Up to Speed

In the 1960 summer Olympics in Rome, Italy, Wilma Rudolph became the first American woman to win three gold medals in track and field during a single Olympic Games, despite running on a sprained ankle. She was nicknamed the “Tornado” the fastest woman on earth, and the Black Gazelle. 

By all accounts, Wilma Rudolph was a master at track and field. Some called her a “natural athlete.” But if you know Wilma Rudolph’s story, you’ll know the truth is that Wilma wasn’t a born athlete. She was a sickly, crippled child who turned herself into a world-class runner through tremendous determination and discipline.

Wilma Rudolph was born prematurely at 4.5 lbs., the 20^th of 22 siblings born into a black family in the South in 1940. She was struck with polio as a very young child, leaving her with a twisted foot and leg. She wore a brace and her family drove her to Nashville regularly for treatments. By the time she was 12 years old, Wilma had also survived scarlet fever, whooping cough, chicken pox, and measles.

Wilma was determined to overcome her physical challenges and become an athlete like her older siblings. Eventually she left the leg braces behind and became a star on her high school basketball team. Wilma was discovered by Tennessee State track coach Ed Temple, the man who prepared her to win Olympic gold in the 100 and 200-meter dash and the 400-meter relay.

What would YOU like to become a master of? If you’re in the work force, you may wish to become a master at your job. If you’re retired, maybe you would like to achieve mastery at a hobby - become a master gardener, or a master fisherman. Or we could apply mastery to people and relationships – becoming the best in the world at being a parent, or a spouse, or a friend to those in need. But what does it take to truly achieve mastery in any area of our life? Why do only a select few ever become great at what they do?

It is a common myth that talent is what makes some people great. From an early age we’re taught that some of us just have a natural aptitude for athletics, or managing companies, or playing an instrument. God given talent is what makes some people masters. So if we try something and discover we’re not all that great at it, or if we experience initial success only to hit a plateau, we give up on mastery, thinking we just weren’t cut out for it. We become a hacker, content with average performance or we give up entirely.

In his book, Talent is Overrated, Geoff Colvin points out that research conducted in the past 30 years or so has proven this idea of inherent talent false. Studies of a variety of subjects - violin players, chess champions, golf pros, etc. - all indicate that the difference between great performers and average performers is hard work and practice, not natural talent. Masters in a given field did not show unusual giftedness, but rather logged many more hours of practice time than their peers and engaged in “deliberate practice” - systematic practice of techniques involving specific goals and regular feedback to improve performance.

George Leonard wrote an inspiring little book called Mastery: The Keys to Success and Long-term Fulfillment. Leonard identifies 5 principles that can help you achieve mastery in any area of your life. 

1. Instruction

There are some things you can learn on your own, but if you really want to be a master in your field you must find a good teacher or coach to guide your efforts. It’s no accident that Bela Karolyi’s gym produced so many Olympic gymnasts or that Meisner, Adler, and Strasberg taught so many great actors - including Jack Nicholson, Marlon Brando, and Paul Newman. Find someone whose students are performing with excellence and learn your craft at their feet.

2. Practice

This weekend I watched my friend, Jeff, play his acoustic guitar so beautifully and masterfully it seemed effortless. But I know that Jeff goes home every night after work and practices his guitar for at least two hours. Deliberate practice is the key to mastery. We have to learn to love to practice in order to become great. You have to love playing scales on your instrument as much or more than you love performing in the concert hall. An old martial arts saying goes, “The master is the one who stays on the mat five minutes longer every day than anybody else.” Be that guy.

3. Surrender.

The courage of a master is measured by his or her willingness to surrender. To your teacher. To the constant routine of hard work to become better. And sometimes we must surrender our own expert status and become beginners again in order to reach the next level of achievement. Tiger Woods famously remade his golf swing AFTER he had already achieved tremendous success in his sport. For the master, surrender means there are no experts. There are only learners.

4. Intentionality

Intentionality is mindfulness, mental practice, having a vision of what you want to accomplish. Arnold Schwarzenneger argued that pumping a weight one time with full consciousness was worth ten without mental awareness. Average distance runners let their minds wander during a race in order to forget about the pain. Master runners focus on their bodies the whole time in order to perform to the best of their ability with every stride.

Cognitive psychology has discovered that visualizing an activity triggers the same parts of the brain as if we were actually DOING that activity. Mental practice can be as effective as actual practice in achieving mastery. 

5. The Edge.

The edge is the point where the master takes a flying leap. It seems to be a contradiction of what got the expert performer to the height of their field in the first place. After dedication to the fundamentals of their discipline and years of small, incremental steps forward there comes a point where these masters take a leap off the edge. “They challenge previous limits, they break the rules they’ve worked so hard to learn, they take risks for the sake of higher performance.”

