Matthew Gordon

Young, gifted and from the Black Country, Matthew is a 6’ 5”, 18 stone, former national league basketball player. Some believed he could have been the next Lennox Lewis, until he came to his senses in 2003, when he collided head first with lamp post in Norway whilst riding a toboggan without a crash helmet!

Matthew has been involved in mentoring on a national scale since 1999 and was presented with Mentor of the Year award by David Blunkett.

Matthew has not traveled the same traditional path as some of his counterparts at Independent Thinking. When he was 12 years old his older brother was shot dead, the shock sent him reeling and subsequently he was excluded from all three of his senior schools, including the highly acclaimed Thomas Telford. Despite failing his GCSEs Matthew, determined to achieve, recommitted himself to education and managed to graduate from university, turn down a graduate position at a leading German car manufacturer, make films and work on three BBC dramas.

Also, in parallel to his ongoing mentoring work, he has pursued a number of entrepreneurial projects, most recently helping set up an online organic and ethical food solution with one of the country's biggest retailers.

Matthew, who claims to be scared of only two things - his Mother and dogs that can run faster than him - has successfully worked in mentoring and coaching capacities with clients spanning from England and Premiership football stars to most of the nation's top universities. However, he insists that his real joy comes from working with young people who, he says, “are not underachievers - they just have not yet joined up the dots”.

He will be the first to admit that he doesn’t have a bag of ‘learning tricks’, but instead works to develop a varied and useful range of innovative approaches to facilitating growth and positive change. Apparently he has never set-up a poorly reviewed mentoring programme which is a good job as he is passionate about achieving top results and offering value for money.

Matthew is a powerful figure when giving motivational talks to large audiences, but his real passion is working with smaller groups on sustainable, inclusive programmes. His areas of particular expertise are on urban culture, male underachievement, black heritage and mentoring implementation.

• For Matthew's prices click here
• People who benefited from Matthew have also enjoyed Jim Roberson

To make contact with Matthew and to find out how he can help you help your students please call the Independent Thinking office on 0709 239 9617 or e-mail us at learn@independentthinking.co.uk.

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