Performance Intelligence

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469 episodes · showing the newest 200

The Science of Brain Ageing + How to Increase Your Cognitive Power | Dr Norman Swan

Nov 11, 2026 1 hr 9 min

Most senior leaders have a year in mind when they will finally stop. House paid off, kids launched, a few rounds of golf a week. Dr Norman Swan thinks that date deserves a much harder look. The research he’s been reading points to retirement as a likely cause of cognitive decline, with the same drop showing up across country after country. And the plan most of us have for filling the time, more family, a caravan trip, a few series to binge, doesn’t give the brain the load it needs. Swan, the ABC’s best-known health broadcaster, joined Andrew live in Sydney for Florence Guild to talk about his book The Brain Cliff and the super-agers who stay sharp into their nineties and beyond. What they share is surprising, and it starts with how they handle stress. Contact Dr Norman Swan: https://www.abc.net.au/news/norman-swan/2849474Order The Brain Cliff: https://www.hachette.com.au/dr-norman-swan/the-brain-cliff 00:00 The retirement date leaders should be suspicious of03:05 Three super agers who never hit the cliff06:54 Why the brain cliff is not inevitable09:04 What super agers share, and the blue zone problem11:13 Stress doesn't age your brain. Rumination does12:16 Scaffolding: how the ageing brain rewires itself14:22 Why your brain lights up when it's meant to rest17:22 Train your brain like a muscle19:52 Fluid vs crystallised intelligence in midlife23:44 The dementia story the headlines miss26:25 Norman turns 70. His kids think he's 5029:13 A week in Norman's life: training, food, sleep, zero supplements33:07 The 200 hours behind a close friendship38:04 Inside a biohacking conference: drips, peptides, red light helmets46:40 Why retirement pushes you off the cliff50:34 Q&A: Can you come back from the cliff?53:59 Meditation and breaking the rumination loop57:44 Don't load all your dice on one thing59:54 Boredom, screens and digital dementia - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. H...

Bite Size: The Routine Behind One of Cricket’s Great Bowlers | Michael Bevan & Jake Trbojevic

Nov 8, 2026 11 min

Glenn McGrath never told his teammates what time he’d see them in the morning. Everyone already knew where he’d be: in the pool, 90 minutes before the bus left, every match day of his career. Former Australian cricketer Michael Bevan explains why McGrath’s real edge was doing simple tasks well, over and over, and why the gap between good and great players is so rarely about talent. Manly’s Jake Trbojevic shares the trademarks he writes down before every game: the few things he knows he does well, and the rest he refuses to chase under pressure. He’ll tell you which trademarks he chose, and why naming them has made him calmer before kick-off. He also explains what happened when Bevan suggested he trademark the rest of his life. You can find Bevo at his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bevo_michaelbevan/?hl=enYou can find Jake at his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jaketrbojevic/?hl=en - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https:/...

The Surprising Mental Skills Behind a #1 Rock Star | Marcus Bridge (Northlane)

Nov 4, 2026 1 hr 5 min

Before you go looking for your next big idea, go back to your last great one. Marcus Bridge was four months into fronting Northlane when the band recorded Node. It went to #1 and won an ARIA, but a decade on he’d outgrown the singer on that record, so he went back into the studio and sang it again. A rock star might seem an unlikely teacher for a leader. But Marcus has spent 10 years doing what you do: delivering on demand, under pressure, with an audience judging every move. Going back is the reinvention most leaders skip, and probably the one you need. Look in the rear view mirror at the work that got you here, and ask what it would sound like with everything you know now. Andrew plays both versions back to back, then he and Marcus get into what it takes to keep evolving when everyone is watching. If you lead a team that expects you to keep raising the bar, this one will change where you look for your next step forward. 00:00 Would you redo your best work from ten years ago?02:17 Why a metal singer is on a leadership podcast04:01 The childhood he had to survive04:58 Turning his story into songs08:46 Reflection, and the trusted conversation that changed everything13:04 The audition where everyone else copied the band17:09 Number one, and no time for imposter syndrome20:08 The teenage promise, and what really got him there24:46 Care, accountability and the partner who won't let him stew30:53 Why he went back to his number one album34:34 Ten years apart: hear both versions39:17 The good work you've shelved43:23 Emotional at 26, physical at 3547:22 Andrew's heart rate experiment50:45 A vocal warm-up for anyone who presents You can find Marcus on his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marcusbridge/?hl=enFollow Northlane on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/northlane/?hl=enFind out more on Northlane's website: https://au.northlaneband.com/ High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over...

Bite Size: What a Performance Psychologist Got Wrong About His Own Life | Dr Michael Gervais

Nov 1, 2026 9 min

There is a phrase elite performers use to keep people at a distance without ever saying so directly: don't look at me, look at my performance. Dr Michael Gervais, the sport psychologist behind some of the NFL's most recognised teams and a trusted voice inside Super Bowl-winning locker rooms, built an entire career on that idea before he noticed what it was costing him somewhere much closer to home. It took one blunt question from someone he trusted to show him the difference between being excellent and being known. What that question was, and what changed once he actually answered it, is the part worth sitting with. You can find Dr Michael at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drmichaelgervais/Listen to the Finding Mastery Podcast: https://findingmastery.com/ High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Wa...

The Science of Neurotransmitters: 5 Chemicals Every Leader Must Understand | Dr Tom Buckley

Oct 28, 2026 59 min

Much of what leaders put down to stress, or to a lapse in discipline, is chemistry at work. Andrew chose five of these moments, drew a real scenario from our coaching practice for each, and asked an expert to identify the neurotransmitter behind it, without warning. Play along. One scenario is the board presentation that keeps replaying long after midnight. Another is the leader whose drive has quietly gone flat, and it gives even our expert pause. Professor Tom Buckley is a University of Sydney academic and Andrew’s co-author on MatchFit. See if you can name each chemical before he does, then learn the levers that lift it and the ones that bring it back down. 00:00 Five chemicals, five real leadership scenarios02:04 What the human body is actually made of04:52 The challenge: name the chemical07:39 Chemical 1: when you can't get started13:55 Chemical 2: wired before the board meeting, awake after it20:34 Three minutes in the car before walking inside24:00 How to come down after a big day27:00 How to ramp up: sunlight, cold water and caffeine timing31:07 Chemical 3: the team that won't say what it thinks40:46 Chemical 4: snapping at the kids at 9am on Saturday49:53 Hot milk, cooked tomato and what our grandparents knew52:12 Chemical 5: when nothing feels fun anymore55:52 Vitamin FLPJ and the joy diary1:03:14 Coming down is two jobs1:04:27 Why leaders can wind up but can't switch off Find Dr Tom Buckley: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-buckley-06a76b98?originalSubdomain=auDownload the neurotransmitters sheet: https://performanceintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Chemistry-Table-PQ-White.png - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and con...