With All Your Might

Ecclesiastes Chapter 9 verse 10 says, “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might.” Like Wilma Rudolph, you don’t need to be limited by challenges or the myth of talent. Whatever you’d like to be a master of, apply these five principles and be satisfied with the slow, steady rewards of deliberate practice.

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy:

On Planning for an Uncertain Future: Will someone please tell me what’s going to be on the test? or

Good to Great Obama Style: Why he won the White House and how it applies to You.

The November 17th issue of Newsweek has a really long but fascinating series of articles detailing what went on inside the campaigns of Barack Obama, John McCain, and Hillary Clinton.

I’m no political junkie, but I am an eager student of management best practices. The story of how Barack Obama did it - how he rose from Illinois state senator to President Elect in just a few short years - is certainly a transcendent tale for the history books. But I also believe Obama is a down-to-earth example of an ordinary man (however talented, smart, and ambitious) who took the right approach to leadership and accomplished extraordinary things.  Whomever you voted for, and whatever your political inclination, there’s a lot to be learned from Obama’s success.

As I read the story of Obama’s campaign - the conduct of his staff, the focus of his message, the character of his leadership, his commitment to constant improvement, and awareness of his own strengths and weaknesses, I was struck by just how closely Obama followed the formula to achieve greatness outlined by Jim Collins in his bestselling business book, Good to Great.

Collins offers a collection of success principles culled from years of research into how great companies excelled over the long term.  Some businesses made the leap from mediocrity to enduring greatness, while their contemporaries did not.  A few of the companies Jim Collins held up as role models, like Circuit City and Fannie Mae, have crumbled in recent months.  But I believe the essence of his findings still holds true.

The road to greatness is paved with principles that work, whether you’re leading a Fortune 500 company, a political campaign, or your own career.  Here is my attempt to place Obama’s amazing victory within the framework of the Good to Great study.

1.  Level 5 Leadership.

Men and women who lead their organizations to greatness exhibit the traits of what Collins calls Level 5 Leaders - people who exhibit a paradoxical blend of personal humility and tremendous professional will to see their organization succeed.  Collins writes, “It’s not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious - but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.”

Good-to-great leaders are frequently described as quiet, humble, modest, reserved, shy, gracious, mild-mannered, self-effacing, or understated.  By most accounts, Obama is this kind of guy.  He has been compared to Abraham Lincoln, a classic example of the Level 5 personality.  Staffers dubbed him, “No-Drama Obama.”  Reporters resented his tendency to retreat from the press and keep to himself.  His cool reserve was often noted in contrast to John McCain’s hot-headed temperament.

And whatever his beliefs about his own destiny, Barack Obama kept his campaign focused on the larger goal of bringing people together to bring change to America.  Though his opponents mocked him as a self-serving celebrity, in the end Obama was able to convince the vast majority of voters that his driving passion was solving our economic problems.  We believed his goal was not merely to serve his own interests, but to build a better country.

Do you have the potential to become a Level 5 leader?  Are you cultivating personal humility and professional will within yourself?

2.  First Who…Then What

Good-to-Great leaders begin their transformation by first getting the right people on the bus and then figuring out where to drive it.  Their management teams consist of people who debate vigorously in search of the best answers, yet unify behind decisions, whatever their own interests.

Barack Obama’s campaign staff worked together exceptionally well, and built a well-oiled machine that raised astounding amounts of support and money for their candidate.  The contrast between the culture of the Obama camp and the Clinton and McCain camps is striking.

Obama managed a team of brilliant, mild-mannered geeks.  They worked together, diligently and earnestly plugging along toward election day.  They met in humble conference rooms, setting differences aside to focus on the tasks at hand.

Hillary and McCain were burdened by back-biting and in-fighting on their campaigns.  The Newsweek accounts make staffers sound like selfish prima donnas. They tried to get each other fired.  They yelled and cursed.  They fought for credit when things went well, and blamed the other guy when things went terribly wrong. Hillary and McCain both had to fire their campaign managers mid-stream.

Do you have the right people on your bus?  Are you willing to keep looking until you find the right people?  Are you willing to kick the wrong people off the bus to make room for the right ones?

3.  Confront the Brutal Facts (Yet Never Lose Faith)

The Stockdale Paradox: Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties.  AND at the same time, confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.

Good-to-great organizations face just as much adversity as comparison organizations, but they respond to that adversity differently.  They hit the realities of their situation head-on, and come back even stronger.

After his campaign spent $20 million to win Texas and still lost, Obama ran through a list of mistakes with his staff, not laying the blame on anyone in particular.  He didn’t ignore the problems, but he didn’t give up or cast blame either.

And when the rants of his former pastor, Reverand Wright, jeopardized his campaign, Barack Obama kept his cool and addressed the situation outright.  He turned potential disaster into opportunity, giving a half-hour speech on race that proved to be a high point of his campaign.

