About us

Olwyn Merritt
Founder and Director of Pure Potential

A word from Olwyn 

No successful leader follows an easy path. We all have to face tough challenges and make brave decisions, both in life and as leaders.

I established Pure Potential to develop talented professionals and particularly experts as leaders. I grew up in Ireland among a family of deep medical experts and I realised that the skills that make you technically excellent don’t necessarily make you an exceptional leader. If you want to lead others, you need to be able to inspire people, engage and influence stakeholders beyond your area of expertise. You don’t learn this from a textbook. In reality, experience, practice, guidance and regular reflection are the cornerstones of real leadership.

That was how I had learned, the hard way. My commercial experience in senior operational roles gave me first-hand experience of leading and managing talented people. During those twenty years, I was mentored and coached by some inspiring and experienced leaders who had faith in me and often challenged me to develop my leadership skills. Although that wasn’t always a comfortable experience I learned how valuable that was, and I am sure I became so much better as a person as well as leader as a result.

Since 2000, I have spent more than 12,000 coaching hours coaching leaders and their teams all over the world. I have been delighted to see the results: high potentials who become directors of divisions; executive directors who become leaders of the enterprise and teams delivering outstanding results.

I believe that leaders set the tone in organisations – in how they behave, in how they communicate and in how well they allow others to think and act around them.

We are very aware of the organisational dynamics at play because we have worked in start-ups, fast-growing acquisitive businesses and established blue-chip corporations over our careers. We have also made a significant investment in ourselves to understand more deeply how to improve the performance of leaders, teams and their organisations. This experience and education brings our clients a wealth of insight and pragmatism to make tangible improvements. Our clients value our long standing partnerships, the results that they achieve with us and our deep commitment to them and to our own development.

If you feel inspired to take the next step, we would be delighted to talk to you.