Consultant

Researcher and Consultant Biography

Marcus Wynne is a pioneer in designing training that integrates neuroscience and psychology to enhance performance under extreme stress. For over 30 years his successful programs have accelerated learning, enhanced performance and inoculated against stress students who include professional race car drivers, astronauts, fighter pilots, law enforcement officers, soldiers, sailors, airmen, special operators, intelligence agents, security personnel and professional athletes.

He’s designed training for the US Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (Counter-Terror and Advanced Law Enforcement Training, Marana) as well as for hundreds of law enforcement and military organizations worldwide.  His methods were adopted at the national level for military and law enforcement in Sweden, Norway, South Africa and Israel.

Marcus has presented his methods to enhance stress resistance, accelerate learning and improve training via targeted neuroplasticity at the US Department of Defense Advanced Research and Projects Administration (DARPA) as well as at Google’s X-Lab, the foremost private sector research and development lab in the US.

His work is cited in many national and international journals.  Significant cites include:  Survival Stress Training As Observed In The Context Of Emergency Egress. NASA Psychological Services Group and Krug Life Sciences; Frontiers of Criminal Justice: International Perspectives on Police Education and Training edited by Perry Stanislad; and The Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology.

Marcus is a veteran of the US Army’s 82d Airborne and the United Nations Command Joint Security Force (Republic of South Korea) and served as an Airborne Infantry Battalion Training Sergeant, infantry Platoon Sergeant and Platoon Leader (1977-1984). He also served in federal law enforcement as a Federal Air Marshal, FAM Team Leader and lead FAM firearms instructor during the First Gulf War. He served in a variety of undercover counter-terror positions in over 100 countries.

His extensive operational experience leavens his academic and laboratory research which results in immediately applicable techniques, methods, and practices for the most cutting-edge high performers in military special operations and other similar high-risk professions.

Significant Consultation and Research Accomplishments

  • Design and deliver accelerated learning and enhanced performance under stress training for Federal Air Marshal Program.
  • Improve training for psychological attributes and enhanced performance under stress for NASA’s Astronaut Training Program.
  • Design and deliver integrated selection, assessment, skills and team building program for TARGET Corporation Corporate Security.  Highest ROI on training in TARGET’s corporate history.
  • Psychological Performance Coach for BMW Professional Race Team (Tour Car) during BMW driver Didier De Chenniere’s winning season.
  • Designed “Mental Conditioning for Close Combat” at South African Police Service National Academy for over 120,000 police officers.
  • Instructor development on how-to integrate psychological skills into military and law enforcement training for NATO instructors.
  • Instructor development for every military and law enforcement instructor in Sweden at Swedish National Police University and Land Warfare Center.
  • Co-designed Swedish Army Close Quarter Battle Program integrated into US Special Operations Combatives Program.
  • Assist Norwegian National Police Academy on integrating stress inoculation into computer-based training and firearms training.
  • Training consultation and instructor development with Israeli Defense Forces and select special operations personnel.
  • Training consultation with Knesset Security Army.
  • Training and instructor development for Israeli Defense Forces Special Operations Units to include Counter-Terror Unit, Counter Terror School and other special units.
  • Led research team with Dr. Aminda O’Hare and Dr. Amanda Beer that established new field of academic inquiry: accelerated learning concurrent with stress inoculation.  First peer reviewed publication in the new field appears in The Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology.

Consultation and Professional References and Endorsements

Nasa Astronaut Office

Mr. Wynne completed an assessment of critical training for NASA’s astronauts during the Space Shuttle Program….Mr. Wynne was hired for his vast experience in training individuals and teams to operate effectively in high stress environments with significant physical, emotional and mental challenges where mistakes or delays in taking action will impact mission success. Mr. Wynne…provided valuable recommendations to improve the training, to remove unnecessary obstacles to the learning so that astronauts could perform the critical tasks, and ensure the crews had the confidence that they and their crewmates would perform if a contingency occurred.

Steve Vander Ark
KBRwyle | Manager, Behavioral Health & Performance

Swedish National Police

I have worked as a police officer for 30 years and as an instructor in use-of-force, firearms and tactics. This including several years as a chief instructor in use-of-force and tactics in a Swedish County Police Authority that served 1.3 million inhabitants. I have also been doing research within this field for ten years. I had the opportunity to train under Marcus Wynne in Sweden…The training I received from Marcus in accelerated learning and preconscious processing was very useful, to the point and effective. His excellent instruction had an impact on my personal skills as well as my instructional skills. Marcus Wynne ́s expertise in accelerated learning was of utmost importance to us when preparing training dealing with active threat situations. His input gave us the ability to reach significant improvements in a much faster pace than we previously believed possible…He is one of the most experienced and knowledgeable within his field…

Dr. Johan Bertilsson
Police Sergeant, The Swedish Police
PhD, Department of Clinical Sciences, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

Norwegian National Police

Marcus Wynne is probably the finest instructor I have ever trained with. He is a superb instructor and his training methods are excellent. He has an approach to the subject where he combines a very practical approach with a scientific one that I find very impressive. After attending his “Shooting with Your Mind’s Eye” where he applied his accelerated learning methods, my shooting and awareness skills improved dramatically—way beyond what I thought possible within the span of 4 days. I apply his methods to my own training and I have taught his methods to others.

