Cyndie Flett

Principal Trainer, Third Factor

Gallup’s decades of research into employee engagement tells us that the number one driver of engagement isn’t how interesting your work is, how much you get paid, what your title is, or even the calibre of your co-workers: it’s the relationship you have with your immediate supervisor. And yet, in the crush of the day-to-day the relationship often takes a back seat to brass tacks. By shifting some of your focus away from task-orientation and towards strengthening the relationships you have with your people you can access deeper reservoirs of motivation, and drive productivity for your entire team.

The relationship is the engine; emotion is the fuel

Every engine needs fuel, and in the coaching relationship there is no stronger fuel than emotion. Much of the time in business we’re taught to keep emotions in check – especially negative emotions like anger, frustration and disappointment. Since it’s rare to see these kinds of emotions expressed, it can be triggering when our people show their dissatisfaction. It can feel like an attack, and the default response can be to mirror the emotion – meet anger with anger – or become defensive.
Every engine needs fuel, and in the coaching relationship there is no stronger fuel than emotion.
Falling into this trap, however, robs you of the opportunity to direct the energy in that emotion in a productive direction. When a team member expresses negative emotion, it means they care. When leaders make an effort to notice and acknowledge the emotion, they can deepen the relationship and build trust. And by exploring the emotion, they can help their people see what’s possible and use their feelings as motivation to take a step in the right direction. In these situations, the relationship is what allows the coach to lean into the emotion and explore it. In our 3×4 Coaching program, we give participants challenges to apply key learnings back on the job. In one of these challenges, a participant committed to asking their people simple questions like, “What’s new from the weekend?” much more frequently than they had before. Asking more, personal questions helped this leader build rapport with their people. And it provided the leader with new insight into their people’s emotions. In the course of these conversations, this leader noticed that the emotion in the person’s response provided a deeper view to valuable information. By leaning into those emotions and exploring them further, the leader was able to learn more about how they were interpreting their experiences. Noticing what made them frustrated, anxious, fearful, or even happy and excited, improved the leader’s ability to identify and address their team’s issues and challenges. With stronger relationships in place, and positive results beginning to emerge, it wasn’t long before the leader began asking more direct questions to gain a deeper understanding of their people’s feelings. Equipped with better information, the leader was able to give more and more targeted support and feedback to enable their team’s success. As a leader and a coach, the relationship you have with your people is what allows you to help them be at their best. When leaders give their relationships the care they need and lean into emotions, they can drive higher levels of performance, and ultimately results.

Make the most of your investment

Investing time in building relationships pays dividends. And yet, all the other pressures don’t go away just because you’ve decided to put your time into this endeavour. To optimize the benefits of relationship building given the reality of time constraints, smart coaches create a strategy for how they’re going to build and maintain their relationships every day. What this comes down to is showing people that you care. That means making time for them, offering them support when they’re struggling, and doing both with unwavering consistency. But every person is different, and what works for one person might not work for another. When you’re working to build relationships with the people you lead, make a point of understanding: and use what you learn to create an approach that’s going to work for them.

Putting it all together

Productivity is the direct result of an effective team. When everyone is engaged and making a strong personal contribution, efficiency follows. And the greatest influence on performance and engagement is the team’s leader; their coach. But which leader garners the higher level of engagement and commitment: the leader who focuses first on task execution? Or the leader who works to build relationships and earn permission to coach their people to a higher level of performance? In your next round of one-on-one meetings, take the time to consider your relationship with the person you’re leading. You might just find that when you move your focus from the to-do list to the person, productivity follows.

Curious about 3×4 Coaching?

Dane Jensen

CEO, Third Factor

Over the course of your career, you’ve probably handed out a few “feedback sandwiches” – a piece of criticism hidden between two pieces of positive reinforcement. But as Peggy Baumgartner lays out in her latest article for HBR, you need to stop softening tough feedback. In the article, Peggy outlines why the “sandwich” doesn’t work:

🧹 People who think highly of themselves might brush off the piece of corrective feedback, giving more weight to the positive news surrounding it.

😟 But those who are self-critical might dwell on the bad news and miss out on the good.

🐍 And the lack of direct communication makes people feel like they’re victims of a sneak attack.

