About coaching AND ADVISORY

  • Coaching is about helping you find your own answers. I'm here to ask the questions worth asking, hold the space while you think, and help you work out what's actually going on and what you want to do about it. We can look at your work, your life, and the complicated blur between the two.

    Advisory is us working shoulder-to-shoulder on the business itself. It’s practical, strategic help untangling the systems that keep tripping you up. We use my D.A.D. framework (Ditch, Automate, Delegate) to build the blueprint for your recovery. Think habit building, time management, and taming the marketing monster. I provide the strategy and the roadmap to get you out of the engine room and back to steering the ship.

    Not sure which you need? Get in touch and we’ll work it out together.

  • Therapy is typically designed to help with understanding where things come from, processing difficult experiences, and working through mental health challenges. It’s important work and there are times when it’s exactly what’s needed.

    Coaching looks to move you forward towards achieving a goal. We start from where you are now and work out where you want to get to and what’s in the way.

    I’m not a therapist and I won’t try to be. If I think you’d be better served by talking to someone else, I’ll say so.

  • My training is in cognitive behavioural coaching - a practical, evidence-based approach that looks at the relationship between how we think, how we behave, and how we feel.

    It’s about working out what’s actually going on, what you can change, and what you can stop spending energy on.

    In plain terms: you can’t always control your circumstances. But you can control how you respond to them. That’s what we work on.

  • All sorts!

    Common ones:

    • Finding it hard to get started.

    • Finding it hard to switch off.

    • Falling out of love with your business.

    • Going from employed to self-employed and finding it harder than expected.

    • Juggling a business with caring responsibilities for kids, for parents, often both.

    • Excited about an idea but not sure where to start.

    • Work related anxiety

    • Transitions - changes at work, at life and within (hormones, I’m looking at you)

    If you're wondering whether your thing is "enough" to bring it is.

  • No. Some of the most useful work I do is with people who are doing okay but sense they could be doing things with a little less friction and a little more joy.


    You don't have to be at breaking point to benefit from having someone properly in your corner.

Working together

  • We start. That sounds obvious but it’s worth saying: the first session isn’t a long preamble or a discovery call dressed up as something else. We get into it.

    We’ll talk about what’s going on, what you actually want, and what feels most useful to work on.

    I can answer any questions you have about practicalities of working together longer term: payments and pricing and where we can meet. Plus I’ll explain what I can and cant’t help you with, my approach to confidentiality and my commitment to global coaching ethics.

    By the end we’ll have a clearer picture of whether further sessions are needed, if I’m the right person for those, and what working together is likely to look like.

  • It varies, but most people find 4–6 sessions gets them to a meaningfully different place.

    Some come for a single session to untangle something specific.

    Others work with me on an ongoing basis as their business and life changes.

    We agree what makes sense after the first session, review progress as we go, and at the six-session mark we'll reflect and decide whether to continue or wrap up. You're never locked in.

  • No. There’s no standard package because there’s no standard situation. After the first session we’ll agree a number of sessions and a cadence that suits you — whether that’s regular sessions, occasional check-ins, or something else entirely.

  • Then we say so, and that’s fine.

    This only works if there’s trust and rapport. I’d rather we worked that out early.

  • Everything you share in our sessions stays between us.

    I won’t share anything you tell me with anyone else without your explicit permission. The only exceptions are the standard ones: if I had serious concerns about your safety or someone else’s, I’d have to act on that. If appropriate, I’d always try to talk to you first.

    I’m also bound by the ethical guidelines of the Association for Coaching

Practical questions

  • The First Session: FREE

    Ongoing Support is tailored to your needs and circumstances, As a guide

    • Ad hoc sessions from £50 per session

    • Block booked sessions: 6 sessions for the price of 5

    • Southampton Neighbour Rate: If you live in an SO-postcode, me too! Message me for community pricing.

  • Online via Zoom, or face to face in Southampton. If you’re further afield, get in touch and I’ll aim to accommodate.

    Walk and talks are a particularly effective way to work, especially for coaching. Let me know if you’d like to find out more.

  • Bank transfer, payable one week in advance. For retainers and block book sessions, you can spread payments.

  • I ask for 48 hours’ notice to cancel or reschedule. Cancellations inside that window are charged at the full session rate. Life happens and I’ll always try to be human about genuine emergencies but I do need to protect my time.

  • Not at all. Sessions can take place virtually via Zoom so we can work together wherever you are located..

    If you are based in Southampton, there's currently a reduced local rate. Just mention it when you get in touch.

    And if you prefer to meet face to face, we can look at that too.

Experience and credentials

  • I hold a Certificate in Coaching from the Centre for Coaching, part of the International Academy for Professional Development.

    I’m a member of the Association for Coaching and committed to my own ongoing learning and development. As a member, I subscribe to their Code of Ethics, which sets out my commitments to you around confidentiality, professional boundaries, and acting in your best interests.

     

  • I’ve been working with small businesses for fifteen years as a sole trader, as a freelance business manager, and now through Worked.

    Before that I worked as a consultant for a Big 4 firm, for a City regulator, in private practice, and for local government.

    I’ve sat in a lot of different rooms — corporate, public sector, tiny kitchen-table businesses — and I have a reasonable sense of how all of them actually work from the inside.

  • I ran my sole trader practice for fifteen years, helping small business owners run their businesses better.

    Over time the work grew: more clients, broader skills, deeper expertise across coaching, mentoring and strategy.

    This work is the next phase. Same commitment, bigger offer. If you knew me as abby shacklock OBM you’re in the right place.

  • Possibly.

    I work best with people who are ready to show up and do the thinking supported by me

    I work less well with people who are looking for someone to validate why everything is someone else’s fault - they might be right but it’s rarely helpful!

    Contact me or book your first FREE session to find out