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Polly Cochrane

Partner, Advisor and Coach

About

Polly has a widely-recognised reputation for creating the conditions for high-performance, inspiring and enabling individuals and teams to flourish.

Polly’s driving force and the thread running through her career is a passion for fostering environments where people are supported and motivated to be outstanding.

Her approach to coaching combines formal training with experience and observations drawn from blue-chip organisations, most recently leading a $1bn business through the pandemic.

Polly brings a sophisticated understanding of how to operate within matrixed structures and steer leaders through high-pressure situations, gained from over 20 years in senior leadership roles, including Director of Marketing & Communications at Channel 4 and most recently Country Manager at Warner Media, now Warner Bros. Discovery.

Polly’s coaching style is ‘active’ rather than ‘directive’, aiming to provoke the kind of reflection and self-awareness that underpins personal growth, lasting change and sustained high performance.

Drawn to complexity, but skilled in the art of making the complex simple, Polly deploys a trademark mix of fierce logic, creativity, and curiosity to get to the heart of intractable issues and enable the unlocking of solutions.

Polly graduated from University of Cambridge with an MA in Architecture and is an Alumnus of the INSEAD Advanced Management Programme. She is an accredited coach through the Meyler Campbell Mastered Programme and EMCC.

Polly lives between London and Gloucestershire and is married with two university-aged sons.

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Credentials

Polly is uniquely qualified and is simply brilliant. With her keen listening, perceptive questioning and insightful input, she graciously facilitates and supports effortless transformation.

CEO, SC Collective and GloWD

Polly brings a rare combination of commercial acumen, warmth and empathy, and a real sense of what it takes to thrive in demanding environments while protecting personal integrity and authenticity.

Executive, Global Investment Bank

I found my sessions with Polly so ‘enabling’. I was in a newly created senior role in a new institution, being pulled in many different directions, whilst adapting to a very different workplace culture. Polly helped me become more intentional, more in control of my day and ultimately more able to pursue my agenda. Her mature, big picture perspective on people was also just what I needed hear and learn.

Senior Executive, UK Commercial Bank

When facing difficult decisions, Polly was able to help me see them from different and fresh angles, identifying what about a problem was critical, what was a distraction and what was to be avoided. Each time the speed of decision making and the decision making itself would improve.

CEO, International Academic Research Institute

Coaching with Polly has been an eye-opener. It has allowed me to change my perspective from negative to positive thinking which has been invaluable. Her style has made what I thought was complex very simple so that I now have a clear idea of priorities and what matters the most.

Managing Director, OMG Unite

After moving into a new global role with distributed executives, a newly built central team and an economic downturn, Polly was able to ask the precise questions needed to intricately understand the situation and individuals involved, which when combined with extensive experience as well as an arsenal of problem-solving tools, resulted in both simple frameworks to guide the way forward, as well as detailed situational preparation for challenging discussions.

EVP of Growth, Stuart Delivery Ltd

Polly has a deep understanding of what it takes to get to, and work at the highest level in blue-chip organisations, and her combination of experience, wisdom and warmth provided exactly the support I required at a pivotal moment in my career. Her counsel has improved my ongoing confidence and performance in challenging environments. As a result, I am now working in a more suitable role, in a more efficient way, with a renewed vigour and approach. I am SO lucky to have found such an adept and collaborative coach, mentor and guide!

Executive Producer, Virtual Production, DNEG