Program Design Coach | Geeking out blending learning design with entrepreneurship to scale impact

I work with consultants, coaches and facilitators to design programs that are easier to market, pitch and deliver. Helping you go from inconsistent referrals to a sustainable business using relationship-based business development habits (without the ick of being sales-y)

I bring together 26 years as a learning designer and facilitator with 15 years of entrepreneurship.

My clients already get results for their clients, but might still:

❌ Find it hard to stand out despite being better than their competitors
❌ Overwhelmed by packaging their expertise into proposals
❌ Frustrated by reinventing the wheel every time 
❌ Annoyed they're not paid what they're worth
❌ Experience imposter syndrome
❌ Feel stretched over-delivering

And they want to:

✅ Feel confident charging more for premium service
✅ Build a more sustainable six-figure business
✅ Have more impact doing work they love

I've gone through frustrations myself.

Since 2011, I've run my own Learning & Development consultancy. And for years, I struggled to package, market and sell the value of what I did.

This is despite being an expert. I had:

• Invested tens of thousands in my professional development. 
• A track record of getting client results on leadership development, team development, organisation change, and service design projects in the tech, finance, public, charity, and education sectors. 
• Designed & delivered thousands of learning experiences, workshops and training as a volunteer, educator, employee, and freelancer since 2001

Turns out: I was an expert at my craft, but not at creating consistent sales opportunities

No one had shown me how to 'commercialise' my learning design expertise. And when I did sell my services, I either subcontracted at lower rates than I knew I was worth. Or I wasted time reinventing my process, making my services less profitable. So there were times I had no work OR burned out because I was saying "yes" to everything that came my way. 

I wanted to put myself 'out there', but I felt stuck 😵‍💫

The turning point was when I started consulting with other L&D companies. I overhauled their learning production processes using my streamlined methods. And during the pandemic, I adapted the process to support 30+ charities through the digital transformation of their learning programmes.

More focus allowed me to market, sell, and deliver my services more easily 📈

Since 2023, I've been working with over 100 self-employed experts to avoid my mistakes.

Join our newsletter: https://www.leverageaccelerator.co/

Pedram Parasmand

You’re not exhausted because you work too much.
You’re exhausted because you rebuild your business from scratch every time a new client signs on.

The real enemy isn’t overwork.
It’s originality.

I learnt that, every time I reinvented a new proposal, I lost:

⚡Energy
🕒 Time
🧠 Focus
🌍 Impact
💸 Revenue

Originality might feel impressive.
But repeatability is what creates freedom.

That’s why I built a 10-step playbook to help you go from overwhelm of ideas to one clear, repeatable program.

I broke it down in a carousel here 👇

Program Design Coach & Facilitator | Geeking out blending learning design with entrepreneurship to have more impact | Sharing lessons on my path to go from 6-figure freelancer to 7-figure business owner

10 Steps Playbook for Packaging  Your Brilliance

If you hear “we don’t have the budget” and your first instinct is to cut your fee, pause.

There are better options that protect your value and keep the conversation alive.

So what’s going on?

A real finance objection isn’t a signal that your work isn’t worth it. It’s a signal that something needs to change. Timing, scope, structure, or expectations.

So take a moment!

What gets people into trouble is treating price as the only lever they have.

Budget options happen ALL the time.

After 15 years of negotiating work across large organisations, charities, and individuals, one pattern shows up again and again:

Budget pushback is normal.
Discounting as a reflex is optional.

You don’t have to:

• Over-justify your value.
• Give away full scope at a reduced price.
• Choose between “say yes cheaply” or “walk away awkwardly”.

This carousel walks through 8 ways to handle genuine budget constraints without shrinking yourself in the process.

Some protect margin.
Some protect relationships.

All protect your integrity.

Because how you handle these moments quietly trains clients how to treat your work.
And that compounds over time.

~~

💬 Which option do you find hardest to hold your ground on?

📩 If you want weekly stories, tips, and resources on holding your value while you grow, join 750 others and subscribe to our newsletter leverageaccelerator.co

8 Ways to Handle Real Budget Objection

You’re not an advanced facilitator if you only design for one type of brain.

Most facilitators call their spaces “inclusive.”
Very few design them that way.

The next level of facilitation isn’t more energy.

It’s better design.

• Different sensory thresholds.
• Design that accounts for different processing speeds.
• Different comfort levels with ambiguity, eye contact, and speaking on the spot.

Most of us were trained to reward 

• Fast thinkers.
• Confident speakers.
• People who can process out loud in real time.

That’s not neutral.
It’s just familiar.

So if you’re serious about maturing your practice, this is the work.

That’s why I’m excited to be back at the Inclusive Facilitation Exchange for coaches, consultants, and facilitators who want to design sessions that work for different brains, not just the dominant ones.

