By Luke Whitworth

Too often there is a disparity between what is said and what is done in an organisation.

Angus Gardiner, the General Manager of the New Zealand rugby team the Crusaders, once said: ‘good and bad teams have the same values written on the wall’.

The ‘saying’ is the easy part, the ‘doing’ is quite another and this idea, was the jumping off point for Dr Edd Vahid’s recent project with Management Futures titled A Cultural Hypothesis, which was published in March 2024.

Vahid hypothesised that sustained cultures of success consistently display four features:

1. Purpose
2. Psychological safety
3. Belonging
4. Cultural leadership

As Vahid wrote, ‘an inspiring purpose is essential, a psychologically safe environment is critical, and a sense of belonging exists as a fundamental human need. Coupled with exceptional leadership, these elements distinguish cultures that thrive’.

The fourth has provided the basis of Vahid’s three-part Performance Support Series focusing on culture and change.

The first session invited Leaders Performance Institute members to assess themselves across the four areas; the second focused on cultural leadership as the ‘super enabler’ of culture; the third session further explored the skills needed by cultural leaders.

The three levels of cultural leadership

In A Cultural Hypothesis, Vahid explains that cultural leadership operates on three levels:

1. Sponsors: those operating at ownership or board level; they give permission to architects and guardians (who have a more active role) to deliver the culture. They are typically one or two people.
2. Architects: those responsible for the design of the culture, ensuring it is set up in a way that can allow people to thrive. They are typically a small number.
3. Guardians: the individuals on the ground, delivering on a daily basis, ensuring alignment to the articulated culture which they can translate to individuals operating in that space. There can be multiple guardians.

The architects and the guardians are more active in their roles and, during the session, Vahid explored the skills required for each.

Cultural architects – what skills are required?

Vahid asked members to reflect on the cultural architects in their environments and their skills. The group suggested the following:

• They have a clear vision of what ‘good’ looks like.
• They have a solid understanding of the current state of the culture.
• They can be what the culture requires them to be.
• They have strong communication skills and the ability and opportunity to lead by example.
• They have the ability to win hearts and minds.
• They are respected in the organisation and have the common skills to bring people along on the journey.
• A resilience to withstand the challenges presented by the journey.
• They set and maintain standards with consistency and genuine care.
• They ‘walk the talk’ themselves and believe in necessary change.

Vahid then shared a series of observations about cultural architects based on his research:

They are often appointed by the sponsors. By contrast, the guardians will mobilise on the ground.

They lead the cultural design. They have the ability to articulate and create the environment; they make others aware of the vision and direction of travel. This needs to be done in a skilled and inspiring fashion, with language that is able to influence the culture.

Their role can also be more literal i.e. they have a role in creating a more optimal physical environment.

They acknowledge the tensions within their team and possess the ability to flex and be agile without losing sight of the purpose.

They understand the importance of stories, which can help to distinguish your culture. As Daniel Coyle asked several organisations in his 2018 book, The Culture Code, ‘tell me a story of something that happens here that doesn’t happen anywhere else?’ They know the answer.

The architect must be effectively monitoring the culture and its current state. That can be checking-in with where the culture is now or, equally, understanding the journey that it is going to go on. It’s important to invite feedback and ‘speak truth to power’. It is crucial for them to be connected to the guardians in staying abreast of goings on; they must also ensure a sense of positivity around the culture.

Architects will take a more ‘global view’ than the guardians.

In light of the ‘radically traditional’ research of Alex Hill and the Centre of High Performance, architects provide what Hill calls the ‘disruptive edge’ while the guardians maintain the ‘stable core’.

Cultural guardians – what are their other traits?

Once again, Vahid turned to members to ask what skills they felt cultural guardians possess. They suggested:

• They have an ability to have courageous conversations with skill.
• They have awareness of their skillset and how to model behaviours and values.
• They are self-aware of their biases.
• They have the ability to advocate for the importance of cultural preservation and to influence others regarding its value.

Vahid outlined what his research had to say on the matter of cultural guardians:

The guardians can provide much-needed support as well as bandwidth, space and capacity for the architects to focus on the things that really matter. It requires insight and intelligence to provide a clear view of the landscape.

They carry a strong purpose; there is a level of awareness, alignment and connectedness. The challenge for the architect is to ensure the guardian remains connected because if the connection is lost, you can lose someone who is a positive advocate and instead they become a disruptive influence.

The guardians can speak truth to power with ‘radical candor’, to cite Kim Scott’s theory; they ‘care personally while challenging directly’.

They are role models. They also need to have a degree of influence as they are the foot soldiers that can carry out the vision effectively.

The guardians are on the ground, taking that more localised view. They can make decisions on the ground for the benefit of and in alignment with the culture. They don’t need to escalate every decision or action.

Finally, guardians are identified or are emerging. Vahid’s use of the term ‘identify’ is deliberate because one of the challenges for cultures is to identify the individuals that are going to have a positive influence. He says teams have to ask the question as to whether they are doing enough to support their guardians and the development of their skillset.

Cultural architects, cultural guardians… and cultural shareholders

While there are cultural sponsors, architects and guardians, these are all cultural shareholders.

Vahid’s research suggests that cultural shareholders can be distinguished by their level of:

• Influence
• Engagement
• Motivation

Those who carry significant positive influence and are highly motivated in alignment with your cultural aspirations could be considered guardians, but they are absolutely your strongest architects.

The challenge of a culture is to get an appropriate balance. Is there sufficient weight towards the guardians – if everyone’s a shareholder, are there sufficient numbers of strong and positive advocates for the culture – or are there people who might be considered countercultural?

How does a shareholder become a cultural guardian?

Vahid invited Leaders Performance Institute members to answer the question. They said that cultural shareholders transition into guardianship because:

• They communicate the ‘why’ well.
• They use rituals to highlight and celebrate their behaviours that support and reinforce the wider cultural aspirations.
• They onboard people into the way things are done with care.
• They give frequent updates and appreciate roles.
• They provide access to the thinking underpinning the culture and mentoring programmes.
• They involve shareholders in governance processes where they can have a say in decisions that affect the company’s culture, possibly through working groups, representation, or advisory roles.

