The Performance Margin 

The crossover between sport and professional performance is one that I hold at the core of my coaching philosophy. It’s why I train athletes and professionals with a similar approach. Lessons identified in one area can be related across and applied to enhance performance. Let me prove it to you... In mid-May, I packed my bike onto the back of my car, loaded up my wetsuit and running shoes and made my way to Burghley House in Stamford. The whole way my stomach was churning wit

In today’s fast-paced world, we send more messages - but understand less. Whether it’s a WhatsApp from a coach, a safety note in aviation, or an email to your boss, written communication is efficient… until it isn’t. Without tone, context, or instant feedback, even well-intentioned messages can cause confusion, mistrust, or worse - critical mistakes. In high-stakes environments, relying solely on written communication isn’t just risky - it’s reckless . The Illusion of Clarity

In aviation, sport, and leadership, few things erode trust faster than blame. In high-performance environments, where human error is inevitable, the way we respond matters more than the error itself. This article explores how blame destroys psychological safety, how Just Culture offers a better path, and why distinguishing between honest mistakes, risk-taking, and negligence is crucial for any high-performing team. This was the Mansfield 10k back in September 2024. I was in d

As human beings, we are all fallible. Mistakes occur, despite knowing every Human Factor at play and identifying the potential for errors to creep into our daily avtivities. Still, they happen. In the complex and high-stakes world of aviation, safety is the top priority. To maintain and continuously improve this safety, the aviation industry relies not only on technology, regulation, and training but also on culture. One concept that has emerged as a cornerstone of modern saf

How many times do we see it in our day-to-day lives? Whether its an email to our boss that they took the wrong way, or a text to a family member where our dry sense of humour is misconstrued for being confrontational, we find that communication breaks down quite frequently. As it happens, that second one happens far too often between my mum and I… Despite technological advancements and decades of Crew Resource Management (CRM) training, communication failures in aviation are

While flying recently, I was handling the aircraft on an instrument approach in for a touch and go. I was wearing the oxygen mask, as we had practiced the smoke and fumes drill, and I hadn’t landed wearing the mask for a while. It was a good training opportunity, however in itself it provided a bit of a distraction. Additionally, the weather was quite poor, and the cloud base was close to the minima for the approach. On reflection, it was one of those approaches where the hol

Communication always comes with its challenges, but there are ways we can overcome these and avoid ambiguity.

Technology is used in today’s society as both a help and a hinderance. We utilise it in all aspects of our lives, and sleep is no different! A 2021 study into the use of electronic devices before bedtime highlighted the impact this has upon sleep quality. So, we should be avoiding screens before bed, but how can we use other forms of technology to monitor and potentially improve our sleep? Wearable sleep trackers have gained a lot of traction in recent years. Most devices

Everywhere you look, there is a lot more focus on sleep than there has been over the past decade. Previously people would wear the badge of ‘don’t mind me, I’m just operating on 3 hours sleep’ with pride, but the narrative has now changed. It is now widely accepted that between 7 and 9 hours of sleep is what most adults need. But where has this research come from, what is the benefit of getting sleep and (most importantly) what can a lack of sleep look like in our day to day

Investigating accidents and incidents serves one sole purpose; to identify the causes and prevent recurrence. Over time, this data can be analysed to identify common issues and precursors to events, which could be used to predict cases of human error in the future. It’s not quite as cut and dry as it sounds, but human behaviour is actually surprisingly predictable. The US military have used this concept to devise an AI programme called Raven Sentry , which was employed in Afg

On 1st June 2009, Air France Flight 447 was flying from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. During the flight, the Airbus 330-200 flew through some weather and ice crystals began forming in the three pitot tubes. These measure the differential between static air pressure and the dynamic, to provide airspeed readings to the cockpit. As these became blocked with ice build-up, there was a disparity between measurements from the three tubes, which disconnected the aircraft’s autopilot and a

In most walks of life, people find themselves in high pressure situations. This often builds over time, with increasing workload, or responsibilities, at home or at work. Pressure builds and people’s fight, flight or freeze (also known as the acute stress response ) kicks in. Some crumble under the stress, some thrive and use it to motivate them. However, the aviation domain is one where pressure does not always build consistently. The Yerkes-Dodson Law, also referred to as t

I’m not always making errors; despite whatever picture these articles may appear to paint. But I am open about them, as I genuinely believe that’s the only way to prevent their re-occurrence. That being said, the latest slip came just last week. While deployed, we have air conditioning carts to keep the aircraft cool before we start engines. As it was being moved to our other aircraft, my captain (in the left-hand seat) was telling me to check out on the right that the cart w

When flying frontline operations, I frequently found myself working varying hours. Set shifts were certainly not a thing. One day we would be needed on task at 5pm, two days later we were wanted at 3am. The biggest difficulty I found in the cumulating fatigue was not necessarily tiredness , but alertness . I was going from needing to be asleep in the late morning to rest for a night sortie, to needing to be switched on at midday to be planning for a sortie I was about to fly.

Sitting in a Grob 115A cockpit, at the hold on an empty airfield I ran through the pre-take-off checklist. It was my first time taking a passenger flying, after completing RAF flying training and finishing off the final elements of my civilian licence. I was eager to get airborne, and although there was no pressure to get going, I did feel the pressure of the responsibility of someone else’s life who didn’t have a clue how the aircraft worked. I’d only ever flown next to an i