And the line-up of speakers is fan-f*cking-tastic.

See you there!

| The Collaboration Coach | Creator of OOPSI | Jenny With the Blocks |

So it’s just over a month to go until the second-ever Inclusive Facilitation Exchange, and preparations are definitely ramping up…

Jane Livesey and I are entering what can only be described as the slightly hysterical but very excited phase 😅💥

IFE is a not-for-profit gathering dedicated to advancing inclusive facilitation and learning design, championing neuroinclusion and designing for difference, not around it.

It’s for facilitators, trainers and coaches who want the tools, insight and confidence to create spaces where diverse voices are heard, connections flourish, and challenges are met with curiosity and care 🫶

If you’re on the fence, I thought I’d share this little montage from last year. 📹 

Every time I watch it, I feel this huge sense of joy and pride. My cheeks actually ache by the end because I’m grinning so much 😊 ❤️.  I could use a dose every day as part of my well-being routine. 

It really was something special. And the feedback still blows me away:

“Today was the first time I've woken up after a conference and just felt warm and snuggly and happy and fulfilled. I don't think you quite yet realise what a beautiful thing you created, but it was absolutely magnificent!”

“Oh my goodness, what an absolutely fabulous event you created! 5 stars feels too little, you deserve all the stars.”

“A beneficial and insightful day. Fantastic setting, wonderful people and very informative and engaging content.”

“Inclusive, carefully organised, great space for people to inhabit.”

“The calibre of speakers was incredible!”

Huge thanks to our incredible speakers from last year, Jan Keck, Ceri Newton-Sargunar Nathy Ravez Ollie Yates Daniel. Susser Matthew Bellringer Dennie Declercq, Mohsin Memon Tumi Sotire Kate (Catherine) Isichei and our awesome helpers Audrey Thouvenin Pedram Parasmand and of course our incredibly talented graphic recorder Sam Carpenter and event photographer Kate Hollingsworth

and yes, some of them are coming back this year just to mingle, which makes us ridiculously happy 🎉

We would absolutely love you to join us.

For the best possible discount, hop onto our mailing list (link in comments).
Find out more here 👉 https://lnkd.in/gB2iZfnM

Every consultant has lived this moment: 
Sudden urgency. Confused stakeholders. “This wasn’t what we agreed.”

The project didn’t go off the rails.

You just never asked the questions that would have kept it on track.

I started asking 5 uncomfortable kickoff questions so I’d stop mediating messes I didn’t create.

💬 Which of these questions do you wish you’d asked earlier on your last project?

~~

📬If you run projects inside organisations and want fewer surprises, my newsletter covers exactly this kind of work. Join 750+ subscribers at leveverageaccelerator.co

5 Kick-off Questions to Prevent Mid-project Emergencies

What happens when amazing facilitation training meets robust business development habits?

We’re collaborating with Voltage Control for a practical session on building consistent sales opportunities as a facilitator.

Why am I excited about this?

Voltage Control has been on my radar for years as a beacon of high-quality facilitation training. A bunch of our clients have come through their programs and consistently speak highly of the depth, rigour, and care in their work.

And this is where it connects.

The relational skills that make someone a strong facilitator are often the same ones needed to build a thriving business. We’ve now helped 100+ coaches and facilitators translate those strengths into clear offers and consistent opportunities. 

So what will we focus on?

In this session, we use our Clarity-to-Clients roadmap to help you decide which opportunity to focus on next and turn that decision into confident, non-salesy client conversations. Without relying on referrals or constant content creation.

Is this for you?

If you’re experienced, capable, and surrounded by options. But unsure what matters when launching a new offering or strengthening one that isn’t selling as well. Then, you’ll leave with clearer priorities and a more reliable path forward.

When is this happening?

10 March 12pm EST, 4pm GMT

What to join us?

Sign up link in the first comment

Trying to help everyone is why most people don’t know what you do.

Broad feels generous.
It also makes you forgettable.

Most self-employed coaches, consultants, and facilitators stay wide because it feels helpful.

More people served.
More doors open.

In reality, it does the opposite.

Serving fewer people on purpose is how you end up helping more people in practice.

That’s the paradox most self-employed experts learn too late.

Check the slides to find out why

I break down 5 reasons niching creates more demand, not less. And why staying broad makes it harder to be known, trusted, and referred.

~~

💭 Which one hit closest to home for you?

📩 If you want more stories, tips, and practical resources on building demand through clarity, you can join 750 other newsletter subscribers here: leverageaccelerator.co

5 Reasons Niching Creates More Demand

Before: Talk to prove you know your stuff
After: Use silence to prove you know theirs.

Experts don’t dominate the conversation. They direct it.

I see this pattern show up in two very different moments.

First is when you’re just starting out.

You want to look credible. I felt this hard when I started my business in my early 30s and still looked fresh faced. Talking felt like proof that I knew my sh*t.

