Progress in Practice Podcast

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading sits down with Matthew Smith, founder of Buckingham Gate Chartered Financial Planners, to explore how he built an award-winning estate planning practice and then turned his competitors into his clients. Matthew shares the extraordinary story of nearly dying on his honeymoon and how that experience inspired both the launch of his business and...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading sits down with Jill Martin, founder of Impact Business Consultancy, to get under the bonnet of how we really operate as humans and why the founder is always the biggest block in the business. Jill works with impact and purpose-driven entrepreneurs who are already high-achieving, but know they're not accessing everything they have to giv...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Felix Mead, founder of Sliq Homes- a London-based property management business built on a model that still raises eyebrows: free management, free maintenance, free refurbishment, and a guaranteed rent for five years. The model works because Sliq Homes converts three and four-bed family homes into high-quality HMOs for working pr...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Mark Stanton, co-founder of Develop People-  a leadership and personal development practice working with manufacturers, engineers, regulated industries, and professional services firms to help technically excellent people become genuinely effective leaders. Mark spent nearly three decades in policing, retiring at a senior level...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Lakhmi Bhambra- also known as The One Minute Healer- founder of the 111 Approach, a wellness practice built around a simple but powerful premise: one thing at a time, one minute to do it properly, one day at a time. Lakhmi's path to wellness is anything but conventional. With a science degree and a background in the medical...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Amanda Regan, founder of Ignite Your Career- a coaching practice helping high-performing mid-career professionals reposition their careers deliberately so they can step into the person they've already become. Amanda's path to coaching is extraordinary. Streamed wrongly at secondary school, told she wasn't A-level...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Charles Maloney, founder of ClearView — an autonomous sales and marketing intelligence platform designed to automate up to 85% of the manual execution behind SEO, paid ads, and analytics for small and medium-sized businesses. Charles brings a fresh perspective to the podcast as a founder right at the start of his journey — build...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Annie Allison, founder of Allison & Co — a luxury interior design studio working on high-end residential projects across the UK and Europe. Annie's path into interior design wasn't traditional — it grew organically from creativity, curiosity, and a willingness to follow what she loved. In this warm and honest conve...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Paul Spires, founder of Sound Financial Planning — a firm he built from the ground up in 1998 with a clear mission: to give clients proper, fee-based financial planning at a time when the rest of the industry was still focused on flogging products. Paul brings 36 years of experience to a conversation that is warm, wise, and pack...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie sits down with Chetan Joshi, founder of coglateral.ai, a specialist firm helping business owners, entrepreneurs and financial services firms move from AI experimentation to real-world execution. Chetan unpacks the difference between generative AI and vertical AI, explains why most organisations are paralysed by choice rather than by a lack of techno...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Michelle Hoskin, founder of Standards International and the Business and Operations Management Network, known as BOMS Michelle shares how nearly three decades of working with business owners led her to a bold pivot: walking away from coaching business owners to champion the operations managers, practice managers, and business ma...

In this episode of Progress in Practice , Charlie Reading is joined by Ross Jones, founder of Home Financial and Evolve Commercial Finance. Ross shares how his business was born out of adversity, why he is passionate about helping clients whose income does not fit the standard box, and how specialising in more complex mortgage scenarios has allowed his firm to create real value. This is a candid c...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Steve Price from Inspire, an accountancy firm with a very different approach. Rather than simply helping business owners stay compliant, Steve and his team focus on helping owner-managed businesses understand, use, and improve their numbers so they can build a business that serves their life, instead of becoming a slave to it. T...

In this episode of Progress in Practice, Charlie Reading is joined by Claire Fudge, founder of Fourth Discipline, clinical dietitian, performance nutritionist, and elite athlete. Claire shares how she helps business professionals, founders, and executives who are also athletes optimise their health, nutrition, and performance - not just to feel better, but to compete and thrive for decades to come...

In this episode of Progress in Practice , Charlie Reading is joined by Bhavik Shah, founder of Providus Capital - a specialist in complex, time-sensitive property finance. Bhavik shares how his business supports developers facing challenging situations where traditional funding falls short, and why thinking like a principal (not a lender) creates a powerful competitive edge. This conversation goes...

In this episode of Progress in Practice , Charlie Reading sits down with Matt Bird from Accelerate Advisor Solutions to explore what it really takes to grow a professional services business without sacrificing your time, team, or sanity. Matt shares how financial advisers across the UK are reclaiming hours each week by outsourcing and optimising their operations and why the real transformation isn...