Kristian Lambine
Senior Executive Officer
The Norwegian Police University College

South African National Police

On the neural based training you did for us…..One of our first success stories was a policeman that worked with us, he was shot 5 times through the front windscreen of the vehicle. It was later determined that the first round struck him in the heart, pulverizing it. He was struck a further 4 times, and was clinically dead when he performed the following functions: He exited the vehicle, drew his firearm, shot the suspect twice in the stomach, put his weapon on safe, reholstered, got back in the vehicle and attempted to start the vehicle to give chase….and that’s where it ended and he ran out of hydraulics and energy!! Following this incident, when it came time to train close combat instructors for the police, we used the neural based programme that you launched for us in South Africa. We have had many success stories from our police officers facing crazy odds against multiple attackers. This programme was launched into the police colleges, and our K9 unit uses elements of this training in all their tactical courses. On a short note….you changed police training for the better and saved many lives in the process.

Warrant Officer Clint Oosthuizen 
South African Police Services

Israeli Defense Forces

I’ve trained with Marcus Wynne for over ten years. His knowledge and skills as an instructor are second to none. His training has evolved my own personal combative skill set, and has taken my instructor skills to unbelievably high levels. I regularly train elite military, basic military, and civilian audiences—training with Marcus helps me bring my students to the highest possible level.

Yaron Brill
Instructor and Performance Coach, Israeli Defense Forces Active Reserves
Filipino Combat Systems representative, Israel

Military Advisor, Fauda (Netflix Series)

Learning and training with Marcus opened and enhanced an entirely new level of training, performance, and human ability for me. I have since successfully taught all that I learned to many special operators, students, and actors. Thank you, Marcus, for your deep insights, unique approach and your endless willingness to help and support us.

Nimrod Astel
IDF Military Combat Veteran

Neuroscience Director

Marcus Wynne has the unique ability to comprehend nuanced research in cognitive psychology, psychophysiology and neuroscience and apply it to training techniques. The result is an accelerated learning experience that helps a person embody and understand the principles of situational awareness and decision making under stress. My experience with his training has stuck with me, and as a cognitive and affective neuroscientist, I can see how his approach interleaves with research in the field.

Aminda O’Hare
Director of Neuroscience
Assistant Professor of Psychological Science
Weber State University, UT

Ralph Mroz, Author-Consultant

You’ve come to the wrong place…

…for long, drawn-out, academic papers on performance enhancement. Complete with obscure abstracts, stupefyingly turgid poly-polysyllabic prose and run-run-on sentences. Also, replete with pages of references and end notes, and phrased so that only three PhDs in the world can actually understand the work in this sub-sub-sub specialty. Of course there’s also the conclusions that are inconclusive and the ever-present recommendation for “further research” to try and get some actual answers…maybe.

But, if you want to learn what you can do right now, often for little cost, to dramatically improve performance under stress, in real world situations, from someone who has read all those papers for you, then this is the right place. Marcus Wynne has been reading the leading- and bleeding-edge research on performance enhancement for decades, and studying the non-academic approaches too. He’s been translating that knowledge and experience into plain-language right-now training with immediate measurable results. His clients have and do include men and women involved in life-and-death professions such as military combat and car racing, across the globe. There’s no one else like him today.

Ralph Mroz

CQB Services International, Hereford And Liverpool, United Kingdom

It’s my pleasure to tell you a bit about Marcus Wynne. He is, quite simply, the most skilled exponent of Neural-based training I have encountered. He analyses and calibrates on a subconscious, almost instinctive, level, and can tell you more about yourself than you ever thought possible. When I first met him he was an accomplished hard-skills operator. However, he was never content to rest on his laurels and sought training and knowledge which led to a ground-breaking body of research. For example, the OODA Loop is now an established model for managing violent encounters. It was Marcus who adapted it into the tactical community.

I have been privileged to have worked with Marcus in England, Scandinavia, Southern Africa and the United States; so I have seen the regard that noted military, law enforcement and civilian instructors hold for him. Marcus continues to research and to innovate, and we are all beneficiaries of his efforts. A true legend.

Dennis Martin
Founder/CEO of CQB Services International, Hereford and Liverpool, UK

Central Intelligence Agency Paramilitary Operations Officer

When I first Met Marcus Wynne in the early ’90’s he was in the early stages of developing what is now called neuroscience. He invited me to observe an intro firearms class he was doing for women. It was an eye opener for me as well as for the ladies. None of them had any firearms experience but he had them making rapid center mass hits on an armed aggressive adversary in just a few hours. The training was high stress and some of the ladies would run through a drill and then have to make a fast trip to the facilities because of their reaction to a serious “threat” posed by a big guy with a baseball bat who was advancing on them while uttering obscenities. But not one of them failed to fire and all got fight-stopping hits.

Since that time Marcus has trained a number of LE agencies both here and abroad. Marcus describes his training as providing accelerated learning, stress inoculation and enhanced performance under stress. But that doesn’t begin to explain what the student learns and is able to perform upon completion of the training. You literally have to see and experience it to believe it. If you want to make sure that those you are responsible for training in use-of-force skills have every advantage you can give them to manage an armed confrontation you need to contact Marcus.

Edward Lovette
CIA Paramilitary Operations Officer (retired)