Mary Black


Consultant - Coverdale UK
With Coverdale since 1998

Career in brief
Mary is a psychology graduate with over twenty years business experience in the retail sector, where she held senior operational posts in fast-moving, customer-focused and results-oriented environments during periods of growth and radical change. Prior to joining Coverdale she was Deputy Retail Director with a blue-chip retail company, responsible for maximising company performance through a high level of awareness of strategic and business goals; galvanising regional teams to achieve objectives through clear direction and support; and collaborating with central functions to realise opportunities and instigate change.

In her work as a consultant she focuses on:
  • Vision, strategy and values consultancy
  • Leadership - developing highly effective Board / senior management teams to achieve and deliver strategic business goals through improved leadership capability.
  • Organisational change – developing the skills and behaviours of the organisation’s people, aligned to their vision, strategy and values.
  • Facilitation – enabling senior teams and groups to resolve issues and conflicts effectively, as well as project facilitation
  • Executive coaching – coaching Directors and senior executives, to maximise personal performance and business results. Some recent assignments:
  • Lead consultant with the Executive Team of an organisation with 1500 employees, and their relevant Directorates, in order to:
    • support them in the development and delivery of their business aims, strategy and plans
    • facilitate and improve collaborative cross-functional working and decision-making, aligned to specific measurements of success.
  • Lead consultant working with the Directors and senior managers of a major UK manufacturing company, to equip them with the relevant skills to drive the culture change programme forward. Facilitating live projects, in order to help them gain competitive advantage by becoming operationally excellent.
  • Coaching members of a newly formed Executive Team for a major governing body for sport, in order to maximise their potential and performance and thereby achieve sustained results in line with the organisation's vision.
Professional experience:
  • Deputy Retail director, blue-chip UK company, retail sector
  • Consulting at all levels in the hospitality, retail, leisure, construction, manufacturing, financial services, local government and voluntary sectors.
Education and training:
  • BSc (Hons) Psychology
  • Coverdale qualified coach
  • National Training Award Winner, for commercial awareness development
  • Accredited in psychometric testing
Working languages:
  • English
Mary says:
"I believe my role is to enable people to discover and then achieve their potential and therefore improve not only their own performance but also business results, in a way that is sustainable. We can only add this value as consultants when we focus on developing a long-term relationship with our clients, in order to fully appreciate their culture, drivers, needs and the issues that they are grappling with." 		Mary Black
Mary Black
Coverdale UK