Instead, Peggy offers simple advice for leaders who need to give feedback: Describe the behaviour you want to reinforce or correct, explain the impact of the behaviour, and outline what you want them to do. Click here to read the article on hbr.org. In our 3×4 Coaching virtual learning journey, participants are given challenges to apply what they’ve learned on the job. In this video, our Chief Learning Officer, Peggy Baumgartner, showcases how one program participant used a challenge activity to make a lasting difference in his organization.
When it comes to coaching, it’s not about what you know; it’s what you do that ultimately matters. That’s why we make challenge activities a part of our online learning journeys. Participants are given a challenge and encouraged to make note of what works for them and what impact it had. One participant, taking the 3×4 Coaching program through Queen’s Executive Education, really took his challenge on recognition to heart. Following the challenge, Dave Cooper shared that he had written a letter to his team to recognize their contributions through the pandemic. As the manager of retail leadership development for Sport Chek, a major retailer with approximately 250 stores, his team had been hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. “Our training team got very disconnected from the stores, which was really difficult for me personally and difficult for our team,” Dave told us. “After going through eight months of this constant stress, I wanted to see if I could write something to recognize what they’d accomplished how long they had endured. And maybe give them a little nudge that they have more in them.” Dave’s letter to his team was particularly effective because it took all the key concepts from the recognition module and used them in a very powerful way: The people in Dave’s organization are sure to feel seen, heard and incredibly valued after reading his letter. It’s always exciting to see the concepts we teach transferred back into the work world. If you’re excited about the possibilities coaching can open up, you can bring the 3×4 Coaching program to your organization or enrol as an individual through Queen’s Executive Education.

In this article

Explore our virtual leadership development options to meet your current needs.

In about 90% of our conversations with clients, the first question we’re asked is “what can you deliver remotely?” And – the answer is ‘a lot!’ We’ve spent the past six months transforming our product line and, since April, we’ve had more than 5,000 learners go through our programs remotely – from webinars on leading remotely for 500+ people, to immersive 6-week learning journeys to Coaching mastery for smaller cohorts, to building resilience skills in the EMBA class at Queen’s Smith School of Business.

One Size Doesn’t Fit All

Depending on your goals for virtual learning, different approaches are required. We’ve taken a ‘small / medium / large’ approach to our product development to meet the needs of a variety of scenarios:

 Large Group Experiences

Webinars or a-synchronous content to spark ideas and motivation for groups of any size.

 Targeted Group Programs

Learning journeys that integrate video, synchronous learning, 1:1 coaching and application to build mastery for up to 49 people.

 In-depth Cohort Programs

Half-day interactive instructor-led sessions for up to 18 people to build core skills.

Whatever your needs – we’re likely to have a virtual solution that hits the mark in terms of depth, duration and class size.

Get the catalog

Download a full summary of our leadership development programs.

Let’s go

Timeless skills + the right tools for right now

Of course, we have a range of virtual options in our core competencies: coaching skills for managers, resilience skills for all, and self-awareness skills to enable more productive collaboration. And, we are continuously launching virtual programs that give learners the skills they need to be successful right now. Note that we are continuously developing new offers (and adapting our in-person programs to virtual delivery) so this list will be updated as new programs come online.

Coaching skills for managers

The 3×4 Coaching model explores the 3 plays and 4 skills consistently executed by world-leading coaches.

We have a full range of options for bringing our industry-leading 3×4 Coaching model to life virtually – with a specific eye to how to coach in a virtual environment.

In-depth Cohort Programs

3×4 Coaching Virtual Learning Journey

Coaches are leaders who do all they can to help people improve and succeed. It is a way of thinking and interacting with people that communicates high expectations, respect and caring. In this 4 – 6 week (depending on your desired pace) virtual program, individuals learn the concepts and skills of a coaching style of management that builds commitment, drives employee engagement, gets results, and integrates this learning into the flow of their work.

Get a feel for the learning experience in this 3-minute video overview of the program.

Targeted Group Programs

Coaching Remotely 1/2-day Virtual Program

Coaches are leaders who do all they can to help people improve and succeed. It is a way of thinking and interacting with people that communicates high expectations, respect and caring. In this 4 – 6 week (depending on your desired pace) virtual program, individuals learn the concepts and skills of a coaching style of management that builds commitment, drives employee engagement, gets results, and integrates this learning into the flow of their work.

Having Challenging Conversations from a Distance 1/2-day Virtual Program

Our practical, 4-step map for challenging conversations is rooted in our 25 years of experience helping elite athletes manage emotions under intense pressure. Participants explore methods of preparing to confront, learn an effective format for an opening statement, practice managing reactivity and discuss how to close the conversation with accountability built-in.

