 Bodies Model ›The shape of a programme
Six to eight weeks, and the middle is the work.
The arc below is the usual shape rather than a fixed curriculum. What actually happens is decided by what the person in front of Leah is dealing with.
Week one
What is actually going on, and what has already been tried
Weeks two to three
Nervous system first: breath, sleep, the physical body
Weeks three to five
Thought patterns, boundaries and what is being carried for other people
Weeks five to seven
Building it into a week that is already full
Close
What to do when it slips, because it will
Sessions run online or in person. Most people mix the two.
Ask about availability ›One to one, or a small group
Small groups run on the same structure.
A group costs less per person and suits a cohort with a shared pressure, for example a set of new managers. One to one is the right answer when the thing being worked on is not something the person would say in front of colleagues.
One to one
Entirely private, and shaped around one person. The right choice for anything involving a specific working relationship, a return from absence, or a manager talking about their own team.
Small group
The same structure with a cohort who share a pressure. Cheaper per head, and the peer element does real work in itself. Not the place for anything confidential.
Either way
What is said in the sessions stays in the sessions. Where an employer is paying, they get confirmation the sessions happened and nothing else.
Commissioning this for someone?
Employers arrange coaching for a named individual as often as individuals arrange it themselves. A short call covers how that works, what the employer sees, and what they do not.
What changes
Three things people notice, in this order.
Sleep, first
The physical body is where stress shows up first and most measurably, and it is the fastest layer to reach with a practical tool. It is almost always what shifts before anything else does.
Then the ability to stop
The gap between finishing work and being off duty. Most people have lost it entirely and have stopped noticing that they have.
Then the reason it mattered
Purpose is usually the first thing burnout takes and the last thing to come back. When someone starts talking about the work itself again rather than about surviving it, that is the marker.
Most people arrive at this after a good while trying to fix it on their own.
Talk about coaching ›Get in touch
Coaching, for one person or a handful.
A short conversation first, to work out whether coaching is the right answer at all. If it is not, Leah will say so and point you at what is.