Projects

My client work combines advice, counsel and coaching, with many of my projects including all three. All of my work is anchored on my approach to being there with and for my clients.

  • Advice on how organisations take an integrated approach to impact, innovation and risk

  • Counsel on how leaders address complex issues and guide their people through change

  • Coaching leaders and teams to help them achieve their potential for impact fulfilment and growth

The way I work with clients in each of these areas is described below, followed by a description of what it is like to work with me.

Advice on how organisations take an integrated approach to impact, innovation and risk

Strengthening organisations’ approach to risk

I work with clients to enable their organisations’ impact and innovation by helping them strengthen their approach to risk — including their risk governance, processes, systems, capabilities and culture.

My work includes collaborating with clients on reviews that assess current strengths of their approach to risk and how to build on those strengths (diagnose), identify what a strengthened approach to risk will look like, which is tailored to clients’ context and culture and enables and protects their organisation (design), and put new ways of working into place (deliver).

Identifying priority risks and actions to address them

I help clients answer the three core questions that underpin effective enterprise risk management: What are the most significant risks we face? What are our priority actions to manage those risks? What action should we take as we continue to strengthen and evolve our approach to risk?

I do this by working with clients on reviews which identify the most significant risks facing an organisation across its risk taxonomy — and targeted actions to address those risks. These reviews can create the basis for dedicated board and executive discussion. They can also be a powerful way to align leaders, wider colleagues and (where helpful) external stakeholders around priority risks and actions.

Strengthening the capabilities of risk and wider corporate functions

I bring the experience and expertise of someone who has ‘sat in the same seat’ to help leaders of corporate functions — including risk, legal, communications, compliance and audit — evolve their strategies, build the capabilities of their people and teams, and enhance the way they support their organisations.

My support includes helping colleagues in risk and wider corporate functions combine their roles as trusted counsellors and technical experts, and be perceived as both enabling and protecting their organisations. 

I do this through a combination of 1:1 discussion (and, where helpful, coaching), joining team problem-solving sessions, and bespoke projects. Where helpful, I can also play an interim leadership role to build or strengthen risk functions, adopting a ‘Build—Operate—Transfer’ mindset to doing so.

Counsel on how leaders address complex issues and guide their people through change

Being there alongside leaders as a source of counsel, calibration and challenge

I provide an expert sounding board for leaders by being there alongside them as a source of counsel, calibration and challenge.

This can include discussing specific questions on their minds, helping them ‘look round corners’ to get ahead of forthcoming risks and opportunities, and creating space for them to breathe in the context of time-pressured roles.

This work can have aspects of a coaching relationship — although with an intentionally fluid boundary between advice, counsel and coaching, tailored to what is most helpful on a specific day to enable a client, their team and their organisation to succeed.

Helping build capabilities and enable change

In addition to my work as an executive coach (described below), I design, facilitate and contribute to awaydays and leadership development programmes, as a way to help build capabilities and create alignment on teams’ and organisations’ path forward.

I also carry out speaking engagements on risk, volatility and leadership, as a way to inform discussion, debate and action on issues of relevance to organisations and their people. (Some of the topics on which I speak are described here.)

Providing expert counsel on complex issues

I provide expert counsel on complex issues of strategy, organisation, operations and risk — by providing 1:1 counsel to senior leaders, contributing as an expert advisor to board, executive team and wider discussions, leading or providing input into special projects, and joining boards, risk committees, and advisory and working groups.

Coaching leaders and teams to help them achieve their potential for impact, fulfilment and growth

Working with leaders at moments of change

In my work as an executive coach, I help current and future leaders achieve their potential for impact, fulfilment and growth — as they navigate external volatility and organisational change, continue to grow in new and existing roles, and explore issues that span the personal and professional aspects of leadership.

My coaching style has three core elements: creating a thoughtful, compassionate, protected space for open, trust-based discussion; combining listening, reflection and advice to spur clients to evolve their thinking; and enabling clients to explore, reflect, problem-solve and identify practical ways forward.

I typically work with clients through a series of six or 12 monthly coaching sessions of 90–120 minutes each. These are complemented as helpful with team sessions, manager and HR conversations, 360º feedback and psychometric surveys. To accelerate impact, I am also available to my clients for ad hoc calls and emails between sessions.

Helping teams increase their effectiveness, cohesion and sense of shared purpose

I work with new and existing teams to help them create a sense of shared purpose, increase their effectiveness and cohesion, and strengthen their collective leadership, through a combination of 1:1 and group discussions.

Projects can be focused on issues of personal and collective dynamics and effectiveness. They can also be anchored on discussion of substantive issues of strategy, organisation or risk — as a way to make parallel progress on resolving pressing issues, exploring new ways of working, and enhancing the culture of an organisation.

Working with clients during career transitions

Changing roles and careers can create opportunities for discovery and renewal. It is also inherently complex, raising issues that span the personal and the professional.

My work with clients during career transitions combines space to think with tailored counsel and practical advice. It recognises that career transitions can benefit from moments of reflection, problem-solving and action; and that they can combine sensations of energy and deflation, confidence and vulnerability, and opportunity and loss. It spans the journey from a client ‘setting off’ and ‘moving forward’, through to their ‘landing’ in a new role, organisation or chapter of their career.

How I work

My work across advice, counsel and coaching is characterised by my approach to:

  • Being there with and for my clients as a trusted, collaborative counsellor.

  • Providing clarity, insight and judgment, by connecting the dots on multifaceted issues that span sectors and regions and organisations’ internal and external stakeholders.

  • Looking at issues through multiple lenses — of an executive coach, risk leader, management consultant, government advisor, and orchestral and operatic conductor.

  • Combining IQ and EQ — with conversations characterised by openness, humility, purpose, compassion, balance and calm, together with positivity and humour.

  • Caring about the fulfilment, happiness and impact of people I work with.

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