What business professionals can learn from a sports mindset

PA Life speaks to world-renowned sport and business mental coach Paddy Upton who has helped guide British boxer Hamzah Sheeraz to the European middleweight title, India to the ICC Cricket World Cup title and the Indian hockey team to the bronze medal at the recent Paris Olympics. Here, he explains what business and sport coaching have in common and how sports-inspired thinking can help people develop their high-performance capabilities in a world increasingly focused on the bottom line…

What is the biggest mental hurdle for elite athletes and business professionals to overcome?

Paddy Upton (PU): Many people struggle to be clearly focused in the present moment on the task at hand. The main reason for this is that their focus is grabbed by the multitude of distractions that surround most high-performance environments. This can be rectified first by formulating clear plans, ensuring you have the right people with the right skills for the job, and then preparing excellently. Next, learn your unique distractions and devise a strategy to circumvent them.

What is the biggest obstacle to an individual’s ability to focus?

PU: Being distracted by the end result or bottom line. Results can only happen in a tiny moment, but they primarily exist in the past or the future, never in the present. When we only focus on the bottom line, we are not focused on what we need to do right now to achieve that result. And that is what creates pressure, fear and anxiety.

How should PAs and EAs approach business executives who are all about the bottom line?

PU: Engaging them in a conversation about how they see getting the desired results is essential. If the executive is not receptive, formulate and present a ‘map’ of your proposed journey, but emphasise that you respect their experience. Present your ideas as a question: “Does this map look like something that will support you in helping get to where we want to go as a business?”

Paddy helped Indian hockey team to the bronze medal at the Paris Olympics

India won the ICC Cricket World Cup title with Paddy’s help

How should professionals approach a typical workday in a high-pressure environment?

PU: If a person only sees a job as a means to an end, it becomes a grind. A job mindset leads to mediocrity and will always leave people feeling flat.

Then you have those who view their work as a career. They are determined to do their best to get promoted, improve their CVs or get better opportunities elsewhere. However, this career mindset can also lead to burnout, selfish behaviour and politicking when colleagues are vying for the same promotion. Internal competition can be healthy, but only up to a point.

The third mindset – and the one I always encourage – is one of creating meaning. Working in boxing with Hamzah these past three months, what stands out most about him is that he wants to give back to his community and his family, who have sacrificed everything so he can succeed in the sport. In the same way, PAs and EAs can go to work embracing the attitude that their efforts make a significant contribution towards improving the lives of the clients and communities the company impacts.

What is your definition of personal ‘purpose’?

PU: Using your strength to serve a worthy cause greater than yourself.

What are the essential ingredients for a positive professional mindset?

PU: I am not saying anything people don’t know already, but the first is good sleep, which sets us up for better emotional regulation, better thinking, better moods, better energy, and a better immune system.

The second is good nutrition, and the third is exercise.

The fourth is the quality of relationships. Even though we live in a more connected world, our phones have disconnected us, even though science has told us that one of the most significant things for longevity and avoiding depression is the quality of relationships.

The fifth aspect is stress management. Fortunately, if you have ticked the first four boxes, stress will naturally be reduced.

About Paddy Upton

Paddy is a South African leadership and high-performance coach, author, speaker and professor of practice at Australia’s Deakin University’s Faculty of Business and Law. He was instrumental in leading the Indian national cricket team to win the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup for the first time in 28 years and to become the World’s No. 1 Test Team for the first time. As performance Director, he helped lead the South African cricket team to become the first to simultaneously hold the World No. 1 ranking in all three game formats. He has coached in five cricket World Cups and, over two decades, has been a mental coach to athletes at the highest level across 19 different sports.

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