Performance
Survive or Thrive?
I was talking with a team we work with the other day and remarked how they were in a perfect storm. End of year mayhem to bring home the promised numbers, a change of leader, planning for 2009 to be completed and a really uncertain external climate. The perfect situation for a team to fracture... Read more
Performance
A change in attitude?
So I'm sitting on the stationary bike doing a warm down session after a half marathon on Sunday. It's a bike in a hotel gym though exactly the same make and model as the bike I use at my local gym. It's only a warm down session so I'm not going crazy -even so I... Read more
Performance
Go on, be brave…
Whilst having a rare flick through the FT the other day, we happened across a book review for "Managing to Learn Using The A3 Management Process to Solve Problems, Gain Agreement, Mentor, and Lead" by John Shook. Not the most enticing of titles! However, the FT article was entitled "The Toyota mindset revealed", which got... Read more
Performance
Focus on your talent
When we're in circumstances that look and feel totally foreign, we can often conclude that we don't have appropriate skills to deal with what we're facing. That conclusion comes from seeing the situation as unique, unexpected, threatening and thereby difficult to achieve. In these instances we need to shift gear and focus on your talent.... Read more
Performance
Next step thinking…
The concept of "next step thinking" came up last week in a conversation. This is all about focusing on being in the moment and being confident that you can do the next thing you need to do with complete focus and confidence. It seems that this is very important at the moment. Much of our... Read more
Performance
Stating the obvious…
Do you know that you will perform better when you are clearly focused on playing to your strengths, rather than focusing on how not to have your weaknesses exposed? Pretty obvious really, but there's a big assumption that everyone has their finger on the pulse of their strengths. In our experience, that's not the case.... Read more
Performance
Active Recovery…
One thing that we know from working with the highest level athletes is that they value and exploit active recovery in order to perform better. This contrasts with the views that we hear in the corporate world, where is appears there is a perception sometimes that sleep and downtime are an inconvenience to getting a... Read more
Performance
Attitudes are contagious…
Attitudes are contagious.... are yours worth catching? (Great line that we've seen attributed to Aussie cricket great, Steve Waugh, but I'm sure it came from somewhere else first!). Actually, do you even know your attitudes? If you're not fully aware of those attitudes, then you're probably not realising how you're infecting people around you! When... Read more
Performance
Paradoxes of Performing…
in pressure situations. Often the success of delivering when facing challenging conditions can be influenced greatly by being able to hold two paradoxical beliefs at the same time. For example, in Good to Great, Jim Collins introduces the Stockdale Paradox, in which he outlines the importance of being able to "confront the brutal reality of... Read more
Performance