About
Mark Wales
Former SAS
TROOP COMMANDER
Wharton
MBA
McKinsey
CONSULTANT
Survivor
AUSTRALIAN WINNER
Bestselling
AUTHOR
Founder
MISSION READY
WHY MISSION READY
Why Mission Ready exists.
I built Mission Ready after time spent in the field with both special forces and a top consulting firm. The threads common to elite teams and leaders became obvious: mission focus, strong planning, an excellence mindset, and relentless execution.
Mission Ready aims to transform leaders and teams with the same frameworks and habits that I saw elite teams embrace in the field.
Mission Ready is everything I learned and distilled into a practical leadership system. A system that you can learn, use and apply — starting now.
How Mark teaches.
Practice over theory
Every Mission Ready lesson comes with a field kit — an assignment applied to your real team, in real time. Leadership is a practice, not a subject.
Honest over comfortable
The most useful feedback is the most accurate feedback. Mark teaches leaders to tell the truth — to their teams and to themselves.
Simple over sophisticated
Elite performance is built on fundamentals executed with discipline, not on complexity. Every framework in Mission Ready can be explained on a napkin and implemented before lunch.
ABOUT MARK
The full story.
Mark Wales grew up in Newman, a remote iron ore mining town in Western Australia, and decided early that he wanted to join Australian Special Forces.
He enrolled at the University of New South Wales and Royal Military College Duntroon, was commissioned as a Lieutenant in 1999, and was selected into the Special Air Service Regiment.
Over 16 years in the Australian Army — including six years in the SAS — Mark completed ten operational deployments across Afghanistan, Iraq, East Timor, the Solomon Islands, Lebanon, and Fiji. As a Troop Commander, he led 30 elite soldiers on combat missions deep behind enemy lines.
After leaving the military in 2014, Mark battled depression and post-traumatic stress. He turned it around — earning an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and going on to work as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company.
Since then, Mark has won Australian Survivor, published the national bestselling memoir Survivor: Life in the SAS (2021), released his debut novel Outrider (2024), appeared in George Miller’s Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, founded the apparel brand Kill Kapture, and published Mission Ready: SAS Commander’s Strategies for Resilience, Leadership and Elite Performance (2026).
He is a sought-after keynote speaker and the founder of the Mission Ready leadership development programme — the practical leadership operating system built from everything he learned in war zones, boardrooms, and high-pressure environments worldwide.
Mark lives in Sydney with his partner and three kids who he absolutely adores.
For individuals
Mission Ready ONLINE Course
Self-paced. Built for action. Proven results.
Learn the same decision-making frameworks used by elite teams to lead yourself and others with confidence.
FOR ORGANISATIONS
CORPORATE TRAINING
Build teams that perform when it matters.
Bring Mission Ready into your organisation with practical leadership training designed to strengthen decision-making, resilience and performance under pressure.
FOR EVENTS
SPEAKING
Battle-tested leadership insights.
Book Mark for in-person or virtual keynotes that challenge teams to think differently, lead with confidence and perform in high-pressure environments.
If you want the full system, start with the course
The complete transformation programme. Preview the first lessons and see exactly how it works.
PREVIEW THE MISSION READY COURSE