Gerard O’Donovan has developed a speciality of training life coaches through his company Noble Manhattan Coaching in Weymouth, Dorset. He has done it at a time – the end of the second millennium and the beginning of the third – when coaching and mentoring is becoming more and more in demand.

O’Donovan, born and raised in County Cork, entered his profession after experiencing several other fields. He was in the Royal Marines from 1975 to 1984 and went into insurance when he left the military.

After a spell in the insurance and financial worlds he set up a property business. However, the timing was wrong and he lost a lot of money in that market.

The tide was soon to turn. He set up his own financial services company in 1988 and eventually employed a staff of 1,000.

In 1992 he sold the company to the huge Cornhill insurance group and started Noble Manhattan, offering personal development services and now specialising in the training of life coaches.