Elite Performance: Why Top Performers Are Using This Rowing Team's Framework | Harriet Beveridge Performance Psychologist Interview

Most business leaders run on autopilot, keeping the same meetings and habits simply because that's what's always been done. Harriet Beveridge has a test that cuts through all of it, borrowed from a British rowing crew that turned one gold medal in a generation into Olympic history.

Beveridge is a performance psychologist, executive coach and stand-up comedian who co-wrote Will It Make The Boat Go Faster? with Ben Hunt-Davis, a member of the British eight that won gold in Sydney in 2000, Britain's first gold in the eight since 1912. Now in its third edition, the book is a working playbook for chief executives and high-performing teams.

Her answer: ask if it makes the boat go faster, then get out of your own way.

What You'll Learn:

- The Bullshit Filter: How "will it make the boat go faster?" helped an underfunded crew cut noise, drop altitude training, and focus only on what moved the result.

- Wouldn't It Be Amazing If: Why asking a deliberately outrageous question first unlocks ambitions that smart objectives alone never would.

- Making It Impossible Not To: How teams engineer commitment, from taping a rower's hand to the oar, to booking a goal before it's funded, to accountability buddies who won't let you off the hook.

- The DICE Beliefs Framework: The four beliefs, deserve, important, can, exciting, that quietly block performance, and how an "evidence wall" rebuilds them without affirmations.

- Removing Friction From Habits: Why the "activation hump," the effort of just getting started, matters more than willpower, and how frictionless design builds habits that stick.

- Thriving Under Pressure: How to identify personal stress triggers, from travel chaos to financial fear, and build small strategies rather than generic advice to stay calm.

- Energy Over Time Management: Why managing energy, not just calendar blocks, decides whether high performers burn out or sustain results.

- Curious About The Recipe: The deliberate practice habit of deciding what to focus on before a task, then reviewing it after, a step most businesses skip.

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Your Business Falls Apart When You Leave? You Don't Own It Yet | Peter Boolkah Business Coach Interview

Most business owners are brilliant at the technical work that got them started and completely unprepared for what running a business requires. The result is a team trained to be dependent, decisions funnelling through one person, and a life that belongs to the business.

Peter Boolkah has spent 21 years inside this problem as an ActionCOACH business coach. Before coaching, he spent 16 years at McDonald's in operations, where he learned to trust 21-year-olds with £3 million restaurants because the systems made it possible. His book, Your Business Sucks, is a coaching fable built on two decades of watching owners repeat the same mistakes.

What You'll Learn:

- The 30-Day Test: Could you step away from your business for 30 days with zero communication? If the answer is no, the business owns you. This reveals whether you have a business or just a job.

- Why Hard Work Creates the Problem: Every time an owner jumps in to fix something, they train the business to depend on them. Most don't realise they're building the bottleneck they're trying to escape.

- The Three Steps of Delegation: Delegation without follow-through is abdication. Peter explains why management is a three-step process and why stopping at step one is where most businesses stall.

- The McDonald's Lesson: A 21-year-old could run a £3 million restaurant because of systems, measurement, and daily P&L accountability. That same discipline is available to any SME owner willing to build it.

- Start with Two Numbers: Track sales and net profit from day one. Close last month's figures by the 3rd and review your forecast daily to catch problems before they compound.

- Balance the Talent Book: Like a football club at season end, every business needs to honestly assess whether its people can perform at the required level and be prepared to act when the answer is no.

- The Real Timeline: 3-5 years to systemise properly. Wealth starts in years 5-7. Show up consistently, implement what you learn, and the path is clear.

Peter Boolkah's Background:

Peter Boolkah is a business coach with 21 years at ActionCOACH, working with businesses across growth, acquisition, and exit. He spent 16 years at McDonald's in operations, starting on the shop floor and rising to oversight of multi-million pound restaurants. That grounding in systems and P&L discipline forms the foundation of how he coaches. His book, Your Business Sucks, is a coaching fable drawn from two decades of client work.

Action Steps:

If You Haven't Started: Define what you want your life to look like, then work backwards to the infrastructure you need to support it. That is your starting point, not a revenue figure.

If You're Already Running a Business: Take the 30-day test. If you couldn't leave for a month, identify the decisions that still flow through you and start building the systems and people to handle them.

For Everyone: Track sales and net profit every month. Close the previous month by the 3rd and review your forecast daily. These two habits will change how you run your business.

Wherever you are in the journey, this episode gives you the framework to build a business that works without you. Subscribe to the ActionCOACH Business Growth Podcast for weekly conversations with people who've done it.

Brought to you by Actioncoach UK | The World Number 1 in Business Coaching

Learn more at: actioncoach.co.uk

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Mindset: The Moment We Stopped Listening to No | Tom Caulfield & James Whittle The Tempest Two Interview

Most people wait until they feel ready. Tom Caulfield and James Whittle know that day never comes, so eighteen months after taking up climbing for the first time, they set off up El Capitan anyway.

Known as The Tempest Two, Caulfield and Whittle rowed 3,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean unsupported in 54 days with no prior rowing experience, then spent 18 months learning to climb before summiting El Capitan in three days, sleeping on ledges the width of a pizza tray along the way.

In this episode of the ActionCOACH Business Growth Podcast, they explain why they banned the word can't, what a bias to action actually looks like day to day, and how doing one uncomfortable thing a year built the mindset behind it all.

What You'll Learn:

- Removing Can't From Your Vocabulary: Why Tom and James banned the word can't entirely, and how Carol Dweck's growth mindset research shaped their thinking on limiting beliefs.

- The Bias To Action Method: How announcing a goal publicly before you know how to achieve it builds accountability and forces you to figure out the how afterwards.

- Training The AMCC, Your Willpower Muscle: The brain region proven to grow when you do things you don't want to do, and why it levels the playing field for everyone.

- 18 Months To El Capitan: How two novice climbers went from the worst in their gym to summiting El Capitan in three days, waking up next to Alex Honnold and Tommy Caldwell.

- The Crisis Playbook: Level-headed, share it, no ego. How Tom and James righted their boat after capsizing mid-Atlantic and narrowly avoiding a collision with a tanker.

- The Misogi Challenge: The ancient Japanese ritual reframed as doing one incredibly hard thing every year, and why it builds a life full of stories.

- Next Up, A 400K Swim: A preview of The Tempest Two's next world-first challenge, a relay swim across the North Sea from Scotland to Norway.

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