In order to create more cultural guardians, Vahid argues that it is important to:

• Ensure people are onboarded effectively; they must know the why of the culture and be granted access to that thinking.
• Make sure people remain connected during change and transitions. New people and those evolving in their roles – include them in the process.
• Be deliberate and attentive with belonging cues. Just because someone fits today it doesn’t mean they will in six months’ time.
• Invest in people development. Are you doing enough to ensure that people have the skill to operate as and feel valued as a guardian? What development programmes do you have in place?

What are some of the fundamental change principles?

Vahid invited members to reflect on cultural change and the fundamental principles they call upon in those phases of development. Attendees suggested the following:

• Start with ‘unfreezing’ the current culture. Help people to recognise what’s not currently working and why there is a need for change.
• A clear articulation of what it looks like and what is desired.
• A clear direction of the path on which you are heading, whilst acknowledging the past as a springboard for future development (maintaining positive traditions).
• Respect the need for time – change cannot be rushed.

The change starts with observation; the sponsor then gives the architect permission to design, create and deliver what the new culture might look like. With this in mind, Vahid suggests a six-step process:

1. Existing status – where are we? Honour the strengths of the existing culture; combine this with data, intelligence and insights, whether that be critical incident reviews, walking the floor, interviews or focus groups. Finally, check in on people’s experience of the four enablers.
2. Move into the idea of vision and purpose and being able to inspire and aspire. This means giving a clear articulation of where you’re going; matching this with the culture and the strategy. Communicate the value of change. Why are we changing, and how do you create a level of urgency and commitment to seeking change?
3. Identify those who align to the target culture. The guardians play a fundamental role. John Cotter talks about the idea of a ‘guiding coalition’ and it has real validity here.
4. Design. What are the short-term wins? Consider the work around removing barriers and instituting change.
5. Behaviour. What are the critical behaviour shifts you want to see? What are you going to recognise and celebrate and be explicit about in terms of the culture? Consistency and regularity are important.
6. Continuously monitor your progress to help reinforce the change.

By John Portch

Gregg Popovich confounds contemporary thinking on how a leader should conduct themselves in modern-day elite sport.

The San Antonio Spurs’ Head Coach, a graduate of the US Air Force Academy, is known as an disciplinarian; and he might also be regarded as an anachronism were it not for the fact that he is revered for creating – and sustaining – one of the most harmonious cultures in elite sport.

Some might say Coach Pop’s gruff demeanour and willingness to yell at players would be sub-optimal in any other environment, especially with a roster full of Gen Z players, but his focus on the people and the environment afford him all the leeway he needs to express himself at the Spurs.

Coach Pop, the alchemist

Popovich, having served as an assistant coach at the Spurs between 1988 and 1992, returned to San Antonio as Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations and General Manager in 1994. He added the head coaching role early in the 1996-7 NBA season

He would in time relinquish his other responsibilities but there was no guarantee that Popovich could make a successful step out of the front office, particularly as his coaching resume amounted to little at that stage.

“He said, ‘hey, I want to do this and I probably have one crack at it’,” said Phil Cullen, the Spurs’ Senior Director of Organizational Development & Basketball Operations. Cullen did not join the Spurs until 2016, but this story, like so many featuring Popovich, has long since entered Spurs folklore.

“Pop said, ‘I want to do this and I want to do this with the people I want to be around’.”

This desire shaped the Spurs’ famous ‘pound the rock’ ethos, with its emphasis on persistence, patience and resilience. It helped to create an environment where a previously inconspicuous franchise could claim five NBA Championships between 1999 and 2014.

Cullen, speaking at the Leaders Sport Performance Summit at Melbourne’s Glasshouse in February, talked at length about the Spurs’ culture, which has been emulated across the globe, albeit with varying degrees of success.

Look a little closer at those other teams and it seems that some have been seduced by ‘pound the rock’ without paying full attention to San Antonio’s unique alchemy.

Not a Spur?

Good people are very important to San Antonio. As Cullen explained, their scouting template includes a check box labelled ‘Not a Spur’. It is a short-hand way of saying that a player lacks some of the team’s character-based values such as integrity, accountability or humility. “It’s very difficult to uncheck that box,” added Cullen. “We have to understand that when we do that there’s a reason why.” They do not always get it right, as he admitted, but their success rate is admirable.

All the same, many teams in the NBA and beyond, have adopted a similar approach, so there must be more to the Spurs success story than any notions of character.

Popovich himself is certainly a major factor, particularly at a time when the Spurs have the NBA’s youngest roster, with an average age of 23.52.

“Right now, we’re probably a coach-led team because of the youthfulness of the roster,” said Cullen. “Ideally, you’d have players that are actually holding each other accountable.” That is the end-game but, in the meantime, “the coach is having to manage the game, not coach the game – there’s a big difference.”

So coachable players are important, as is the coach; there are also key environmental factors at play.

Community, casual collisions and fine dining

The primary environmental factor is food. Cullen shared an image of the cafeteria at the Spurs’ new $72 million Victory Capital Performance Center practice facility, which opened in 2023. “This is the most important room in the building,” he said.

Popovich places a premium on team meals; the players’ families are regularly invited to eat with the team and staff . Cullen said: “There is nothing better than sitting across the table from somebody else from a different culture, with a different set of experiences, and just being able to share a meal together. Food and drink is very important to us.”

Mealtimes, they believe, help to develop mutual empathy and promote selflessness. “This job is hard and if it’s going to be all about you, you’re probably not going to reach your max potential,” said Cullen. “We want to be part of something bigger than ourselves – it can’t just be about you.”

Cullen played a significant role in the design of the facility and was influenced by Popovich’s words of advice when the project was green-lighted. “He goes: ‘I’ve got two things for you: protect the culture and protect the people’.” It confirmed Cullen’s belief in human-centred design. “I may never have the conversation directly with the player, but what we can do is design the space so that Coach can have that conversation with that player,” he said, explaining that players spend more time at the new practice facility than they did at the old one. “It’s shocking as you’ll go in there today and the players will be sitting there next to an equipment manager, next to the travel guide, next to your lead physio; and they’re just hanging out.”

