Adam Burns
Abhi Dhar, CIO,Walgreen’s
There should be acertain amount of leadership imperative that all of us, at the level weoperate, need to carry. And the way Ithink about it is that it’s very similar to a coach, a general manager.
Bracken Darrell,European President, Whirlpool
Innovation is a contact sport.
Scott Thompson,President, PayPal
If you’re gonna playthe game, you’re playin’ to win.
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Great leadership and business principals are vital for success in sport – but what lessons do some of the most successfulleaders in sport today have for your business?
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Charlie Sheen tweeted it to instant acclaim, but for some winning is a word untainted by irony. It’s everything. Nick Bolletierri has coached Andre Agassi, Boris Becker and MonicaSeles – so what defines the very best sports people?
Nick Bolletierri,Legendary Tennis Coach
They refuse tolose. Win. It’s all about winning.
Warren Gatland, HeadCoach, Wales National Rugby Team
I wouldn’t do the job– you’ve got to be in to win. If you’renot in here to win, then you probably shouldn’t be in the role.
Nick Bolletierri,Legendary Tennis Coach
When you say, “Iwanna play the best I can play,” and get in the corner with losers, I don’taccept that.
Floyd ‘Chip’ Ganassi,Owner, Chip Ganassi Racing
Heart. It’s how much heart guys have. The heart is the tile that – the grout thatkeeps all the tiles together, if you will. It’s everything that pulls it together is right here.
Nick Bolletierri,Legendary Tennis Coach
Attitude can help youreach levels that you never thought you can reach, by just making sure, “I willdo it.” No such word as, “I can’t doit.” What do you mean you can’t do it?
You can’t do it,unless you don’t try it.
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How do you trainpeople to have a positive attitude? Trevor Moawad is director of mentalconditioning at IMG and has received worldwide recognition for his work withsome of the world’s best coaches and most elite athletes.
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
It’s important tounderstand what attitude is. Andattitude’s kind of like a teeter-totter. It’s not negative or positive. It’s just simply a direction in which you lean. And you can either lean positively, or youcan lean negatively.
I don’t know ifpositive thinking works all the time, but I know that negative thinkingdoes.
According to Trevorwe all talk to ourselves at a rate of between 300 to 1000 words a minute. Doesit have an effect? Here’s a simple experiment…
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
I don’t want you tothink of the Eiffel Tower. I don’t wantyou to think of Paris in the summer.
Pan out from Paris insummer image to reveal head and thought bubble. Fill bubble with montage of bigbrands: Coca-Cola, Budweiser, Google, Apple, Ford, Macy’s, etc.
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So what are youthinking about? Big brands spend $3 million on 30 seconds of Superbowl Sundaybecause of that powerful combination – words and pictures...
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
It’s a universaltruth. You will talk to yourself. And those things that you say to yourselfwill affect those pictures in your mind, and those pictures will affect youremotional state.
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Do champions reallyavoid talking about the negatives? Here’s Floyd ‘Chip’ Ganassi, the first teamowner to win the Triple Crown of American auto racing.
Floyd ‘Chip’ Ganassi,Owner, Chip Ganassi Racing
People always ask mewhat race I wanna win the most, and the answer is, “The next one.”
So I don’t – I trynot to get too caught up in talking about our victories, because I damn suredon’t wanna talk about our losses. And Ithink it’s important to keep focused on what’s ahead and not what’s behind you.
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
If you notice TigerWoods in his prime, Tiger would never talk about being in a slump or playingpoorly. He did a great job managing hisown advertising campaign.
He was interviewed afew years ago with Ahmad Rashad. And hehad Tiger, Pete Sampras, Charles Barkley and Peyton Manning. And he asked them, he said, “You neverpublicly say anything bad about yourself.”
So he would alwaysbasically come out and say, “You know what, I was great off the tee. I really did a good job in getting to thegreen. I’ve got to get a little bitbetter once I’m on the green in terms of finishing.”
