Making progress, moving forward, winning at what you do, however you want to describe it, requires strategies, discipline and execution to get a result.
It doesn’t matter if it is a personal goal. Improving your lot in life, a business goal or a sporting achievement the role of the mind is well documented.
High performance athletes are recognised for their way of focusing totally on their goals and in the heat of the contest standing up and showing why they are elite. They know how to perform at the top level and they know what it takes.
The role of the team and the way a team combines its mental approach is very important in the overall group reaching their goal.
Think about the times in your workplace where people are pulling against each other versus the times they work collaboratively naturally. The difference is extremely obvious when you reflect on previous experience with both.
A team you have to admire if you are a rugby follower is the Queensland Reds. Yes I know I live in Queensland and have a natural bias, however in context I am a born and bred kiwi, who came from Auckland. I have two home teams in Super Rugby. I love barracking for the Reds, even more so of recent times, as they have found the winners podium more often than not, but also cheer wildly for my Blues.
It’s not that they are ranking well alone that has be cheering loudly for them, my original home team Auckland is top of their table too (for now), but there is a difference at times between the two.
Last year when I first met Quade Cooper, we now sponsor his online presence, our conversation ended up talking about the changes that had occurred since Ewen Mckenzie had taken the reins. Quade talked a lot about how the key focal point in the early days from the new coach, was to get the teams ‘head’ right. To understand what they were doing, to believe they could win, but more importantly that they could continue to win and that there was a habit involved and a need for all to believe they actually could do it.
The Reds had the talent. They had Superstars. That enough wasn’t winning a team game.
I am sure you have some stars (well they probably think they are) in your workplace, in your team. They probably are in their field stars. Often in a work environment, or other group, the team isn’t a conscious part of the focus from leaders, and the team itself. Too much emphasis on what’s in it for me, or what my role Is, means the overall picture can be lost.
Quade Cooper playing his part in a winning team
What impresses me most about the Reds at present, is that they know their strengths and weaknesses, but play their game plan so well, the opposition doesn’t really factor into the equation. They have a belief, they are believable. When they recently played the Blues, they were able to get the Blues playing a game that hasn’t worked for them this year, and consequently they controlled the result. They just played their game so well, they believed they could win.
As a leader Ewen McKenzie has obviously done a lot for this team.
That’s a credit to him and everyone around him. It’s a credit to the understanding of what humans need if they are to achieve in a group, and group achievements are truly where we reach new levels far above our individual efforts.
Being good at something isn’t enough, if it doesn’t contribute to the group, to the greater community. You need to hone your individual skills, so you can use them to help the greater group around you reach new heights.
Otherwise we are just a bunch of clever dicks trying to outdo each other.
What value does that bring?
Why not review how you play in the teams you live in each day! Your family, your friends, your work. Be excellent at what you do, but be awesome in those groups.
Use your head, put in to place ways that you can get a better result out of your teams around you.
Hat tip to you Ewen and the Reds, you guys should be proud of how far you have come and how well you are doing!
Well that’s what Ireckon anyway
Cover you mean Printed, then that's a rule... 36 days ago