In sport and in business it’s usually easier to find the motivation to look into the ‘why’s’ of a performance, if the team has failed to win a contract, delivered a bad service or lost a competition. The emotion and hurt around losing motivates many of us to analyse ‘why’ we lost, especially when the team has tried hard, given their heart and soul in an attempt to succeed.
Postmortems / retros / lessons learned are a great way to reflect on performance and ask the questions
What went well?
What should be improved?
What should stay the same?
I’ve talked to lots of people about this topic in different situations (Professional Sport and Business) and was surprised to learn that while some teams get this right, there are still some teams that seem to want to move on and not engage in a review of the performance post execution/competition. It’s as if the engagement in discussions around defeat will release negative energy and drag the team down.
In my opinion what this really shows is that those teams aren't yet ready to be high performing.
I have been lucky to be a member of successful sports and business teams. They weren't always a bed of roses to be a member of in fact they were tough. They all set high standards and levels of expectation around performance. There was sometimes brutal honesty within the team if standards slipped. But they were also the most rewarding teams to be members of.
The very best teams analyse their performances whether they win or lose. The Mercedes AMG F1 team is a case in point. From 2014 to 2021 they won an unequalled 8 constructor titles in a row. At all times they maintained the same ritual after each practice session and race of debriefing as a team to analyse the ‘Why’s’ behind their performance. This practice is seen as a key reason they maintained consistency for so long by their Team Principal Toto Wolff. He listed the following as key practices they follow
Analyse Mistakes—Even When Winning
Foster an Open, No-Blame Culture
Relentlessly Battle Complacency
Specific sports often have specific KPIs and Metrics that are reviewed on a regular basis and employ professional sports analysts. Data is key because it carries no emotion, therefore can be discussed as fact and not opinion. Take the time to understand what your key data points are to measure performance in your sector.
Business teams can also learn lessons from software engineering and run retrospectives or if an issue has occurred carry out root cause analysis using techniques such as the 5 Whys. By being relentless in the search for knowledge and improvement a team team can improve their chances of winning for longer.
The important element is teams need to reflect on their performance in an open non blaming way. That way the conversation can focus on what will be done in the future to remedy any issues or maintained and improved where positive actions have taken place.
Summary
If teams only carry out analysis when they are losing, there’s a heck of a lot of learning and improvement opportunities being left on the table. The best teams are always looking for ways to improve and understand what they are doing well when they are winning and losing, because you could be a few poor decisions away from a series of losses and without a rigorous lessons learned process you'll have no idea what helped you win.
To discuss how My Performance Coach could help you or your team reach your full potential please book a free introduction meeting. I'd love to help.
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