A day in the life of a coach and confidant to executives

A typical day for Steve Tappin starts at 6:15 am when he has a quick breakfast and then takes a train into central London.

He tends to stop off at Third Space, a central London gym, for a workout before going to his business club, One Alfred Club, to meet with his direct business team

His new CEO confidant and coaching business Xinfu sometimes involves him having three to four advisory sessions with industry leaders.

Some days are spent doing interviews with the news media or speaking at corporate events or at universities about CEOs and leadership.

He rarely has time for lunch and often has to make do with a sandwich.

Currently, he is working on a new book called, appropriately, The New Secrets of CEOs, which will include more interviews with CEOs from India and China.

This involves taking a week out of every month to go to either China or India to do interviews.

He either gets the train home in the evening, which he says gives him time to reflect, or hires a performance car from a specialist car rental firm for a more fun drive home.

Evenings usually involve dinner at home with his family and then working into the evening on client sessions.

Later he scans the news channels, including CCTV, NDTV (India) and CNBC (Europe/US) to learn what is happening in the world.

After a quick bath, he goes to bed at 11 pm with a good book, but is usually asleep within minutes.

(China Daily 11/23/2009 page12)