The second happens with experience.

You now know a lot. I caught myself here trying to explain how I’d integrated learning design, facilitation, design thinking, systems thinking, and Theory U. All true. All too much.

In others, I see the same two drivers.

Early on, it’s imposter syndrome.
Later, it’s the curse of knowledge.

Both lead to the same outcome.

You talk more to convince someone you know your stuff. And that gets in the way of them realising your stuff can help solve their problems.

I learned this later than expected.

In 2021, ten years in business, I finally did proper sales training. What stood out wasn’t a clever script. It was how little the best sales people spoke.

They asked better questions.
They left space.
They let the other person hear themselves think.

And when I tried this

I came across as more expert. As it turns out, the better the questions you ask, the more people believe you understand their problems.

And once they feel understood, your expertise no longer needs explaining.

~~

💬 Where do you notice yourself talking too much?

🎯Want more on asking better questions, building trust, and sounding like an expert without over-explaining? Join 750 newsletter subscribers at leveverageaccelerator.co

The biggest misconception I had about self-employment?
Less structure meant more freedom

You know...

Leisurely mornings.
Doing whatever I felt like each day.
“Seeing how things unfolds” energy.

I went fully solo in 2015, chasing that.

A couple of years in, I realised something important. No boss didn’t mean no pressure.

It meant I became the boss.

And HR.
And operations.
And the person panicking at 10pm, wondering why nothing felt finished.

With no structure...

Every day felt busy and oddly unproductive. Lots of motion. Very little traction.

The fix was structure all along

One clear target market.
One clear core offer.
One way to deliver.

And the days that I design around that

The irony still makes me laugh.

I'd left employment to remove structure and be free. But freedom came from choosing structure

~~

👀 What’s one rule or boundary that actually gave you more freedom?

📬 Join 750+ coaches, consultants, and facilitators getting stories, tips, and resources on building real freedom through structure: leverageaccelerator.co

The more “bespoke” your service is, the harder your business is to grow.

I used to think that was a sign of quality.
It’s usually a business model design flaw.

I just got off a call with someone who emphatically said, "I'm done being a freelancer. I'm a founder", and it made me reflect on two types of coaches.

Coach A: 3 clients.

Digging through old folders to “tweak something similar.”
Switching between designing, delivering, firefighting.
Calendar dictated by ad hoc meetings.
No space for business development.
Underestimating timelines.
Feast or famine on repeat.

Coach B: 3 clients.

Knows the inputs that create the outputs.
Clear client-serving system.
Clear client-getting system.
Can predict capacity.
Can predict time off.

For 9 years, I was Coach A.

Everything was bespoke. I wore it like a badge of honour.

Then, during the pandemic.

While doing digital transformation work for charities, I accidentally started systemising. Not because I was clever. Because I had to.

Now around 95% of what I do is standardised.

And the best bit. Creating something that compounds is still as creative act. AND I get to choose my bespoke work. I just don’t have to build my entire business around it anymore.

~~

👀 If you looked at your calendar for the next two weeks, what would it say about your business model?

Spent time this week with one of the most forward-thinking coaching communities.

The quality of people was obvious.

But what really stood out was how honestly the same challenges came up.

Lucie Coudret, ACC has built something special with Coaching Innovators and is delighted to be a supporting partners.

So we shared our Clarity Roadmap

We ran a workshop on how to design and price offers that actually sell. Shared the approach we’ve used with 100+ coaches and consultants in the last 2.5 years to package up their expertise and create more sales opportunities.

Things got interesting in the reflections.
Two things kept coming up:

1️⃣ Focusing challenge

A lot of these coaches have worked across industries, roles, and contexts. They know they can help a wide range of people. So narrowing in on one market feels like leaving impact on the table.

But in practice, the opposite happens.

When your message is broad, it’s easy to miss.
When it’s focused, it cuts through.

2️⃣ Pricing for value (not time) challenge

Not as simple as it sounds when the outcomes are intangible. Confidence. Clarity. Better decisions. Which makes things harder to measure. And why so many end up charging for time?

Easy to underprice. But not impossible.

When you map the transformation.
You can identify the milestones.

We’ve seen both of these patterns play

This workshop was just another reminder. And it’s exactly why partnerships like this matter. Different perspectives. Shared thinking. Better outcomes for the people in the room.

And more great coaches having an impact!

Grateful to Lucie for bringing together a group like this and trusting us to contribute.

Most partnerships don’t fail because of strategy. 
They fail because nobody talked about the awkward stuff.

People think they can skip the values conversation and “figure it out later.”

This clip shows what to cover early so the relationship survives pressure, money, and emotion.

I don’t think you can skip sales and still call it a business.

And I don’t think you can skip the values conversation and expect a long-term, fulfilling partnership.

