Our Lead Consultants

Solvej has an extensive City background as a practising lawyer together with 15 years executive coaching and leadership experience. She works with individuals and organisations to implement tough, lasting and positive change.

Highly experienced at managing client relationships and leading teams at the very top end of commerce both nationally and internationally, Solvej works with senior executives as well as the leaders of tomorrow. She assists them in getting the most out of themselves and, through their management and professional relationships, the most out of those who work with them.

Her specialist areas include client management, personal development, motivation, personal effectiveness, interpersonal communication, management skills, team building, presentation performance, assertiveness, career progression, work/life balance, career satisfaction and returning to work following leave.

Solvej coaches on a one-to-one level as well as platform speaking and instructor-led training.

In her spare time she enjoys travelling, fitness and spending time with her young family.

Prior to joining LDL, Jane developed a successful track record in sales and sales management. With a City based sales background, Jane moved into corporate services where she managed key client relationships and a multi-site sales and service team.

After completing her Masters degree, Jane joined LDL to develop specific training and performance improvement initiatives for key clients. This included conducting skills audits, research and on-site training needs analysis.

A training consultant with LDL since 1999, Jane conducts open programmes as well as tailored, in-company initiatives covering sales, negotiation, service excellence, teambuilding, project management and presentation skills. Jane's style of delivery ranges from one-to-one coaching through to facilitation, instructor-lead training and platform speaking.

In her free time, Jane's hobbies include sailing, skiing, rock climbing and competing in triathlons (she dreads the day that she takes up golf and has to compete against herself!).

Nieves’ belief in the power of effective communication skills is the driving force in her specialised areas of service excellence, management and sales.

Nieves works with a diverse client base to build the skills and confidence of their people. ‘Energy’, ‘positivity’ and ‘humour’ are the words clients repeatedly use to describe Nieves’ training style. These clients include: Channel 4, Serono Biogenetics, Baring Asset Management, Elf Business Energy, Royal College of Physicians, Progress Software and ING

Outside work, Nieves takes every opportunity to get her oilskins on and expose herself to wind and water. She sailed for Great Britain this summer and raced from Hong Kong to the UK in 2000.

Her experience of working in high performance teams in pressurised environments provides a real-life context for her training. Her best discovery on the water is that great teams have to be able laugh together.

For the last 16 years Chris has worked with and led teams in investment banking, media and the armed forces.  He is passionate about teamwork and leadership and has seen the impact a positive attitude can have on both.

Chris’s focus is on how to get the best from people in their role whether this is management and leadership or business development, negotiation and sales.  He runs the open Introduction to Management programme and uses his skills, including Myers Briggs and NLP, to work with clients to develop unique development solutions. 

Chris is a great coach and, whether he is working on leadership or sales development, he helps people to develop their own solutions for peak performance.

Chris has also worked as lead consultant on several large change programmes.  He is a skilled facilitator helping organisations align their human capital to the strategy of the organisation.

His major clients include The London Stock Exchange, BSkyB, Wall St Systems, Control Risk Group, Betfair, Barratt, Scottish Water and Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi- UFJ.

Since joining LDL in 2001 Matthew has become our creative whiz! When a client is looking for something ‘really unusual’ Matthew is the man we turn to!

His flair ensures that clients experience uniquely designed programmes that hit the mark. Matthew has worked extensively throughout the UK, Europe, South Africa, the USA and Far East.

He specialises in developing leadership, project management, team building and service excellence learning for wide and diverse audiences - from graduates to senior management.

As a learning professional Matthew has worked with British Airways, The London Stock Exchange, Alexander Forbes, Marriott Hotels, Forte Hotels, 3Com, Sun Microsystems, One 2 One, Logica, Deloitte, Royal Bank of Scotland, Iceland and Panorama Holiday Group.

In his spare time, Matthew loves to escape the city to find fresh air and steep hills, with theatre, music, fine food and wine being his preferred relaxation.

After completing his academic studies, Julian Feinstein, Bsc Dip Psych PhD worked for a number of international organisations as well as local government before joining LDL in 1982. His objective was to expand LDL's in-company and consultancy business and, in so doing, pioneered sales development for the professions and built much of LDL's City client base.

Julian specialises in sales, negotiating skills, management and leadership at all levels. In addition he has had many successful motivational conference speaking engagements. In particular, Julian has the distinction of regularly training and coaching the key players in a number of the world's most successful investment banks.

In his spare time, Julian takes a great interest in wines and loves his sport. He is currently a season ticket holder at Harlequins and has followed the fortunes of QPR for 30 years.

Angela Jones, BSc (Hons), DipMRS, and a Member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, has nearly twenty years’ experience in training and development.  She is passionate about maximising the human resource.

She started her career in financial services, working in a broad range of departments including marketing and lending functions. 

In 1990 Angela moved into training, gaining vast experience in the delivery of a wide range of personal development, management and skills programmes.  She has worked on the development of senior management, leadership, graduate induction, teambuilding and change management programmes.

She also undertook a role as a Performance Manager, taking a lead role in the recruitment of a large team of skilled training professionals.  She shared responsibility for the development and introduction of a range of performance management tools and was line manager to 13 trainers, responsible for coaching and developing their facilitation skills.  Angela has also worked as an Associate Lecturer for the Open University on the Certificate in Management Programme, for two years.

