Foundations - Stefan’s Week-notes 14/06/2026
Inspired by the weeknotes of friends and coachees including John Fitzgerald, Steve Messer and Nour Sidawi - I love doing these when I get time to ‘do it properly”. cementing thoughts, refining approaches and who knows , adding some value along the way.
Weeknotes | Foundations
1 - What I’ve Been Up To
This week took me from Brussels to agriculture, regeneration, medical technology and digital transformation.
I spent time with founders building an impressive organisation. Like many founders, they were so focused on what remained to be done that they struggled to see what they had already created.
By the end of our first conversation, one of them simply said:
“I already feel calmer.”
That stayed with me.
Not because we’d solved everything, but because we’d created enough space for them to see the foundations beneath their feet.
I also worked with two founders who are four months away from launching their organisation. There is real momentum behind what they are building. Yet alongside the excitement sat a handful of conversations that need to happen if the organisation is going to become what it is capable of becoming.
The challenge wasn’t capability.
It was courage.
I spent time with a senior leader in the medical technology sector exploring how best to support a key member of their team. As often happens, a conversation that began with an individual quickly became a conversation about systems, leadership and culture.
I also worked with a leader pursuing what could be the role of their dreams within the agriculture and regeneration space.
Our conversation wasn’t about pretending they were already there.
Nor was it about focusing on what they lacked.
It was about understanding how much of the role they already carried within them, where the genuine gaps existed, and how they might bridge them with honesty and confidence.
Alongside the coaching work, a case study was signed off capturing some of the work I’ve been fortunate enough to do with Public Digital.
That felt significant.
Not because of the document itself, but because it created a moment to pause and recognise what good conversations, sustained over time, can make possible.
2 - The Thread Running Through the Week
The central theme has been meaningful progress.
Over recent months I’ve been developing a simple equation:
Meaningful Progress =
Agency + Forum + Stewardship + Service
This week was the first time it stopped feeling like a framework and started feeling like something lived.
Agency is helping people recognise they have choices.
Forum is creating the space to explore those choices honestly.
Stewardship is considering the impact of those choices across people, place, planet, past, present and future.
Service is putting our energy into something larger than ourselves.
What struck me this week is that every meaningful conversation seemed to contain elements of all four.
Alongside this, I continued shaping the Be the Waves Forum.
What started as a rough idea is becoming something much more tangible.
Nine questions.
Ten sessions.
A small cohort.
A trusted place to think.
A place where people carrying significant responsibility can bring what they are wrestling with and work on it together.
I’m excited to see where it leads.
3 - What Lit Me Up
Without question, the moments that lit me up most were the moments where people saw themselves differently.
A founder recognising how far they’ve come.
A leader recognising they are closer to their aspiration than they thought.
A team recognising the conversation they need to have.
A client recognising that their challenge may sit within a wider system rather than solely within an individual.
I’ve become increasingly aware that much of my work is not about giving answers.
It is about holding up a mirror.
Not a flattering mirror.
Not a critical mirror.
A truthful one.
Because clarity creates agency.
And agency creates movement.
4 - What I Wrestled With
One of my biggest challenges this week was giving myself permission to think.
Many of the ideas that emerged this week appeared between sessions rather than within them.
Joining dots.
Connecting ideas.
Reflecting.
Exploring patterns.
I still occasionally find myself treating thinking as something separate from the work.
Yet the more I coach, write and facilitate, the more I realise that thinking is the work.
I also spent far too much of the week indoors.
For somebody who often finds clarity through movement, fresh air and changing scenery, that felt noticeable.
A useful reminder heading into next week.
5 - Personal Moments
A conversation with my friends Jason and Darren stayed with me.
We talked about life, responsibility and the realities many people are carrying.
What struck me afterwards was how easily life can become a cycle of purpose, productivity, caring responsibilities and paying the bills.
What often disappears first is fun.
Yet joy is not a luxury.
It is part of what sustains us.
Part of what allows us to keep growing.
Part of what makes the rest worthwhile.
I’m grateful for the people who keep reaching out, checking in and helping each other stay human.
6 - Stewardship in Practice
I found myself reflecting on stewardship repeatedly this week.
In conversations about founders and culture.
In conversations about leadership.
In conversations about mission, values and strategy.
One discussion explored the relationship between those three things.
Mission.
Values.
Strategy.
In that order.
Because strategy without values can become opportunistic.
And values without mission can become vague.
The question that keeps returning is:
Are we actually being the standard we aspire to be?
For individuals.
For teams.
For organisations.
For systems.
That feels like a stewardship question.
7 - Beneath the Surface
Perhaps the most important thing I noticed this week is that most people do not need more information.
They need more clarity.
Clarity about where they are.
Clarity about where they want to get to.
Clarity about how far they’ve already come.
Clarity about the conversations they’re avoiding.
Clarity about what really matters.
Again and again, the challenge wasn’t capability.
It was clarity.
And clarity creates agency.
8 - What I Don’t Want to Rush Past
This week I received some wonderful feedback from participants on the Boost Cheshire & Warrington programme.
One comment stopped me in my tracks:
“Like an earthquake in the most positive way – shifting the foundations of what’s possible. Ever indebted to Stefan.”
It would be easy to smile and move on.
But I don’t want to rush past it.
Not because it is flattering.
Because it captures something I’ve been seeing all week.
The greatest shifts often happen when people begin to believe that something more is possible.
Not because reality changes overnight.
Because their relationship with reality changes.
9 - Image of the Week
This week we lost David Hockney.
That prompted this work-in-progress sketch inspired by a post from Pete Swift.
I’ve always admired Hockney’s ability to help people see familiar things differently. Not through complexity, but through attention.
Looking back across the week, I wonder whether many of the conversations I had were really trying to do the same thing.
Helping people look more closely.
At themselves.
At their organisations.
At their aspirations.
At the conversations they need to have.
At the foundations already beneath their feet.
Sometimes meaningful progress begins not with action, but with seeing.
10 - What I’m Carrying Forward
A growing conviction that we need more people capable of creating agency in others.
More people capable of stewarding forums.
More people capable of holding conversations that matter.
More people capable of helping groups think well together.
The more I reflect on coaching, facilitation and leadership, the more I wonder whether this is the work beneath the work.
Not simply helping people progress.
Helping people create the conditions for meaningful progress themselves.
11 - Looking Ahead
Next week I’m looking forward to travelling north to spend time with my mum and my brothers near Wolverhampton.
I’m looking forward to a virtual cuppa with Susie Cuppill.
And I’m looking forward to beginning a 360 process with a leader in the medical technology sector.
Three very different activities.
All centred on people.
All centred on connection.
12 - Song of the Week
Drive – Incubus
“Whatever tomorrow brings, I’ll be there, with open arms and open eyes.”
A reminder that agency begins with how we choose to show up.
13 - Writing of the Week
What Makes a Cause Worth Carrying?
A reflection on conviction, contribution and why some causes call us forward more strongly than others.
14 - Sign Off
This week reminded me that meaningful progress rarely starts with action.
It starts with seeing.
Seeing ourselves more clearly.
Seeing others more generously.
Seeing the foundations beneath our feet.
And recognising that the next breakthrough may not be another answer, but a conversation we’ve been waiting too long to have.
15 - Question for the Week Ahead
If meaningful progress begins with clarity, what conversation, truth, possibility or achievement might you need to look at more honestly this week?
Until next week
If something in this resonates - or you’re carrying something you want to think through:
Just reply…