Bite Size: Why “My Door’s Always Open” Isn’t Enough | Keegan Hipgrave

Oct 25, 2026 12 min

Most leaders have said it. My door’s always open. Far fewer realise their team is watching whether they ever walk through a door themselves. Former NRL player Keegan Hipgrave was the teammate everyone could talk to, the one pushing mates to open up inside a macho dressing room, and later the host of his own mental health podcast. Yet for 8 years, he kept the loss of one of his best mates locked away, while telling everyone else to talk. What finally broke that silence, and what changed once it did, is where the real lesson for leaders sits. This episode discusses suicide. If it raises anything for you, support is available through Lifeline on 13 11 14. - You can find Keegan at his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/keeganhipgrave/?hl=enOr at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keegan-hipgrave-9a36b8230/Follow Keegan's podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/keeganandcompanypodcast/?hl=enListen to Keegan's podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/keegan-and-company/id1695873736 High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintellige...

198 Culture Expert: How Leaders Measure, Own, and Fix the Culture They Inherited | Karl Treacher

Oct 21, 2026 36 min

If culture’s in HR, it’s in foster care. Karl Treacher has spent 25 years inside boardrooms, including the war room of a big four bank during the Royal Commission, and he has watched leaders hand culture to the one department that was never meant to own it. Engagement scores can look healthy while the culture underneath is quietly turning toxic, and the board is often the last to know. Karl built a culture diagnostic later featured in Harvard Business Review, and he says measuring culture is far easier than most leaders believe. He and Andrew get into what boards consistently misread about the culture they lead, and the afternoon in an aged care day room that set the course of his career. If you sit on a board, run a team or answer to one, this conversation will change how you look at your own organisation. 00:00 Who really owns culture in your company? 01:31 Nursing homes, Olive and the moment Karl saw the system was the problem 07:41 “If culture’s in HR, it’s in foster care” 09:31 Culture vs climate: the confusion boards keep making 11:38 Building the culture diagnostic HBR called the gold standard 14:43 Donuts, beers and gaming the engagement survey 15:41 Inside a big four bank’s war room during the Royal Commission 16:59 Return to office: what the evidence actually says 22:32 Small business: when the founder’s character becomes the culture 24:30 Why most leaders have burnout wrong 28:45 Writing a book on burnout, and burning out 31:37 Why we’re running antique cultures not fit for today Find out more about Karl’s work and the Culture Institute: https://builttoburn.com.au/ Connect with Karl on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/treacher/ Get Karl’s book: https://www.amazon.com.au/Built-Burn-People-Leaders-Cultures/dp/1394456514- High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental...

Bite Size: The Hidden Cost of a High Performing ADHD Brain | Lindy Hadges

Oct 18, 2026 7 min

Lost jobs. Bankruptcy. Marriages that did not survive. Unmanaged ADHD can leave a trail most of us never see, because the risk-taking that looks like drive on the outside is fed by the same low dopamine that quietly pulls a life apart. Lindy Hadges maps the layers sitting beneath the label, and makes the case that you cannot work with ADHD until you understand what is actually holding it in place. View the ADHD Cake model: https://performanceintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/ADHD-Cake-of-Understanding.pngFind out more about the ADHD Foundation: https://adhdfoundation.org.au/about-usConnect with Lindy: https://ccaa.net.au/practitioner/200102-14/ High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceintelligencepodcast If you enjoy the podcast, we wo...

197 How a CEO Built Leadership Capacity + Created a Ripple Effect in His Entire Team | Byron Cannon

Oct 14, 2026 1 hr 17 min

You’re exceptional at your job. That isn’t the problem. The skills, the experience, the judgement, you’ve spent years building those and they aren’t going anywhere. The question is whether you’ve still got the capacity to use them. Enough in the tank for the project that matters. Something left for the people at home afterwards. The momentum to get where you told everyone you were going. And the wave is coming either way. A bigger year, a harder quarter, a team asking more of you than it did last time. Capability isn’t what keeps you upright when it lands. Byron Cannon has the capability. He is the CEO of LDK Seniors’ Living, a business about to triple in size, and a year ago he worked out capability wasn’t what he was running out of. Andrew and Byron walk through how they built Byron's leadership capacity to sustain his performance and how this rippled onto his leadership team. Byron didn’t do anything you couldn’t do. He just did it before he had to. 00:00 Why senior leaders really get pushed out 07:12 The hotel room phone call: “I can see burnout on the horizon” 11:02 Inside Byron’s full physical and psychological assessment 13:41 Dr Tom Buckley on what the data showed 20:20 Love, decency and kindness: the mission to change retirement living 26:33 Larry the gnome and how LDK builds its culture 29:46 The mindset shift: treating leadership capacity as strategy 38:47 AI: why depleted leaders outsource their thinking 47:34 How Byron rewrote Andrew’s framework: from survival week to surge week 52:50 “I felt selfish”: the hidden barrier to putting yourself first 56:29 Eight months later: the reassessment results 01:06:45 Unscripted: Byron’s team shares what changed for them Want to learn more about Leadership Capacity? Start here: https://performanceintelligence.com/building-leadership-capacity/ Follow Byron on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/byroncannonLearn about LDK: https://ldk.com.au/ - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the c...

Bite Size: Stop Promoting Your Best Performer Into Leadership | Lisa Alexander

Oct 11, 2026 7 min

Ask Lisa Alexander who the best coaches she has known were, and almost none of them were the best players. Alexander spent a decade running the Australian Diamonds netball team to an 81 per cent win rate, one of the most dominant coaching records in Australian sport, and she names the pattern directly: serial winning coaches are rarely elite players themselves. The reason has nothing to do with talent and everything to do with what coaching actually requires. What that is, and who she credits with teaching her the difference, is where this goes. You can find Lisa at the TGI website: https://tgisport.com.au/talent/lisa-alexander/Or the Celebrity Speakers website: https://www.celebrityspeakers.com.au/speakers/lisa-alexander/Connect with Lisa on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisa-alexander-am-a83bb378/?originalSubdomain=au High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Face...

Bite Size: How To Coach a Client Through the Worst Year of Their Life | Nam Baldwin

Oct 7, 2026 10 min

Divorce at the start of the year. A great white shark attack, live on television, in the middle of it. The death of his eldest brother at the end. That was 2015 for professional surfer Mick Fanning. Performance coach Nam Baldwin, who has worked with world champions across multiple sports, was in his corner for all of it. Baldwin says the conventional playbook for elite athletes, push through, stay hard, don’t let it show, would have made things worse. What he coached instead, and why it had to come before any return to competition, is what this one is about. Visit Nam's website: https://www.nambaldwin.com/Visit Hupo's website: https://hupo.com.au/ High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceintelligencepodcast If you enjoy the podcast, we would rea...

Bite Size: Why Win-At-All-Costs Doesn't Survive Contact With Business | Michael Klim

Oct 4, 2026 6 min

Olympic gold medallist, Michael Klim, explains why the mentality that won him 17 years of world records nearly destroyed his life after retirement. Michael took the same win-at-all-costs approach into business: redeye flights, fourteen-hour days, no off switch, and it cost him his relationship, his mental health, and eventually his body. You can find Michael at his TGI Sport Profile: https://tgisport.com.au/talent/michael-klim/At his Website: https://www.michaelklim.com/Or on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaelklim1/?hl=en High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceintelligencepodcast If you enjoy the podcast, we would really appreciate you leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Google Play. It takes less than 60 seconds and...

