Phil Holdcroft

Phil Holdcroft is a former combat pilot whose 20-year career saw him dodge bullets on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan and extend to executive senior leadership of Defence, shaping Britain’s future on the global stage.

With an inspiring story like no other, Phil Holdcroft triumphed over adversity in every chapter of his remarkable life. He has made it his mission to share his powerful and transformative lessons, equipping others with the knowledge, skills, and mindset to achieve extraordinary results.

Phil is committed to pushing the limits of what is possible; he has tested his mind and body through record-breaking feats, as an elite endurance athlete and extreme adventurer, including rowing unsupported across the Atlantic Ocean.

The most daunting challenges have been thrown at him by life itself. Phil talks openly about ‘unravelling’ when his youngest daughter was diagnosed with leukaemia. An event he describes as “more harrowing than the terrors of battle or the fiercest of ocean storms”.

Thankfully, the outcome was a happy one. But the experience taught Phil life-lessons about the complexity of resilience and the power of purpose.

For his final role in the Armed Forces, Phil had the privilege of designing and delivering the senior leadership programme at the United Kingdom Defence Academy. This role allowed Phil to draw together his incredible life-lessons and experience to create the ultimate playbook of leadership, resilience and high-performance.

Now officially a veteran, Phil Holdcroft is continuing to pursue his life’s purpose: helping others to conquer Big Hairy Audacious Goals. His keynotes are utterly captivating – he connects, energises, and inspires in equal measure. Audiences are left contemplating his favourite quote: “What would you attempt to do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”

Contact Great British Speakers today to book former combat soldier and inspirational veteran Phil Holdcroft for your next event.

Type Of Speaker

Business & Finance Exploration & Military High Performance Keynote Leadership & Teamwork Motivational Personal Development Resilience Speaker Virtual Speakers

More About Phil Holdcroft

Phil Holdcroft is fascinated by High Performance. His passion for pursuing goals on the edge of what’s possible is matched by his thirst for understanding the building blocks for high performance. For his second Masters, Phil dived into the topic of Resilience – exploring ‘Why, when faced with extreme stress, adversity and trauma do some crumble and fail, while others grow and thrive?’

A unique combination of lived experience and obsessive curiosity has allowed Phil to build what he calls ‘The Universal Playbook for High Performance’. Irrespective of your goals, Phil believes that by embracing High Performance knowledge, skills and mindset we can all unlock extraordinary results.

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Phil Holdcroft – Speaking

Working with corporate and public sector clients, Phil is able to capture the audience’s imagination, planting seeds of inspiration and providing actionable tools for immediate impact.
Phil takes enormous pride in ensuring his keynotes are carefully tailored to deliver maximum engagement and impact for each audience he works with.

By investing time and effort in understanding the audience, Phil ensures he is drawing on the most impactful life experiences and frameworks for each client. As a consequence, the ‘so what’ for the audience is laser-focused, leaving them empowered and equipped to take meaningful action in their professional and personal lives.

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Phil Holdcroft | Speaker Keynote Topics

Through Adversity to the Stars

Topics: Leadership, Teamwork, Resilience, and High Performance

Perfect for: Sales kick-offs, annual kick-offs, industry and association events, inspirational speaker series, customer events

In this utterly captivating and inspiring keynote, Phil Holdcroft takes your audience on a rollercoaster journey. He unpacks and explores leadership, teamwork, resilience and high performance using powerful lived experience. By sharing his own remarkable journey, from the depths of adversity to incredible triumphs, audiences are able to connect the dots in their own lives.

Your audience will learn:

The Playbook for High Performance (equipping you with the knowledge, tools and mindset for High Performance).
How to leverage adversity as a springboard for growth.
The importance of building resilience in individuals and teams.
How to build, inspire and lead a team to achieve extraordinary results

Finding Purpose – the power of purpose for achieving extraordinary results

Topics: Purpose, leadership, vision, resilience, empowerment

Perfect For: Employee teamwork and collaboration events, global conferences, client-facing events, corporate meetings, associations

With the right ‘why’, the seemingly impossible can become possible. In this tailored, visual, and highly memorable keynote, Phil Holdcroft takes your audience on a journey to discover the ‘Power of Purpose’ for galvanising your organisation with a shared vision for success. Your audience will learn:

What can be achieved when we harness the power of purpose?
How to build a clear, compelling, and shared Purpose for any team or organisation.
The importance of communication and how to get this right.
How to empower teams through a shared vision.
How to build trust and the importance of vulnerability in teams and leaders.
Simple actionable steps for building a resilient mindset that is underpinned with purpose.

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Wing Commander Philip Holdcroft, RAF, photographed in the Forum of the JSCSC at the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom.

Big Hairy Audacious Goals: Conceiving, Believing, Achieving

Topics: High Performance, Goals, Resilience, Mindset, Leadership and Teamwork

Perfect For: Sales kick-offs, annual kick-offs, internal leadership events, customer and user conferences, associations and industry.

Having achieved Big Hairy Audacious Goals in every chapter of his life, Phil Holdcroft shares the secret sauce for success in this engaging and highly impactful keynote. Drawing on his academic research credentials, experience from high-end combat missions, and history of extreme adventures and elite sport, this is the ultimate lesson in conquering big goals.

Conveyed with humility, energy and passion, this keynote will transform the way your team thinks, acts and achieves. Audiences will learn the following:

How to make the habit of excellence part of your team’s culture.
Proven methods for triumphing in a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world.
How seemingly ordinary people and teams can achieve extraordinary results.
The playbook for setting and achieving goals right on the limits of your capability.
How to equip your team with the knowledge, tools and mindset for high performance.