Why not me?

The past 18 months have been tough for all of us on many fronts. Worried about the health of our family and loved ones, our jobs and businesses, and fellow humans across the globe.

Yet we have seen some shoots of optimism and hope. Hope is so important to us humans. The fact that the UK vaccine programme is working has brought confidence to the UK economy which is expected to grow by record levels this year. On a personal note, watching my son Matthew play hockey; a scene that felt like a typical British summer’s evening.

It got me thinking if our depths and worse performances can be the necessary preparation for our peak?

Recently the British and Irish Lions squad was announced for the up-and-coming tour to South Africa. It is twelve years since these sides have played each other. That series was a very close affair. After going one nil down in the first test, the Lions had to win the second to keep the series alive. In the last few minutes, they were drawing to stay in the series and the only thing the needed to do was not give away an unnecessary penalty. However, that is precisely what they did, and the man who many blame, was Ronan O’Gara.

Many pundits believed that he would never come back from that; it was too devastating, and his rugby days were over. How wrong they were! Fast-forward twelve years and Ronan now coaches one of the best teams in Europe – French team La Rochelle - and he has transformed their belief and culture.

Manchester City have suffered many sharp exits from European competitions and have not been in a European Final for over 50 years. There had been a catalogue of Manchester City European disasters over the past few years such as 4th May 2016 – Real Madrid 1-0 Man City, 5th November 2014, Man City 1-2 CSKA Moscow, 2nd October 2013 – Man City 1-3 Bayern Munich, 24th October 2012 – Ajax 3-1 Man City. Yet they have now reached their first Champions League Final with manager Pep Guardiola.

Pep Guardiola said, “Getting to the Final makes sense of what we've done in the past four or five years.”

It got me thinking why and how certain people can use their greatest lows to reach incredible heights. It is as if it is an essential part of the preparation and necessary trauma they must go through. Why does this not occur for all of us?

I believe we get to choose our mindset, how we respond to feedback and to difficult challenges. As mentioned in a previous post, society has shifted in the last twenty years so that when things go wrong, we blame others.

If you look closely at both Ronan O’Gara and Pep Guardiola, they are both relentless leaners. O’Gara decided to go into coaching. He could easily have stayed in Ireland, but he went to France to get outside his comfort zone. He then went to the other side of the world, to New Zealand, to learn from the best club side in Rugby Union. There he learnt about the need to create standards for the whole organization, to build belief and how to build better relationships with players. He asks the players and the whole town of La Rochelle - Why not us? Why can’t we be European Champions? I so admire his mindset and determination.

Manchester City’s Pep Guardiola is no ordinary football manager; he can count Garry Kasparov as a close friend. Kasparov is one the greatest chess players ever, and one of the sharpest minds around - you have got to be smart to have friends like that.

When meeting Kasparov at his New York apartment (even though it was meant to be an informal diner with their wives), Pep was relentless. He interviewed Kasparov on winning at chess, strategy, planning and how to outflank opponents, so he could apply all this knowledge to his football team. This obsession serves him well, and he lives by that great mantra “Win, lose or draw - let’s get better.”

On his great show ,“Don’t Tell Me The Score”, Simon Mundie interviewed Danny Kerry, the gold-winning hockey coach from the 2016 Rio Olympics. Kerry shared how when they finished sixth at the Beijing games in 2008, the post- games review felt like a charter assignation from the players. They saw him as aloof, stuck behind a computer, and only interested in results rather than the players. He had a clear choice: be defensive and probably lose his job, or reflect within and adapt. He chose the latter and now has a daily mantra for how he enters challenging conversations:

·       Where am I right now?

·       Where do I need to be?

·       Where are they right now?

·       Where do they need to be?

·       How do we close the gap?

This mental checklist enhances his self-awareness and situational awareness and creates the space to jointly develop better outcomes.

If you are thinking that these are special examples, I urge you to ask yourself, “Why not me?” You can take feedback, adjust your behaviour and apply that to new frameworks.

There is a well-known saying: “The person you will be five years from now will be a direct result of the people you meet and the books you read.” This is so true, especially if you add the podcasts you listen to and other information you let into your brain. I urge you to take these opportunities.

Our purpose at Enterprise Sales Club is to enable SaaS Sales Professionals to achieve their potential through the power of life-enhancing connections, shared experiences, and collaborative learnings.

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