With learning and development at the heart of all we do, it is always a cause for celebration when we can share academic achievements from within our own consulting community at TimmerHaus.

We are delighted to announce that one of our Senior Consultants has just graduated with a Practitioner Diploma in Executive Coaching from The Academy of Executive Coaching (AoEC), one of the world’s leading executive coach training companies.

In an interview with Anna Nardini, she shares her experience of the course and why it was such an important goal for her to achieve

“Despite extensive experience of working in a developmental capacity within Leadership circles, I felt a deep need to refresh and extend my skills portfolio, in service of my clients.” Anna goes on to explain the importance of embracing a ‘stretch zone’ to remain in a state of continual professional evolution. “Nothing beats the ‘stretch zone’ of a learning environment,” she confirms, “and I wanted to experience it myself again; to feel that same level of vulnerability that our clients often feel when working with us.”

It is fair to acknowledge that we live in a world where we are all increasingly required to validate our professional selves. The acquisition of a qualification can be a welcome accompaniment to the skills we inherently possess, and the actual process of qualifying can be a mind-opening and transformative one, presenting positive new challenges and nudging us towards new levels of competency in a learning cycle that never really stops.

“It is so easy for complacency to creep in,” admits Anna, who recognises the unsung benefits of both self-reflection and inviting new perspectives through the nature of her work. “As both an Assessor and Coach, there is a demand to bring different skills to different situations – the course encouraged me to reconsider the diverse needs of my different clients and their individual scenarios. It also served as a powerful reminder of my own areas of strength, as well as providing me with new coaching approaches and techniques that I could introduce to further support my clients.”

With coaching becoming increasingly recognised as a compelling culture to support high-performing individuals and businesses, this was a natural area on which to focus. “Coaching is such a powerful intervention.” says Anna, “There is no hierarchy in the relationship between Coach and Client, no superior knowledge – just equity, and a deep-rooted belief that the Client is sufficiently resourceful to optimise their own performance themselves, with the Coach serving purely as a catalyst. The result of this approach is remarkable. It empowers the Client, nourishes self-belief, supports accountability, and drives positive, manageable, incremental change. I wanted to learn additional ways to facilitate all of this for my clients and the course provided that in both a practical and theoretical framework.”

The work undertaken by Consultants within Leadership circles is continually subject to modification and new, external influences. To accommodate the ever-changing world in which we work, there is a moral obligation for us all to adapt and pivot and to do this with credibility and ethical training.

Marc Timmerman, the owner of TimmerHaus, is a firm believer in the necessity to learn and develop and encouraged Anna to commit to the course in addition to the training he, himself, provides to all Consultants that join the TimmerHaus

“I have worked with numerous Consultants who have attended courses via the AoEC and each of them has had hugely enriching experiences, so when Anna discussed her interest in studying for the Practitioner Diploma in Executive Coaching, I couldn’t have been more delighted!” Marc’s warm smile compounds his enthusiasm. “It is a prestigious qualification to hold and will further increase opportunities for Anna to work with Clients in yet more diverse development scenarios. We are all celebrating her success, and, personally, I am thrilled to see yet another member of the TimmerHaus team enjoying the confidence that a formal qualification invites.”