How to lead
A High Performance Team
How to create a high performance culture | Andrew Sillitoe | TEDxRoyalTunbridgeWells
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when I first heard I was will be
speaking at Ted was about six weeks ago
I immediately started typing my script
and it's been an obsession ever since
I don't know about the other speakers
but and I was saying to my wife
yesterday that it's not ready it just
doesn't feel right you know you know
something doesn't feel right don't worry
it'd be fine you know this was yesterday
right there's people in this room
thinking that's not what we rehearsed on
Wednesday and I said you don't get it
this is Ted if this goes viral its
career-defining I'll be the next simon
Sinek you know and then I realized that
I'd completely missed the point that I
forgot my purpose in this and so I'm
gonna flip the script I woke up I was my
bike this morning I'm gonna talk about
something different and I think we are
losing our purpose in society you know
purpose is about meaning in our life
it's about staying engaged and you know
when things are tough and it's about
connection and I'd lost that connection
with you is it become about me and not
you yeah so um I'm going to talk about
that for a bit I think whether you are
an athlete or a teacher or a parent or
running a business we cannot operate at
our full potential without purpose now I
was I was sharing this about six years
ago in Canary Wharf with a group of
traders now I'd tell you to picture the
room it's 2009 and they're just starting
their career in trading in the city okay
so the crisis just hit and I'm in there
I'm talking about purpose right and to
be fair time they were getting into it I
started to get the idea but there was
this chap in the corner my I threw out
whole session and he was just heckling
me throughout the day this wasn't
getting it in his words this is fluffy
bollocks and this continued in the
afternoon he said to me um he said
Andrew you've been talking about purpose
all day even talking about asking us why
we do what we do what gets us out of bed
every day he said what do you do what
what gets you out of bed you know why do
you do what you do what's your purpose
which is a fair question to ask the
person who's talking about purpose right
and I need the answer because I
reflected on it in the past and I said
to him do you remember the rocky films
do remember the Rocky films yeah Rocky v
Tommy Gunn I said that's the worst I
said I remember that film
I remember watching it it was a Sunday
night it was a it was 1993 March 21st I
mean watching that film and Sundays in
my house are pretty sad I woulda been
out all day playing street hockey I'd
have been at Safeway car parking tell me
girls
I still call it safe ways I didn't
paying or dare to come home had a
roasting of my family and we'd watch
sport it have been cricket football golf
or snooker one of those for depend on
some a year and this tonight I was
watching my dad love sporty was a baker
my granddad was a baker and I always
expected the business to be mine but
when I was 11 my dad sold to business he
sold it so that was kind of the end of
that I still feel like a baker but he he
said to be fair to me made a lot of
money he moved into into construction
and we had this wonderful we made big
houses into materials we had this
wonderful big house and we had a you
know the fancy holidays two-port Avenue
you know all that kind of mob bayar you
know that nice stuff with this wonderful
e type jag blue etype jag it's to sit on
the drive but as quickly as he made all
his money lost a lot it was the mid 80s
and that's what happened in construction
lost it in our lives change like that
and on his Sunday night
he um he came to the door and I was
watching his film and he said to me I'm
going to bed come on keep it down a hug
and I said no no you've had a drink
he said come give me a hug I said no no
he went too but I didn't he went to bed
that was last time I saw him he died of
a heart attack aged 48 and I looked at
this guy and I said do you know that 20%
of people died in the early hours of a
Monday morning brought on by the stress
and anxiety and fear of facing work the
next day I said I don't want happened to
you or anybody that's why I do what I do
let's shut him up I feel blessed to live
in some beached whales actually cuz I
grew up playing street hockey in
somewhere else and I I got my first
stick when I was 9 and it changed my
life forever I was 9 years old I played
other sports but I think you know Paul
was talking about giving children
opportunity you know 80% of young people
young 14 year olds will become
disengaged with sport 80% because
they're looking for alternatives and we
don't we're not offering it but I was
lucky because I found street hockey and
I went on this extraordinary journey
with the Tunbridge Wells Street cruisers
and we would play all over Europe we
would drive out to Amsterdam Rotterdam
we'd go out to disord off and play in
these role hockey tournaments out there
out into the mountains of Switzerland we
even went off to Chicago to play in
Chicago we had an amazing we're never
very much money we have to save our
pennies in fact we used to go to Europe
we used to rent a transit van we used to
put our hockey bags in the back and put
mattresses on top so we'd go out and
that would be our accommodation for the
weekend and we were the first team
believe it or not the first time as
Royal Street cruisers was the first team
in 95 to switch from traditional roller
skates rollerblade you know courts to
roll
the blades because we thought it would
give us a competitive advantage it was a