Large Group Experiences

3×4 Coaching Overview Webinar

Learning coaching skills is the best way to dramatically increase your people’s commitment level and performance. This interactive 1-hour online session starts your powerful coaching journey.

3×4 Coaching Asynchronous Video Program

The 3×4 Coaching Video Program is a self-paced, asynchronous learning journey that unpacks the 3 plays and 4 skills of exceptional coaches. It provides learners with a powerful, easy-to-understand model for coaching people to higher levels of results and engagement.

Watch a brief sample of the 3×4 Coaching video program

Resilience skills for all

Building Resilience is aimed at giving participants a toolkit of inner skills to navigate their high pressure realities.

Rarely has resilience been as relevant as it is right now. We take our 30+ years of experience in resilience, and bring it to life in a way that gives people the insight and skills needed right now.

In-depth Cohort Programs

Building Resilience Virtual Learning Journey

The virtual Building Resilience program synthesizes 30 years of science-backed and performance-proven strategies into a practical toolkit that participants can use to stay healthy under pressure and recover when they are thrown off balance. Our approach to resilience draws on work in elite sport, teaching and research in academia, and work with thousands of people in organizations of all sizes. Building Resilience is a transformative experience that allows participants to learn in the flow of work while changing the way they relate to pressure.

Targeted Group Programs

Building Resilience 1/2-day Virtual Program

A leader’s ability to stay resilient through setbacks and be predictable under pressure is the #1 indicator of how their team will weather the storm. Learn practical techniques for staying even-keeled when it matters most in this 1/2-day online workshop.

Large Group Experiences

Building Resilience Overview Webinar

This online session equips participants with an understanding of how uncertainty and pressure impact their performance and health, an awareness of the choices they have to enhance their resilience under pressure, and a guided, applied exercise that will specifically tackle how they are framing and taking direct action on the areas that will most impact their performance and resilience.

Topical skills leaders need right now

Our Maintaining Team Motivation Through The Troughs program teaches leaders four allies for fighting disillusionment.

A collection of fit-for-purpose programs that address hot button issues like motivation through prolonged periods of uncertainty, challenging conversations from a distance, and the imperative for agility and personal ownership over re-skilling.

Targeted Group Programs

Maintaining Team Motivation Through the Troughs 1/2-day Virtual Program

As the pandemic drags on, maintaining motivation and engagement will become a primary challenge for leaders. Learn practical techniques to keep people energized, resilient and motivated, inspired by Olympic coaches and athletes, in this 1/2-day online workshop.

Large Group Experiences

The Meta-Skilled Organization

Meta-skills are the connective tissue that allow people and organizations to let go of the skills that have anchored their successful past and master and embrace new ways of working – in other words, to evolve. Packed with ideas on both how to foster the development of meta-skills for yourself, and how to build meta-skilled organizations as stewards of talent, this keynote lays out a framework for six key meta-skills that allow individuals and organizations to see clearly, move quickly, and stay the course.

Self-awareness & collaboration

The “player’s card” is one of our favourite tools for helping learners translate self-awareness to communication and action.

The Attentional and Interpersonal Styles Inventory (TAIS) was originally developed to help Olympic athletes and elite military units optimize performance in high-pressure situations. Every day, these individuals must make critical decisions under pressure with less than perfect information. Since its introduction, business leaders have recognized that their people face similar, if not identical, problems and have made the TAIS their assessment of choice. Our work with the TAIS and fostering self-awareness has never been more vital – or easier to deliver. 1:1 coaching and self-awareness work is a natural fit for a virtual environment.

Targeted Group Programs

The Self-Aware Leader Virtual Program

The Self-Aware Leader program combines the TAIS assessment, three one-on-one coaching sessions, the creation of a personal action plan to address a real business challenge, an ability to chart your progress and adjust your approach through the guidance of a coach. It will help leaders understand and leverage their strengths under pressure and identify what changes if made, would matter the most.

Large Group Experiences

TAIS Assessment + 1:1 Coaching

Whether you want to build self-awareness for a few executives or all of your people managers, the TAIS can help them identify environments and performance situations in which they will thrive and excel, when and how they are most likely to make mistakes and what they can do to ensure you will perform well under pressure. Participants receive an individual report detailing 18 personal styles as they relate to attention, information, leadership, social and communication and have the opportunity to build further clarity with a 1:1 coaching call.

