Pursuing Personal Excellence Together

A recent Q&A at IMD business school, featuring the world’s fastest man, Usain Bolt, and his coach Glen Mills, yielded some fascinating insights into the process of translating potential into achievements – including the big paradox of pursuing personal excellence: that you can’t do it alone. [1]

In the space of just 12 months, the Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt shattered the world records for the 100m and 200m twice, while winning three Olympic and three world titles.

People’s first reaction to Bolt's prowess is to say that he is a natural phenomenon.  That is certainly true, but it is just part of the story.  Even with his amazing talent, he could easily have never become the superstar he has become.

He first came to prominence as the youngest ever world junior champion over 200m, aged 15. But every year athletics commentators and coaches see youngsters who seem blessed with astonishing talent. The reality is that most of those individuals don’t make it for one reason or another.

Bolt very nearly featured among those casualties. In making the transition to the professional ranks he suffered repeated injuries, culminating in an inglorious first round exit from the Olympics in Athens, aged 18.

As supporters back home started to criticize him for being giddy headed from too much early success and too much partying, Bolt realized that something had to change. He approached the veteran Jamaican coach, Glen Mills, to train him.

You can’t do it alone

Referring to Mills as a “second father”, Bolt readily concedes that his exploits at the Olympics and again at the World Championships would not have happened had he not met Mills: “He took me from being injured to being a champion.”

Mills worked on Bolt’s technique and intensified the training program, including more weights work to strengthen weaknesses, but at the same time brought in a physiotherapist to alleviate the strain on Bolt’s lower spine (he suffers from scoliosis), which was the root cause of his recurring hamstring injuries.

Part of what allows Bolt to focus on his running is that he has “delegated” key decisions concerning training regime, choice of events and races to Mills – someone with far greater experience of the efforts required to succeed, the art of peaking at the right time, and the dangers of overtraining or burning out. The fun-loving Bolt also chose a trainer renowned as a strict disciplinarian knowing that Mills would help him stay focused on the task.

Finding the right coach or mentor is critical for anyone who wants to improve. In a recent Fortune article, Google CEO Eric Schmidt, reckoned that the recommendation to “hire a coach” was the best piece of advice he had ever received – not necessarily because the coach can do it better than you, but because he or she helps you articulate things, allows you to see the problem better, to focus your energies and get you to be your best.

As Bolt and Mills discussed the way they worked together, the executive audience at IMD came away with numerous insights into the business of maximizing one’s potential. Seven key lessons can be captured.

Lesson #1: Fighting deafness. Getting a great coach or mentor is critical, but pointless unless the athlete remains receptive. Mills notes: “He’s the star and I recognize his achievement, but in training, I’m the boss.” When Mills asked Bolt to stop listening to music during warm-ups for races, Bolt complied, later noting: “Glen says: you have to be totally focused, with no distractions. You can’t concentrate on what you have to do if your mind is on hip-hop. And he’s right.”[2]

Bolt left it entirely to Mills to decide whether he would double up in the 100m and 200m in Beijing or whether participating in the 100m would jeopardize his chances of gold in his specialist event, the 200m. As world record holder in the 100m, Bolt could have insisted on entering both events, but he realized that overconfidence might cloud his judgment.

Bolt understands that he needs someone to keep him honest. So too for executives. As they accumulate successes, they can grow hard of hearing or even deaf. To make sure they do not become imbued with an inflated sense of their own importance they need to maintain contact with people who, like Mills, a) know the truth and b) are willing to tell the truth. Mills notes wryly: “This is the only job where the employee gets paid to be the boss.”

As we achieve goals and progress, we all need someone to whom we give full license to ask the awkward questions.

Lesson #2: Learning to lose. According to Mills: “It is the mind that carries the body through the tough times.” The first big psychological lesson that Mills taught Bolt, and that stuck most in Bolt’s mind, was that “You have to learn how to lose before you can learn how to win.”

