Elevate your performance with expert-led workshops
Our Intelligent Action workshops combine cutting-edge research with real-world experience to empower individuals and groups to achieve their best. Designed and led by Dr Kath Bicknell, every workshop builds on 16 years of experience as a researcher and sports journalist, including a PhD and postdoctoral research focused on strategies elite and developing athletes use to develop their skills and perform them under pressure.
My approach is unique: I translate complex theories from cognitive science, performance studies and anthropology into practical, accessible strategies you can use immediately. Whether you’re an athlete, a corporate team, or a community group, I’m passionate about making cutting-edge research accessible and fun, enabling you to develop personalised strategies that unlock your full potential.
Upcoming workshops
Mind Over Mountain: 2026 goal smashing and resilience building workshop.
This workshop isn’t about more grit. It’s about developing smarter, robust, personalised strategies to tackle your biggest goals in 2026, whether that’s at work, in sport, your health or other parts of life. …With some research-backed techniques for tackling unexpected challenges on the way.
Gallery from previous workshops and speaking gigs
Need an idea? Try these as a starting point, which we can customise for your audience and goals
Athlete Workshops
“The Cognitive Edge: expanding your mental skills for increased efficiency and consistency in sport“
Gain a mental advantage with this workshop designed to help you master your mind under pressure. Learn how to use mental shortcuts to reduce overwhelm and overthinking, enhancing your speed, efficiency, and consistency. This workshop is aimed at athletes seeking to sharpen their mental focus and expand their toolkit for moving well when it counts.”
- Key benefits: Reduce overthinking, increase efficiency, improve consistency, perform better under pressure.
- Who it’s for: Mountain bikers, cyclists, sports teams, individual athletes.
- Format: In person or online (Google Meet)
- Duration: Availalbe as a 1-hour talk/presentation or half-day workshop.
“The Adaptive Athlete: building mental flexibility and strength for peak performance”
Discover how to build on your existing strengths and develop research-backed strategies to navigate upcoming challenges. This workshop teaches you to work with anxiety and fear, leverage the expertise of others, and respond effectively to unexpected situations. Ideal for anyone facing pressure in sport, work or life.
- Key benefits: Increase resilience, manage anxiety, improve collaboration, develop problem-solving skills.
- Who it’s for: Mountain bikers, cyclists, sports teams, individual athletes.
- Format: Online (Google Meet) or in-person.
- Duration: Available as a 1-hour talk/presentation or half-day workshop.
Corporate Workshops
“Peak Performance Mindset: Applying Athlete Strategies to Business”
Equip your team with the mental tools to thrive in today’s dynamic business environment. This workshop focuses on building resilience and developing strategic thinking skills to enhance performance and adaptability. Drawing on research-backed strategies and case studies from high-performance sport, participants will learn to navigate challenges, manage stress, and make effective decisions under pressure. Ideal for teams looking to improve cohesion, boost productivity, and cultivate an adaptable, proactive mindset.
- Key benefits: Enhance adaptability, improve strategic thinking, build resilience, perform better under pressure.
- Who it’s for: Corporate teams and small businesses navigating change and growth.
- Format: In person or online (Google Meet)
- Duration: Available as a 1-hour talk/presentation or half-day workshop.
Community Workshops
“Navigating the Unknown: building resilience and mental flexibility.”
Empower yourself to face any challenge with confidence. This workshop helps you build upon your existing strengths and develop research-backed strategies to navigate current and future uncertainties. You’ll learn to work with anxiety and fear, tap into the support and expertise of others, and respond to unexpected situations with an expanded toolkit.
Designed specifically for community groups and run with sensitivity to specific challenges group members are facing and overcoming such as unemployment, domestic violence, disability and chronic health challenges, or supporting others facing ongoing challenges.
For community groups:
- Key benefits: Increase resilience and mental flexibility, manage anxiety, expand your toolkit for navigating unexpected situations.
- Who it’s for: Community groups
- Format: Online (Google Meet) or in-person.
- Duration: Available as a 1-hour talk/presentation or half-day workshop.
What past participants have said about our workshops
“A place to go to build a better self-understanding.”
participant, resilience workshop
“This workshop helped with finding tools we already have in ourselves but are not aware of.”
community workshop participant
“Kath made everyone feel very comfortable and is a great presenter.”
community workshop participant
“I feel a lot more in control of my own thoughts”
participant, resilience workshop
“Empowering the mind and body to be in tune with what we have but aren’t utilising.
community workshop participant
“The workshop helped with seeing positive aspets of what I already do and promoting thinking about other ways to achieve goals.”
community workshop participant
“Kath brings something new to this area of NSW. I urge anyone who is facing challenges not to miss out on the opportunity to join one of her sessions.
Pat O’Flaherty, chair, hunter adults financial collaborative
“It highlights a big goal you are working towards and helps to visualise the journey to reach that goal”
participant, resilience workshop
“It really opened a new view and way to think.”
participant, mind skills workshop
About Kath
With a unique background in research and sports journalism, combined with my own experience as a competitive cyclist and living with invisibile disabilities, I bring a unique perspective to performance development and resilience training.
My PhD focused on the skills and processes that enable mountain bikers to race their best in chaotic unpredictable conditions. I’ve expanded on this reserach to study cognition in teams, skill learning in circus, and user experiences of an app that helps people recover from – or learn to live well with – chronic pain. I co-edited the academic book Collaborative Embodied Performance: ecologies of skill with Professor John Sutton and have published over 500 articles for Australian and international sports media.
I’m passionate about sharing findings from this research to enable people to discover their own strengths and unique capacities as they achieve goals of their own.
Your message has been sent
Ready to take your performance to the next level? Or increase your resilience under pressure?
Contact me today to discuss your needs and book a workshop or brainstorm ideas for other workshops or speaker sessions. Use this contact form or email me directly at kath@intelligentaction.cc.
Intelligent Action 