Let’s talk!

If you’re interested in any the above – or anything that you don’t see here – let’s chat! You can get in touch at hello@thirdfactor.com.
Download the catalog.

Get a complete overview of our coaching, collaboration and resilience programs.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
Feedback is such an important part of our 3×4 Coaching model. Giving people information about their performance is one of the best ways to help them get better. But do your people actually know that the information you’re telling them is intended as feedback? A woman walked up to me in an executive leadership program I was teaching and said, “My 360-degree feedback from several of my employees says that I don’t give enough feedback. That’s nonsense! I give feedback to them all the time.” My advice to her was to use a yellow highlighter. She told me that that wouldn’t work because most of the feedback she gave was verbal.
“Let me give you some feedback on that.”
“Then use a verbal yellow highlighter,” I responded. “Whenever I have to give anybody feedback, and I want to to make sure it’s been heard and recognized as feedback, I always use the word feedback and emphasize it… as in ‘let me give you some feedback on that.’” On the next day of the program she walked up to me and said “Oh my gosh that was so simple, and it will make a big difference. In thinking back to my conversations with my employees I realized that very often when I was actually giving them some feedback I rarely used the word feedback, so they didn’t recognize it as such when they were asked.” It will definitely help the employees’ performance and, secondarily the results on her 360 feedback. We have long said growth is what gives meaning to pressure. During difficult times, the people who are most likely to stay committed are the ones who have clarity and feel like they’re moving forward with their personal development. And the person with the greatest ability to provide clarity and help drive that development forward is their leader; their coach. In this interactive, 60-minute online session, one of Canada’s leading experts on coaching, Cyndie Flett, will explore the strategies great coaches use to ensure clarity, inspire and develop their people even when faced with significant uncertainty. And, she’ll introduce the tools leaders can use to overcome the logistical challenges of building engagement while working remotely. This session is about people – not technology. The environment has changed, but people’s basic needs haven’t. You will come away with a better understanding of the role coaches play in supporting people to rise to the occasion while meeting them where they’re at. You’ll also gain practical tools you can immediately apply in your environment, backed up by examples and best practices from top coaches. Participants will learn:
SORRY WE MISSED YOU

This event has passed, but it won’t be the last. Be the first to know about future webinars from Third Factor by entering your information below.

About the presenter:
Cyndie Flett is one of Canada’s leading experts on coaching. As the former Vice President of Research and Development for the Coaching Association of Canada, and Director of the National Coaching Certification Program, Cyndie has dramatically impacted the way that literally millions of coaches are educated across the country.
Editor’s note: This article was first published on April 14th, 2020, just a few weeks into the COVID-19 pandemic. While the context may have changed, your plays as a leader are still the same.

In this article:

Four imperatives for leaders in times of uncertainty

In these uncertain times, you are likely facing new challenges as a leader. From working from home to school closures and outright community lockdowns – everyone has been dealing with significant, unexpected change over the past few weeks. These changes have impacted us all – changing the way we communicate, work together, and accomplish our goals. During these tough times what we have noticed is people’s desire to help others. The feeling that we will come through this together is a rallying cry that gives heart to many. But as leaders, as coaches, what does this mean? How do you help your people during times like this? It’s a question many are struggling with.

It’s all about the relationship

When people go through difficult times together, they can emerge more connected – but only if they’re conscious about it. Difficult times can also lead to fracture. As a leader, it’s your job to step back and really think about how you are building and deepening relationships with your people in this new environment. Take the time to check in with your people and listen to them. Take some time to step back and see what you’re going through as impartial observers and acknowledge that it’s hard. These are unprecedented times and the effort you make to stay connected with your people can make a huge difference. Coach Roy Rana of the Sacramento Kings spoke with us about how building relationships is intentional. There is an intention to communicate, to make the person feel connected, to ensure they know they have your attention. He talks about the little things that he does to accomplish this. In the video below, he lays out the wonderful challenge he sets for himself of “30 seconds every day for every player”:
Rana’s Strategies are for basketball – not your environment. So what would work for you? What are the little ways you can connect with your people to communicate that you are thinking of them and you care?

