Work Like An Athlete, Specific but Adaptive

The human body does better when it moves. Not only does it benefit you physically, but also psychologically. You can read about it here, here, or here.

Fitter, healthier humans make better teammates.

You can get fit in multiple ways and not every way works for everyone.

You could train for a marathon. Trying to get as aerobically fit as possible by running many kilometres daily. This builds your ability to endure the challenge of running 26.2 miles.

You could train for bodybuilding. You want to gain as much size as possible then diet to get as lean as possible to look great on stage for one shining moment.

You could train for powerlifting. You want to get as strong as possible while staying under a weight level for your competition. On the event day, you want to lift as much as possible over the 3 competition lifts.

What can training like a distance runner, a bodybuilder, and a powerlifter teach about being a better leader? A lot.

Specifics

Running, bodybuilding, and powerlifting are three distinct ways that humans can train. They all have different goals. The runner wants to run a marathon, the bodybuilder wants to look as big and lean as possible, and the powerlifter is trying to move the most weight.

The goal informs the training and the process.

The bodybuilder will train differently than the other two, and so on.

However, as humans, we can’t train everything in complete isolation. There will be a crossover for the powerlifter to put on more size and get fitter, and the runner improves when they get stronger.

But if the powerlifter trains completely like the runner, they will fail at their goal.

Specifics matter.

Sign Posts

Along the way, you will want to set up measures to assess how the project is proceeding.

For the runner, before the marathon, you will run a half marathon. These help see whether you are on track with the original plan or if you need to reconsider the process.

Testing

All three people have final points where they can assess their performance.

The idea of the training is to track improvement and put yourself under pressure to achieve something that was previously out of reach.

The testing piece is not about seeing if you are good or bad but whether the training has been effective or ineffective.

Good or bad are terrible metrics, yes, you can see how you perform relative to others but your training and improvement have nothing to do with what they do.

Resting

An enormous part of training is resting.

Resting after sessions and resting after competition. Humans are not machines and you can’t run them all the time.

It is the same with your car engine, if you run it constantly at high revs it is going to break down faster.

Reassess

After the completion, you need to reflect on the success of the training.

What worked? What didn’t? Did you achieve your goal? Was the goal even an effective or meaningful goal? What was learnt? What was learnt about yourself?

For your Team

So how does looking at training for an event relate to your team?

Specifics – The goals of the project matter. Being clear on what is important and focusing on doing that thing to a high level is going to get better outcomes than having some vague idea of what you want to achieve.

Some work in this project will support other projects, and vice versa, so use that to your advantage but don’t stray from the goal of this project because it is easier to complete one than the other.

Sign Posts – How is the project tracking relative to the understanding at the start of the project. Are all the assumptions still true or do you need to reconsider what has to be done?

Testing – At a certain point, you need to evaluate the project against the initial criteria. The project is over, did you achieve the goal you set out at the start? Did you do it in an efficient way?

Resting – If you are pushing your team hard, you have to give them a chance to decompress. This isn’t allowing them to be lazy but giving them space to recover which is beneficial for them but also beneficial for the team.

Reassess – Given what you know now, what would you do differently? What information would you have liked earlier? What areas of effort should you have done less of. Where should you invest more time in the future?