Work that Olympic spirit

By MARK STORY

The fact there'll be no roof over the swimming pool at the Athens Olympics could be a little off-putting for some competitors. But when you're focused and mentally prepared for anything, swimming coach Jan Cameron says overcoming these sorts of hurdles is just business as usual.

It's somewhat amusing to Cameron that the corporate world is increasingly looking to sport for a competitive edge. Cameron views sport - at least at the elite level - as the ultimate business model. And the pool? Well that's her office.

She sees huge similarities between the business papers she studied at university and the training she received to become a leading coach. To Cameron, top athletes are no different to great products. It's through the input of a lot of people, constant testing and refining over time that they finally deliver excellence.

But from her observations, what top-level athletes bring to sport, which many people fail to take with them to work, is a passion to give their all. She says the processes of ensuring you're doing quality training - looking for advantages to provide an edge on competition day - come only after you've committed whole-heartedly to a particular journey. In the words of former American athlete Steve Prefontein, she believes those who give less than their best at sport or work sacrifice the gift.

In between preparing her 10 Athens-bound swimmers she's been motivating people to go for gold at work.

"You can have all the technology in the world to make your job easier, but unless there's a genuine enjoyment of what you're doing - the elixir, passion, drive, persistence, and commitment - the competitive edge in business will be missing," she says.

It's no different for her Olympic swimmers, says Cameron, who, despite not being top medal contenders, are not discouraged about training six hours a day, seven days a week.

So how can people draw meaningful comparisons between top-level sport and success at work? To Matthew Downing, 31, general manager with Newmarket Nissan, the courage and commitment of Cameron's swimmers offers valuable insights into how workers can improve their performance, promotion opportunities, wellbeing and, above all, success.

Having brought Cameron and her swim-team in a year ago to fire-up co-workers, Downing is discovering the difference between winning and losing in the workplace has more to do with the power of relationships than systems and processes.

" The standard of professionalism and selfless dedication displayed by Jan's swimmers is a step up from other so-called professional codes where the financial rewards are far greater," says Downing. "Their ability to punch well above their weight, without any expectation of remuneration - and with such limited resources - provides useful parallels for career development."

Having observed Cameron's swim-team in action it became clear to Downing there's no magic wand for personal improvement. He concluded that what sets Olympic athletes apart from others is that they're exceptionally hard workers who have successfully garnered the help of others to get to where they're going.

So what's in Cameron's bag of tricks that Downing has made his own? Post-swim and monthly health checks that focus on key performance issues are critical to Cameron's training programme. By getting co-workers to do weekly physical and performance-based health checks - encompassing everything from their own wellbeing to management issues - Downing says they're now much more focused on outcomes. As a result, he says it's now much easier to identify lingering negative issues that aren't always visible at the surface.

Swimmers have a long period of evolution and Downing is trying to adopt similar career development philosophies. That means putting in more effort throughout the journey, not just at the end.

"Weekly reviews and evaluations are a great way to bring people together to watch and learn about making integral improvements to their own performance," he says. "As with any top-level sporting pursuit, I want to impart the philosophy that reward only follows effort."

Much of what makes (most) top athletes hard working and humble, advises Cameron, is the realisation that reaching peak performance usually requires the input of many. When you rely on so many people behind the scenes to get to where you're going, how you treat people along the way becomes incredibly important. That's another reason why she says attitude is everything. In fact, she says the requirement top athletes and business people have for excellent support structures belies the old adage that anyone is ever truly self-made. "One medal is very much a team victory."

But if you thought competing at the Olympic games was only ever about medals Mike Stanley - part of the NZ rowing eight pipped for a bronze at the LA Olympics in 1984 - has a different view. Like most of Cameron's swimmers, Stanley never made a mint out of rowing nor did he ever take out Olympic honours.

He believes the real pay-dirt is being able to transpose the power of the Olympic dream into other aspects of his life.

"Sport is about winning, but unless there are other things - such as honesty, tolerance, credibility, fair play, courage, commitment and endurance underpinning it - these victories become soulless," says Stanley, CEO of the Millennium Institute for Sport and Health. "The journey of becoming an elite athlete helps people learn more about themselves and these lessons will stay with them forever."

According to Stanley if there's one thing workers can learn from top athletes it's how to play the mind-games associated with highly competitive environments. To him, what differentiates two businesses competing within the same industry are the individuals working for them and what they bring to the party.

Instead of having people motivated because they've got a mortgage to pay off, Stanley says fellow-workers must be committed on an emotional level. Those who aren't sufficiently motivated to do so are probably in the wrong job.

So how is his background as a top-level rower reflected in his approach to work today? That's simple, he says. "It's cultivated a can-do culture where if something needs doing you just get it done."

As well as helping him to remain calm in intense environments, he says it's also helped him manage fear and disappointment.

One of the real gems for Olympic athletes' who don't win medals, says Stanley, is the drive to find out how good they can be on the world stage and beat their personal best. "In a workplace setting that means building on the idea that everyone needs to strive for higher levels of performance."