From Executive Leadership to Coaching

Bozkurt Cendey, executive and team coach

For nearly forty years, I worked in different organisations and held management positions. I witnessed the changes experienced by people, teams and organisations, not only as an observer but also as a manager responsible for making decisions and carrying their consequences.
My transition into coaching did not replace this experience. It built on it.
Today, I work with managers, leaders and teams to help them assess situations more clearly, see different options and make their own decisions. Throughout my corporate career, I worked in tourism, event management, sales, marketing, planning, operations, communication and training. My entire career was in the service sector.

I spent nearly twenty years in management roles at Setur, part of Koç Group, and its related companies. I then worked for seven years in event management at Jules Verne Event Management, which I co-founded. I completed the final ten years of my corporate career as a senior executive at OYAK Group.
These years taught me that leadership is not only about knowledge and experience. Making decisions under uncertainty, managing different expectations, building trust within teams and taking responsibility for results are all part of a manager’s daily reality.
I keep this reality in mind in my coaching work. However, I do not present my own experience as a ready-made solution. Instead, I aim to create a space where clients can see their circumstances, options and responsibilities more clearly.

My Approach to Coaching
I do not see coaching as a process in which I tell people what they should do.
My role is to create a safe and structured space where managers and teams can express their thoughts openly, question their assumptions and develop their own answers.
My guiding principle is to empower individuals and teams. My aim is not only to help address a current challenge. I also support the development of thinking, relationship and leadership skills that can be used in future situations.
The purpose, scope and boundaries of each engagement are agreed together at the beginning. Confidentiality and professional ethics are at the heart of all my work.

What I Do Today
I provide one-to-one coaching for managers and leaders, team coaching for teams and supervision for coaches. Depending on the need, I also offer mentoring, training programmes and workshops that I design myself.
In coaching supervision, I support coaches in looking at their practice, their relationships with clients and their professional decisions from a broader perspective. I also help them reflect on who they are and how they show up as coaches. This work provides a reflective space that strengthens professional development and the quality of coaching practice.

Education and Professional Development
I graduated from Marmara University with a degree in Business Administration in 1984. I completed a master’s degree in Business Administration at Koç University in 1995 and a master’s degree in Clinical Psychology at Kent University in 2019.
I completed advanced professional coaching training at Adler, an international coaching education institution, and earned the ACPC designation. I also hold the PCC credential awarded by the International Coaching Federation.
In addition, I have completed training in Organisation and Relationship Systems Coaching, Erickson Team Coaching, Transactional Analysis, NLP and various assessment systems.
I do not see professional development as a process that is ever complete. I continue to learn, question my practice and reassess it in the light of new knowledge.

My Research on AI Coaching
Since 2023, I have been studying for a doctorate in Coaching and Mentoring at Oxford Brookes University in the United Kingdom.
My doctoral research focuses on AI coaching. I explore how individuals and organisations experience AI coaching systems and how they make sense of those experiences.
My aim is neither to promote nor reject AI coaching. It is to understand user experiences within their individual and organisational contexts and to contribute scientific research to the coaching profession as a coach from Türkiye.

Beyond My Professional Life
Creating music has been an important part of my life for many years. I play the ney and have a strong interest in Sufi and Turkish music.
Through the online programmes offered by Berklee College of Music, I have completed courses in orchestration, music production for film and television and advanced recording techniques. I also write lyrics, compose music and create arrangements.
Music teaches me to listen, make space for silence and notice the different voices that form a whole. I believe this perspective also enriches the way I work with people.

Let’s Meet
If you would like to explore whether working together could be right for you or your team, we can arrange a short introductory meeting.