E76 - Guests: John Peters, former RAF pilot, Gulf War Prisoner of War, Founder and Owner of Monkey Business

WARNING: This episode contains graphic descriptions of torture and interrogation as well as frequent bad language.

My guest this week is John Peters.  John flew Tornado GR1 aircraft as an RAF pilot and was shot down and captured on his very first operational mission during the Gulf War of 1991.  He was subsequently held as a Prisoner of War for 7 weeks, during which time he was brutally interrogated and tortured on a routine basis.  The traumatic pictures of him (and others) that were released by the Iraqi regime whilst John was in captivity went around the world and still shock to this day.  However, when he was released from captivity at the end of the war, it was those same images that were to transform his life completely in the years that followed.

Although we focus quite heavily on his time in captivity, that is not really what this podcast is about.  The bigger story is all about what John learned about himself during his time as a PoW, and the opportunities that he has been able to leverage to forge a successful business career as a result. He has built up an extensive leadership development, speaking, and coaching career that he has been able to use to benefit countless others in the 25 years since he left the Royal Air Force, and he is able to use first hand examples of resilience and dealing with adversity that very few can match!

This is a powerful, emotional and incredibly interesting story and we have a great discussion about a wide range of leadership issues along the way.  I really hope you enjoy it.