Meet Pete: Your Coach
Most coaching doesn’t change anything by Monday morning. The coach arrives with a slide deck and a framework with a name. They present. You nod. They leave.
I work differently. You do most of the talking. I listen until I’m genuinely useful.
I’ve paddled out in the North Sea in December. Hiked to Makalu Base Camp, where the trail narrowed to barely a foot wide, snow and altitude playing tricks on your head. I was confident. I wasn’t always competent. The Sherpas were both — they knew which stone would hold before I did.
Nearly three decades making decisions under pressure. 20 years mentoring leaders, the last 10 coaching SME founders and CEOs specifically. Not because any of that’s impressive — because it built a way of thinking about difficulty and trust that a purely corporate career doesn’t.
Activity Isn’t Progress
Early in my career, I delivered a software release on time and on budget. It nearly ended my career.
The deadline was immovable. So I made call after call, stripping capability out to protect the schedule. Every decision felt rational. We hit the date. We hit the cost. The customer hated it — it wasn’t what they needed. I sat in rooms with senior directors explaining myself, and spent months rebuilding a product recovery plan and the trust I’d taken years to earn.
I’d convinced myself I was doing the right thing. I was measuring success with the wrong instrument.
I see this constantly with SME owners — hitting targets they set themselves, delivering what they promised, wondering why the business still feels stuck. Activity isn’t progress. Output isn’t outcome. One question would have saved me the whole ordeal: what does success actually look like for the person receiving this?
What Waiting Costs
Nobody I’ve worked with ever wished they’d waited longer. Not one.
What I hear instead: “I knew something wasn’t working. I just kept thinking I’d figure it out.”
Usually they do — eventually. After the decision that cost six months to recover from. After the hard conversation that never happened. After the strategy that quietly drifted.
I watched this for thirty years in aerospace, where waiting costs you immediately and visibly. Business is slower. Easier to ignore. The pattern’s the same.
What are you figuring out right now, alone, that you don’t have to?
“Pete's leadership and determination to succeed inspired the team to challenge the norm and achieve above and beyond expectations, at the same time implanting a feeling of camaraderie and accountability not often experienced”
— Simon Cross
Ready to take your first step?