Sir John Whitmore

Sir John Whitmore, pioneer of coaching in the workplace and co-creator of the most widely used coaching model GROW, was a founder of Performance Consultants International, the market leader in coaching globally. Honoured for his lifetime’s work with the President’s Award from the International Coach Federation (ICF), Sir John’s global contribution to coaching and leadership has helped drive organizational transformation and bring meaning and purpose to work. Through his books – most notably Coaching for Performance – workshops and speeches, he defined the principles of performance coaching and midwifed its birth from sporting excellence, transpersonal psychology, and emotional intelligence. Coaching for Performance is widely considered to be the bible of coaching and Sir John’s vision, philosophy, and methodology has inspired millions of managers, leaders, and coaches across four decades to bring the best out of themselves and others and find through coaching that is transformational not transactional. Sir John will always be considered one of the leading figures in the international coaching community. He was instrumental in the early stages of the creation of the ICF, which is now the world’s largest organization of professionally trained coaches. He remained involved in the evolution of coaching and the ICF, serving as a Trustee for the ICF Foundation until he died in 2017. The 5th Edition of Coaching for Performance was completed before his death and his extraordinary legacy is continued by his colleagues.

Founded in the early 1980s, Performance Consultants’ mission is to transform the relationship between organizations and employees. Their stance is simple: organizations are sitting on a great untapped reservoir of potential – that of their people. They partner with organizations globally on leadership development, coaching and culture transformation. Market leaders in their field, they invite organizations to improve performance through their leaders and thereby reap rewards for people, profit and planet. They are able to demonstrate an average 800% return on investment for their clients. Their flagship leadership program, named after this book Coaching for Performance, is considered the industry gold-standard and delivered in over 40 countries and in 23 languages