The Courage to Ask

John Niland is best known as a conference speaker and coach with VCO Global (VCO-Global.com), focusing on supporting professionals to raise the value of their work and create opportunity through better dialogue with their customers and marketplace. John graduated in philosophy only to discover that his native Ireland had limited requirements for philosophers in the 1980s and that supply greatly exceeded demand. He hurriedly cross-trained into computer science and lived in disguise as a systems analyst/project leader for fifteen years, managing large pan-European projects for fast-moving consumer goods, retail, and petrochemical organizations until even the money could not induce him to continue. He then set up his own systems company and soon discovered how little he knew about managing people. The real learning began: how to develop business with people rather than for them. Since 2000, John has been coaching others to achieve success, with increasing misgivings about the value of this, until he discovered a passion for supporting those who wish to contribute rather than just to win and hence produce some real value: both social and economic. With trademark humor, he's a popular speaker at professional conferences on raising the value of work, value-centered selling, and negotiation. In parallel, John is one of the co-founders of the European Forum of Independent Professionals, reflecting nineteen years of coaching more than 600 professionals to create more value in their work. His books include The Courage to Ask and the ebooks Hidden Value and Opportunity Conversations (all available on VCO-Global.com). John is passionate about raising the value of professional services and inspiring contributors to find meaning in work. He currently lives in both Lisbon and London and still talks about settling down someday.