Life beyond basketball

Beyond mealtimes, Popovich promotes a wide range of extracurricular learning opportunities. Cullen recounted the time ahead of a road game at the Washington Wizards in 2018 when Popovich took the team to the US Supreme Court. There are numerous examples on his watch of similar site visits and non-basketball focused discussions, with topics ranging from US federal law and international politics to same-sex marriage and social justice.

Again, these are issues far bigger than the individual or the sport of basketball. “It’s so easy to be insulated when you’re a professional athlete,” said RC Buford, the former San Antonio General Manager (2002-2019) and current CEO, in Dan Coyle’s 2018 book The Culture Code. “Pop uses these moments to connect us. He loves that we come from so many different places. That could pull us apart, but he makes sure that everybody feels connected and engaged to something bigger.”

Coyle also explained that Popovich relies on three types of belonging cue and ‘toggles’ between each in an effort to say ‘this is a safe place to give effort’. Those cues involve:

1. Personal and up close connections: in practice and in warm-ups, Popovich will rove and get almost nose to nose with a player or coach. Such moments, as Coyle wrote, translate as ‘I care about you’.
2. Performance feedback: Popovich will offer a continuous stream of feedback from ‘the middle distance’ in both practice and games. This translates as ‘We have high standards here.’
3. The big-picture perspective: as Coyle put it, ‘Life is bigger than basketball’. The team meals, coffee conversations and history lessons are testament to the Spurs’ belief in this approach.

It led to Coyle conclude: ‘Popovich’s yelling works, in part, because it is not just yelling. It is delivered along with a suite of other cues that affirm and strengthen the fabric of the relationships [at the Spurs].’

Consider this the next time you see Popovich raise his voice.

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“I’ve been told I give really good hugs.”

So says Lindsay Mintenko, the Managing Director of USA Swimming’s National Team, in the second episode of this new series of the Leaders Performance Podcast, which is brought to you by our Main Partners Keiser.

“Just being able to sit with an athlete; sometimes you don’t even have to talk,” she continues, “it’s just so they know you are there.”

It is difficult to imagine many of her predecessors demonstrating such empathy with athletes whether they’re a multi-medal winner like Michael Phelps or Katie Ledecky or a swimmer who came agonisingly close in some of sport’s most competitive trials. The top-two finishers are guaranteed a spot on the roster; those in third – who would likely medal with other nations – are almost certain to miss out.

“After the trials, our main job is to make sure our athletes are focused on Paris, but we don’t always take a step back and look at those who came third by a hundredth of a second. That’s a tough place to be; so we really need to make sure that we do a better job of looking out for those athletes afterwards.”

It is perhaps no surprise that USA Swimming is currently the only national governing body in the US to have an in-house licensed clinician on staff.

This has happened on the watch of Lindsay, a two-time Olympic gold medallist in the 4x200m freestyle.

She is the first former athlete and first woman to serve as Team USA’s Managing Director, but as she tells Henry Breckenridge and John Portch, it is not about her but serving her athletes and their coaches.

Lindsay also spoke about her role being analogous to that of a general manager in the major leagues [8:00] and the importance of providing a challenging but safe environment [17:40].

Elsewhere, she elaborates on the importance of providing mental health support for her athletes [29:50] and explains how her swimming career began when as a six-year-old Lindsay fell out of a tree [5:30].

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By John Portch

Elite sport has long looked to dramatic arts for inspiration and Budi Miller, the Co-Artistic Director at the multi-centred Theatre of Others, sees the parallels.

“An actor is an athlete,” he told an audience at the Leaders Sport Performance Summit at Melbourne’s Glasshouse, while accepting the obvious differences.

“We use our bodies, we use our emotions, we use our intellect, we use our voices – we use everything we can to get you to believe that we are who we say we are.”

Miller took to the stage alongside Kit Wise, the Dean of the School of Art, Design and Social Context at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology [RMIT], who shared his own views on the trainable psychosocial skills in talent development in the arts.

Here, we explore Miller’s thoughts on addressing questions of self-awareness, fear and resilience in a learning environment.

Self-awareness: the base for all development

As an actor learns to use their body, emotions, voice and other facets, Miller explained that it “requires a sense of awareness” and “from that awareness we [develop] an authenticity.” This ‘authenticity’ includes the taking of calculated risks as actors stay true to themselves. Miller helps actors to develop a deep awareness of their bodies and actions as well as a healthy attitude towards self-inquiry.

There is also a collective element. “We have an agreement that when we walk through the door we meet each other at our best.” That can be anything on any given day “and then everyone in the room is doing what they’re doing best at this moment; and what happens is they start to work and everyone’s level has increased”.

Fighting fear and constraints

Miller mentioned that fear can get in the way of talent development. In response, he emphasises the role of playfulness and fun in learning environments; that when actors are free of fear, they can stay motivated and free of unnecessary stress and self-consciousness. It’s a process he describes as the “de-socialising of the body”

He also cited the “speed of fun”, which is a concept devised by Miller’s former tutor Christopher Bayes at the David Geffen Yale School of Drama. The concept encourages actors to be present and spontaneous, enhancing their performance by keeping them in a state of flow and playfulness. “Bayes said that ‘fun is faster than worry and louder than the critic’ and it forces you to be on the front of your actions”. It is a primal rhythm that actors use to stay in the moment and maintain a high level of energy and engagement. “As opposed to thinking about the binary of ‘good and bad’ you’re just in. That happened. Get back to the rhythm, get back to the pace.”

Miller also advocates for a “body-first, not psychology” approach. “Psychology is a response to what’s happening in the body,” he said, adding that he will take actors through a series of fear-relieving exercises. “The body is leading me first; so if you have the awareness of understanding your body and how the body works, you can change the pattern that’s getting in the way.”