Many inidividuals, families, and companies around the world are facing adversity today.  Will you confront the realities of your situation while keeping absolute faith that you can and will triumph in the end, regardless of the difficulties? Will you emerge from adversity even stronger?

4.  The Hedgehog Concept

The Hedgehog Concept is an understanding of the intersection of three things: 1) What you are deeply passionate about, 2) What you can be the best in the world at, and 3) What drives your economic engine.  Equally important is understanding what your company CANNOT be the best at.  The key phrase here is “best in the world.” 

Like a dowdy hedgehog, good-to-great companies pick one big thing and stick to it.  They uncover their passion, they determine what they can be the best in the world at, and they find the economic denominator that will make them most profitable.  Comparison companies are more like foxes - crafty, cunning creatures that know many things yet lack consistency.

Newsweek described Barack Obama as “something unusual in a politician: genuinely self-aware.”  He was “a careful student of his own unique journey.”  Obama knew he was good at writing books and giving speeches, and he used those platforms to inspire people to believe in change and hope.  He knew from his community organizer days that he was good at building support through grass roots campaigning.  Like the Little Engine that Could, he chugged along in his boring diligent way, repeating and perfecting his core message through his whole campaign.  A better economy, a unified America, change and hope, change and hope.

His rivals, in contrast, were foxes.  They weren’t sure what their strategy was exactly, other than to do whatever it took to win.  Their message changed every time the political winds blew something new their way.  They never seemed to figure out their “best in the world” concept. And they lost.

Can you answer these three questions for yourself?  1)  What are you deeply passionate about?  2)  What can you be the best in the world at?  3)  What is the most profitable application of your energy?

5.  A Culture of Discipline

Collins writes,”Sustained great results depend on building a culture full of self-disciplined people who take disciplined action…The single most important form of discipline for sustained results is fanatical adherence to the Hedgehog Concept…and to shun opportunities that fall outside…”

Obama wasn’t tempted to jump on the negative stories that rose up around Sarah Palin.  When asked to comment on her teenage daughter Bristol’s pregnancy, Obama graciously reminded the audience that his own mother was a teenager when she had him and swept the issue aside.  He focused on the issues of the campaign.  He stayed on message.  He focused on building grass roots support in every state.  And it worked.

What do you need to ignore or quit so that you can focus on your own Hedgehog Concept?  Collins says “STOP doing” lists are more important than “to do” lists.  Read Seth Godin’s The Dip for more good ideas supporting this principle.

6.  Technology Accelerators

The Web did for Obama what radio did for FDR and what TV did for JFK.  Technology allowed him to spread his message far and wide to an active, connected network of supporters.  It allowed him to raise large sums of money from millions of donors, giving small amounts online.

But Collins points out technology doesn’t create momentum for good-to-great organizations,it ACCELERATES momentum. Social Media and Internet technology itself were not the primary cause of Obama’s success.  They were effective tools utilized by an already successful campaign.

“Those who turn good into great are motivated by a deep CREATIVE urge and an INNER compulsion for sheer unadulterated excellence FOR ITS OWN SAKE.  Those who build and perpetuate mediocrity, in contrast, are motivated more by the fear of being left behind.”

Are you compelled to use the Internet and social media because it is an extension of your creative self, or because you are afraid of being behind the times?

7.  The Flywheel and the Doom Loop

Collins explanation of this concept is so good, allow me to quote him at length:

“Good-to-great transformations often look like dramatic, revolutionary events to those observing from the outside, but they feel like organic, cumulative processes to people on the inside…No matter how dramatic the end result, the good-to-great transformations never happened in one fell swoop.  There was no single defining action, no grand program, no one killer innovation, no solitary lucky break, no miracle moment.  Sustainable transformations follow a predictable pattern of buildup and breakthrough.  Like pushing on a giant, heavy flywheel, it takes a lot of effort to get the thing moving at all, but with persistent pushing in a consistent direction over a long period of time, the flywheel builds momentum, eventually hitting a point of breakthrough.”

“The comparison companies followed a different pattern, the doom loop.  Rather than accumulating momentum - turn by turn of the flywheel - they tried to skip buildup and jump immediately to breakthrough.  Then, with disappointing results, they’d lurch back and forth, failing to maintain a consistent direction.”

Obama’s campaign strikes me as a classic flywheel movement.  Slow, steady, deliberate, and gaining momentum all the way.  I believe he will use this same strategy to lead our country toward progress and change.  We won’t see any earth-shattering changes to begin with, but slowly and surely America will push the wheel in the same direction.  And we will hit that point of breakthrough.

How are you building your career, your business, your brand, your legacy?  Do you impatiently lurch around, looking for instant gratification and overnight success?  Or are you engaged in an organic, cumulative process that focuses on thoughtful, sustained effort in one direction, waiting for that point of breakthrough?

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