Bite Size: What Creatine Actually Does to a Desk-Bound Brain | Dr Tom Buckley

Sep 30, 2026 10 min

Creatine has spent decades filed under gym supplements, something for building muscle and nothing else. Dr Tom Buckley says that filing is out of date. A recent meta-analysis found measurable improvements in memory, attention and processing speed among people taking creatine, distinct from any effect on strength or size. Buckley, who has spent his career researching human performance, is careful about what the research does and does not show. What it does show, for a desk-bound brain rather than a gym-bound body, is the part worth hearing. Find Dr Tom here View the UNSW StudyView the Hair Loss StudyRead the study on creatine and cognitive functionRead the creatine articles from the AFR and The Guardian High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceint...

Bite Size: The Weeks You're Allowed to Just Survive | Andrew May & Angela Poon

Sep 27, 2026 1 min

Most productivity systems quietly punish you for a bad week. Andrew May's Better Week framework budgets for them. The target is 25 to 30 genuinely good weeks a year, a number most high performers find uncomfortably low, which leaves room for the stretches when everything lands at once. He walks Angela Poon, Performance Intelligence COO, through the maths. What he calls the rest of the year, and what changes when you say it out loud to your team on a Monday. High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. - Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceintelligencepodcast If you enjoy the podcast, we would really appreciate you leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Google Play. It takes less than 60 seconds and really helps us build our audience and continue to provide high quality g...

Bite Size: The Skill Sport Teaches That Leaves You Lonely | Stuart Clark & Steve Rixon

Sep 23, 2026 12 min

Years of touring teach cricketers to be very comfortable in their own company. Coffee when you want it, lunch when you want it, a day built entirely around you. Former Test wicketkeeper Steve Rixon argues the skill cuts both ways: it protects you on the road, then quietly isolates you once the career ends and the kids leave home. Former Test fast bowler Stuart Clark has already had to work it out for himself. What each of them realised was missing, and why it had nothing to do with cricket. You can find Stuart at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stuart-clark-32019360/Book Steve to speak at your next event: https://www.celebrityspeakers.com.au/speakers/steve-rixon/ - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanceintelligencepodcast If you enj...

Bite Size: How to Step Down Without Screwing It Up | Michael Bungay Stanier

Sep 20, 2026 9 min

Most people who benefit from the status quo work hard to keep it. Michael Bungay Stanier, Rhodes Scholar and bestselling author of The Coaching Habit, says it was built for him, and decided to spend some of that advantage. First through curiosity and humour, the quieter tools for shifting who holds power in a room. Then through the harder move: stepping down as CEO of Box of Crayons, the company he founded. What that handover asked of him, and the temptation he had to resist to make it stick. Find Michael at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelbungaystanier/ Or Website: https://www.mbs.works/ Buy a copy of Michael's books: https://www.booktopia.com.au/michael-bungay-stanier/author1256.html - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/performanceintelligencebyam/ Watch this episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@performanc...

196 The Science of Mental Fitness: Why Movement is Non-Negotiable | Dr John Ratey

Sep 16, 2026 1 hr 8 min

A professor at Harvard and MIT wrecked his knee and stopped running the 7.5 miles he ran every night of his adult life. 5 months later he could not finish his own work. He was losing the thread in conversations, forgetting things he had never forgotten, and getting angry in a way he did not recognise. He was convinced he had developed adult ADD in middle age. He hadn't. He had just stopped running... The psychiatrist who worked that out went looking for evidence that barely existed at the time. 2 decades later it became Spark, the book that put exercise and the brain in the same sentence for most of us for the first time. You already know you should move more. That is not the problem. The problem is the distance between knowing it and doing it, and what that distance costs you if you are paid to think for a living. Attention? Mood? Whether you can still hold a hard problem in your head at four in the afternoon? Dr John Ratey is now 78 years old. He has been at Harvard since his residency, he has written 12 books, and his own protocol is far simpler than anything you would expect from a Harvard laboratory. He explains what BDNF does to a brain, why he now describes muscle as an endocrine organ rather than scaffolding, what the last 10 years of research has added to the case he made in Spark, and the one thing he could not write at the time because the evidence was not there yet. You can keep treating exercise as the thing you do for your body when there is time left over. Or you can treat it as maintenance for the organ you are actually being paid for. 00:00 The Harvard genius who lost his mind when he stopped running 06:05 The cocktail party patient who started it all 11:01 The 1970s discovery behind the runner's high 14:05 Turn ADHD into a superpower: the Ferrari brain with bicycle brakes 20:06 The real prescription for a distracted mind 24:54 The school that got smarter by moving more 29:08 Meet BDNF: the brain's own Miracle-Gro 32:45 Dr Ratey is 78, and he's nowh...

Bite Size: The Simple Habit That Flattens Your Energy Crashes | Dr Amantha Imber

Sep 13, 2026 9 min

Most nutrition advice focuses on what you eat. Dr Amantha Imber, an organisational psychologist and author of The Health Habit, became more interested in what happens after you eat, and started wearing a continuous glucose monitor on herself to find out. The device tracks blood sugar in real time, and what she discovered about a specific ten-minute habit after meals surprised her enough to build it into how she coaches high performers now. What that habit is, and why flat blood sugar matters more than most people realise, is what this one gets into. You can find Dr Amantha at her Website: https://www.amantha.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amanthai/Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber/?originalSubdomain=auBuy The Health Habit: https://www.penguin.com.au/books/the-health-habit-9781761342363 High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our website: https://performanceintelligence.com/Book Andrew: https://performanceintelligence.com/keynotes/Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/performanceintelligencepq/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/performanceintelligence-byandrewmay Facebook: https://w...

195 Conflict Expert: What Swallowed Words Costs a High Performing Team | Tim Duggan

Sep 9, 2026 1 hr 7 min

You have rehearsed it in the shower. You have written the message and deleted it. And every time the moment arrives, you find a reason it can wait until next quarter. That conversation is still making decisions for you. It decides who gets the promotion, which project quietly dies, and which good person leaves without ever telling you the real reason. Tim Duggan spent 3 years inside one question: how do you get better at conflict? He built a media company out of a website he started in his twenties, hired hundreds of people, sold it, and was still terrible at the hard conversation. He thought he was good at it. He was not, and it took him years to work that out. So he went to the people who are: Adam Grant. Oxford negotiators. Accredited mediators. An executive producer of The Real Housewives, which turned out to be the most useful conversation of the lot. What he came back with is a map. 4 terrains, and every conflict you are carrying right now sits on one of them. The move that works on one will detonate on another. Andrew puts it under load. The leaders who can run a profit centre and have never been taught to disagree. Performance Intelligence's own work on psychological safety and constructive challenge. And a live test Tim has not seen coming, where he places a conflict still playing out in public onto his own model, no notes, no preparation. Listen to this one before your next difficult conversation, not after it. 00:02 — Why are we so bad at conflict? 03:38 — How our families teach us to avoid difficult conversations 07:02 — The moment Tim realised avoiding conflict was costing him 09:01 — What “swallowed words” do to us — and why silence isn’t really silent 11:32 — The counterintuitive question: what happens if you don’t have the conversation? 18:50 — The four terrains of conflict: summit, arena, minefield and swamp 27:27 — What happens when emotion takes over and the “amygdala hijack” kicks in 34:27 — The RISA test: should you actually have the fight? 37:...

