About
About Penny Cook
I’m Penny Cook. I work privately with senior leaders and founders who are still delivering, but who have started to notice what it takes to keep delivering.
Penny’s story
I’ve never been particularly good at taking the conventional route.
I’m Penny. Former international trampolinist, psychology graduate, behavioural analyst, coach, wife, mother of three girls and, depending on which chapter of my life you catch me in, an enthusiastic starter of new adventures.
My life has taken me through a few different countries, careers and versions of myself.
I started out in competitive sport, training full-time as a trampolinist. It was an environment built around discipline, performance and pushing limits. When that chapter ended, I had to work out what came next, and who I was outside the sport.
That question led me down a rather different path. I studied psychology, went on to complete a degree in communication, behaviour and credibility analysis, and trained in investigative interviewing. I’ve always been fascinated by people: what drives us, why we behave as we do, and the gap between what we say and what we actually do.
A life that hasn’t followed a straight line
Along the way, I moved to Norway, where I built a life with my now Dutch husband. We got married on top of a mountain at midnight, which probably tells you something about our approach to life.
We went on to have three girls, although the journey to motherhood wasn’t quite as straightforward as I might have imagined. Pregnancy brought hyperemesis, miscarriages and some incredibly difficult periods, all while living far from the familiarity of home, family and the culture I grew up with.
Eventually, we made another big move, this time to Tanzania. Raising three girls in East Africa has brought a completely different set of experiences, challenges and perspectives. There is something about living outside the culture you know that makes you question a lot of things you previously took for granted.
Finding work that fits
Professionally, I’ve tried a few things. Jobs I loved, jobs I didn’t, careers that looked right on paper but never quite fitted. I’ve changed direction, studied, retrained and started again.
Each experience taught me something, but it took time to recognise what connected them all.
I’ve always been drawn to understanding people, behaviour, performance and what makes us tick. Today, I’ve brought those interests together in my work as a coach and performance consultant.
It’s the first time my professional life feels like a genuine fit: a place where my background, education, experience and interests come together, and where I can do work that I find both challenging and meaningful.
I don’t believe there’s one prescribed route to success, or that getting everything right means never changing direction.
I’ve changed direction plenty of times. And I’m rather glad I did.
The idea behind my work
I call it The Success Dilemma. Discipline, resilience and a willingness to put others first can take you a long way. My work looks at what happens when those strengths become automatic responses rather than conscious choices.
Short professional bio
Penny Cook is a coach and consultant who works one-to-one with senior leaders and founders under sustained pressure. Her framework, The Success Dilemma, explores how the strengths behind achievement can become costly when used automatically. Her approach draws on full-time trampoline training, the study of psychology and behaviour, and investigative interviewing.
Work with Penny
If what you’ve read resonates, the next step is a private conversation.