From home education and faith-led roots to care work, council offices and film sets, Chris Hewitt’s path to coaching was far from conventional. unLTD Business Podcast host James Marriott went to find out more about how, through his practice Possible, Chris helps others reconnect with what matters and take bold, human steps forward in work and life.
Thank you for joining us on the unLTD podcast. I’m looking forward to hearing more about you and your journey and what’s led you to what you do now. Where do you want to start?
I suppose key moments for me… and it’s interesting, because since I started Possible at the beginning of last year, I’ve had some opportunities to go and tell my story in different places and use that as a way to enable other people to think about changes they could make in their lives or in their work – about what might be (no pun intended) possible for them.
A really important thing for me was my childhood. Two things, really. One was that I was home educated – I didn’t have a school education. I did go to school for a bit when I was about seven, just to try it out. My brother and sister were also home educated. My parents just had some beliefs about the school system. They thought this might be better for us as kids – they were interested in trying it – and we all really got on and enjoyed it.
I think that’s helped me to not feel bound by conventional ways of thinking and doing things. It feels more natural to me, I think, than some people, to challenge and look at other ways of moving towards the same broad objective.
The other thing is that I would have been described as a sensitive kid – oversensitive, very affected by other people’s experiences, by what people might think of me, having strong emotional reactions. Not that I could articulate or process them – I just had big feelings about things in a way that felt at odds with the type of person I felt I ought to be as a boy in the 80s. That idea of masculinity – being cool and being tough – I felt very different from that.
The reason those two things are relevant to my work now is because I help people – instead of looking at how things are usually done or the groove they’ve wound up occupying – to take a step back and think: who am I? What’s most deeply important to me? What do I want my work and life to look like? And then take active steps to make that happen.
I coach individuals – leaders, business owners, people in their careers or creative practice – to connect with what really matters to them and amplify that. But I also help organisations and teams think about how work could be a place where the human spirit can flourish, rather than be suppressed.
Take us into your first steps into the world of work, then. What did that look like?
I grew up as part of a church – my parents were very active members and founded a church around the time I was born. In my teens, I realised that wasn’t really for me, so I went off and did my own stuff.
Being home educated, I went to college when I was 14 to do my GCSEs, but it was quite amorphous – lessons at odd times – so I worked part-time in a Christian bookshop at 14.
When I went to university – I studied sociology at York – I’d already worked in warehouses and had been exposed to some of the weirdness of how we show up at work. How hostile and inhuman it can feel.
At uni I worked in bars and cafés, and all the while I had this growing anxiety about the “real world”. Through my teens, I had this ever-growing worry: what am I going to do? I don’t feel like I belong out there. Work seemed like somewhere you squash down all your creativity, care, individuality, love, and openness, and just get through the day.
When I finished university, I was face to face with a world I felt so unprepared for. I knew I had value – I could talk, write, make human connections – but I had no idea what to do with that.
I cleaned a nightclub. I worked in a toy shop – weirdly hostile environment, run by someone who hated kids. I worked in a record shop, then factories, warehouses, admin.
I was a care worker for a couple of years – that was really rewarding. I worked in a day centre for adults with learning disabilities. It was meaningful – spending time with people, helping them do things they otherwise might not.
But even there, I quickly saw the problems in the system – the lack of freedom, the lack of support – and that was frustrating. I didn’t want to be a manager because I didn’t want to enact decisions I didn’t believe in. I wanted to be liked, and I wanted to do things I believed in. But in organisations, being a manager often means carrying out decisions you don’t support. That felt wrong to me.
I moved to Sheffield in 2006 when I was 25. I was doing admin and temping – a year in a really brutal admin job. The office was dysfunctional – systems, software, processes – all slightly rubbish.
Cumulatively, it was debilitating. No one seemed to have the energy or enthusiasm to change anything.
Eventually the office ran out of temping work. The agency asked, “Want to work in a factory that makes prosthetic knees and hips on the Parkway?” I needed the rent, so I said yes.
I had to get up at 4.30am, cross town and stand in front of this machine for nine hours. They told me most people last three days – I lasted three and a half weeks. It was brutal.
Then I had a bad breakup. I thought, I can’t do this anymore. So I left – no plan, no job.
A week or two later I was in the pub. A friend of a friend was working on a music video and I half-joked, “Got any jobs?” They said, “Sure – if you don’t mind no pay and 15-hour days.” I wasn’t doing anything else, and it sounded fun, so I said yes.
Next day I was in the art department for five days. I was diligent and got on with it, so they put me forward to be a runner on a feature film filming in Sheffield. Then the trainee grip dropped out and they asked if I’d take the role. I didn’t even know what a grip was – but I said yes.
