The Athar of leading is not the work that got you here.
Executive coaching for founders, operators and newly promoted directors. Eleven years, four hundred and twenty leaders, one conversation at a time. The first conversation costs nothing and ends in a recommendation — which is occasionally someone other than me.
420+
Leaders coached since 2015
11 yrs
In independent practice
92%
Renew or refer someone
- On the record
- CredentialedICF PCC(Professional Certified Coach)
- Leaders coached420+(Since 2015)
- Bound byThe ICF Code of Ethics(Not a logo — a contract term)
- ConfidentialityAbsolute(Including employer-sponsored work)
- DeliveredRemote & in person(London, and by video)
Coaching carries no state licensure anywhere in the world. The ICF credential is the profession’s own self-regulatory standard, and ICF’s 2022 Global Consumer Awareness Study found that 85% of clients consider it important, reporting 28% higher satisfaction when their coach holds one. Credential number and verification link available on request.
What this is — and what it isn’t.
Three sentences that save both of us a wasted hour. If any of them makes you close the tab, they have done their job.
A thinking partner, not a consultant.
I do not arrive with your answer. I ask the question you have been walking around for six months, then stay quiet long enough for you to answer it yourself. Where you actually want advice, I will say so out loud and change modes on purpose.
Coaching, not therapy.
This work is forward-looking and performance-focused. It is not clinical care and it does not treat anxiety, depression or trauma. When something belongs with a clinician I name it in the session it appears, and I keep a referral list for exactly that moment.
Your agenda, not your employer’s.
Where your organisation pays, the coaching contract is still with you. The sponsor receives attendance and, only with your written agreement, the themes you choose to name. Never notes, never recordings, never a readout of what you said.
Four stages. No surprises in any of them.
You will know the shape of the next six months before you pay for any of it. That is the whole point of the first call.
No charge, everThe discovery call
You bring the thing you would not say in a leadership meeting. I ask questions and take no notes. At the end I tell you whether I think coaching is the right instrument for it, and if it is not I say what is. Nobody is sold anything on this call.
45 minutes- Format Video
- Cost Free
- Ends with A recommendation
Within a weekChemistry and contracting
If we both want to proceed, you receive a written agreement covering goals, cadence, fees, the cancellation window and exactly what a sponsoring employer will and will not be told. Nothing begins until that is signed by everyone paying and everyone attending.
1 week- Signed Client agreement
- Sponsor Terms in writing
- Set Confidentiality
The relationshipThe engagement
Fortnightly seventy-five minute sessions by video or in person in London, held in your timezone wherever you are between UTC−8 and UTC+5:30. Between sessions you have my direct line for voice notes and email, answered inside one working day.
6 to 26 weeks- Cadence Fortnightly
- Length 75 minutes
- Between Voice note and email
The exit is designedClose and hand-back
The last two sessions review the work against the goals set in session one and hand the practice back to you, deliberately. A good engagement ends. One follow-up session ninety days later is included at no charge, and most people take it.
Final two sessions- Review Against session one
- Handover Your own practice
- Included 90-day follow-up
Three shapes of work.
Every engagement starts with the same free conversation. What differs is how long the relationship runs and how much of your week it asks for. The current price of each is on the engagements page, set by the practice and never restated here.
- Sessions
- 6
- Cadence
- Weekly
- Session length
- 60 min
- Between sessions
- Reply inside one working day
- Not included
- Written goals review at the midpoint
- Not included
- 90-day follow-up session
- Not included
- In person in London
- Not included
- Sessions
- 12
- Cadence
- Fortnightly
- Session length
- 75 min
- Between sessions
- Voice note and email
- Reply inside one working day
- Included
- Written goals review at the midpoint
- Included
- 90-day follow-up session
- Included
- In person in London
- Included
- Sessions
- Ongoing
- Cadence
- As needed
- Session length
- 60 min
- Between sessions
- Voice note and email
- Reply inside one working day
- Included
- Written goals review at the midpoint
- Not included
- 90-day follow-up session
- Not included
- In person in London
- Included
Prices are shown on the engagements page and exclude VAT where applicable. Sessions reschedule without charge up to 72 hours before the agreed time. No engagement begins without a discovery conversation, and that conversation is never charged.
Client confidentiality is contractual, so nobody here is named.
Every quote below is published with written permission and with the identifying detail removed. A coaching site full of headshots and full names is telling you something about how it treats confidentiality.
“I came in wanting a communication fix and left having rebuilt how I run a leadership team. The second session was the first time in four years anyone had asked me what I actually wanted.”
VP Engineering
Series C fintech · 6-month engagement
“My board coach worked for the board. This did not. Knowing precisely what my investors would and would not hear was the reason I could be honest in the room.”
Founder & CEO
Seed-stage climate hardware · Monthly retainer
“Six sessions, no theory, no personality inventory. We worked on the two conversations I had been avoiding since January. I had both of them by week nine.”
Director of Operations
Global logistics, newly promoted · Six-session foundation
For a practice this size, you are buying a person. Here is the person.
I am Elinor Vance. I ran operations for a 300-person software business for nine years and was, by my own honest account, a competent manager and a poor leader. I trained out of that. Since 2015 I have coached founders, executives and newly promoted directors in technology, financial services, healthcare and public infrastructure — four hundred and twenty of them, one at a time, with no associates and no delegation. You will never be handed to somebody else on my roster, because there is no roster.
Training and hours
ICF Professional Certified Coach (PCC), credentialed 2019 and renewed 2025. Certificate in Executive Coaching, Henley Business School, 2014. Systemic Team Coaching, AoEC, 2018. Over 2,400 logged paid one-to-one coaching hours, verified for credentialing.
Supervision and accountability
Monthly one-to-one supervision with an accredited coach supervisor, as the ICF and EMCC both require and as too few independent practitioners actually keep up. Member of ICF and EMCC in good standing. Professional indemnity insurance of £2,000,000 in force.
Our Values
Sectors I know well
Venture-backed software, financial services and fintech, healthcare delivery, and public infrastructure. I turn down work in sectors I do not understand, which is a shorter list than it used to be but still a real one.
Who I am not for
If what you need is clinical care, career outplacement, a fractional COO or somebody to write your strategy, coaching is the wrong instrument and I will say so on the first call rather than the fifth session.
How I hold sponsored work
Where an employer pays, they receive attendance and agreed themes only. That boundary is written into the contract they sign, and I have ended engagements over it before.
Our Locations
Headquarters
123 Design Street, Suite 400, New York, NY 10001
hello@minimalstore.com +1 (555) 123-4567Start with a conversation, not a contract.
Forty-five minutes, on video, at no cost. It ends with a straight recommendation about whether coaching is the right instrument for what you are carrying — and if it is not, what is.
45 min
Length of the first call
£0
Cost of the first call
1 in 5
Referred elsewhere after it
What this work is, and what it is not
Coaching is not therapy, counselling, psychiatric care or medical treatment. It is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any condition, and it is not a substitute for professional mental-health or medical advice. If something surfaces in our work that belongs with a clinician, I will say so plainly in the session it comes up and help you find the right person.
Everything said in a session stays in the session. Where an employer sponsors the engagement, the sponsor receives confirmation that sessions took place and, only where you have agreed in advance, the themes you choose to share. They never receive session content, notes, recordings or assessments — and they are told that in writing at contracting, not afterwards.
Sessions may be rescheduled without charge up to 72 hours before the agreed time. Inside that window the session is drawn from the engagement. Unused sessions expire twelve months from the start date. Engagements are refundable pro rata against unused sessions up to the halfway point.
Coaching is not a mental-health service and is not a substitute for medical or psychological care.