The role of the coach and collective in building resilience

Miller discussed resilience as it stems from a sense of connection in a supportive environment. The topic was raised in light of the risks posed to actors who chase external validation. “Whenever you use an external stimulus to identify your self-worth you are always secondary,” said Miller, who spoke of actors chasing grades and roles rather than finding internal fulfilment.

It takes an empathetic teacher and Miller made his point by referring to the Hindu faith where the god Shiva told his wife, Parvati, ‘through you I know myself’. Miller sees the struggles of his students and recognises that he was in their shoes once upon a time. “By integrating this empathy you’re able to change them without them even realising they’re being changed just by that energetic connection.” Miller must embody the traits he is training in others if he is to best engage students in their own development. “If I have the courage to have that vulnerability and just allow myself to be present, then we get to look at what the actual problem is, because oftentimes the problem is external.” As with playfulness, there is a collective element. “How can we as a team interact to solve this external problem together without the walls between us?”

By John Portch with additional reporting from Henry Breckenridge

“One of the great things about the job is there’s no typical day,” said Michael Bourne. “There’s gate posts and structures in place to keep us on track, but my job is very much to adapt to that.”

The Performance Director of the Lawn Tennis Association [LTA] was a guest on the Leaders Performance Podcast in early July, where he discussed his remit.

“I break it down as if we want to deliver performance, then performance equals the talent that you’ve got multiplied by the exposure you can give that talent to them to develop and grow, minus interference.”

When it comes to high performance, tennis has several traits that separate it from other sports and this is reflected in the LTA’s provisions. For example, the organisation offers full-time multidisciplinary support to players from under-10s through to elite level, but player needs vary from individual to individual. They provide coaching too, at camps and competitions, but players tend to have private coaches.

It is a balance and one that he has been trying to strike during his four years in the role, which began during the first year of the pandemic. “It was a huge learning curve for me,” said Bourne, whose non-tennis background has never held him back.

Here, we reflect on his thoughts about his role.

He has a firm focus on the mission

Bourne, who has worked in sports science for organisations including UK Sport, the UK Sports Institute and the England & Wales Cricket Board, has a clear understanding of what the LTA is trying to achieve and why. “Our mission is to be world-class and respected at player development,” he said. “The slightly longer answer to that is that we create a pathway for our most talented players to go on a journey to becoming elite professional players, whether that’s in the tennis game or wheelchair tennis game.” It requires continuous self-evaluation on both his part and the LTA’s as well as acknowledging how the challenges faced evolve. Bourne emphasised a people-first approach. “However you cut it up, we are a performance-based industry and you have to have great people to do great things.” He spoke of “passion and care”. “We have a team of individuals who deeply care about the journey these players are on”. Passion is one of the LTA’s values and the sight of others in service to players is one Bourne finds “very humbling”.

Michael Bourne, Performance Director at the LTA. (Photo by Shane Anthony Sinclair/Getty Images for LTA)

His role in driving change

In addition to being mission-focused and people-centred, Bourne places a premium on critical thinking. He also believes that having great ideas is one thing, but being able to apply them is quite another. “You can have the greatest thinking and the greatest ideas in the world, but if you can’t drive and implement change, then it’s for naught,” he said. “Ultimately, leadership is about being able to drive and support change.” His team bring their tennnis-specific expertise and Bourne ensures everyone is aligned around the work that needs to be done. “It gets the balance between my background and their backgrounds in the right space.”

He does not assume things will happen on their own

Bourne readily admits his expertise is not rooted in tennis. Nevertheless, the necessary traits and skills are made familiar to him through his staff. He has set up a clear chain of direct reports and basic processes, but it needs constant attention. “Don’t just trust that they’re going to happen all the time – make sure that you’re around enough and verifying whether the communication, the connection that’s supposed to be in place, is actually in place; and if you need to step in and just give the person that support or just give that reminder of what we’re trying to do to prevent those dreaded silos developing people ploughing their own furrow”.

He relishes the daily challenges

Bourne feels that his role is inherently challenging; and that’s alright. “I feel like in these types of jobs, if your job is easy, something is wrong – I don’t think they’re meant to be easy,” he said. “If they’re easy, then you’re missing something or you’re not pushing when you need to push. There’s always more.” It feeds into his attitude towards the challenges faced by the LTA. “It should be unacceptable in a high performance environment to know there is a challenge and to take no steps to do anything about it.” There will often be “brutal facts”, as he put it, “then it’s my job to ensure that we’re all leaning into that and in the right way in a professional way and in a safe way; having the right types of conversations that we need to have.”

Listen to the full interview below:

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Michael Bourne has a sports science background, so it is no surprise that he places a premium on critical thinking.

“It is core to me,” the Performance Director at the Lawn Tennis Association [LTA] tells the Leaders Performance Podcast, which is brought to you today by our Main Partners Keiser.

Critical thinking is a skill that also served him well in roles at UK Sport and the England & Wales Cricket Board amongst others before he took the reins at the LTA in October 2020 (with Covid restrictions still in place).

“But,” he cautions, “leadership for me is about change and progress, and you can have the greatest thinking and the greatest ideas in the world, but if you can’t drive and implement change, then it’s for naught.”

It starts with taking stock. “As a leader, make sure that you are ensuring everybody else is confronting those brutal facts and you’ve got to be ahead of that,” he says, adding that he too must be open to feedback.

“It should be unacceptable in a high-performance environment to know there is a challenge and to take no steps to do anything about it.”

In the first episode of this new series, Michael explains his mission-driven and people-centred approach to helping produce British tennis players with the means to compete with the world’s best [33:10].

During the conversation, we also touch upon the challenges the LTA faces and the benchmarks set [8:30]; his belief in the unique qualities of British tennis [14:30]; why the flow of information cannot be taken for granted at the LTA [38:30]; and the enduring power of the Lion King to move him [48:00].

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By Luke Whitworth

We want to start this Debrief with a big thank you to those who made it to our Sport Performance Summit in LA last month.

It is always wonderful to see the great and the good of the Leaders Performance Institute gathered to discuss the pressing performance challenges of the day.