Mills expands: “Learning how to lose does not mean that we practice to lose. But the fear of losing is what you need to overcome. That’s a crippling fear.” And as Bolt puts it, once that fear is gone, then you can focus on the positive and you can play to win – rather than playing not to lose.

In part, Mills instilled this mindset by deliberately pitting Bolt against the stiffest competition from the outset. Bolt learnt that losing was no disgrace, but rather a spur to review the races to see what could be done better. Bolt notes: “Now, nothing could really break my confidence. When I lose, I just have to find out what I did wrong, work hard on it and bounce back.”

The management scholar, Chris Argyris, noted a similar challenge for fast-trackers in organizations. He found that the psychological make-up of smart people paradoxically made it harder for them to learn. Having rarely experienced failure, they had not properly learned how to deal with the embarrassment and sense of threat that accompanies failure. When they encountered failure, it triggered defensive routines that inhibited learning.[3]

Lesson #3: Building resilience. Openness to learning is one thing, but persistence is another. Mills has instilled in Bolt the idea that injuries are part of the game when you are pushing your body to its limits. They are to be expected – and even welcomed as part of your development.

Injuries help to build mental resilience. They provide an opportunity to correct weaknesses but also to reflect on the things you are doing right. They should not be viewed as a sign that you are on a negative trajectory, but rather embraced as an integral part of the learning journey. It was because of injury that Bolt hooked up with Mills. It was injury that changed Bolt’s mindset and helped instil the focus and self- discipline needed to realize his full potential.

Similarly, for executives who are stretching to the limits of their capabilities, it is impossible to avoid setbacks and even the odd derailment. In the current context, many former high flyers are suffering from the economic crisis. The question for them is: Are you learning enough from this? Are you happy with the way you are investing your energies and what it is adding up to?

As Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Andrew Ward point out in their work on how great leaders rebound after career disasters: “These occasions of distress are potentially clouds with silver linings. It is through such loss that we often discover what we truly value. It is through such loss that we discover whom we can really trust. It is through such loss that we reveal new dimensions of our own character.”[4]

Lesson #4: Boosting stress immunity. There are no signs of nerves from Bolt as he prepares for a race. On the contrary, he likes to entertain the crowd with cheeky antics. Asked about these, Bolt reveals that they help him relax at the start of the race as well as setting the stage for the spectators who respond well and like to be involved.

Mills adds: “Over the years Usain has developed mental skills. I taught him to visualize and always see himself winning regardless of who he competes against. If success is in your subconscious, it is a part of you. So when you see people, you see people you are going to beat. If you are nervous, you visualize failure. If you visualize winning, you have fun.”

Their comments actually reveal two techniques for dealing with stress. First, Bolt uses the pre-race routine to take his mind off the stressors and to gain a sense of control over his environment. Second, where anxious rivals see the pressure of expectations from the packed crowd, Bolt sees support. He believes that “the crowd is your friend” and notes: “I feed off the energy of the crowd.” Such reframing allows him to convert negative stress into positive stress and to operate at maximum potential, both mentally and physically.

Executive life is replete with potential stressors including difficult relationships, job uncertainty, travel obligations, unrealistic deadlines, demands or assignments and sudden changes. To progress, executives have to learn to absorb or shut out those stressors – or even to reframe inhibiting stressors as stimuli.

The good news is that there are techniques that can be used in the heat of action and others that can be used during a time out – to help take personal control over stressful situations we face.

Reacting positively to stress is something that can be improved with practice.

Lesson #5: Guard against your own weakness. Training, according to Bolt, is not much fun. The daily routine is painful. To push himself through punishing training sessions, Bolt keeps his eyes on the long term objective. But he also knows that come the training session, he won’t want to do it. So he has given Mills the permission to force him to do it. Bolt has found a way of fighting the instinct known as “hyperbolic discounting” that erodes our motivation when the payoff is very distant.[5]

Numerous studies have shown that people are really bad at following through on things that they want to do in the long term because they tend to discount future benefits so steeply. For example, when we diet, the goal of a healthier body weight often cannot compete with the immediate lure of the chocolate.

