People Soup
Why do good people do things they later regret?
It's a question that's fascinated me for years.
Before I became a coach, studied organisational psychology, or discovered Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), I spent years in HR leadership. One of my roles was leading the Conduct and Discipline Team in a large government department in the UK Civil Service. In that job I became increasingly curious about what really drives human behaviour.
In this special solo episode, I share my working hypothesis about leadership:
Under pressure, leaders often default to behaviours designed to reduce discomfort rather than create impact.
I explore six common patterns of psychologically inflexible leadership and introduce my leadership framework, built around three core skills topped and tailed by the Pause and the Review Loop:
Along the way, I share stories from my own leadership journey, including:
This episode is both a reflection on leadership and an invitation to consider what might be running you when pressure shows up.
"Pressure doesn't reveal who we are. Pressure reveals what's running us."
When pressure rises, what patterns show up most often for you?
You can find an illustration of my ACT-based Leadership Framework in the show notes.
People Soup: Real conversations about work, leadership, and being human — grounded in behavioural science, with practical ideas you can actually use.
If you’re enjoying People Soup, hit follow so you don’t miss future episodes.
Visit Ross' Website.
Connect with Ross on LinkedIn
People Soup on Instagram which also features plenty of Ross' photos of the Andalusian life
He's now also on Bluesky
The People Soup Website on CAPTIVATE