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Alex Papaioannou (Head Coach)
Expertise and Background​​
4x co-founder, strategy consultant, ex-private banker, and professional actor: Alex’s coaching is unique and multidimensional offering a depth of perspective that gives an edge over traditional coaching.
Macbeth - Academy of Dramatic Arts, Hong Kong, 2024​
Performance Coaching & Communication Trainer
Since 2015, Alex has utilised his diverse background in finance, entrepreneurship, and acting to serve as a communication and performance coach. His experience includes coaching founders, accelerators, and local government councillors, as well as training and facilitation for large corporate clients such as Coutts, Barclays, UBS, and EY.
Strategy Consultant & Advisor
Alex has advised numerous founders and businesses on subjects ranging from strategic planning to personal confidence and vision. In addition to his banking and founder experience, he has served as the head of strategy at an AI tech startup and as a strategy consultant to various UK businesses, including film and TV production companies and digital media platforms. This wide array of experience, combined with his focus on narrative and storytelling, brings a distinctive depth to his consulting and advisory practice.
Professional Acting
Alex has been a professional stage and screen actor since 2012. Recent notable credits include playing the title role of Macbeth at the Academy of Arts Hong Kong and Victoria Theatre, Singapore, in winter 2024. Alex also has an extensive background in immersive theatre having worked with many of the leading producers in London including Secret Cinema, on numerous productions including Blade Runner, Romeo and Juliet, Back To The Future and Casino Royale (where he met his now wife, who also played Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth during the Asia tour).​
Entrepreneurship
After cutting his teeth as a private banker, specialising in managing the wealth of high-net-worth UK entrepreneurs, Alex went on to co-found four businesses spanning multiple sectors. These include a hand-crafted fashion and home textile production import and export business (India / UK); an online-media production business (UK); an AI, VR ed-tech startup (UK) and now NarrativeEdge Coaching (UK).
Banking and Finance
As a former UBS private banker, Alex was part of a team that managed over £200 million in assets for high-net-worth UK entrepreneurs and founders. Inspired by his clients' passion and success, he left banking to become an entrepreneur himself. Managing relationships with successful founders and investors has become an invaluable foundation for his work as a business coach, entrepreneur, strategy advisor and corporate communication trainer.
Documentary Production
Alex read Microbiology (BSc hons) at The University of Nottingham. He then became a specialist science documentary researcher and producer, with credits for the BBC, Channel 4, Five, and Discovery. Documentary production began Alex's journey to understanding the power of narrative, storytelling, and authenticity—three principles at the core of NarrativeEdge Coaching.