Sam’s coaching is shaped by a career spent leading in fast-moving consumer businesses, including senior roles at Nestlé, General Mills and Mars, and as Managing Director of Innocent Drinks (UK & Ireland). He works with senior leaders navigating growth, broader leadership scope and increased organisational complexity, bringing the perspective of someone who has led businesses, built teams and made decisions under pressure.
Background & Experience
Before establishing his coaching career, Sam has over 20 years of experience in consumer goods, holding senior commercial and strategic leadership roles across some of the sector’s most recognisable organisations. At Mars, he led Commercial Strategy and served as Grocery Sales Director for Mars UK, as well as holding leadership roles at Nestlé and General Mills, before becoming Managing Director of Innocent Drinks (UK & Ireland), where he led the business through periods of uncertainty, cultural evolution and rapid change. This background provides Sam with a strong understanding of the commercial realities, pace and leadership demands that shape performance in complex organisations.
Who Sam Works With
Sam works with senior leaders who are taking on broader responsibility, operating across more complex stakeholder groups, or adapting their leadership style as their remit expands. He is particularly effective with individuals stepping into enterprise-level leadership, where success depends not only on functional expertise, but on judgement, influence and the ability to lead through ambiguity. His experience as both a business leader and coach allow him to support clients with a practical, grounded perspective on what senior leadership requires in real organisational contexts.
Coaching Style
His coaching style is warm, direct and people centred. Sam creates the conditions for honest reflection while maintaining a clear focus on outcomes, helping clients think more clearly, strengthen their judgement and lead with greater consistency under pressure. He combines empathy with challenge, supporting leaders to understand how they show up, how they influence others and where they may need to adapt as expectations increase. His work is particularly resonant for leaders who want to lead in a way that is both effective and aligned with their values.
Alongside his executive coaching work, Sam is Founding Partner at Psalt, an organisation focused on helping people widen their perspective, seek out difference and develop a stronger sense of confidence and direction. He has also served as Chair of the Board of Trustees for the youth charity Future Skills and continues to hold a number of non-executive roles. These experiences reflect Sam’s broader commitment to leadership as a force for positive change and add depth to his work with clients who are thinking not only about performance, but also about purpose, culture and longer-term impact.
Clients
Sam works with leaders from Director and Partner level through to CEO and President across sectors including consumer goods, financial services, legal and investment. His clients include Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, UBS, Morgan Stanley, Waypoint Capital, Schroders, Moody’s, Allen & Overy, Cooley, HG Capital, Nestlé, Waitrose and IFAW.
Qualifications & Credentials
Sam holds a BSc (Hons) in Banking, Finance and Management from Loughborough University and a Professional Certificate in Coaching from Henley Business School and is an accredited coach with the Association for Coaching (AC).