Bite Size: The Two Steps That Stop a Player Throwing a Punch | Gilbert Enoka

Sep 6, 2026 7 min

A young player once told Gilbert Enoka that his advice was rubbish. On the field, when a referee makes a call he disagrees with, he wants to throw a punch, and no amount of mindset work was going to change that in the moment. Enoka, the All Blacks' mental skills coach for 23 years, did not argue the point. He gave the player a simple physical structure instead, and the player's own frustration rating dropped within seconds of trying it. It is the example Enoka now uses to explain why he believes structure, not mindset, is the most underrated lever in high performance. High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our websiteBook AndrewFollow us on Instagram, Linkedin, FacebookWatch this episode on Youtube If you enjoy the podcast, we would really appreciate you leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Google Play. It takes less than 60 seconds and really helps us build our audience and continue to provide high quality guests.

194 Performance Nutrition: Lessons From Special Ops + Elite Athletes for Everyday People | Jessica Spendlove

Sep 2, 2026 1 hr 9 min

Elite athletes and Special Forces do not eat like you do....and the reason you fade in the afternoon is usually something you did that morning. Jessica Spendlove will tell you exactly what. She will also tell you what to eat when you have 4 minutes and no time to think, whether the supplements you bought are doing anything at all, and why she rarely recommends that a woman fast. Jessica is a performance dietitian with more than 15 years behind her, a decade of it in elite sport across 7 professional teams, Olympic medallists, world champions and premiership-winning sides, plus 7 years with Special Forces Command. Jessica has heard every version of "I'm already doing everything right" and she has never met anybody whose nutrition she could not improve. And she is happy to be challenged on that! The reason it lands is that she got it wrong herself. Jessica spent years feeding elite athletes while running on adrenaline, cortisol and caffeine, and it took her own data to stop her arguing with herself. If you have been telling yourself you will sort your nutrition out when things calm down, start here. 00:00 The day we took nutrition off the table 03:44 Seven professional teams at once, running on adrenaline, cortisol and caffeine 06:12 The reply-all email that got her roasted at the Christmas party 11:46 The keynote she nearly pulled out of, and the data that made the call 17:19 The three hour morning window where it all comes apart 20:14 The domino habit has to survive your worst day 31:41 You can't ice bath your way out of chronic sleep debt 39:25 Why she almost never recommends fasting for women 55:25 Same meal, different order, different result 01:04:00 Walking into a room of commandos and getting it wrong 01:14:42 How to work with Jessica Spendlove Contact Jessica through her website, Linkedin, or Instagram. Buy Jessica's new book "For The Long Run" here. - High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters a...

Bite Size: You Are Almost Certainly Underestimating Yourself | Craig Harper

Aug 30, 2026 9 min

There is a gap between what you are capable of and what you are actually doing. Craig Harper has spent 40 years studying it. His view: the gap is not primarily a talent problem or a knowledge problem. It is a psychological one. Fear, the need to be right, poor self-awareness, and an unwillingness to tolerate discomfort are quietly capping the performance of people who are objectively skilled, experienced, and intelligent. And the higher you rise, the easier it becomes to avoid confronting that. You can find Craig at his website:https://craigharper.net/Follw him on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/craiganthonyharper/Listen to The You Project:https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/the-you-project/id1342430567 High performance is not about pushing harder. It is about building the capacity to perform when it matters and sustain it over time. Hosted by Andrew May, one of Australia’s leading experts in human performance, leadership and mental skills, the Performance Intelligence Podcast explores how leaders, athletes, coaches and researchers think clearly, manage pressure and consistently perform at their best. Drawing on more than 20 years working with senior executives, elite sporting teams and the Australian Defence Force, Andrew combines candid conversations with evidence-based performance insights and practical strategies you can apply. Episodes span leadership capacity, performance psychology, mental skills, energy management, strategic recovery, productivity and wellbeing. Listen to think more clearly, lead more effectively and perform at your best for longer. Get in touch through:Our websiteBook AndrewFollow us on Instagram, Linkedin, FacebookWatch this episode on Youtube If you enjoy the podcast, we would really appreciate you leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Google Play. It takes less than 60 seconds and really helps us build our audience and continue to provide high quality guests.

193 Mental Agility: Why it's so Important & How to Train it | Andrew May, Angela Poon, Jacqui Louder

Aug 26, 2026 56 min

Some people get sharper when the pressure lands. The meeting turns hostile, the plan collapses, the number comes in wrong, and they are still thinking clearly while everyone around them has gone quiet or gone hard. That is Mental Agility. The capacity to move between demands, tasks, roles and relationships while staying grounded and effective when conditions change. It is trainable, and it is the capability every organisation is now asking for without ever having taught it. PQ founder, Andrew May, PQ COO, Angela Poon, and Sports Psychologist, Jacqui Louder, spent 6 months building mental agility into six layers. What your brain does to you under pressure. Why your body sets the ceiling on your thinking. How your identity decides what an event means before conscious thought gets a say. The six seconds that stop you saying the thing you regret. How to actually retain what you learn. The hardiness that has you growing through pressure instead of surviving it.Now, they are walking you through all six layers here, with one strategy from each you can use this week. Andrew brings you into his real life test of mental agility with a gripping story of being upside down, underwater, strapped inside a helicopter fuselage in the dark, with an instructor offering him a way out. But what he does next is where mental agility shows up... 00:00 The word everyone uses and nobody can define04:12 Your brain under pressure is not a character flaw07:21 What AI can't give you11:10 Elite sport, clinical psych, actual clowns14:24 Why an insurer is training this17:51 Leaving KPMG for a startup23:43 The three zones28:18 The brain runs on the body35:03 Why the same words land differently on different people39:14 Hanging up the bad day jacket46:55 Upside down, underwater, offered a way out52:25 How to work with us Learn more about a Mental Agility program for your team here or email us at support@performanceintelligence.comContact Jacqui Louder here

Bite Size: A Debrief Won't Fix a Numb Team | Ex-SAS Soldier Harry Moffitt

Aug 23, 2026 7 min

A suicide bomber walked into a crowded local event in rural Afghanistan, and Harry Moffitt's small medical team spent the day treating the dead and dying. By the afternoon his unit sat in near silence, exhausted and numb. Moffitt, who spent close to three decades in Australia's Special Air Service, reached for the one thing he carried on every deployment for exactly this reason. What happened next, in the middle of one of the worst days of his career, became one of the most effective group resets his unit ever experienced, and he says he has never seen anything else do the same job. You can find Harry at his website: https://harrymoffitt.com.au/Order a copy of Harry's book: https://www.panmacmillan.com.au/9781761563133/Connect with Harry at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harrymoffitt/Follow Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harrymoffitt353/?hl=en