The part most people avoid is the part that protects you later:

Exit clause
Remuneration
How money gets managed
What each of you needs to live

Have those conversations early, when emotion is low and honesty is easy.

It saves the relationship when things get stressful.

If you’re building a partnership, what’s the one conversation you’ve been avoiding? 👇Subscribe: https://lnkd.in/ehnd4_Tv

The fastest way to lose trust in a sales conversation is to stay at the surface.

Most people ask about goals, metrics, and strategy.

Almost no one asks what it actually means to the person.

In this clip, I talk about the question that changes everything:

Not “What problems are you facing?”
But “How is that affecting you personally?”

When you ask that, the dynamic shifts.

You stop being the problem-solver trying to impress.
You become the thought partner in their corner.

And especially at senior levels, where business and identity are tightly intertwined, that’s where the real conversation happens.

If you want clients to open up, stop staying safe.

Ask the question that actually matters.

What’s one question you’ve asked that changed a conversation completely? 👇

Subscribe for the full episode: https://lnkd.in/ehnd4_Tv

Just updated the exact 9-step flow we use to keep goodwill in a sales conversations even when someone doesn’t buy. Want it?

Comment FLOW and I’ll DM you the pdf

Refined over 15 years in business and hundreds of sales calls. Perfect for coaches, consultants and facilitators that value relationships rather than sleazy sales tactic.

I didn’t need more strategy. 
I needed someone to notice when I vanished.

Accountability wasn’t about pressure for me.

I used to tell myself I just needed more discipline. Then I got an accountability buddy. Not because I didn’t know what to do. I did.

I just wasn’t doing it consistently.

The value wasn’t pressure or guilt.

It was having someone outside my own head. Someone who’d calmly ask, “Did you do the thing you said you’d do?”

It worked. We’re still mates.

But the bigger shift came when I started building alongside someone else.

There’s a different standard when your decisions affect another person’s livelihood too. You stop negotiating with yourself.

If you’re stuck, it might not be motivation you’re missing. It might be stakes.

What’s one thing you keep dodging right now?

~~

👉 Subscribe to full episode: https://lnkd.in/ehnd4_Tv

Many professionals believe going independent means finally getting paid for their expertise.

But expertise alone rarely builds a sustainable practice.

The real shift is harder:

Learning to create demand for what you know, not just deliver it.

Because you're NOT going from:
↳ 𝗘𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗼𝘆𝗲𝗲 → 𝗦𝗲𝗹𝗳-𝗲𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗼𝘆𝗲𝗱 𝗼𝗿 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿.

You're going from:
↳ 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝗽𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗲𝗿 → 𝗕𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝘁 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀.

I've seen it time and time again.

A highly respected professional leaves the corporate world to build an independent practice. Six months later, they say some version of:

“𝘐 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘨𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴. 𝘞𝘩𝘺 𝘥𝘰𝘦𝘴 𝘪𝘵 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘐’𝘮 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘻𝘦𝘳𝘰?”

Because in some ways, you are.

When I first went fully solo in 2015, I landed a few early clients through my network. £850/day rate. A couple of referrals came in. It felt like I was on a roll

But it was a mirage.

Because the pipeline slows. And a new set of questions appears.

• How do I generate demand for what I do?
• How do I create a flow of opportunities?
• How do I sell without feeling icky?

These are not questions most professionals have ever had to answer inside an organisation.

• The brand carried the credibility.
• The company created the demand.
• The system produced the opportunities.

Independence removes that infrastructure.

Which means growing a practice requires something many experts find confronting.

Being a beginner again.

And that can feel brutal.

• Being sh*t as business development.
• Being sh*t at selling.
• And just feeling a bit sh*t

Even when you pivot, it's the same

That transition is something I've navigated multiple times. And it's what I now help my clients with.

because I've learnt that

Most independent experts don’t fail because they lack expertise. They struggle because they underestimate the shift from expert to business builder.

~~

What surprised you most when you first went independent?

My journey from a childhood stutter to leading teams in the US Army and Manufacturing taught me one fundamental truth: Innovation is a forging process.

It requires two opposing forces working in rhythm:

The Spark: The visionary ideas, the "what if," and the heat of creativity.

The Anvil: The operational rigor, the "how," and the discipline of execution.

Most organizations fail to innovate not because they lack ideas, but because they lack the rhythm to toggle between these two modes. They either burn out in chaos (All Spark) or stagnate in bureaucracy (All Anvil).

That is where I come in.

At 5th Hammer Innovation, I help leadership teams master the rhythm of the forge. We bridge the gap between the "Visionaries" and the "Operators," providing the tools to turn volatile ideas into durable impact.

If your team is tired of "innovation theater" and ready for reliable execution, let’s find your rhythm.

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The Battle

Pedram Parasmand

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The Battle

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Steve Whitehead

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