Speaking of which, the happenings at Red Bull were far from the only opportunities on offer at the Institute in June, with roundtables and community calls packed with members sharing both challenges and best practices on a range of topics.

Many are covered in this month’s Debrief. As ever, do check out our upcoming events and virtual learning sessions, which are designed to help you to connect, learn and share with your fellow members from across the globe.

Right, let’s get into some reflections on June.

What we learned at the Sport Performance Summit in LA

We had a great couple of days with those of you who made the trip; and there was plenty of thought-provoking content for us to get our teeth stuck into (full account here). Below are a few snippets that particularly caught our attention:

Four tips for avoiding the ‘Innovator’s Dilemma’

The Innovator’s Dilemma is a 1997 book by Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen that explores the tension between sustaining existing products and embracing disruptive innovations. It resonated with Jen Allum, from X, the Moonshot Factory and Alphabet, the parent company of Google, who understand they could easily fall prey to the Innovator’s Dilemma. Onstage, Allum shared their four top tips for avoiding this scenario:

1. Aim for 10x not 10% – use ‘bad idea brainstorms’; practise the behaviours of audacious thinking; put everything on the table.
2. Be scrappy, test early – reject the social norm of refining; find the quickest way to learn that you’re on the wrong path; have a thick skin and be OK with people thinking you’re wrong and weird.
3. Build-in different perspectives – recruit for a growth mindset (high humility, high audacity; people who take risks in their own lives; who think differently and challenge the way problems are solved).
4. Reframe failure as learning – you can’t solve for success, so track what you do, as failures will support future ideas.

Allum added that X, the Moonshot Factory “rewards project shutoffs, dispassionate assessments, and intellectual honesty” in the work they do.

How to optimise your energy as a leader

As a leader, strategic thinking is in your remit, but do you ever include protecting your energy as part of the equation? “An organisation can’t outpace its leaders,” said author Holly Ransom onstage. “So there’s nothing more important than working on ourselves as leaders.” Here are her thoughts on how leaders should show up each day:

• Manage your energy, not your time; and build-in moments of ‘micro recovery’ to support yourself in the moments that matter. We spend too much time in ‘up-regulation’ and we need to find ways to down-regulate’.

• Make sure your highest energy moments of the day align with your most important tasks so that your return on energy is optimised.

• Who in your corner is your supporter, sage, sponsor and sparring partner?

• Remember: you are the Chief Role Model Officer in your team – make sure you live and talk about the things that help people lead themselves in ways that manage their energy.

The biomarkers of a healthy culture

Back to the myriad insights gleaned from our June Virtual Roundtables, starting off with the latest segment of our series of learning centred around culture and change. The sessions highlight findings from a recent research project by the Premier League’s Edd Vahid titled ‘Cultural Hypothesis’. The project examines the key components of cultures that have been able to sustain themselves.

Vahid posits astute leadership as a ‘super enabler’. Indeed, as Donald and Charles Sull wrote in the MIT Sloane Management Review in 2022: ‘A lack of leadership investment was, by far, the most important obstacle to closing the gap between cultural aspirations and current reality.’

What are some strategies we can consider?

1. Start with acknowledging the connection between leadership and culture: the literature largely points in this direction, with leaders having a fundamental role in supporting the change management process.
2. Identify aligned leaders: from there is important to ‘identify leaders who align with the target culture’ as Boris Groysberg, Jeremiah Lee, Jesse Price, and J Yo-Jud Cheng wrote in the Harvard Business Review in 2018.
3. Honour your existing culture: you can too quickly go from point A to point B without taking a moment to understand what the existing culture looks like.

Vahid’s also research reveals that cultural leadership operates on three levels:

1. Sponsors: senior individuals critical for manifesting the desired culture.
2. Architects: these are responsible for designing cultural initiatives.
3. Guardians: everyone contributes to safeguarding the culture to varying extents.

Four features of a great debrief

Effective debriefing skills was the top of conversation for our latest Leadership Skills Series session. If you are interested to join roundtable sessions centred around developing your own leadership, there are some great topics coming up around strategy and cohesion you can find on the Member’s Area.

To keep this section punchy, a section of our discussion focused on some top line considerations for what constitutes a great debrief. Are you doing these well in your environments?

1. Psychological safety and the notion of creating a calm, positive and supportive space. As part of this consideration, set people up to focus on learning, not to be defensive and model your belief in their potential to create great performance. Finally, do everything you can to reduce power differentials.
2. Get good at questioning. Use open, non-judgmental questions and a lot of follow up questions. Focus on learning more than results and allow time for reflection.
3. Strike a good balance between focus on the positives and areas for improvement. A reminder: we learn quickest by reinforcing what works.
4. Pay attention to group dynamics to get the best possible contribution from all individuals.

The pathway to better collaboration and multidisciplinary working

Finally, we wanted to highlight some interesting insights and perspectives from our topic-led roundtable on functioning more effectively as multidisciplinary teams, which is often a very popular topic of interest across the Institute when speaking to many of you.

Do check out the complete summary. Below are a handful of ideas from members on the call that they feel are currently missing or need to be given more attention in the quest to do this well:

1. How are you supporting new leaders in your teams? Often we see those in technical expertise of ‘tactician’ roles move up to leadership position but lack the requisite skills to lead effectively. The role inevitably changes, so what are you or we doing to help them ‘lead’ their teams and embed true collaboration?
2. Be intentional with feedback. It was shared that an opportunity is a robust and thoughtful feedback mechanism that have variations in their approach. The idea of thinking about detailed feedback is to support learning on a consistent and ongoing basis within your teams. It always seems to us that high quality feedback seems challenging for our teams, so this may well be an opportunity to explore.
3. Are your standard operating procedures clear? If not, they need to be to support this quest for high levels of collaboration.
4. Psychological safety and empowerment. How do we  empower people more effectively to take targeted risks within their roles, whilst still feeling safe and secure? What we are really getting at here is psychological safety in teams and a shared understanding of what that means and looks like.

By Luke Whitworth

The old adage that people learn best through experience is not necessarily true – at least not on its own.