Ambitious executives must also be willing to postpone gratification. One of the great unwritten career rules for fast trackers us that they can expect to be undercompensated for their efforts during the first half of their careers and overcompensated during the second half.

Like Bolt, they will need to forfeit immediate benefits in the interests of longer term goals – and may have to find clever ways of saving themselves from their own weaknesses – “pre-commitments” that will help them to maintain their focus on an objective they might otherwise dodge.

Lesson #6: Recalibrating the dream. After his stunning feats in Beijing, Bolt’s new found celebrity generated fresh distractions, including interviews, talk shows and celebrity parties. For a while, he lost his motivation to train, until a chance exchange with an old friend made him realize that his real dream was not to smash records but transcend his sport, like Tiger Woods or Roger Federer: “My standard is championships, not time records. I want to be a legend. I want people to say that I am one of the greatest athletes ever in the sport.”

Similarly, for ambitious executives, there may come a time when they achieve what they set out to achieve in their current careers – at which point they may have to contemplate what will sustain their motivation, their emotional flexibility and their intellectual vitality over the coming years or even decades.

Getting the job is one thing, but how do you maintain the appetite to do keep improving?

Lesson #7: Keep it fun. Perhaps the most striking characteristic of the ebullient Bolt is his sense of fun. He jokes about the hard work and the amount of effort, pain and discipline involved, but he projects an infectious joy that comes from doing something that he loves to do and having a purpose that he believes in passionately.

Interestingly, this joy and this passion were not initially there. Bolt started off with a desire to be a cricketer, but along the way a teacher suggested to him that his real strength might lie in athletics.

Later, with Bolt’s 6’ 5”frame, his coaches, including Mills, saw him as having the ideal build for 200m and moving up to 400m, but ill-suited to the 100m where compact builds are the norm. Bolt felt he had it in him to excel at 100m and worked hard to prove Mills wrong.

These choices provide a fascinating illustration of the three circles that executives must keep in mind as they try to shape their own careers.

The first two circles are the things you like to do versus the things you are actually good at doing. A lot of the things you like to do – like cricket for Bolt – you don’t really excel at. On the other hand, some of the things you’re good at, you don’t like to do. Bolt may have the ideal build to run 400m but he does not like the event. Just before the 100m final in Beijing, Mills issued a mock warning: “If you don’t win the gold tonight, I’ll get you running the 400m.”[6]

The third circle is things that people will actually pay you to do. Sponsors and advertisers are drawn to Bolt’s strong personality and showmanship, but only as long as he continues to deliver on the track. As Bolt’s agent, Ricky Simms, is quick to point out: “Coach Mills makes sure he’s an athlete, first and foremost. If he were running 10.1, no one would want to talk to him at all.”[7]

If you can find a zone of convergence between those three circles – the things you feel passionate about, that really play to your strengths and that bring you success – then you have really made it. As the old saying goes: “Find a job you love and you’ll never work another day in your life.” 

Lessons from the fast-lane

Sprinting is not polo. Running flat-out is something that virtually everyone tries at some time. To be number one in the world, you have to be better than billions of people.

It represents an extreme case of the challenge of turning potential into accomplishment.

Natural talent clearly rules, but at that extreme level of performance, the mental aspect is what makes the difference. It is about the ability to reframe injuries, failures and pressures as stimulants to learning, growth and the pursuit of excellence.

Take the example of Bolt’s compatriot, Asafa Powell. Although he has been the top performer in the world for several years – having won more sub-10 second 100m races than any other sprinter ever – he has yet to win a major championship.

Stephen Francis, a top Jamaican coach who watched Bolt at an early stage recalls: “Actually, I doubted whether he would make the transition. I figured he would be trying to go abroad. I figured he would be lost like so many others before him.”[8]

Bolt’s winning partnership with Mills ended up uncovering even more potential than anyone suspected. What Bolt showed in his early years turned out to be the tip of the iceberg. 

Jean-Louis Barsoux Jean-Louis.Barsoux@imd.ch is a senior research fellow at IMD.