Angela is one of LDL’s Senior Consultants and has responsibility for running the Senior Management Public Course. She specialises in management skills, encompassing leadership, change management, management development, recruitment and selection, interviewing skills, people management, coaching skills and training the trainer.  Angela now particularly enjoys challenging senior groups and several executive teams, helping them to define and plan vision, values and behaviours.

Always active and ever positive, Angela’s latest project is to have bought a property in Spain, and the next challenge is to master both Spanish, and the game of golf. At the moment, the money is on the linguistic skills being mastered first!

Cath started her career within events and exhibitions. Having started work within the planning team of a small event organiser, Cath moved to P&O events to manage the logistics of a number of high profile exhibitions.

She joined LDL in 1994 to get some top quality training plus sales experience and has been here ever since! Having started off as a Corporate Account Manager, she progressed to Sales Manager and then to General Manager with responsibility for overseeing the smooth running of the sales, administration and consulting teams.

Cath has always remained client facing, however, her focus now is on ensuring that LDL delivers consistently excellent service to our clients. She is our secret weapon and her dedication and positive attitude towards the business is hugely appreciated by every member of LDL.

Whenever she gets the chance Cath heads off to the slopes to indulge her passion for ski-ing - the tougher the slope the better!

Prior to joining LDL in 1989, Robin spent a number of years as a National Account Manager and Regional Sales Manager with Dun and Bradstreet. He was also Sales Director of Radio City plc.

A Director of LDL, Robin specialises in Leadership and Sales. His clients include The Cooperative Bank, Scottish Power, Volkswagen, Reuters, Hewlett Packard, Cisco, Lego, and Nortel Networks. A keen devotee of peak performance, Robin places a high degree of emphasis on the 'Will to Win' factor. He has developed a reputation for dynamic, fun and vibrant programmes that challenge comfort zones and stretch people to new horizons.

Robin has extensive experience of facilitating cultural change projects where winning 'hearts and minds' is critical. He works with clients in a variety of ways from one-to-one coaching to facilitation, to instructor led. He is also an outstanding conference speaker where his exciting and humorous delivery style always goes down well.

Robin's passions out of work include his family (he has 2 sons at University), tennis and music. He plays bass-guitar and piano and does a mean 'Elvis' and 'Jerry Lee Lewis' at LDL get-togethers!

Richard progressed rapidly through a classical FMCG sales and leadership career with Blue Chip companies. His successes have always involved business development, team motivation and people development.

Richard is always keen to work closely with clients on very specific projects and broader business consultancy. This ensures an up-to-the-minute, detailed understanding of the leadership and commercial issues facing today’s businesses. .

All aspects of sales and negotiation, as well as motivation and leadership make up Richard’s portfolio of learning and development programmes and his clients always see tangible results from the programmes that he has run. Richard has been part of the team for twelve years.

Away from LDL, Richard keeps fit by long distance running and is an ambitious sailor, competing at national level in the Laser 2000 class and relaxing by yacht cruising in the Solent or, preferably, warmer climes!

Clare has seventeen years of sales, operational and training management experience. Since joining LDL in 1996 Clare has worked very successfully with a variety of clients from sectors including pharmaceuticals, IT, manufacturing, retail and recruitment. Her clients include HR Consultancy, Astra Zeneca, Reuters Health, Bull Information Systems, Royce Recruitment, Virgin, Computer 2000, Misco, Volkswagen, RBS and Microbank.

Clare is MD of LDL Scotland.

Clare's speciality areas include Consultative-Partner Selling, Management & Leadership, Presentation and Negotiation. She is known for her irrepressible, upbeat training style, which leaves her delegates feeling positive, energised and committed to implementing new ideas.

Clare is also regarded as an exceptional keynote speaker and firmly believes in the skill + will ethos which makes LDL learning and development events both unique and successful. She is also an NLP Master Practitioner which gives her an added dimension when providing solutions to her clients.

Clare's husband is Greek and as they have a second home on the south-west coast of the Pelopponeses, she is most definitely a beach addict.

Prior to joining LDL in 1992, Michelle gained extensive experience in sales and service management at Barclays Bank Plc, Ford plc and Wharfedale plc where she ran sales and service for five Hi-Fi brands in 44 countries.

An enthusiastic and vibrant learning professional who brings real wow factor to her work (well that’s what we think!), Michelle’s specialist areas include Service Excellence Skills, Telephone Selling, Professional Selling Skills, Train The Trainer and Effective Speaking.

Her clients include Halifax plc, Kingston Communications, University or Warwick, Virgin, Espa, Weetabix and Carphone Warehouse.

In her spare time Michelle is a dedicated fitness fanatic who loves nothing better than a good spinning class where ‘skill+will’ certainly comes in useful!

Deborah brings a wealth of experience from her background in sales and multi-million pound account management. She joined LDL in 1997 and has maintained a hands-on approach to selling and negotiation as well as tailoring a wide-range of development projects for clients.

This practical experience infuses the courses she delivers in a friendly, fun and down to earth way. As well as sales, negotiation and account management, Deborah also delivers personal effectiveness, business writing and service excellence solutions.

Deborah has a wide range of enthusiasms. She supports Aston Villa FC so is no stranger to adversity! Passionate about music; her taste is eclectic and so she finds plenty of opportunities to see live performances.