192 We Have Misdiagnosed a Generation of Exhausted Leaders | Andrew May on DLTOMI

Aug 19, 2026 1 hr 4 min

You're probably treating recovery as the reward for hard work, when elite sport treats it as part of the work. Andrew May has spent more than two decades coaching in sport and business, and Andrew thinks we have misdiagnosed a generation of exhausted leaders. Call it burnout and you go looking for rest. Andrew says the shortfall is usually capacity, and the first move is measuring it rather than resting on it. Pod O'Sullivan had Andrew on Don't Let The Old Man In podcast and asked him the things he does not get asked on his own show. It was too good to leave over there, so we are bringing it to you here. 00:00 The plan you don't have01:11 Burnout is not what you think it is04:25 Vitamin FLPJ: fun, laughter, play, joy06:52 The CEO who has never burnt out09:45 Train hard, push hard, recover hard12:25 What executive blood profiles show16:17 Your father, your son, and you18:45 The waterfront house and the crash23:47 The five metrics worth tracking30:17 You'd spend a year planning a renovation38:55 Wearables: who they help, who they wreck44:38 Why sauna beats cold50:21 The toast that explains burnout54:05 Three things to start this week01:00:25 What your 75 year old self would ask01:01:24 I've burnt out almost twice Listen to the original episode: https://pod.fo/e/5543c9Watch the original episode: https://www.youtube.com/@DontLetTheOldManInPodcast/videosFollow Pod on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/padraigbosullivan/ Follow DLTOMN: https://www.instagram.com/dltomipodcast/

Bite Size: Forget Your Why. Start With How... | Keith Abraham

Aug 16, 2026 15 min

Most goal-setting advice starts with your why, the deep, soul-searching question everyone knows they're meant to answer but rarely do. Keith Abraham, one of the world's leading authorities on goal achievement, thinks that's exactly backwards, and too hard for anyone with a job and a diary. He starts somewhere else entirely, with a short list of feelings almost nobody names out loud before setting a goal. Once that shifts, the goal itself, the reasons behind it, and the people who can help all fall into a completely different order. What that starting question actually is, and why it beats a purpose statement, is the part worth hearing. You can find Keith at his website: https://keithabraham.com/Or at his LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/keithabrahamOrder a copy of Keith's new book: https://www.amazon.com.au/Unstoppable-Velocity-Goals-Reality-Faster/dp/1394389302

191 Mental Skills that Saved the Only Person to have the #1 Radio Show in 2 Countries | Christian O'Connell

Aug 12, 2026 1 hr 24 min

What do you do when the version of yourself that's winning is also the version that's breaking? You know the feeling, hitting every number, saying yes to everything, and still walking away from the day feeling like you performed it rather than lived it. Now imagine finding the exact moment that stopped working, and the one small shift that got you back. Most high performers don't burn out overnight. It happens one performance at a time, right up until the body forces the stop, mid show, mid meeting, mid life. Christian O'Connell has hosted the #1 breakfast radio show in 2 different countries, the only person to do it. He built that success on a persona so complete he stopped recognising himself underneath it, until panic attacks started hitting him minutes before airtime. Christian walks you through the exact mental skill that pulled him out of it, the same one he now teaches others to use before they hit their own breaking point. You can keep performing until something forces you to stop. Or you can borrow the skill that saved someone who'd already won twice. 0:00 — The reflection he didn't recognise 5:40 — The epiphany behind a show built on being unscripted 9:12 — "F**k off home": Australia's brutal welcome 19:49 — The morning his mother-in-law nearly died on air 21:03 — The radio tuner dial: shifting from fear to joy 32:12 — The woodshed: never running out of things to say 35:32 — What Jerry Seinfeld taught him about mastery 46:19 — Bruce Springsteen: "thank you for being my purpose" 1:02:18 — Running on clean fuel instead of dirty fuel 1:04:41 — Ricky Gervais, and the courage to admit you're not okay 1:09:56 — Why storytelling is the most underused skill in business 1:22:48 — How to work with Christian O'Connell You can find Christian at his website: https://christianoconnell.com/Buy a copy of Christian's book: https://christianoconnell.com/unscript/#pre-orderListen to the Christian O'Connell Show: https://www.thechristianoconnellshow.com.au/Connect with Chris...

Bite Size: A Bad Day is a Jacket, Not an Identity | Rose Herceg (WPP President, AU/NZ)

Aug 9, 2026 7 min

Rose Herceg, President of WPP Australia and New Zealand, has a specific image she uses to stop a hard day turning into something bigger, something she thinks most people have lost the ability to do. Running a business of 2,500 people through a genuinely volatile industry, she has no shortage of bad days. What she refuses to do is let one bad day become a bad week, a bad month, or a story about who she is. The image itself is deceptively simple. What's harder, and more useful, is the discipline she has built around actually using it. You can find Rose at her LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rose-herceg-025982bb/

190 The Science of Fasting & How to Use It for Sharper Thinking | Dr Tom Buckley

Aug 5, 2026 1 hr 4 min

When did you last actually let yourself feel hungry? Not the "due for a snack" kind. Properly, deliberately hungry, on purpose. If you can't remember, you're not alone. Now imagine using that discomfort as a lever instead of avoiding it. Every reflexive snack, every meeting that runs straight into the next, every bite you take before your body even asks for it keeps you running on one setting. You never give your body the signal to switch fuel sources, sharpen your focus, or clean house at a cellular level. The fog, the afternoon slump, the stubborn weight that won't shift: that's the bill for never stopping. Dr Tom Buckley has spent more than 22 years reading the bloodwork of Performance Intelligence's executive clients, translating what's happening inside hundreds of high performers into how they eat, train, and lead. He's back on the podcast to explain what fasting actually does inside your body, why the meal you were told never to skip has a cereal company to thank for that reputation, and how two nights a week without dinner might be the highest-leverage habit in your week. You could keep running on constant fuel and wonder why your energy never settles. Or you could learn to use hunger as a lever instead of an enemy. 03:35 The fat that's easiest to shift, and where it sits 05:41 Ghrelin, leptin and the people who never feel full 09:03 Three fuels, one easy habit: why carbohydrate wins by default 10:27 Metabolic flexibility: the skill Western living has trained out of us 16:08 The story that's driven Dr Tom for 35 years 21:47 What fasting switches off first 22:47 Ketones: the fuel that skips the insulin queue 25:13 Fasting and the new GLP-1 drugs are chasing the same biology 27:33 The shortcut risk: trading discipline for a jab 28:17 What decades of fasting research actually agree on 31:16 The benefits nobody puts on the label 33:21 Andrew's own Tuesday and Thursday fast, and why it finally clicked 36:01 The worst thing we do as humans, and the second worst th...

Bite Size: What a Great Coach Does When Your Confidence Is Gone | Jason McCartney

Aug 2, 2026 6 min

Most leaders try to restore a struggling performer's confidence with a pep talk. It almost never works. When Jason McCartney had written himself off, a coach did something far more deliberate, and it pulled him back from the edge of walking away. The approach is simple, repeatable, and the opposite of what most people reach for. You can find Jason at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-mccartney-oam-b10a39217/