For learning to take place, people need to both reflect on and make sense of the experience; then they can think through how they will apply the knowledge gained.

Therefore, it follows that one of the most powerful applications of coaching is to facilitate learning through an effective debriefing process; to squeeze as much richness out of the experience as possible.

Done well, it can drive a very steep learning curve, build responsibility and confidence, and increase the focus on results.

In short, the high performance organisations that best sustain success know how to debrief.

What the literature says…

Debriefing was at the heart of the most recent Leadership Skills Series session, where members of the Leaders Performance Institute spent time considering some academic findings on the topic.

A 2008 study in the International Journal of Performance Analysis in Sport found that coaches only recall between 16.8 per cent and 52.9 per cent of events. This underlines the notion that if coaches don’t debrief consistently well, they are missing out on potentially rich conversations and insights.

Here are some further numbers:

• Leaders who engaged in reflection and debriefing improved their decision-making skills by 18 per cent, according to a study in the Academy of Management Journal.
• Reflective practices in leadership were linked to a 25 per cent increase in innovative solutions and problem-solving abilities in organisations, according to a report by the Center for Creative Leadership.
• Looking through a sport-specific lens, a survey of professional coaches found that 90 per cent believe debriefing is crucial to athlete development, with 85 per cent reporting noticeable improvements in performance and strategy understanding following regular debriefing sessions.

The positive effects of good debriefing

• The process builds self-awareness and enables ownership of individual and collective learning.
• Consistent and well thought-through debriefing fosters an openness to feedback.
• Helps to build relationships and team cohesion.
• Can decrease negative emotional effects.

What Leaders members are doing well in this space

During the session, members were invited to rate their teams’ debriefing skills on a scale of one to five and the mean was 2.8. Much room for improvement, no question, but there were a list of things that people believe they are doing well:

• At most teams, there is a genuine honesty and curiosity around enhancing performance.
• Intelligent framing and consistency.
• The creation of a safe space.
• Prioritising the debrief as a crucial source of information about how to get better.
• Appropriate priming. Differentiating between a ‘hot debrief’ and a post-event review. If it’s a review then sharing content beforehand allows for productive discussions.
• Taking nothing personally, instead, taking feedback professionally with the goal to be better – detaching from the emotional side of things and sticking to facts.
• Sensitively-phrased questions that focus on positive outcomes and changes even when asking what could have been better.

Six steps towards an effective structure for debriefing

The following is a six-step approach to debriefs. Consider each when designing the structure that works for you and your team:

1. A focus on reviewing where you are against your goals.
2. Dedicate time to draw out the learning around what has gone well.
3. Explore areas for improvement and insights around what’s not gone well.
4. Focus on learning, not blame.
5. Use root cause analysis.
6. Understand the key lessons and how they inform future actions.

David Kolb’s learning styles model

The session explored the work of educational theorist David Kolb, who devised a structured approach to understanding how individuals learn from their experiences. It involves a four-stage cycle and four separate learning styles. Much of Kolb’s theory concerns the learner’s internal cognitive processes, therefore can be a useful model to consider when thinking about both individual and collective debriefs.

The four stages of learning:

Graphic designed by Educational Technology.

1. Concrete experience

The learner encounters a concrete experience. This might be a new experience or situation, or a reinterpretation of existing experience in the light of new concepts.

2. Reflective observation

The learner reflects on the new experience in light of their existing knowledge. Of particular importance are any inconsistencies between experience and understanding.

3. Abstract conceptualization

Reflection gives rise to a new idea or a modification of an existing abstract concept (the person has learned from their experience).

4. Active experimentation

The newly created or modified concepts give rise to experimentation. The learner applies their idea(s) to the world around them to see what happens.

Kolb developed his four learning styles to illustrate different ways people naturally take in information:

Graphic designed by Educational Technology.

1. Diverging (concrete experience/reflective observation)

Learners who prefer the diverging style are best at viewing concrete situations from multiple perspectives. They prefer to watch rather than do, tending to gather information and use imagination to solve problems.

2. Assimilating (abstract conceptualization/reflective observation)

Assimilating learners prefer a concise, logical approach. They require a clear explanation rather than practical opportunity. They excel at understanding wide-ranging information and organising it in a clear logical format.

3. Converging (abstract conceptualization/active experimentation)

Learners with a converging style can solve problems and will use their learning to find practical applications for ideas and theories. They prefer technical tasks, and are less concerned with people and interpersonal aspects.

4. Accommodating (concrete experience/active experimentation)

Accommodating learners are ‘hands-on’, and rely on intuition rather than logic. They use other people’s analysis, and prefer to take a practical, experiential approach. They are attracted to new challenges and experiences.

The STOP model for live debriefs during the event

The session also discussed the STOP model, which is useful for ‘in the moment’ debriefing (sometimes known as ‘hot debriefing’).

Stand back: take a helicopter view of a situation or problem.

Take stock: analyse what is happening in the moment.

Options: explore options around what you can do differently.

Proceed: step back in and take action. Then assess what impact your new approach has.

The features of a great debrief

• Psychological safety and the notion of creating a calm, positive and supportive space.
• An approach that underlines belief in the potential for great performance, that encourages learning and reduces defensiveness.
• Reduces the impact of power differentials between leaders and those they lead.
• It involves good questioning. Use open, non judgmental questions and be prepared to follow-up.
• Focuses more on learning than results and allow time for reflection.
• Strikes a balance between focusing on the positives and areas for improvement. People learn quickest by reinforcing what works.
• Pays attention to group dynamics in order to get the best possible contribution from all individuals.

By John Portch

It’s difficult to imagine Dan Carter looking awkward or out of place in an All Blacks environment so we’ll have to take his word for it.

The former first five-eighth (fly-half), who won back to back Rugby World Cups with New Zealand in 2011 and 2015, was one of a “legacy group” of former players invited in August 2023 to observe the team’s preparations and answer any questions the younger players might have ahead of their World Cup campaign.

“It’s a new bunch and you guys know pretty well that when you finish playing, you get invited back into the changing rooms or the team room and it’s quite awkward,” Carter told former England internationals James Haskell and Mike Tindall on The Good, The Bad & The Rugby podcast.

