What kind of a corporate athlete are you?
Posted on June 12, 2012 by Laura Bacci CPCC, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.
The Summer Olympic Games are coming up soon. What type of a corporate athlete are you? What does your team need to reach for the Gold?
It’s just a few months until the Olympic Games start in London. As the excitement builds, it got me thinking about the analogy Loehr & Schwartz made between executives and athletes in their article: The Making of a Corporate Athlete¹. So I’d like to ask you the question: what kind of a corporate athlete are you?
Think about it. If you were on your country’s Olympic team, in which discipline would you be competing? Would you be a 100 m sprinter or would you be more inclined towards endurance events such as the marathon? Do you get excited about the 400 m hurdles, the javelin throw or the madness of table tennis? How about team sports like water polo or hockey? Would you go for scary sports like diving, or aesthetically pleasing ones such as synchronised swimming? What about being an all-round decathlon champion?
Have you ever taken the time to explore what type of corporate athlete you are? What makes you excited, what are you good at? What are your natural talents? What discipline should you really be in? Are you a solo athlete or a team player? What times of the day do you give your best performance? When do you take a break from the training and what’s your recovery time? How do you deal with setbacks? What do you need from your coach?
Above all, what motivates you to get out of bed in the morning and perform to the best of your physical and mental abilities? Is it the thought of the gold or are you just taking part?
Now think about the people in your organisation. Do you know what motivates them? Do you know how you can motivate them better?
Remember that the one thing that ensures that companies succeed in business – in whatever industry, wherever they are in the world – is people. What do you need, and what does your team need, to beat your competition to the gold?
©Laura Bacci, 2012 (www.laurabacci.com)
1- J. Loehr & T. Schwartz, The Making of a Corporate Athlete, Harvard Business Review, 2001
