Wednesday 8 August 2012

Are You In A "Gold Medal" Organisation?

The current excitement over the London Olympics makes me ask this question.  The current crop of athletes now vying to win any one of 302 competitions and earn a gold medal makes me think of how businesses compete in the market to win a slice of business.  

The athlete standing triumphant on the podium is the symbol of sporting excellence, but like any business, there’s a vast team behind him or her making sure that he or she is in the best possible mental and physical condition to win. 

A “gold medal business” doesn’t just happen.  It takes months and years of training and honing skills.  Athletes don’t “burst on the scene” – they’ve been practising for ages.  It’s the same with businesses.  People “grow” into companies – but more often than not, they’re expected to be “rainmakers” immediately.  Some achieve this, others don’t. 

The team has coaches, doctors, physiotherapists, nutritionists, psychologists, planners, tacticians, observers, administrators, logistics managers, drivers and others.  Around them are the organisers judges and volunteers of the Games (similar to business groups and regulators).  People will tell me that business is the same with its accountants, lawyers, IT staff, administrators, HR managers, but unlike the athletic world, one corporate worker hardly sees their “physio” from one year to the next, except possibly at appraisal time. 

Everyone in the team is focussed on one thing and they all know what it is: to get the athlete/team into the best possible physical and mental shape possible to take gold.  It's a simple mission, easily communicated and understood.  Everyone knows exactly what they have to do.  They know who the competition is, their weaknesses and what they may do.  Feedback on results is immediate and unambiguous both in practice and in competition.  Results can't be fudged (unless doping is involved).

Performance in the stadium, on the road or on the wateris affected by any number of factors (temperature, wind speed, condition of track, light, current, changes in rules, for example) - just as happens in business.  The athletes who win do so because they can overcome these, or because those around them are less successful in managing them.  They may have control over some, and little or none over others

There are winners, losers, surprises and disappointments.  As in business, we occasionally see abuse of the system in the behaviour of a very few athletes.  These have (rightly) been publicly shamed and dealt with swiftly.  Would that it were as easy elsewhere… 

Even “office politics” can rear its head, as inter-team disputes come to the fore (this happened with at least one of the teams at the London Olympics).   

For the winners, there’s a medal, recognition and other rewards.  Interestingly, these don’t, for the most part, consist of obscenely high amounts of money.  In this writer’s opinion, gold medal winners achieve far more than many of those in corporate life and at much higher personal sacrifice. 

Medal level performance costs: athletes spend years focussing on their goal, spend large amounts of time away from families and have little time for other pursuits. There are plenty of “work widows” who would say the same about the business world.   

So looking at your business or organisation, ask yourself: 
· What are our goals?
· Is it easy to remember them?
· Have we communicated them to everyone so that they understand them as I/we at the top do?
· Does everyone know what they themselves have to do to ensure that we reach them?
· What support is available to ensure that our “athletes” are in tip-top condition?
· How do we know if we’ve achieved our goals?
· How do we reward our “athletes”?

You might be unpleasantly surprised at the answers. 


I have spent more than half my life working in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With more than 20 years in the world financial services industry running different service, operations and lending businesses, I started my own Performance Management Consultancy and work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email . My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services.

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posted by William Martin @ 15:33

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