About Dave
Seventeen years making decisions under pressure. A stroke that grabbed my attention. Coaching that grew out of both.
The story
I spent seventeen years as a British Army officer, including operational tours where the cost of unclear thinking wasn't hypothetical. After leaving, I moved into corporate life at Amazon and then Aberdeen – different uniform, same pressure to perform and to hold it together.
The coaching practice began almost by accident: supporting a veteran going through a genuine crisis, in a way that had nothing to do with any leadership framework I'd been taught. That work showed me something about how people actually change, and it didn't match what most coaching and leadership development assumes.
Then, in 2021, life caught up with me – and I had a stroke. Recovering from it made me look at what was important and what I wanted to do with my time. Making Simplicity in Mind my full time gig was the result. Simplicity in Mind is built on the understanding that clarity isn't something you add on top of a busy life, it's what's already there underneath the noise.
How I work
Insight-led, not method-led
I'm a Three Principles practitioner (trained through One Thought and The Clarity Academy) and a Certified Clarity Coach®. In practice, that means I'm not handing you a new model, a personality framework, or a set of habits to install.
The work is about seeing – often quite quickly – how your own thinking is shaping what feels true right now, and what becomes possible when that shifts. It's closer to Sandhurst's "serve to lead" than it is to a typical executive coaching programme: less about performing leadership, more about who you actually are underneath the performance.
The Coaching Journey
As a dyslexic, Dave is a visual thinker and drew this representation of Simplicity in Mind. The first three pictures show the arc of client work and the fourth describes the pay it forward effect of that work.
Credentials
- Three Principles Practitioner (One Thought, Clarity Academy)
- 17 years, British Army officer
- Certified Clarity Coach®
- Post-military leadership roles at Amazon and Aberdeen
Worth knowing
I'm dyslexic – identified during my Army service – which has shaped how I think and communicate more than most things I list here. If plain, direct language matters to you as much as it does to me, we'll get on.