3 lessons leaders can learn from David Brailsford about the pursuit of team success

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Episode four in Sky Atlantic’s recent series British Cycling: Road to Glory documented Team Sky’s bid to win the 2012 Tour de France and it proved fascinating as well as topical, coming as it did in the wake of stunning successes at London 2012 on the road as well as the velodrome.

On the surface, the programme explained the steps that were taken to support Bradley Wiggins in winning the Tour; though at a deeper level there were some valuable insights into Team Principal David Brailsford’s ethos that can be applied in pursuit of team success beyond sport and in particular in business. Below are three key lessons leaders can learn and apply in their world…

1. A commitment to learning and self-development. When David Brailsford was interviewed in his office/study, there were plenty of books on the shelves behind him that demonstrate that he is a man who looks outside the world of cycling for inspiration, knowledge and insight. For instance: Good to Great, by Jim Collins, Getting things done by David Allen, Leadership, by Rudolph Guiliani, The Essential Wooden: A Lifetime of Lessons and on Leaders and Leadership by John Wooden and Steve Jamison to name but a few. He is clearly committed to raising his self-awareness and knowledge about what it takes to succeed by learning lessons from others.

Leadership lesson: what are you reading, watching and listening to, to inform you and raise your self-awareness in your role? 

2. An unambiguous, ambitious, compelling vision. According to Richard Moore’s book  ‘Sky’s the limit. Wiggins and Cavendish: the quest to conquer the Tour de France’, David Brailsford’s ambitious vision for a GB cyclist to win the Tour de France for the first time in the Tour’s history began to take shape in July 2007. More than that, Brailsford wanted to win it ‘clean’ and within the realms of ‘performance credibility’ (not on drugs) as Peter Keen, his predecessor at GB Cycling put it.  It’s important to put Brailsford’s vision into context. July 2007 was:

Brailsford’s vision was clearly unambiguous and certainly ambitious. As he said in the Sky Atlantic tv documentary: “if we aim for the stars, we might hit the moon” and such a vision certainly attracted likeminded people.

Leadership lesson: what’s your vision? Is it ambitious? Unambiguous? Compelling?

3. Team interests before personal interests. What became apparent in Sky tv’s documenting of the unfolding story of the Tour was the way that egos were kept under control in pursuit of the team goal. Everyone on the team had a clear role and responsibility and that was to support Bradley Wiggins and maximise his chances of winning the Tour.

The best example was the way that talented cyclist Chris Froome put his own ambitions  on hold to support his team mate in pursuit of the stated and agreed team goal of winning the overall Tour. It may have been a struggle for Kenyan born Froome off camera or away from the media. However, in public and certainly in his actions on the course, his loyalty could not be doubted: “anyone in a team position has to make personal sacrifices for the sake of the team and that’s what’s we’ve been doing so far and it seems to be working for us. So why stop doing that?” he explained in the press conference after stage 11 of the Tour. 

Leadership lesson: are you/your colleagues putting team goals and interests first? If not, what’s stopping you? What will you do about that?

There are so many lessons leaders can learn from the way David Brailsford has achieved success in the velodrome and on the road over a sustained period of time against the odds and against fierce competition. What have you learned? What have you actioned? And if this blog post has inspired you to take action now, what will you do? Post a reply. It will be great to hear from you.

Click here for my earlier blog piece on leadership lessons we can learn from David Brailsford.

 

 

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