Chris Marshall studies how humans make decisions when things get messy. Which is most of the time, if we’re honest.
He competed at elite level sport, where he learned that physical skill only gets you so far if your head’s not in it. Then he walked into the investment world in 2008. Right as the financial crisis hit.
Great timing, really.
It became a live laboratory. His early research focused on how people evaluate risk when uncertainty’s high and everything feels like guesswork. Turns out, resilience and mental toughness matter. But they’re not the whole story.
His career’s circled one question: How do people make good decisions when the world gets messy?
That question’s taken him through leadership development, working with trauma survivors, behavioural research, organisational design. He’s trained as a performance coach, psychotherapist, and applied psychologist. He’s now finishing a PhD on playfulness as a strategic advantage in high-pressure environments.
(Yes, a PhD on playfulness. His family also thinks it’s weird.)
Chris’s interest in playfulness didn’t start where you’d expect.
He was working with survivors of complex trauma. Heavy stuff. And he saw something resilience alone couldn’t explain: playfulness wasn’t a luxury or a nice-to-have.
It was a recovery tool. A performance tool. A way to reactivate creativity, connection, and cognitive flexibility when it mattered most.
Since then, he’s applied that work across finance, leadership, and team performance. Helping organisations rethink not just how people cope with change, but how they thrive in it.
Because the teams that survive disruption aren’t the grittiest ones. They’re the ones who can adapt without breaking.
Chris wrote two books:
Decoding Change (2022)
Why disruption comes in waves. And how to ride them instead of drowning.
The Playful Advantage (2025)
Why playfulness is the human superpower we’ve been ignoring. Backed by neuroscience, psychology, and real-world practice. Not trust falls.
Chris speaks at conferences. Shows up on podcasts. Talks about leadership, resilience, and why humans are terrible at uncertainty (but can get better).
His philosophy’s simple:
Disruption isn’t going anywhere. The leaders who thrive will be the ones who can be playful.
Not because play is fun (though it is). Because it’s what keeps you flexible when everything else is falling apart.