189 The "Why Not?" Mindset: How to Break Self-Imposed Limits | Matt Formston

Jul 29, 2026 1 hr 14 min

What goes through your mind when you're trapped underwater by a 50-foot wave? For Matt Formston, it's not fear. It's making an omelette. After losing 97% of his vision at just 5 years old, Matt has become a Paralympian, world champion, world record holder, and the first blind athlete to conquer the legendary waves of Nazaré. But today isn't about the achievements...it's about the process behind them. Matt shares the 8 hard standards that have shaped every part of his life, from elite sport and leadership to parenting and business. Matt believes standards matter more than goals, explains why your "glass ceilings" are often self-imposed, and the mindset you can learn that turns perceived risk into opportunity. Whether you're leading a team, chasing a personal goal, or simply trying to perform better when life gets hard, Matt offers a tried, tested, and successful framework for building trust and lasting high performance. 00:00 37 seconds under a 50ft wave 02:41 One word for every achievement 06:32 Blind at five, and the story everyone gets wrong 10:05 Nearly dead or in jail 11:23 Perfect process, not perfect vision 13:41 The eight hard standards 14:37 Values in a mahogany case 15:24 Standards without consequences are just wishes 18:56 Five minutes early or you're late 21:00 Andrew's team rate him live 27:35 The standards meeting nobody runs 29:15 Why high standards make people feel safer 32:51 He refused to learn what the best in the world could do 35:16 Making an omelette while being held under 39:26 The flap of skin costing him 100 feet 44:24 The only standard that matters: coming home 48:09 The b******t audit 01:07:49 The list of 12, and the six he wasn't 01:10:38 Why most people never set a goal Buy a copy of Matt's new book: https://www.mattformston.com/books-hubVisit Matt's website: https://www.mattformston.com/You can find Matt at his LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/matt-formston-am-gaicdOr at his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mattformston/?hl=enLi...

Bite Size: The Embarrassing Habit Even Smart People Have | Andrew May on Healthed

Jul 26, 2026 7 min

"I know this." Andrew May hears it from some of the smartest people in the country, right before they admit they are doing none of it. The gap between what we know and what we do is not a willpower problem or a time problem, and treating it like one is exactly why nothing changes. He breaks down the difference between self-awareness and self-regulation, and the small, almost embarrassing first step that actually closes it. This episode was originally published on the Healthed podcast with Dr David Lim. You can find the original interview here.Visit the Healthed website: https://www.healthed.com.au/

188 Producer of X Factor, Big Brother: How to Build Brands People Buy & Can't Ignore | Maz Farrelly

Jul 22, 2026 28 min

What do people say about you when you're not in the room? How are they introducing you, summing up your work, your professionalism, your brand? Now imagine you had control over that. Because here's the reality: you already have a brand. You're building it whether you like it or not, and right now it's either working for you or quietly costing you. Maz Farrelly has spent 30 years creating and articulating some of the biggest names and biggest shows on television. The producer behind Big Brother, The X Factor, Celebrity Apprentice, Q&A: Maz is back on the podcast to hand you the exact strategies she's used to make the most famous brands and people unforgettable. You could leave your brand to chance and risk being misunderstood. Or, you could take control and build a brand people buy. 00:00 The sentence people say when you're not in the room 02:50 Maz's brand framework: know who you are, know what they want 03:34 Stop selling, start being bought 06:08 The man who wore white every day 07:31 Say it until other people say it for you 09:53 What's your "white coat"? 10:28 Your one line is harder than your wedding vows 13:02 The room full of CEOs who wrote her off 14:52 The reframe: your brand is about them, not you 18:14 Speak backwards: how to find your oddity 22:44 Inside the room with the most famous people on earth 24:09 Why Trump didn't waste energy on her, and why it's smart 26:32 How to work with Maz Watch the full interview with Maz: https://youtu.be/SB4TALfDVpw?si=qKrCZ2qOh1_5oR4w Find Maz at: https://www.mazspeaksglobal.com/Connect with Maz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maz-speaks/Download Maz's Speaker Kit: https://www.mazspeaksglobal.com/#speakerkit View the branding model: https://performanceintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/Personal-Branding-Model.png Why You Should Book Maz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maz-speaks/details/recommendations/?detailScreenTabIndex=0

Bite Size: The Exercise Formula Was Never Designed for Women | Dr Paul Batman

Jul 19, 2026 7 min

Women achieve the same cardiovascular health benefits as men at roughly half the exercise volume. Yet the standard exercise guidelines prescribe identical amounts for both. Dr Paul Batman argues this is one example of a deeper problem: a fitness model built on incomplete data, applied to populations it was never designed to reach. Only 16 percent of people follow the conventional guidelines. The question is not how to motivate the other 84 percent to do more. It is whether we are asking them to do the right thing at all. You can find Dr Paul at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-paul-batman-9092a052/

187 The Science of Sleep High Performers Swear By, From Special Forces To CEOs | Dr Jemma King

Jul 15, 2026 1 hr 2 min

The best performers in the world have found a competitive edge that's completely free. You can use it too, and it starts tonight. When Dr Jemma King put wearables on Australia's Special Forces in 2017, the culture was "sleep when I'm dead". Within months, those same soldiers were showing off their recovery scores and competing over who slept the most. Not because they went soft. Because the data showed sleep was making them faster, sharper and safer, and elite performers chase anything that does that. Jemma has spent a decade measuring what great sleep unlocks in people whose decisions matter: Special Operations Command, Olympic swimmers, CEOs. Her conclusion is genuinely exciting. Sharp is recoverable at any age, and it doesn't take supplements or gadgets. It takes a handful of deliberate habits the world's best are already using. Jemma introduces you to the midnight librarian who explains your 3am wake-ups (and how to give her the night off), the express bus that takes you straight to deep sleep, and how to build your own Sleep First formula around your biology and your life. Your upgrade is waiting. 00:00 It's 3am. You're awake again.02:05 Two experts, one room at last04:20 Meet your midnight librarian: why you wake at 3am07:55 The other 3am suspects: temperature, gut bugs, sugar and alcohol12:22 The welcome practice: making peace with 3am15:04 "Mother nature is like the mafia"16:36 Why the pub sometimes beats the pillow19:01 Wearables: who should buy one, who should bin one20:57 The traders who made more money reading their own heartbeat22:39 The five metrics worth tracking25:17 Catch the express bus: the case for sleep consistency29:26 The DEC2 gene and the ruthlessly selfish habits of the world's best32:19 How Special Forces went from "sleep when I'm dead" to sleep competitions36:35 The pattern that made a stress scientist write a sleep book38:14 Your Sleep First formula40:20 Burnout, insecurity and the six whys44:27 Kids, dogs and the family bed50:53 The spo...

Bite Size: Why Being Underestimated Might Be Your Greatest Asset | Nic White & James Slipper

Jul 12, 2026 10 min

Nic White played 77 test matches for the Wallabies. For most of that career, he felt like he was one bad game away from being dropped, one coach away from being told he was not in the plans. He was told exactly that in 2015. So he left. What he did next, and why he came back, says a great deal about what actually drives elite performance over the long haul. This is a conversation about the difference between proving people wrong and knowing your own worth, and why both matter more than most leaders admit. Follow Nic on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/white_nic/?hl=enFollow Slips on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jamesslipper/?hl=en

Bite Size: Mental Rehearsal Is Not Mindset, It's Neuroscience | Andrew May

Jul 8, 2026 7 min

Jim Carrey wrote a cheque to himself for ten million dollars when he was a broke, unknown actor. Sara Blakely visualised a billion-dollar business and an Oprah appearance before either was remotely plausible. Easy to dismiss as coincidence. Harder to dismiss once you understand what an fMRI shows when a person runs a scenario in their mind. Andrew May breaks down the neuroscience behind why mental rehearsal works, and why leaders who ignore it are leaving a genuine performance edge on the table.