What does a trainee grip do?
In the UK, grips handle all the camera-related rigging and movement. Anything to do with holding the camera still or moving it between or during shots. You know the dolly that tracks the camera? You lay the track, set up the dolly. You build the rig based on what the Director of Photography wants.
I did that for nearly three years – 30 or 40 short films, music videos, feature films.
Any that people might know?
I worked on Bronson with Tom Hardy. I came in after they’d started shooting. They called me up – the assistant grip had dropped out – and said, “Can you start tomorrow?”
I bet there are some stories you can’t tell publicly…
Yes, definitely. But Tom Hardy – lovely human being. Gave everyone a hug each morning. Learned everyone’s names. We’d hang out with him – have pizza in his flat in Nottingham. Genuinely kind.
That’s nice to hear! So – big contrast then: working on film sets, then back to temping in a Sheffield council office. Poles apart. How did you deal with that?
Interesting question. Steve Jobs said, “You can’t connect the dots looking forward, only backward.” That’s what it felt like.
I started to realise, about 18 months into working film, that it probably wasn’t for me long-term. People were jealous of what I was doing – I was getting bigger jobs. I was a bit older, I had good people skills, so I got on well.
But it wasn’t sustainable. There was a whole culture – very masculine, tough, a bit performative. You wore your hardship. The working conditions were exhausting. Twelve-hour days, six days a week. No time to see friends, cook, listen to music, have a life.
So I stopped. Gave myself three months off. Bought a £30 road bike from a charity shop and cycled into the Peaks every day. Thought things through.
I realised: when you’re on a hill, it sucks – but on the other side is something you want. That helped me reframe effort. I thought, “If I can handle that on a bike, I can handle a desk job.”
I’d carried something from the film world – if I saw something that could be done better, I’d do something about it. I didn’t want to just shrug and accept dysfunction.
I said to my manager, “Our payment system isn’t working. Can I look at changing it?” She said, “Yes – just bring the team with you.” So I interviewed the whole team, designed a better system around their needs.
Then I started helping other teams too. Eventually I became a manager. I ended up staying at Sheffield City Council for seven years.
What was the point where you started thinking about coaching – or helping people – as what you were meant to do?
Coaching is at the heart of it, yes. It’s all about helping people fulfil their potential – and that’s rooted in a belief that everyone is capable of creating what they need and want in the world.
But there are obstacles – structural, societal – that get in the way. Coaching helps people reconnect with what’s possible for them.
When I was managing a team at the council, I had two goals. One – get them working self-sufficiently so I didn’t have to deal with the admin! But more importantly – help each of them figure out what really mattered to them and go and do it. Even if that meant leaving.
At the same time, I was going and speaking to commissioning managers and helping them unpack big problems. I realised I wanted to leave – but I also felt like it was someone else’s job to create something better for me. That victim mindset.
Eventually I realised no one was coming to save me. So I did a postgrad in developmental psychology.
Then I worked on a Department of Health-funded project, supporting leaders in the public sector to work more collaboratively with communities. That was coaching in all but name.
After that, I led the spin-out of that project into a commercial consultancy, owned by a housing association. I led it for five years – running workshops, coaching leaders, helping people realise they already had most of the resources they needed.
Then in 2021–22, I had a growing realisation that I needed to do something that was fundamentally about what matters most to me. Which is: creating work where the human spirit can flourish.
I found what I was meant to be doing in my late 30s, early 40s – sort of by accident. But I also feel like I had to go through all the frustrations first to really appreciate what I do now. Does that resonate?
Completely. I’ve had moments where I had to let go – to grieve the lost years. But also, being grounded about it, I don’t think I could have done what I do now any earlier.
There was a time at the council when I was sat with someone, helping them solve a city-wide problem. I remember thinking, “I wish I could do this for a living.” I didn’t know it was called coaching – but it felt right.
What I bring to my coaching now isn’t just knowledge or technique – it’s my own lived experience. Just being a human being for a while, with values and intentions, and staying connected to those.
Final question to wrap us up: when you think about the future – what do you see?
It’s a weirdly vulnerable question – but lovely.
I’m focused on building Possible – more work with organisations, more coaching, more speaking opportunities.
I also make a bit of music. I did a Brian Eno songwriting masterclass earlier this year. I challenged myself to record my voice – something I’ve always been scared to do. But I did it.
I want to perform live at some point. I’m collaborating with someone. There are little dreams I’ve got that are too tender to talk about yet – but I know I need to build towards them.
