Focus on the next lamppost
It’s 06:00 on the 28th August 1988, and I’m standing on the Dutch coast looking westward over the choppy waters of the North Sea. It’s dark and cold, the air temperature at 4 degrees C.
Ahead of me: a 2½ -mile sea swim, 112-mile cycle and a full marathon run. I’m here to win my first full length triathlon – or at least that’s what I’m telling myself – and I have a strategy.
I’d been racing triathlons for about three years and this year had trained well and competed in the three longest and hardest races I could find in the UK, placing in the top ten of each.
I’m really nervous. Will I blow up half way round? And I didn’t sleep well last night, hardly at all. We chose a quiet village about 10km from the race start only to realise we had arrived on the day of the annual beer festival and the oompah band played all night and well into the morning.
At 7am the gun fired and 1000 of us all sprinted off, going for the same line. It was the usual mass start: chaos, kicking, punching, and the water just 11 degrees C.
Over an hour later I’m on my bike pedalling hard, trying to get warm and overtaking faster swimmers but for now slower cyclists.
Holland is flat and windy. The route is two, 56-mile laps with a long stretch to the finish on the coast and into the wind. With sand from the beach blown onto the road, there were lots of tyre punctures and I had four.
I rode the last 30 miles into the strong headwind with soft front and almost flat rear tyres. I was tiring fast, thinking I’ve got a marathon to run now, and it seemed clear that I was not going to win this race. I catch myself: “No, Dave don’t go there, stick to your strategy.”
Onto the run. Different muscle set, and I’m flying. The sun is out and the wind has eased. Damn it! I could do without the sun and the wind would have been cooling. It’s now 26 degrees.
I manage to keep running; to stop and walk would be a killer. Over the 26.2 mile course I pass loads of fellow competitors, which spurs me on and I eventually finish with a sprint, ascending the order by another half dozen places. I’ve done it, completed an Ironman and am the first Brit, apparently.
My strategy throughout was to focus on getting to the next lamppost, or the next route buoy in the sea. It’s a strategy that has worked well for me in many other triathlons and in life and work situations. Here’s an example.
Costain – Implementing Best Practice
Back in 2000, Costain was having a tough time. Some investments had gone wrong and they were losing money on 20% of their projects. Some were big loss makers.
The then CEO and his systems director initiated a change programme based on rolling out best practice to all regions of the business. I was brought into help design and then facilitate all the training: 10,000 person days over seven years. It was all about implementing best practice in bidding for and delivering construction projects.
All members of staff went through a mandatory, three-day course and my job was to keep the energy up among presenters and participants, and to keep the whole thing on track.
At times it was pretty dry stuff and it being mandatory never helps. There were lots of exercises and good discussions but three days of it was heavy going for all concerned, including me, so at the start of each programme I’d say a little about how I raced triathlons by focusing on the next lamppost. I’d then say “Your next lamppost today is 10:30, cup of tea and a 15 minute break”, and “just keep getting to the next lamppost and you will get through this in good shape”. And I would do similar, signposting, the next break all the way through to the 4pm finish on day three.
It seemed to work. Energy remained high throughout and I gained a reputation for talking about lampposts and for encouraging people to eat fruit in the breaks rather than biscuits.
The programme worked, and contributed to Costain’s turnaround and winning New Civil Engineer magazine’s Contractor of the Decade Award. Read the case study here.
Next lampposts for leadership teams
I’ve been using the same strategy for the last 20 years in my work coaching big business and big project leadership teams.
In the first session of our DeliverStart2Finish™ programme, the team articulates their collective vision of future success.
We then go on a journey together from here to there, pausing at three monthly intervals to review and appreciate progress and to reset the collective focus for the next three month period.
Each reset represents the next lamppost on their road to success. They are moving forward together and leading the way for others to follow.
If we can all just get to the next lamppost and the one after that and keep going, together, we will get there in good shape.
And they do, delivering remarkable results along the way. More case studies can be found here.