The game has changed

By now, every workplace has been impacted by COVID-19. The game has changed, and clarity needs to be re-established. Your team needs new skills and mindsets so that you can get through this together.
“We can’t go back, only forward.”
Ask yourself what your team needs for their new playbook. Do your people know what the work expectations are today? Timelines are different. Things change quickly so clarity is always evolving. Think short term and help them find focus. Do they know what other people need from them? Are they aware of how your goals have shifted? Especially if your team is working differently than they’re used to, over-communication is impossible when it comes to these things. Your team also needs clarity on what your organization’s values look like in this reality. Not just the vague, nice-sounding words – what they actually look like. If you value safety, how are you acting on that value? If you value team, how are you making sure that no one’s feeling isolated? Get together as a team to discuss your values and think through how you’re living up to them at this time. Through all of this, recognize that as a coach you need to meet your people where they’re at. Some team members might be juggling kids and other family constraints. They may even be caring for someone who is sick. Give them real clarity on how your team can work well together in a way that’s not going to make anyone feel criticized, judged or guilty. Have empathy for what they’re going through and use humour to help people feel at ease. Some team members (and perhaps even you) may be thinking they just need to hold on for a little bit longer until things get back to normal. That thinking will not serve them or the organization well. When companies face disruption, the ones who try to ignore it or find a way to hang on to their old ways of doing things don’t fare well – think Blockbuster. We can’t go back, only forward.

New plays for a new game

When the game changes, you can’t expect to get the same results from the same behaviours. As a coach, your goal is to help your people succeed in their new reality – and this means helping them get up to speed on the skills that will support the new expectations as well as discouraging the old behaviours that are no longer productive. This is all about consistent feedback and communication, and feedback is a challenge when you can’t see what people are doing. For the coachee, the lack of visibility can lead to frustration and unnecessary roadblocks that can harm engagement. Make a habit of checking in frequently with each team member to support their development. This isn’t about micromanaging or checking up on them; it’s about making sure they’re not sitting alone frustrated because something’s blocking their progress. If that sounds like a big job, that’s because it is. Coach Rana told us about how making time for each and every team member is a challenge even as a professional coach. And he offered this advice for keeping the connection alive even when it feels like you’re too busy.

Out of sight, not out of mind

If what I’m doing can’t be seen, how do I know if it’s valued or appreciated? This is one of the challenges your people are facing as they transition to a new reality. People need to know that what they do has value, so giving appropriate recognition is more important now than ever. This doesn’t mean handing out awards and prizes. It’s about looking for the bright spots – things that are going well, little wins, positive behaviours – and acknowledging them. You might recognize a team member who creates a shared space for everyone to connect, or someone who volunteers to take on a task for another team member they see struggling. It’s also vital to recognize that people need to feel connected and not isolated. Make every conversation a coaching one. Even simple questions like “how are things going today” have value for a coach. As you explore the answer, you can uncover the information you need to find possibilities and build commitment to a solution. When people are worried, anxious or afraid they’re harder on themselves than ever. Having the coach remind them of who they are at their best brings tremendous energy.

Be ready for the human element

Behind all this is a real humanitarian challenge. As time goes on, the people on your team may become sick, need time off to care for loved ones, or worse. Loss is going to look very different for different people – it can be loss of a loved one, income, or something else. As a coach you have a role to play in supporting your team members as they recover from whatever their loss may be. The temptation is to think that when someone is in pain over their loss that bringing it up will cause undue pain by reminding them of it. Just keep to your work and ignore it. And that’s like the monster under the bed for a little kid. As long as the kid believes there’s a monster under the bed it gets bigger and bigger. The longer it goes, the bigger it gets.
“When loss isn’t acknowledged, it feels like it’s been dismissed.”
This is true on both sides of the relationship. In Sheryl Sandberg’s book, Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy, she talks about how the hardest part of going back to work after losing her husband was the silence. When loss isn’t acknowledged, it feels like it’s been dismissed. And a significant loss being dismissed feels really bad. You don’t need to be a counsellor or have all the answers, and there’s no secret formula for how to deal with these times. Your job as a coach is to bring things to the surface and give people permission to talk about it if and when they want.

Help people get better at whatever it is they do

We often define a coach’s core job as this: help people get better at whatever it is they do. We call this developmental bias, the idea that a coach is always biased toward developing their people no matter what the circumstance. As the “whatever it is they do” continues to change and evolve over the coming months, and probably years, you have an opportunity to help your people stay engaged and rise to the occasion. By maintaining and building relationships, building clarity around what’s expected, building competence in new ways of working, and recognizing the all of what is happening, you can show your people that you’re on their side and help your entire team emerge stronger for it. This Friday marks the 10-year anniversary of the Closing Ceremonies of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games. Here at Third Factor, we were incredibly proud to directly and indirectly support many of the athletes and coaches that would go on to become household names. Ten years later, we are still committed to supporting Olympic and Paralympic athletes and coaches in their bid for the podium. And three incredible stories from the 2010 Games continue to influence our understanding of the power of pressure and the way we interact with our clients across all areas of our business.

