Sally Cherry

Region:: Midlands

My background is in the Probation Service, first motivated by an interest in people and what makes them tick.

This expanded to an interest in what enables people to change and grow.

My career encompasses learning and development with a strong focus on management within the third sector (National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders) and local authorities.

After eight years of successfully developing and operating my own consultancy I was ready for a change and was appointed Assistant Director to a West Midlands Training Consortium, and currently have a lead role in the development of leaders and managers.

I am one of the UK’s leading exponents of Pro-social Modelling; a principled people-centred way of working with involuntary clients.

I believe in this approach with a passion and bring many of the underlying values to my work.

I am the author of Transforming Behaviour; Pro-social Modelling in Practice (2nd edition, Willan, 2010) which is acknowledged as being the primary source material for the UK, as well as a recognised international resource.

Executive Development

Whatever I have been doing I have never lost my interest in working alongside people as they develop.

Whatever expertise I have is not in providing answers but in listening, developing empathy and nudging people towards finding their own answers.

Through direct experience of its effectiveness, I have been influenced by ways of working that embrace solution-focused approaches.

The words of Bill O’Connell go some way to describing the elements that I bring in my practice:

“the (developer) should trust the client’s best instincts and see the client as creative, imaginative and resourceful. The (developer), too, is optimistic, resourceful, creative and imaginative. S/he helps the client to keep going in the direction of his/her goals, but is not the expert who chooses what direction that should be.”

I have an ILM level 7 qualification in Leadership Coaching and Mentoring.

Recently I have been coaching four Senior Leaders in the Probation Service, supporting them with personal transitions to more challenging roles during a time when the service itself is also facing major challenges.