Build a Better Business Without Carrying It All Yourself​

Shane Spiers is a business coach, former CEO and founder of Summit SCALE Coaching. Since 2017, he has helped owners of established small and mid-sized businesses strengthen their leadership, improve commercial performance and build businesses that are less dependent on them.

You’ve Built a Good Business. Now It Needs to Work Better.​

Many of the owners I work with have already created something successful. The problem is that continued growth has brought greater complexity, more decisions and increasing pressure.

They are often still too involved in the day-to-day running of the business. Their team may be capable, but responsibility continues to flow back to the owner. Priorities compete, performance is inconsistent and there never seems to be enough time to step back and think strategically.

That is where I help.

My role is to help you identify what is really holding the business back, decide what matters most and implement the leadership rhythms, systems and commercial disciplines needed for the next stage of growth.

The objective isn’t simply a bigger business. It is a stronger, more valuable business that is easier to lead and less dependent on you.

How I Help

Our work is structured around the Summit SCALE Growth Operating System. It gives us a practical framework for strengthening the business across five connected areas.

Strategic clarity

We clarify where you are taking the business, what needs to change and which priorities deserve your attention now.

Commercial performance

We strengthen the disciplines behind revenue, margin, cash flow and profitable growth—turning financial information into better management decisions.

Leadership and accountability

We develop clearer responsibilities, stronger management rhythms and a team that can take ownership without every issue returning to you.

Systems and scalability

We identify where the business relies too heavily on individual people, particularly the owner, and build more reliable ways of operating.

Personal effectiveness

We also work on the habits, behaviours and decisions you need to develop as the leader of the business.

Business problems are very often personal problems in disguise. If you want a better business, the business frequently needs a better-equipped owner.

What It’s Like to Work With Me

My coaching style is practical, direct and supportive.

I will give you the space to think properly, but I won’t allow important issues to remain buried beneath day-to-day activity. I ask questions that help expose the real issue, bring structure to complicated situations and challenge assumptions when they are getting in the way.

You can expect:

• Honest, commercially grounded conversations
• Clear priorities rather than an overwhelming list of initiatives
• Practical tools and frameworks you can apply inside the business
• Constructive challenge when a difficult decision or conversation is being avoided
• Accountability for the actions you commit to
• Support through both the commercial and emotional pressures of ownership

This isn’t generic advice delivered from the sidelines. I understand what it feels like to carry responsibility for performance, people, customers and cash.

Experience Built in the Real World

Before becoming a business coach, I spent more than 25 years leading and growing businesses.

In 1999, I joined the leadership team of Unite Students as it was pioneering purpose-built student accommodation in the UK. Over the following eight years, the business grew by approximately 2,000%, developing from an SME into a FTSE 250 company.

As Managing Director of Operations, I was responsible for a £240 million revenue business unit, leading more than 1,200 people serving approximately 40,000 customers across 135 locations and 23 cities. During that period, I led a turnaround from a £400,000 loss to an £11 million net operating profit within two years.

In 2012, I became CEO of a group of seven small and mid-sized companies. I led combined revenue growth of 300% in one year and subsequently oversaw the sale of two companies in a multimillion-pound transaction. I also led the mobilisation of major support-services contracts for the UK Border Agency and Ministry of Defence.

That experience taught me that growth is rarely achieved through one brilliant idea. It comes from making better decisions, developing capable people and installing the disciplines that allow good performance to be repeated.

Why I Became a Business Coach

During the rapid growth of Unite Students, I realised that the business was developing faster than I was.

To continue leading it effectively, I had to become a better leader. That led me to complete a master’s degree in Coaching and Development, where my tutors included respected figures from the world of performance coaching, including Sir John Whitmore.

But qualifications are only part of the story. What matters is whether coaching helps an owner create meaningful change in their business and life.

Over the years, I saw a predictable pattern. Businesses move through recognisable stages of growth, and each stage demands new systems, leadership capabilities and ways of working. What helped an owner establish the business can eventually become the very thing that prevents it from progressing.

I founded Summit SCALE Coaching in 2017 to help owners navigate those transitions—to move from reacting to leading, from personal effort to organisational capability, and from owning a demanding job to building a valuable business.

A Little More About Me

I was raised on a sheep and cattle farm near Christchurch in the South Island of New Zealand.

Growing up within 30 minutes of the beach and two hours of the ski fields gave me a lasting love of the outdoors. Rugby occupied my winters when I was younger, and I remain a committed All Blacks supporter.

After graduating in Valuation and Property Management, I began my career in New Zealand before leaving in 1990 for my “big OE”—the traditional Kiwi overseas experience. My route to the UK included working in bars, Australian shearing sheds and on demolition sites in San Francisco before arriving in London in 1991.

Outside work, I enjoy skiing, hiking, sailing, fly fishing, scuba diving and, whenever the opportunity arises, flying helicopters. These days, life also revolves around my wife Clare, our children Harry and Mackenzie, and our Labrador, Buzz.

Those experiences have shaped the way I coach: stay curious, remain grounded, keep moving forward and never lose sight of the life the business is supposed to support

Ready to Make the Business Easier to Lead?

You don’t need another collection of ideas or a longer list of things to do.

You need clarity about what matters most, a practical plan and the leadership discipline to follow it through.

If you would like to explore what may be holding your business back—and whether I am the right coach to help—let’s have an initial conversation.