Gwen Burridge

I am absolutely delighted to be working for a company with amazing colleagues who share my passion for making a difference to peoples’ working lives.

With over 36 years’ experience in financial services as a Trader, Operations Manager, and HR Learning and Leadership Development Consultant, these roles have provided me with a pragmatic and outcome-driven approach to helping others grow and develop.

My years as a Trader helped me develop a deep level of resilience in a very challenging and often confrontational environment. It provided me with a high level of self-confidence, as well as the ability to recognise when to follow and when to lead.

Working in Operations provided me with my first experience as a Manager, and the challenges I faced such as juggling getting work done and managing people were helped enormously by attending an amazing new manager course that I still remember fondly to this day. Not only did it make me a much better manager, but the course was the catalyst for me to want to provide the same opportunities and support for others, and move into learning and people development. I’ve never looked back; it literally changed my life.

In my years in HR I got to understand better the different challenges people face in their daily lives, and the impact they have on their performance and their working lives in general. I provided training on techniques, tools and resources to help them make small changes that would have a big impact and increase their self-awareness, and coaching that supported their present and future career choices, helping them progress more quickly through their chosen path.

I have designed and delivered many courses over the years, covering topics such as core management, communication, time management, decision-making, dealing with conflict, and leadership. I’ve also used the profiling tool, Insights Discovery, for many years for team-building, raising self-awareness, leadership development, and in coaching to help people identify how to leverage their strengths, mitigate areas of stress and challenge, and sometimes change their chosen role or sector.

My pragmatic and candid facilitation style encourages people to engage openly and honestly, and the depth of my work and life experiences helps me empathise with people, as well as entertain them!

Specialties: Insights Discovery Practitioner, Clifton Strengths Coach (Gallup), Career Coach (ICF).

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