And so first of all,with athletes, it’s amazing how simple it is, but getting them to recognizethat although they still might be thinking things, not to say things out loud,particularly in the media, coming out and saying, “I’m playing poorly. I can’t finish. I’ve got no backhand today. I can’t seem to get anything right. I’m in a tough spell.” As soon as you do that, you put a nail in it.
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So how does a winningattitude manifest itself? What does it actually look like…
Nick Bolletierri,Legendary Tennis Coach
I remember severalyears ago, Borg was here training for the seniors. And I said, Bjorn, what is the link that youhave? He said, “Nick, when I go on thecourt, I block out everything else but the ball, and I must hit the ball overthe net one more time than the opponent.” That was it. That’s what made himwhat he was.
Trevor Moawad, Director,IMG Performance Institute
I don’t necessarilythink all athletes have a positive attitude, but I certainly think all athletesare looking for repeatable symptoms that can allow you to be – to maintainsuccess. Success always leaves clues, andit’s always developed with patterns.
I think probably oneof the best things that happened to me was in 2001, our football agent broughtMichael Johnson, the Olympic sprinter down, to help our athletes run faster 40times.
And Michael wouldtell us, okay, as he’s competing in the Olympics, he had four simple things:keep my head down, pump my arms, explode, think like a bullet. And we would get him in front of theathletes. He’d talk to the athletes. He’d take them through their process. Recognizing that you’re always talking toyourself. And there’s a lot ofsubstitution Brian Tracy and a lot of people talk about, which means you canthink about one thing at a time.
So if I’m tellingmyself “keep my head down, pump my arms, explode”, very basic things, thenthose are the things that I’m going to be thinking about in the criticalmoment, not the 100,000 people or the one billion people watching on TV.
Warren Gatland, HeadCoach, Wales National Rugby Team
One of the thingsabout professional sport, and I suppose it’s the same with a business is thatplayers do want to know where they are.
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Honest feedback isessential, but time consuming. There are differences of opinion here. WarrenGatland focuses on improving his fringe players to provide more competition forplaces.
Warren Gatland, HeadCoach, Wales National Rugby Team
Sometimes your keyplayers, your stars don’t need a lot of feedback. But some of the players that are on thefringes, they want to know why they’re on the fringes, what they need to do toget them inside, to improve, to make them personally better and that’s oftenyour time consuming path.
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Unlike Warren, TrevorMoawad pays most attention to the key influencers – relying on them to raisethe game across the team.
T/H
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
The reality in thesports world is you treat all athletes fairly, but you don’t treat them allequally, and that’s just the business. Some are paid more. Some are paidless. Some need more attention. Some need less.
So, ultimately, Iwork a lot of time with those key influencers and how they can impactchange.
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An important note onthe subject comes from Chip Ganassi. How you communicate is just as importantas what you say…
Floyd ‘Chip’ Ganassi,Owner, Chip Ganassi Racing
Everyone wants to becommunicated with differently. And Ithink the trick to communicating today is finding out just how those peoplelike to communicate. And once you canopen up that channel, whether it’s verbally, whether it’s over the phone,whether it’s e-mail, whether it’s text, whether it’s mobile, whether it’sthrough another person, once you can open up that channel communication becomesvery easy.
And I think it’s notalways the point you’re trying to get across; it’s the manner in which it’scommunicated. So I – what I like to workon is trying to figure out what mode of communication people like best. Once that channel’s figured out and put intofocus, I think then you can – getting your point across is pretty simple. We all know what we wanna do and how to getthere.
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Wherever you spendyour time, and however you communicate, there’s a simple metric for success:impact. You’re looking for a Tim Tee-bo speech...
Trevor Moawad,Director, IMG Performance Institute
A few years ago, TimTebow lost a game, went out in the media and said, “I’m sorry. I can’t affect that we’re going to win everygame. But I can tell you, I guaranteethis team will fight, will compete, will go above and beyond to make thedifference.” And he took theaccountability and affected it.
The team went on to win two huge games, and sothat key influencer impacted change by being verbal.