Practise With The Best
Talent density is massively underrated. It is something we don’t hear enough about within businesses.
If you ever see two high performing colleagues there can be healthy competition, I have a strong belief where possible you should ensure there are more practise periods and projects where you can manufacture practise time and collaborative projects.
In my career there have been a handful of colleagues and team members who positively pushed me, they instantly increased the talent density and would increase the quality of the project or campaign by raising the status quo, having higher standards and having fun sparring with each other and pushing the projects forward.
This Instagram reel of two of the best tennis players on the planet reminded me that you rarely get chance to practise or test yourself against with a world class competitor/colleague/industry rival/foe.
This reminded me of a Simon Sinek and Adam Grant podcast and quote that rings true with me often.
Whenever I heard the name “Adam Grant”, it made me uncomfortable. If I heard someone sing his praises, a wave of envy washed over me. I knew him to be a good person and a nice guy. I respected his work a great deal, and he was always nice to me when we’ve met. We do the same kind of work — write books and give talks about our views of the world.
Although there are many others who do similar work, for some reason I was obsessed with him. I wanted to outdo him. I’d regularly check the online rankings to see how my books were selling and compare them to his. Not anyone else’s rankings — just his. If mine were ranked higher, I would smile a gloaty smile and feel superior. If his were higher, I would scowl and feel annoyed. He was my main competitor and I wanted to win.
Then something happened. We were invited to share a stage at the same event, and the interviewer thought it would be “fun” if we introduced each other. I went first. I looked at Adam, looked at the audience, and said, “You make me unbelievably insecure because all of your strengths are all my weaknesses. You can do so well the things that I really struggle to do.” The audience laughed.
Adam looked at me and responded, “The insecurity is mutual.” He went on to identify some of my strengths as areas in which he wished he could improve.
The question might be do you have a rival that will help you improve? And if yes - you do, do you practise or challenge each other enough?
