In May 2025, we launched the Paradigm Norton Coaching Academy with our first cohort of senior team members. The Academy aims to help our team develop their coaching skills for client conversations by developing greater self-awareness. We realise that upskilling isn’t just about technical financial knowledge; it’s also about the ability to have more meaningful conversations with clients – ensuring they have the chance to have meaningful conversations about the ‘big things’ that matter, or that they may not even have considered.
Here, Tracey Reed, Regional Director for our Bristol office, talks about her experience of the Coaching Academy. Tracey joined Paradigm Norton in 2009 as a financial planner. Today, she manages a team of chartered financial planners as well as looking after her own clients. More recently, she took on the Regional Director role in Bristol and sits on our Executive Committee.
“It’s been a great experience to be part of the first coaching cohort. I’m joined by our CEO, our Head of People, other Regional Directors and Key Client Directors. The programme consisted of six sessions, delivered online and face-to-face by an external coach.
I’ve found it extremely interesting, particularly learning how to have different and more fulfilling conversations with people. We’ve discovered how our communication style, biases, and experiences shape our behaviour, and the impact this has on our conversations. Understanding the theory has been fascinating and putting it into practice in break-out sessions with exercises has been a useful application of that knowledge too.
We’ve also delved into how our behaviour translates into our relationship with money. It’s important to understand our biases, as our individual perceptions around money is so varied. You could have been brought up in a family that was frugal with money, or where there were serious financial worries, or where there was lots of extravagant spending. It’s important to be aware that this has the potential to influence how clients talk about money.
The programme has also helped me consider how I may come across when communicating with my clients. It’s about asking the right questions and learning to be gently curious. As a result, I’m having much more fulfilling, rewarding conversations with clients, and they’re getting more value from the conversations we’re having, too.
Some parts of the programme have required deep reflection. Instead of just thinking, ‘that’s the way I am’, we’ve been challenged to develop an awareness that helps us interrupt these patterns. It’s helped me think about how to communicate difficult or sensitive messages to my team and bring more consciousness to this.
In between sessions, we either see our coach for one-to-one coaching, where we focus on a specific issue, or we split the time between 30 minutes one-to-one and 30 minutes in a peer session, where we practice a conversation and give feedback. We’ve gained deep value from this.
This experience has been completely different from other learning and development at Paradigm Norton. This is the first time we’ve had this kind of coaching, which is something we don’t see other financial planning firms doing regularly.
This journey of self-exploration means I’m a lot more conscious about the way I communicate with people, including stopping and thinking more regularly about what I am asking. I really enjoy the people side of my role, encouraging and supporting the team. I have noticed my conversations with the team have also changed in a positive way, thereby enhancing that support.
After a positive pilot year for the Coaching Academy, we’ll be reflecting on our learnings from this cohort to design phase two of the roll-out in 2026.