disaster but what happened is that we
you know people thought it was hilarious
because the first taunt we played and we
came last and this was in Switzerland
and he one thought we were crazy for
doing it they could understand why we'd
made this this transition until of
course we started winning and in 98 the
talmud royal street cruisers beat the
düsseldorf rams in the final of the
championship now if you speak to the
team and say you know tell me about your
experience it's very rare that they'll
talk about the winning you know winning
is great it's it's a wonderful feeling
winning but if you ask them they'll talk
about the sacrifice they'll talk about
the road trips obviously I can't tell
you the stories because you know the
rules they'll talk about the fact that
we owned it that we shaped it it was
ours we'd have a coach or a manager
telling us where to be what to do it was
all self directed by us and the
following 10-15 years I played in 12
World Championships for Team Great
Britain at inline hockey I played I was
turned from America playing and and in
2010 I took on the head coaching job for
Team Great Britain and I'd acquired a
team that had lost in the quarterfinals
of Paul be in the World Championships
Paul bearer's is essentially like
divisions too and Paul a is that the top
eight countries in the world so sweet
and Czech Republic Canada USA etc the
top I sake countries that come across
and so I noticed that they'd become a
bit disengaged with playing for their
country having lost to Australia and the
quarterfinals the other 14 Paul B so I
was going to go in there you know all
guns blazing as head coach and I was
going to create the exact the same
culture as I might experience with the
temperature street cruisers the problem
is you cannot take one culture and put
it on another it just doesn't work right
and that was my experience so I had to
rethink what I was doing with the team
and and think about putting a different
set of rules in and these are the five
rules I'm going to share with you that I
put in place but for me have helped
create an environment where everybody
can absolutely thrive and I think we all
have a responsibility to create that
type of type of environment so the first
thing first thing we did with it
with the deep Team GB is that they
needed their own story they needed their
own story not one that I was trying to
force um our story happened over ten
years it was organic you can't just
recreate that but I had nine months
before the world chairmanships and their
story what they came up with was that
they wanted to look act and feel like a
pull a team to look acting for not to
win the gold medal in Pool B but to look
act and feel that was their vision for
the team now I couldn't go in and say
well if you want that you need to eat
better you need to train harder because
you still get resistance so I promised
myself that I would not tell them to do
anything and I would just ask them if
that's what you want too cheap I would
just asked in the questions there were
some things I had to to put in place
around strategy and how we play the game
but I wanted them to come forward of
everything for them to thrive and really
own it
like we had the other thing is I wanted
the creators in the team in team Great
Britain I didn't want to I didn't want
fun followers are good for the ego
they're not good for business right
they're not good for sustaining change
they're not good for creating high high
performance culture so I wanted to
create leaders and that's my cat so I
say to be unity captain you need your
assistant captains out there you need
people who can influence change and we
need to change the other thing is I
promised that we would embrace failure
absolutely embrace it because what I
could see was a group of players who
were paralyzed by the fear of failure
and it was prevents them from playing at
their full potential so we we said we'll
embrace it embrace the unknown and when
the street crews have switched to
rollerblades it was a failure but we
came back stronger me ended up winning
and you know when you take a risk it's
gonna go one of two ways isn't it you
can have it's going to be a really good
experience and you learn from it or it
might mean knots a great experience and
you learn from it right so either way
it's a bonus the other thing is if you
can do all
of that then we could hold each other
accountable we could look each other in
the eye and feel absolutely trusted that
we would do what we said we would do now
the problems I'm seeing which is driving
disengagement is that I see it in
education I see it in businesses is that
we are focused on that holding people
accountable businesses are getting
better and the reason why they're
getting better because they realize it
if you engage people if you help them
find their purpose it means they're more
productive they will be more engaged and
that means more profit organizations
like that in sports we're seeing
athletes as a commodity which is driving
personal greed and corporate greed and
corruption as we've seen recently with
FIFA because we're just focused on
performance in schools we're seeing
academic robots on a conveyor belt to
something they don't know where they're
going because that's what they're being
told what to do because they've been
held accountable what's this one that's
a degrade send it back yeah it's not the
system is not working and we need to
rethink how we can create an environment
where everybody can thrive feel inspired
and operate at their full potential so
I've shared my story with you I'd like
you to think about what your story is
and what you can do to help others
thrive in this world thank you
