John Peck is a former army officer and Metropolitan Police Commander who has spent decades leading in some of the most demanding environments imaginable — from inner-city London at its most volatile, to unclimbed Himalayan peaks, the Sahara, the North Pole and the Atlantic. In 2004 he became the oldest British person to row the Atlantic unsupported. For the past 30 years, through his consultancy Tiger Teams, he's worked with senior leaders and organisations to build teams that perform when it matters most.

Thematic description:
John and Jez — who met at a conference in 2007 and went on to run youth leadership programmes together tackling gun and knife crime in inner-city London — dig into what actually makes a team perform under pressure. They cover why parachuting someone in at the last minute nearly always backfires, why John opens his book with the word "care," and why he believes human connection isn't a leadership nicety but runs through everything "like a stick of rock."

Topics covered:

• How John and Jez met, and the youth leadership work that followed
• Why bringing in a new team member at the last minute damages team cohesion — even highly capable people
• Building authenticity: why you "can't talk rubbish" once a team is under real pressure
• Turning anxiety into risk — the value of naming what you're actually afraid of
• The strategy/skills/mindset triangle for performing under pressure
• Grit, and why it beats qualifications and experience
• The slow work of building connection vs. the fast stretch of a challenge
• Care as the foundation of team performance, and the return-on-investment problem nobody likes discussing
• Advice for anyone considering an outdoor/expedition-based intervention with their team

On the horizon:
Further episodes exploring the same core question — what leaders can learn from people who've led in genuinely tough conditions — with guests from expedition, search and rescue, and crisis backgrounds.

One thing:
If you move someone into a team at the last minute, don't be surprised when the team stops feeling like a team. Cohesion is built, not assigned.

Links:
Restless — https://www.amazon.co.uk/Restless-John-Peck/dp/B0GR5HZK8L
The Seven Seas to Success — https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Add-Adventure-Your-Life-ebook/dp/B0BMM6TRMK
Tiger Teams — https://tigerteams.co.uk
John's website — http://www.john-peck.com
LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-peck-0587125/

Learning from the Edge | learningfromtheedge.com
In partnership with Dartmoor Search & Rescue Team