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Arcana Coaching - Who We Are

Arcana Coaching lead coach and Director is Clive Gross.

Coaching Experience
Clive joined the national BizFizz Business Coaching programme in 2006. Created jointly by the New Economics Foundation and Civic Trust to bring coaching methodology to business support in regeneration areas. He also coached on the SEED Coaching project run by Chichester College.

Clive has worked with and supported a hundreds of people with a wide range of business ideas. He has supported them from their Eureka moment, to starting up and through the full business life-cycle. These have included:

creative freelancers, designers and artists
musicians, actors and performers
retailers and on-line shops
tourism, hospitality and catering businesses
therapists and health professionals
authors and publishers
green, organic product and eco-friendly businesses
not-for-profit and social enterprises
community trusts, groups and campaigns

Clive is a SFEDI Accredited Business Advisor and a Visiting Lecturer working with Degree Foundation Music Production students on entrepreneurial practice in the music industry.

Business and Enterprise Experience
Starting his career in music retail, Clive had his own retail stall in the famous Great Gear Market in Kensington High Street, before going on to merchandise for and manage independent and alternative bands through his own management agency. He later ran his own alternative label, production and distribution business, working with labels in Germany, France, Italy, Scandinavia and the US. His most recent business venture was a coffee shop and art gallery business on the Sussex Coast.

Creative Industry Experience
Clive has worked for a number of independent music labels in sales, production, design, distribution, product management and development. He worked in creative services for a major film distribution company, responsible for brands including MTV and Nickelodeon worldwide. Clive has also worked as a Key Account Manager in a long-established specialist London design agency, managing international film releases for a major client. He has been a Marketing, Brand and Public Relations Manger within the leisure industry for two Community Leisure Trusts.

Performing Arts Experience
Clive has performed as drummer and frontman in his own bands, and run alternative club nights as promoter and DJ. He continues to be a keen landscape and architectural photographer and regularly stages his own exhibitions. He understands both the creative process and the business side of the industry, having managed several bands, organised and publicised tours, and negotiated with record companies, agencies and publishers.

Campaigning Experience
Over the years, Clive has been involved with many community campaigns, from fighting local hospital closures to being Press Officer for a football supporters club. He has appeared on national, regional and local television and radio representing different organisations and run press and PR campaigns covering newspapers, magazines, specialist press and on-line publications.

What is in a Name?

Arcana Coaching is the integration of all the diverse experience and knowledge gained put into the philosophy and approach to our coaching, mentoring, training and facilitation services. Arcana comes from the word arcane, which means mysterious, secret or understood by few, and is often used in reference to old or ancient knowledge. We chose the name as it signifies our approach of integrating modern coaching methods with the much older roots and understanding from which many of them come or can be traced back to.

Arcana Coaching is dedicated to helping individuals, groups, businesses, organizations and communities develop simple, powerful strategies for dealing with the challenges of modern life, wherever and whenever they occur, using all of this new and old knowledge. Amazing things can be achieved with the right blend of intention, attention and action. Arcana Coaching is about demystifying and debunking much of the superstition that surrounds some of this ancient wisdom and helping to make it accessible to anyone who is interested in self-development in a jargon-free way.

Arcana is also the name given to the characters and houses of the Tarot, which may have appeared as early as 1392. Today, modern techniques like the Myers Briggs psychometric test (beloved by so many corporate HR departments) is based on Jungian human archetypes, which he based in turn on his understanding of the Major Arcana cards of the Tarot. There is really very little new in the world!

Read more about our influences.