The Team

Lesley Roberts
Founder, Coach

MSc Executive Coaching, EMCC Senior Practitioner
BEd PE and Outdoor Education

Contact by calling +44 (0) 7799 581792 or email info@coachingoutdoors.com.

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About

Lesley Roberts is a business coach and adventurer.  During her MSc in Executive Coaching at Ashridge Business school her research focused on how nature can support both coach and client.

Her passion for people development in the outdoors began at university, whilst studying to be a PE teacher she majored in Outdoor Education.  After teaching, Lesley worked with youth at risk groups in the Highlands of Scotland, using the environment as a catalyst for personal development. In 2000 she began a 16-year corporate career with Mars Inc spending 8 years in the commercial side of the business before moving into people development where she brought her insights from working outdoors to her coaching work with teams, and executives.  Whether it be a mountain walk, a stroll through the woods or along a river, she has found that nature has proven to be an excellent environment for supporting and enhancing the experience of both coach and client.

In 2011/12 Lesley had a chance to experience all nature has to offer when she participated in the Clipper Round The World Yacht Race, spending a year at sea competing to win.  It tested her limits and gave her the opportunity to learn about life, leadership and team-work in the most extreme of environments.  Click here for Lesley’s race blog.

Since 2016 Lesley has been the Managing Director of Brave Conversations and has supported many individuals and teams internationally across a range of sectors, to unlock their potential.  She is also an Ashridge Business School coach, supporting individual clients and those attending programmes.

Lesley set up Coaching Outdoors because she firmly believes that being outdoors in nature brings powerful developmental and wellbeing benefits to coaches, clients and businesses. Then there is the higher purpose; once we engage with nature and develop a relationship with the planet, it can catalyse a desire to protect it.

Qualifications

  • MSc in Executive Coaching with Ashridge

  • EMCC accredited Senior Practitioner in Coaching

  • Emotional Intelligence Profiling & Coaching; ECR report Roche Martin

  • MBTI Step I & II, trained with OPP

  • Firo, trained with OPP

  • Leadership Competency Profiling & Coaching using the Ashridge AIMS 360 tool

  • NLP Business & Master Practitioner, trained with Sue Knight

  • NLP Trainer, trained with Sue Knight

  • Situational Leadership, trained with Ken Blanchard

  • Situational Leadership for Teams, trained with Ken Blanchard

  • Lominger Competencies

  • Running Effective Meetings, trained with Grove Consultancy

  • Advanced Facilitation Skills, trained with Grove Consultancy

  • Voices Feedback Coach, trained with Korn Ferry

Meet the Team

In addition to our core team below, we have a wide network of coaches based all over the world. We’d be delighted to pair you with a great coach for a chemistry session.

  • Natalie Barfield

    Administration

    BA European Studies

    Natalie has many years' experience working across the corporate travel sector in project management, account management and implementation and has a keen eye for detail. Professional and highly organised, she works hard to keep things running smoothly day to day and with all our events.

    Natalie loves spending time with her family as well as going for walks and runs outside. Whether it be a lake or the beach, she also loves to be near the water.

  • Sam Clarke

    Coach, Trainer, Facilitator

    NLP Certified

    As a result of 15 years training and developing Sales Associates at Mars in the UK, Ireland and South Africa, Sam offers a wealth of expertise in areas such as coaching, mentoring, blended learning training programmes, personal development, presenting, workshop facilitation, team building, engagement and feedback.

    Through charitable projects and volunteer work, she has also worked with children of all ages in the UK, Chicago and Burkina Faso (West Africa).

  • Sam Eddleston

    Coach

    MSc Occupational Psychology
    ICF Qualified Coach

    Sam is a Chartered Psychologist and ICF accredited Coach with a passion for working outdoors. She has 25 years’ experience working in Learning & Development and specialises in coaching and the design of learning solutions. She loves how working in nature offers so many opportunities for creativity, away from the constraints of an office environment. “Outdoors our coaching partnerships also feel more equal.”

    When it comes to the outdoors, Sam describes herself as a bit of a ‘jack of all trades’, enjoying most activities from walking, running and biking to swimming, rowing and sailing. Nature has always provided her with a brilliant playground and it’s only in more recent years that she has deliberately slowed down to enjoy the scenery and take in the benefits that nature has to offer.

  • Fi Macmillan

    Leadership Coach, Facilitator.

    She has worked at a senior level within Aberdeen Investments, Standard Life, KPMG, Camelot, University of London, AKQA, Investis and the British Heart Foundation.

    She has an MSc in Executive Coaching, a PgC in Coaching & Development, is an Ashridge accredited coach, EMCC Senior Practitioner and Coaching Supervision Academy accredited coaching supervisor.

    An innate adventurer her favourite place is anywhere wild and, apart from every day life, her most powerful development experience was a vision quest in 2017.

  • Claire Sheldon

    Coach, Supervisor

    MA Coaching and Mentoring, Coaching Supervision Diploma, Associate British Psychological Society

    Claire has over 20 years experience of coaching executives and professionals. She excels at getting ‘beneath the skin’ of her clients and their organisations. She helps them find clarity to focus and deliver on what really matters. Her clients include: Ashai, Sony, FitFlop and the Home Office. Claire has an MA in Coaching and Mentoring Practice from Oxford Brookes University.

    She delivers workshops for the EMCC and British Psychological Society’s CPD portfolio, is a coach supervisor, and writes about supervision, coaching and using intuition with maturity and skill.

  • Laurianne Walsh

    Communications Lead

    BA Hons Design Studies

    Laurianne has a background in creative, linguistic and technical communications, and has worked with brands such as Associated British Foods (ABF), the BBC, the DIT, Fitbit, Fortnum & Mason, Graham & Brown, Jamie Oliver, Hitachi, KFC, Le Tour de France, Mercedes-Benz, and the PFA, among others.

    Laurianne works in collaboration with our associates to build our online programs and communications.

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