Bite Size: ADHD It's Not Laziness, It's Low Dopamine | Lindy Hadges

Jul 5, 2026 11 min

Since the 1700s we have described this condition in the language of character. Lazy. Undisciplined. Careless. As recently as 2023, an Australian parliamentary inquiry heard the same words still follow people through their lives. Lindy Hadges explains why a condition that sits in the brain attracts shame that an identical shortfall in the pancreas never would, and what happens the moment someone stops believing the story they were told about themselves. View the ADHD Cake model: https://performanceintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/ADHD-Cake-of-Understanding.pngFind out more about the ADHD Foundation: https://adhdfoundation.org.au/about-usConnect with Lindy: https://ccaa.net.au/practitioner/200102-14/

Bite Size: He Ran His Recovery Like a Pre-Season | Jason McCartney

Jul 1, 2026 13 min

The first thing Jason McCartney asked for wasn't a doctor. It was a whiteboard. Badly injured and facing months in hospital, he didn't ask "why me?!". He set a goal, picked a deadline, and started working backwards, the same way he had for every season of his AFL career. What he learned about handling the moments that flatten everyone else is something most leaders never have to discover until it's forced on them. You can find Jason at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-mccartney-oam-b10a39217/

Bite Size: You've Accepted a Lie About Getting Older | Craig Harper

Jun 28, 2026 7 min

There's a moment in your 50s when you start planning for decline instead of planning for growth. Craig Harper never had that moment. At 60+, he's more committed to his physical and mental performance than most 35-year-olds. This isn't about genetics or obsession. It's about asking a different question: what would I have to do differently to stay in the game? His answer might surprise you. Craig Harper is a high-performance coach, author, and speaker specialising in sustainable performance and behaviour change. You can find Craig at his website:https://craigharper.net/At his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/craiganthonyharper/Listen to The You Project:https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/the-you-project/id1342430567

186 How to Access Flow State & Significantly Boost Performance | Dr Sue Jackson

Jun 24, 2026 1 hr 13 min

Have you ever finished a presentation, race, meeting or performance and someone asked, "How did it go?" only to realise you can barely remember it? Not because you failed but because you were completely immersed. Dr Sue Jackson is one of the world's leading researchers on flow and co-authored the defining book on the subject alongside the man who first named it, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Sue takes you inside one of the most sought-after and least understood states in human performance. Why do some moments feel effortless while others feel like a grind? Why can pressure elevate performance one day and destroy it the next? And why do some of our best performances seem to happen when we stop trying so hard to force them? Using examples ranging from Olympic athletes to Wallabies captain Harry Wilson's match-winning moment against Argentina, Sue explores why some performances feel effortless, why pressure can either sharpen or derail us, and why trying harder isn't always the answer. This is about attention, confidence, pressure, preparation and the hidden conditions behind extraordinary performance. Because flow isn't something you find. It's something you allow. 00:00 Why your best performances can be the hardest to explain 02:14 The psychological state that fascinates elite performers 05:58 What athletes mean when they say "everything just clicked" 10:08 Flow vs clutch: two very different ways to perform under pressure 13:09 Harry Wilson's match-winning Wallabies moment, and what it reveals about performance 19:27 The letter that changed Sue Jackson's career 26:51 The hidden ingredients behind a flow state 28:00 The challenge-skill balance that can make or break performance 32:00 Why anxiety might be closer to flow than you think 39:03 The attention crisis nobody is talking about 42:18 Are we losing our ability to focus? 45:40 The coaching habit that can pull athletes out of the moment 48:53 Why flow feels energising instead of exhausting 50:32 Can you perform brillian...

Bite Size: Why a Psychophysiologist Thinks We're Treating Depression Wrong | Dr Paul Taylor

Jun 21, 2026 10 min

Most conversations about depression treatment start and end with medication. But what if that starting point is too narrow? Paul Taylor challenges a widely accepted assumption in mental health care that antidepressants are the primary or most effective solution for depression. What he argues is not simplistic and not anti-medication. It’s more uncomfortable than that: that for many people, medication alone may not be enough to meaningfully address the deeper drivers of depression. That raises a harder question most people never get asked: if medication isn’t the full answer, what is? This is a conversation that sits in the tension between science, treatment norms, and lived experience. And it may change how you think about the way depression is actually treated in practice. You can find Dr Paul at his website: https://www.paultaylor.biz/or at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paultaylor1971/Buy a copy of Dr Paul's new book: https://www.paultaylor.biz/books

185 The Science of Ozempic and What Happens After You Stop | Dr Tom Buckley

Jun 17, 2026 1 hr 0 min

Inside the venom of a desert lizard, scientists found a molecule that does something the diet industry spent 50 years failing to do. It quietly switches off hunger. That molecule is now the most talked about drug on the planet, and it's sitting in the fridges of millions of people who couldn't explain how it works if you paid them. Dr Tom Buckley, 30 years in medicine and a professor at Sydney University, has looked at the evidence and called these drugs revolutionary. But what about "Ozempic face"? What if the wait comes back after you stop? Who should never touch these drugs? Dr Tom and Andrew get into the science so you finally have all the answers you need. 00:00 – A desert lizard that eats twice a year 03:32 – What a GLP-1 actually is, in plain English 07:36 – Ghrelin and leptin: hunger and fullness, explained 10:23 – The venom that cracked the hunger code 14:06 – Why your body is built to hold onto fat 15:19 – How to raise GLP-1 without a prescription 18:10 – Become the CEO of your body and brain 22:10 – You don't lose fat cells, they shrink 24:39 – "Ozempic face," and why you lose weight slowly 28:17 – The "Limitless" effect: cognitive horsepower 29:28 – 76 trials, 40,000 patients: the evidence 30:47 – Lancet 2024: heart attacks and strokes down 32:11 – Why Tom calls these drugs regenerative 34:18 – Who should never take it 35:23 – The side effects nobody mentions upfront 41:19 – On it and off it: what you have to get right 48:14 – Most regain 75% within a year of stopping 50:09 – Metabolic rebound: worse than where you started 52:51 – The hidden economy GLP-1s are reshaping 56:13 – Tom's cliff notes You can find Dr Tom at his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-buckley-06a76b98/

Bite Size: How to Stay Hungry After Success | Dan Haesler (Mental Skills Coach Penrith Panthers)

Jun 14, 2026 7 min

Most teams spend their lives trying to reach the top. Very few have to answer the question of what happens when they get there. The Penrith Panthers have won 4 consecutive NRL premierships. In an era designed for parity, they've achieved something almost unheard of in modern sport. Which raises a fascinating challenge. How do you keep people motivated when they've already achieved the goal? How do you maintain standards when success becomes normal? How do you avoid complacency when everyone around you is telling you how good you are? Dan Haesler, Mental Skills Coach for the Penrith Panthers, shares what it takes to sustain excellence after success. But this isn't really about rugby league. It's about leadership, culture, psychology, and human behaviour. Whether you're leading a team, running a business, building a career or pursuing your own goals, eventually you'll face the same challenge: how do you keep growing when you've already won? You can find Dan at his Website:https://danhaesler.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danhaesler/?hl=enLinkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danhaesler/?originalSubdomain=auBuy a copy of Dan's book: https://www.actofleadership.com/