It was a changing room Carter had shared with a number of that All Blacks squad. “I don’t know if you guys feel it but going back into that environment, you kind of feel like a spare wheel.”

At no point was this the perception of the players, coaches or the All Blacks’ high performance team. In fact, two months later Carter, Keven Mealamu, Richie McCaw, Conrad Smith, and Liam Messam were invited to return at the Rugby World Cup in France, which took place in October and November.

“Talking to our team’s leaders, they got the most from the legacy group because the players are the ones who are having to drive along with that in the environment and the playing group would look up to them,” said Mike Anthony, New Zealand’s Head of High Performance, at February’s Leaders Sport Performance Summit at Melbourne’s Glasshouse.

Here were some of the most-esteemed guardians of the All Blacks culture coming back to reinforce the connection between all those who have worn the jersey.

Anthony continued: “That group had been through adversity. They’d lost World Cups and won World Cups. They knew what it took. The legacy piece for us is important.”

Legacy – a word long-associated with the All Blacks – is crucial in bringing to life the ambitions across the ‘teams in black’ i.e. the All Blacks, the Black Ferns (current women’s world champions) and both programmes’ sevens teams.

Their three core ambitions are:

1. To be the most dominant team in history.
2. To leave Mana in their wake.
3. To include the players in shaping the team’s vision.

These ambitions help to plot the path towards a performance culture described by Anthony as “unwavering at it’s core, it’s inspiring, it’s empowering, it’s inquisitive, and it’s responsive to change.”

The last point is critical. “How do you bring it to life day to day and how do you refresh it so that’s it’s relevant to your current group?” asked Anthony. “I’ve observed teams being successful and then they continue to run with what worked before as the group changes. It comes down to induction: how do you make sure your vision is relevant for your current group?”

Here, we unpack how the ambitions of the teams in black are brought to life through their behaviours and habits.

The building of a legacy: the All Blacks have won three World Cups; the Black Ferns have won six of the last seven Women’s World Cups. This enduring excellence burnishes their legacy year on year. “We talk of leaving the jersey in a better place,” said Anthony. “You’re the guardian for a short time, so when you leave it to the next person, you hope to add value.”

A team-first attitude: this is a challenge for New Zealand Rugby as a whole, with the growth of individual brands and the often more lucrative opportunities on offer abroad. Yet New Zealand’s best players invariably remain at home during their peak years to pull on the black jersey. The allure runs deep and it requires selflessness. “You’ve got to be selfless,” said Anthony. “You’re an All Black or Black Fern 24/7 and it’s in the little things you do when no one’s watching. You’ve all heard the analogy ‘sweep the sheds’ – it is genuinely something that our guys do. It’s not the job of somebody who’s paid to clean up after us and we take pride in how we do that.”

A player-driven environment: Anthony explains that buy-in is at “100 percent” amongst the players and that some players “never want to leave” New Zealand. This is in part because the team is intentional in its efforts to encourage players to speak up and contribute to the culture (“you have to create something pretty special to keep players here”) but it is also due to the increasingly creative ways that players are incentivised. “We give guys sabbaticals to go away because we know the money’s good; then we bring them back and that’s worked really well,” said Anthony.

Alignment: it is obvious that no two people are alike but that does not necessarily prevent them sharing a common vision. Said Anthony: “For me, ‘alignment’ is when people understand and are deeply connected to your vision.”

It is also a consequence of effective leadership, which he distilled into several traits while adding the caveat that you have to, above all else, play well. “I think we sometimes burden our leaders and they feel cluttered,” he said. “We want the spine of the team playing well first because, generally, they’re your best players. You have to get the balance right there.”

In New Zealand rugby, leaders embody…

Humility. As Anthony said, “you’ve got to be humble and vulnerable because that’ll encourage others to step into that space and contribute.”

Inclusivity. Anthony felt that although teams want everyone to have a voice, there is too little focus on schooling people in how to give and receive feedback. “If we want our players to challenge their peers, we’ve got to give them the tools”.

A growth mindset. There is always a performance gap; always a challenge. “It’s never about ‘we’ve arrived’,” said Anthony. “That gap creates that discomfort and itch that you want in a high performance environment.”

Ownership. Being an All Black or Black Fern is a 24/7 commitment. Anthony described Richie McCaw as the embodiment of that view. “It’s doing the unseen things,” he said. “It’s easy to sweat, but when you go home, what you’re eating, your sleep, how you present around your family – those are key.”

Finally… he tāngata, he tāngata, he tāngata

Anthony wrapped up his presentation with a whakataukī (Māori proverb):

He aha te mea nui? Māku e kii atu, he tāngata, he tāngata, he tāngata.

What is the most important thing in the world? Well, let me tell you, it is people, it is people, it is people.

“The price of entry is technical knowledge,” said Anthony, “but get the people right and hopefully you can build the right environment for a performance culture that supports the athletes.”

By John Portch

Jen Overbeck painted a scene for Leaders Performance Institute members.

“Here’s the situation,” she said. “You have an idea born out of your expertise; a lightbulb moment. Maybe it’s something that’s developed over time and you bring it to somebody you think is going to benefit, whether that’s an athlete, someone in your organisation or somebody who works with you.

She continued: “You’re explaining it with all your passion and they say ‘yeah, nah, I’m not excited about that at all. I don’t think I want to do that.’ Has that ever happened?”

A few individuals tentatively raised their hands in the audience at Melbourne’s Glasshouse.

“OK, good, because otherwise you should be up here teaching instead of me!”

Overbeck, a Professor of Management at Melbourne Business School, was speaking at February’s Leaders Sport Performance Summit.

Over the course of half an hour she explored the social and psychological elements that affect how people react to requests to change and why, as a leader, that reaction can depend on your power and influence.

