1:1 Coaching · led by Marie Willis
Marie Willis runs 1:1 coaching at Lequin. 23 years of senior leadership coaching. Named senior coach, not algorithmic matching.
We'll send a written summary within 48 hours and tell you if 1:1 coaching is the right call.
Trusted by senior leaders inside
Senior leaders across many businesses have brought Lequin in for 1:1 coaching. The list includes:
Three moments
The HRDs we work with most often arrive in one of three moments. Either way, the next step is a discovery call.
They were brilliant in the old role. Three months into the new one, decisions are slow and the team feels uncertain. Nobody wants to say it directly because they're senior or well liked. We've worked with this pattern for 23 years, helping leaders adapt before trust and performance erode around them.
Just promoted. Bigger remit, bigger ambiguity, less feedback from above. The shape of the role is different but nobody's told them how. The risk isn't that they fail. It's that they operate at the level below for the first six months and the business notices. Coaching here is about shape, not skill.
You've spotted them. So has the CEO. The challenge isn't capability, it's whether they can grow quickly enough into what the next role demands. They need a coach who'll work alongside the line manager, not run parallel to them.
How we coach
Most 1:1 coaching delivered at scale runs through a platform: an algorithm matches a coach to a profile, sessions happen over video, the data goes back to L&D. It works for volume. It isn't built for the politically important leadership moments where the business needs the coaching to land properly.
Marie scopes every senior coaching engagement personally and matches the leader with one or two carefully chosen coaches based on the role, the context and the moment. Before coaching begins, the leader meets their coach for a chemistry session. No algorithm. No profile match. The coach stays with the leader throughout.
The leader doesn't sit in a vacuum. We work with the wider dynamics around them: relationships, pressure, politics, team patterns. That systems approach runs through both our team coaching and 1:1 coaching. If the coaching surfaces a wider issue affecting the team, we can work with that too.
Some sessions work over video. Some need to be in the room. The named coach and the leader agree which is which. We come to where the leader works. UK, Europe, North America, Asia.
The investment we've made in coaching with Lequin has led to a substantial improvement in quality and style of management in the business, and in my opinion, improvement in commercial performance.
We'll send a written summary within 48 hours and tell you if 1:1 coaching is the right call.
Long relationships
19 years inside BNP Paribas CIB. 14 inside EDF across six business units. The BBC for team and 1:1 coaching across multiple structural changes. Multi year executive coaching at HSBC Private Bank. Seven years at Dennis Publishing. These are long term coaching relationships, not single engagement projects.
What presents as a coaching problem in month two often shows itself as something different by month six. The coach who's been in the relationship from the start sees that shift. A replacement coach mid engagement doesn't. We're built for the second half of the engagement, not just the first.
Before booking
Most engagements run 7 to 12 sessions across 7 to 12 months. Sessions are typically 90 minutes. The cadence is built around the leader's actual operating rhythm, not always a fixed monthly slot. High potential coaching is the same shape.
Where to start
Most 1:1 coaching engagements with Lequin begin one of two ways. Both are free or fixed price. Neither starts with a sales pitch.
Option one
30 minutes with Marie. She'll ask about the leader, the role, the change they're in, and what's already been tried. We send a written summary within 48 hours, including whether we think 1:1 coaching is the right call. About one in four scoping calls turns into a paid engagement. The rest end in a clean handover.
Book a 30-minute callOption two
A 90-minute online workshop for up to 12 of your leaders. Choose one topic from our list. We lead the session, your people take part, you watch the work. If we're the wrong fit, we'll tell you and you keep the materials. Most pilots happen within 6 weeks of booking.
Book the pilot