Cirencester business owner Vicky Henderson, founder of Ascend Performance Coaching, has won two awards this month for her work with young people.

Vicky works with teenagers and schools on a 1:1 and group basis as well as working with small business owners, leaders and their teams.

Since starting her business in 2017 she has always offered some coaching on a pro-bono basis.

In January 2019, Vicky joined the nationwide Career Ready programme and was selected by Cirencester College student, Bindiya Hadani, to be her mentor.

After a wonderful 12 months working together and unbeknown to Vicky, Bindiya nominated her for the Career Ready, 2020 Mentor of the Year Award.

Vicky said: “Being able to work with young people and introduce them the world of personal development is so important to me and something I would have really benefitted from at their age.

"Helping them improve their confidence, resilience and giving them to tools to manage anxiety sets them up thrive in life.”

When Vicky was told in February, that she had won the award she cried.

“It was very emotional, there are 3000 mentors nationwide and I really wasn’t expecting it," Vicky said.

"Bindiya and I were off to London for the awards ceremony, it was all very exciting. "Unfortunately, due to coronavirus we didn’t make it to London and the virtual awards ceremony was held earlier this month.

“Being part of Bindiya’s journey has been fantastic, she is now studying for an MPsych at Plymouth University, I’m so proud of all she has achieved.”

Bindiya shared a message during the virtual ceremony: “Big congratulations to my mentor Vicky.

"You have helped me so much over the past two years. Words cannot describe how amazing you are!"

Vicky’s second surprise was waking up to start work in virtual Malaysia at 1am on Saturday, November 21, to find out that she had won the Cirencester Chamber of Commerce award for Corporate Social Enterprise, sponsored by FRC Financial Planning.

This award also took into consideration Vicky’s outreach work with the Isbourne and CCP in Cheltenham supporting vulnerable young adults, a free support call service that was available to anyone during the first lockdown and Emotional Intelligence masterclasses she delivered both at Cirencester College and the Royal Agricultural University.