Power v influence

Overbeck used the example of Phil Jackson as someone sports coaches and practitioners might aspire to emulate. She lifted a passage from his 2013 book Eleven Rings where he wrote about ‘benching the ego’:

‘After years of experimenting, I discovered that the more I tried to exert power directly, the less powerful I became. I learned to dial back my ego and distribute power as widely as possible without surrendering final authority. Paradoxically, this approach strengthened my effectiveness because it freed me to focus on my job as keeper of the team’s vision.’

Jackson came to recognise that power and influence sit on a spectrum. As such, the NBA’s most-decorated coach, provided the perfect case study for Overbeck to define those terms.

“‘Power’ is your ability to get somebody to do something that they don’t want to do,” she said.

This is set in contrast to ‘influence’. “You could also call it ‘persuasion’,” she added. “This is all about how much credibility and persuasiveness you have to influence people to go where you want them to and they’re going there willingly.”

There are few coaches in the high performance community that would prefer to increase their power at the expense of their influence and Overbeck stressed that you are free to make your choice.

“When you understand the differences and what drives them, you can make those choices deliberately – and that’s generally better for ourselves, our athletes and our organisations.”

How to elicit change

Overbeck explained that there are three types of behavioural strategy:

1. Dominating

She says: “That’s when you’re using a great deal of power; you’re not using a great deal of influence. You’re basically trying to make the person change.”

2. Negotiating

This emerges in a space where a leader has more moderate power and influence. “We’re giving people some choice, but we’re not giving up on our power altogether.”

3. Supplicating

“This is a very big word,” said Overbeck, “because it means you’re completely leaving it in the other person’s  hands; you’re exerting no power whatsoever.”

The best scenario for a leader, as Jackson understood, is to be negotiating. Overbeck posed a series of questions that leaders can ask themselves when moving away from either dominating or supplicating:

• Do you typically believe that you have the skills and ability to bring people into alignment with yourself?
• Is it more your experience that you end up fighting them?
• Do you tend to lean more on power? Or do you lean more on your persuasion and your credibility? And what informs your response? Do you know why you’re doing that?
• Which of these three behavioural strategies is your go-to?

The tactics available to a leader

Overbeck ran through some of the tactics available to ‘negotiators’ and asked the audience to raise their hand if they’d employed any of the following:

• Sharing information about the background and context of change. Nothing unusual here and when she asked the audience at the Glasshouse most admitted they had tried this approach.
• Explaining the benefits of the change to the person. “We all here are supposed to do this,” said Overbeck and indeed the room indicated that it was a common tactic.
• Promoting your own expertise. “Letting people know why they should listen to you because of what you know.” Overbeck noted that in comparison to the first two, this approach was less common.
• Dare them, challenge them. “A bit more contentious,” said Overbeck. “‘I don’t know if you can do this one – prove me wrong’.” Again, a few hands went up.
• Make them feel like a loser if they don’t make the change. It may have been a favoured tactic of former college basketball coach Bob Knight, who Overbeck referenced for his draconian approach, but no hands went up in the room. “Nobody will admit it,” she said, with a smile.

The six types of capital available to leaders

None of the tactics described above are particularly unusual. “We know a lot about the tactics we’ve been told will be helpful for pursuing change,” said Overbeck, adding, “we don’t know what kind of power and influence we need to have ready and available with us in order for these tactics to succeed.”

She returned to the example of Jackson, who managed to elicit the very best from Michael Jordan during their time together at the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s.

“Phil Jackson may not have led with power but it was in what he did,” she said. “He was using what was available to him.”

He was, in essence, aware of his ‘capital’, as Overbeck put it. “Power comes from the resources that you control.” There are six kinds of resources, or ‘capital’. The first three are easily explained:

1. Financial – money, essentially.
2. Human – people, specifically their talent, strength and energy (in sporting context)
3. Material – facilities and equipment.

The final three must be used carefully because they can be sourced into power:

4. Psychological – your ability to affect other people’s mental and emotional states. “If you can inspire people and rev them up and get them excited about something then that builds your credibility; it helps to persuade them.” This can, of course, tip into the dark side of manipulation in unscrupulous hands.
5. Social – networks and relationships can be a source of credibility. “That could be encouraging team members to lean on a person or getting your coaches together to influence upwards”, said Overbeck. “That could be social capital as long as you’re controlling that relationship as opposed to abusing it.”
6. Intellectual – your expertise (separate from human capital). “If you hoard it and you only give it out when you get what you want that’s power, otherwise it can be a source of credibility.”

Social and intellectual capital

Overbeck homed in on social and intellectual capital because while leaders in sport may want to have power in the background, you probably will not want to lead with that power.

Instead, you’ll want to dial up your influence and credibility, which can come from various sources, such as trust and belief in your abilities as a coach due to your track record and reputation; that your place is not a result of political chicanery or nepotism.

“I’m going to talk about it as ‘tribal membership’,” said Overbeck. “When people are deciding whether to accept your influence, the No 1 thing they are assessing is: are you with me? Are you part of my team?” She makes it clear that ‘team’ may not be the literal team but your alignment with an individual’s personal values. Without that, they may reject you out of hand. “The first thing we have to do is make sure that we’re telegraphing to the other person that ‘even if we have those differences in terms of those things that you most cherish and value, I honour those things, and I’m not going to get in the way of them. I’m going to work with them, not against them’.”

Once you loosely establish yourself in the same tribe, you then need to demonstrate how your expertise can be of value – that’s your intellectual capital.

Overbeck said: “When we’re trying to build credibility, it’s our job to build that bridge and make sure that the other person understands.”

She likens it to a credit account. “The higher your credit limit, the more you’re able to go out and spend.” However, it must be kept topped up. “Once we’re good, we always have to be thinking: ‘am I getting over my limit?’” You have to continuously demonstrate your credibility or you will lose people.

Final questions to ask yourself:

• How much power and influence do we have in the relationship with the person or people we’re trying to influence?
• Which behavioural style – dominating, negotiating and supplicating – do you lean towards? Or is it a combination? What are the likely outcomes going to be of employing this style?
• Is it doing what we need or do you need to make adjustments?
• To the extent that either our power or our credibility are lacking, are you engaging with some of these behaviours and using some of these resources to boost them up?