Changing a Canadian mindset

Prior to the Vancouver Olympics, Canada was known in Olympic circles for one notable achievement: it was the only nation in the world to host the Games without a local athlete winning gold. In fact, Canada had achieved this feat twice; first at the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal, and again at the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary. When Vancouver won the bid to host the 2010 Winter Games, Canada’s 13 winter national sport organizations were determined to change that reputation. A report by sport management consultant and Olympic Hall of Famer, Cathy Priestner Allinger, found that Canadian athletes ranked top-five in the world the year before the games were far less likely to go on to win an Olympic medal than international athletes who were performing at the same level.
“Canada’s challenge wasn’t producing world-class athletes; it was producing world-class athletes who could perform with all the distractions and pressure of the Olympics”
In other words, Canada’s challenge wasn’t producing world-class athletes; it was producing world-class athletes who could perform with all the distractions and pressure of the Olympics. Brian Orser was one of Canada’s star athletes at the Calgary Games in 1988, and he spoke to us about the pressure of competing in front of a home crowd.
To help Canada’s performers prepare for the pressure of Olympic competition, the not-for-profit organization Own the Podium was formed to provide and fund support structures designed to give Canadian athletes the preparation that would allow them to access their best performances in the face of Olympic pressure. Own The Podium was a spectacular success. At Vancouver, Canadian athletes won 26 medals, including a record-setting 14 gold medals, placing Canada third overall. Since that time, Canadian athletes have been ‘converting’ at a rate of around 70% and Canadians now enter Olympic Games with an expectation that they could indeed, be the best in the world.

The impact of self-awareness and communication strategies

We had always believed that self-awareness was a critical component of team performance, and there was no doubt on the subject following our work with the Canadian Women’s Olympic Hockey Team at the Vancouver Games. In 2010, the team was looking to defend its gold medal from the Turin Games four years prior. They were also preparing to face their American arch-rivals who had bested them at the world championship the year before. As the team’s mental performance coach, Third Factor Founder, Dr. Peter Jensen, was tasked with helping the team perform through the high-stakes tournament while under intense scrutiny from the home crowd. To help keep the team running like a finely tuned engine, he elected to bring in our collaboration guru, Peggy Baumgartner, to guide the team through our Self-Aware Team process. Through the program, the team was able to gain a better understanding of their tendencies – both individually and as a team under pressure. And, they leveraged that new understanding to design systems to keep communication flowing effectively when the pressure mounted. The players remember it as a challenge that was both extremely difficult, and extremely worthwhile.
With a strategy in place, the team was able to communicate and stay consistent whether things were going well or poorly. They were able to work their way through the ups and downs of Olympic competition and successfully defend their gold medal on home ice. What we learned is that when you have a high functioning team – even one that’s among the best in the world – one of the most powerful ways to further enhance their performance is to increase their self-awareness and communication skills.

The convergence of health and performance

For us at Third Factor, there was a hidden storyline we were following that was far more significant than the Olympics. One week prior to the start of the Games, Peter Jensen was with the Women’s Olympic Hockey Team in Jasper, Alberta, at their pre-Olympic camp when he received confirmation that he had throat and neck cancer.
“Peter had to keep the information from the team so as not to become an enormous distraction”
Peter had to notify the leadership at Hockey Canada and, with their blessing, continued to support the mental performance of the Women’s Olympic Hockey Team. As they headed into their most important competition of the four-year cycle, Peter had to keep the information from the team so as not to become an enormous distraction while simultaneously teaching skills, being at his best and dispensing regular doses of his usual sense of humour. Peter is currently cancer-free and maintains a crazy busy schedule delivering keynote speeches to audiences big and small around the world. Peter wrote about his experience in his own words in his whitepaper, When Health and Performance Converge: What I (re)Learned From Cancer. It’s a great read if you’re curious to learn more about how he was able to stay resilient through such a difficult time. To those of us at Third Factor, the 2010 Vancouver Games are a reminder that Peter doesn’t just teach people how to handle pressure, he lives and breathes the content.