184 LIVE: The Mindset that Drives an AFL Premiership and a Full Career Reinvention | Kieren Jack

Jun 10, 2026 59 min

Talent gets you through the door. It does not keep you in the room, and it has almost nothing to do with what you become. Kieren Jack is proof. The last pick in the AFL rookie draft, too small and too slow on paper, he outworked every reason he should not have made it. Kieren played 256 games for the Sydney Swans, co-captained the club, won the 2012 premiership and earned a place in its Hall of Fame. Then he did the harder thing. He walked away at the top and started again, building a whole new career in business where his name meant nothing. What carries across is the useful part. How do you keep performing when you are running on empty? What actually holds a team together when pressure hits? Why do the people who get knocked down and underestimated often end up the most dangerous? Recorded live, in a room that was never meant to be a podcast. No script, no second takes. You've got a seat that wasn't on sale. Whatever you are trying to build, you'll leave this one thinking differently about how you get there. 0:00 Pick 138, a famous surname, and why talent only opens the door1:50 How the Swans built a dynasty on character, not talent5:10 Missing the draft, choosing his own sport, and finding his identity9:20 The 2012 flag, and what that team had that he's never seen again17:40 Take the baton: the motto that outlived the players who made it19:15 A season as co-captain, played on empty, in a dressing gown22:05 When a private family conflict went public before his 200th game28:10 Twins, no sleep, and what sport does and doesn't teach you about parenting33:45 Why he studied an MBA mid-career, and why leaving the game made him better37:00 A $120m deal in four months, and what footy gave him no MBA could41:05 Joining the West Coast rebuild and flipping the member thank-you44:55 Premiership to wooden spoon: what went wrong and what a rebuild takes48:25 Q&A: carrying elite habits into everyday life when structure disappears49:55 Q&A: what good culture really looks like, an...

Bite Size: The Survival Skill That Keeps Reporters Calm on Air | Ali Piotrowski

Jun 7, 2026 12 min

Ever lost your composure right when you needed it most? In a high-pressure moment, when everyone's watching and one wrong move costs you, most people freeze. This reporter learned to do the opposite. Seasoned news reporter, Ali Piotrowski breaks down the one skill that kept her sharp through war zones, Middle East conflict, and the chaos outside Trump's indictments: calm. Not the kind you're born with. The kind you train. She explains why composure became her edge, and why it can be yours too. If you work in a fast-moving, high-pressure environment, this one's worth a few minutes of your time. You can find Ali at her LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alisonpiotrowski/Or at her Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alipiotrowski/

183 The Question Nobody Asks High Performers: Who Motivates the Motivator? | Craig Harper

Jun 3, 2026 49 min

The kind of person who's been helping others perform better for 40 years doesn't usually admit they're struggling. Craig Harper did. His dad is in the hospital. The drive is five hours return. The calls from clients still come. And somewhere in the middle of all of it, one of Australia's most recognised performance coaches said something he'd never said publicly before. That he's lonely. This conversation is for anyone who gives more than they get. Who holds it together at work and unravels at home. Who knows exactly what to tell others and struggles to apply it to themselves. Craig doesn't have a tidy answer here. But he does have hard-won perspective on where your energy actually goes, who you let close enough to tell the truth to, and what it takes to keep showing up when life gets genuinely heavy. Honest, uncomfortable, and worth your time. 0:00 — Who motivates the motivator? Craig Harper on why this is the question helpers never get asked. 1:30 — "I'm feeling pretty shit, to be honest, mate." How this conversation started. 2:07 — Craig says publicly for the first time: "Sometimes I feel really lonely." 5:34 — Mum and dad at 87. What's actually been going on behind the curtain. 10:28 — Energy out, not in. How Craig thinks about his performance threshold when life gets heavy. 12:10 — When doing a podcast feels like calm instead of work. Craig explains the difference. 16:45 — Who do you belong to? Craig on connection, loneliness, and what actually fills the cup. 17:09 — Vin from school. Why Craig's best mate is the one who tells him he's full of it. 18:49 — The inner circle test: if the 4–5 people around you are 80% the same in five years, you'll probably be okay. 23:35 — The friend who shouldn't have survived. Craig's story about the person who inspired him more than anyone he's coached. 28:17 — Something Craig says here is going to land differently for anyone who's always been the strong one. 30:09 — Why willpower doesn't work. What Craig uses instead when the d...

Bite Size: The 8 Health Behaviours that add 26 Years to Your Life | Dr Tom Buckley

May 31, 2026 15 min

Could eight daily habits, locked in by 40, really add more than two decades to your life? The research says yes. And the habit at the top of the list is the one most senior leaders quietly deprioritise. If you want a clear, no fluff framework for long-term health and the small daily decisions that compound into decades, start here. You'll walk away knowing exactly where to focus, and what to stop wasting money on. Watch the longer episode on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaOmJ25Q-GI Contact Dr Tom: https://au.linkedin.com/in/tom-buckley-06a76b98Read the study here: https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)66280-X/fulltext

182 Friendship, Footy, and What's Next? | Wallabies James Slipper & Nic White

May 27, 2026 53 min

How do you build a team where people will run through a wall for each other? Not metaphorically. Literally. James Slipper, the most capped Wallaby of all time. Nic White, the third most capped scrum half in Australian rugby history. Two men who've spent more time with each other than with their families, who've argued hard on the training paddock and sat next to each other every Tuesday team dinner for over a decade. Their answer isn't team building. It isn't trust falls. It isn't a values poster on the wall. Slips opens up on his 2018 rock bottom and the rebuild that gave him the longest career of any Wallaby in history. Nic on the chip on his shoulder that ran most of his career, the sepsis that nearly took him out after he hung up the boots, and the word he never used until now: fragile. Two careers. One friendship. A blueprint for the leaders who are tired of culture being a buzzword. 03:00 — How it started: Nic's first run-in with Slips on the field 05:10 — The relationship that goes deeper than friendship and why that matters for performance 07:30 — "If we brought corporates to watch a Wallabies camp, they'd go... do you guys even like each other?" 10:00 — The Tuesday night team dinner test and why everyone scanned the room for Slips 13:25 — Nic's career in one line: never really felt wanted. 77 test caps later, here's what kept him going 17:55 — The "f*** you" fuel: where it came from, and how long it ran on it 22:10 — When the chip on the shoulder finally became something else and the moment Nic stopped playing for himself 28:35 — Slips on stumbling into a career and what reinvention actually looks like 39:20 — Post-career surgery, sepsis, and the moment the invincible mindset ran out of road 43:05 — "Fragile." Not a word you expect from Nic White. What changed. 49:10 — The next generation: why today's players want to know the why, not just the what 49:45 — Disagree and commit: how high-performing teams hold both honesty and alignment at once Follow Nic on...

Bite Size: What an Olympic Recovery Scientist Really Thinks of Your Fitness Tracker | Shona Halson

May 24, 2026 9 min

You've got more data on your body than any generation before you. Heart rate variability, readiness scores, recovery metrics. But are you actually recovering better? Dr Shona Halson is one of the world's leading recovery scientists. She's worked with Olympic athletes, elite sport, and high performers at every level. Her verdict on wearables is more nuanced than the marketing suggests, and more useful than most of the scores on your wrist. This one will change how you look at your morning metrics. You can find Shona at her LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/shona-halson-627b74268