ST HELENS-BORN Dr William Holden is chairman of Sewells, a Chester-based organisation providing business change programmes and behavioural transformation.

He has also written The Guide, a book about personal development. This was his working day:

6am: Up and at it early. One of my mentors taught me “any day above ground has got to be a good one”.
I live, eat and breathe that wisdom. It’s the opportunities today will bring that wake me up, not the alarm.

6.25am: Spend some time imagining the outcomes I want from today, this week, this month, this year. My creativity and energy is now on full power.

6.30am: Switch on the lap-top to see what inspiration and ideas are contained in my emails.

7am: Make my way to my first meeting – leave several voicemail messages for the people I’ve been missing over the last few days.  Listen to 5 Live for news and traffic.

7.45am: Attend a breakfast meeting with a client from a leading financial services company to discuss delivering a development programme to help turbo-charge their acceleration out of the recession.
They’ve had to lose over 15% of their workforce and those who remain are bruised and exhausted. Our Leading After the Storm programme will re- invigorate everyone, and the client is on fire with enthusiasm.

10:45am: Meet up for the weekly review meeting with our internal sales and operations team.
Their passion and hard work is paying big dividends. I say a few words to motivate them, but, in reality, they motivate me.

11.30am: Telephone interview with Mayah, editor-in-chief of a new national lifestyle magazine being launched in October. They want to do a two-page feature on my new book. The Guide. It’s already selling like hot cakes and the reviews on Amazon are spine-tingling. The article should help many more learn how to achieve their life’s ambitions.

1pm: Conference call with Carla Rodenburg, global fleet marketing manager from Shell.
We finalise the details of the South-East Asia roll-out of the Dialogue Sales development programme that will help them maximise sales, profit and customer loyalty in a tough market.
The impact in Europe has been so positive, Shell have decided they want the programme to go global.

2pm: Review our new promotional videos and the latest case studies from Volvo Trucks and CBS to use as testimonials on our success in transforming business performance.
We discuss book review quotes to include on the second edition and agree marketing campaigns that will run over the next 10 weeks.

3pm: Sign 60 hardback copies of The Guide for BMW.

3.30pm: Travel to Carden Park Hotel, in Cheshire, to deliver a motivational keynote speech to 230 people from Kellogg’s on the subject “Being my best self, always”.
I give insights into the laws of success and self-motivation that anyone can apply.

6pm: Back to the office in Chester to interview two people who have applied for a customer relationship manager position.
Technically, two very competent people but one’s attitude is poor, the other will never fit into our vibrant, deeply professional culture. We’ll keep looking.

7pm: My working day ends, but the inspiration goes on. I have always got a couple of books on the go, searching for stories that would warm the cockles of the coldest heart.