Locker Room Power

One of the most common human conditions that I encounter is capable people, including high level athletes and highly trained individuals who are successful, falling into the trap of undervaluing their expertise. Naturally, when we’re very good at something it comes easily to us and because it feels so easy, we automatically think that it comes easy to everybody and that our information is common sense, or that our level is normal.

It’s amazing because so often when I’m doing a podcast, presentation, blog or release anything public I can have a mini panic and think “Why would anybody listen to this because surely everyone knows this already?” One of the biggest challenges is to keep realizing that information that I have delivered often, which has become so ingrained in me that nothing is fresh about it to me, is the danger that I no longer value the information and feel that it will be no good or help to anyone.

How do I get over this? What experience has taught me that because I know something so well that it has become basic to me, it does not mean it is basic to everybody. Also, learning takes time and whilst something is second nature to me and maybe not unique to me it still takes hearing things or seeing things many times before it is automated in our minds.

This can lead to serious consequences like not volunteering their expertise when needed, failing to go for promotions, undercharging or losing through self-induced poor performances all because they overvalue the quality of their opponents. People find ways of stepping back from a challenge all because of the assumption that they are not good enough. It is so easy to imagine that others are somehow better for various reasons, which so often is based purely on assumptions made up in our own minds.

In sport it shows when athletes assume the underdog position based on a self-assessment or because of a ranking position when the reality is at every level the margins are small, so it takes very little for a result to change. The trick is to just compete and never assume anything.

If we're really talented at something, then we so often default to automatically thinking that others around us are also very good.

The reality is so often what we have to say or what we can do is not common sense or easy for others and they need our help. The thing to remember is, if you're really good at something, there are probably very few people in the world who are up to your level. Equally you are unique so the way in which you present what you know and what you're an expert at, is totally different from anyone else. It'll have its similarities, but ultimately, your blueprint, your fingerprint, on the way that you do things, is uniquely yours. Keep reminding yourself to not discount your own value to the world.

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Saving people from situations or problems may seem like a wonderful thing to do but very often it is an ego trip, a deflection from a person’s own problems or to create a form of control through dependency. Good teachers from caring parents to coaches understand the importance of care and guidance to help others, especially young people who learn so much better through their own experiences and by doing things for themselves. It is essential to not fall into the trap of caring so much that you feel like you must bail children out of every difficult situation and prevent them from making mistakes.

Give people the tools to handle their mistakes and to learn from their mistakes. It is so important not to consider yourself as somebody who can prevent others from making mistakes. People only learn resilience through making mistakes and having to bounce back. I think too often in society right now there is a tendency to try to short circuit all potential hazards. This has been described as helicopter parenting and when this happens it is doing young people a disservice.

Owning and taking responsibility for mistakes is an important part of the maturing process. When you can own a mistake and learn from it that is powerful. As teachers, parents or coaches, our job is to question people, helping them to conclude that possibly a decision needs to be different, either this time or the next time. If people work things out for themselves that is really effective. For sure we can bring our experience and expertise into the conversation to give pointers, ideas, comparison and perspective which is especially powerful if we do it through stories.

Learn how to ask the right questions and not allow people off the hook with soft questions. Saving people is an ego trip because that means that they need you. And when people need you, that massages the ego. It somehow puts you in a position of power above them. And that is not what we want. What we want is for people to be open and to learn how to challenge things and challenge other people with good questions and inquiring minds no matter what their position.

Thanks for listening. I respect the fact that you have taken time out of your day to hear these nuggets and take the responsibility of giving you all I have seriously. My hope is that in a small way I can shift your thinking about a topic that helps you in your life.

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This is a magical lesson. Things have value whereas your peace of mind is priceless. Never ever sell out what is priceless for what is valuable? So, if you lose something valuable, leave something behind or break that which is valuable to us, we can really get upset and experience feelings of regret, guilt, anger, frustration, and loss for the item. We will often go to enormous lengths to buy something we really want like a sports car, diamond ring, house or whatever we desire that we think will make us happier. It is easy to slip into feelings of jealousy or inferiority if we compare our possessions to others.

The reality to consider is how much we can use possessions and how much we are in love with the idea of having things and how it will cause others to admire and envy our status when the fact of the matter is we can only drive one car at a time, use one room at a time, wear one amazing outfit at a time and imagine in our minds how much people admire our beautiful things. I’m in no way advocating blunting ambitions and enjoying rewards for hard work but what I am saying is that possessions are all replaceable, upgradeable, and breakable. They can have great monetary or sentimental value, but they are just things and even though relationships can suffer the same fate as possessions they are not easily replaced like possessions. Your key relationships are priceless.

If we sell our soul by neglecting or destroying priceless relationships for things, it is a mistake because in the one bed where we sleep, surrounded by our own thoughts or in the mirror we use, the one relationship we cannot escape is the relationship we have with ourselves!

The peace or lack of peace within our minds lives with us every day and if we have no peace then redemption is hard to find and takes way more time than causing the damage with no guarantees of repair.

When justifications ring hollow and we are forced to brush poor relationship decisions under the carpet, where we must accept our own lies in order to function, surrounded by beautiful things and broken loyalties, then our mental health suffers more than we care to admit.

Remember, understand that which in life is valuable, versus that which is priceless. Ultimately peace of mind is everything and it cannot be bought!

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Quit or carry on
When I work with sportsman often you get to a situation where they talk about quitting because things are so tough and it's not going their way. I'll always say to them, "Let’s not be flippant about quitting. This is a serious statement so if you genuinely want to quit then do it, don’t just talk about it. There are only two answers to this. You either quit or you carry on, but if you carry on, you carry on with a positive attitude. Working towards a goal with a negative attitude is living in a horrible environment, one that will never succeed, especially when tough challenges occur as they most certainly do. When it gets difficult the idea of quitting cannot invade the mind."
I worked with a company director who basically was telling me his story, and wow this was a massive moan. Basically it seemed to me like he carried the company on his back. He was doing everything, other directors were lazy, they weren't pulling their weight, and he was the guy who was always having to deal with the staff, and he was the guy who was always having to motivate people, and it was just way too much for him.
I came with the same thing, I said, "Well there's only two answers to this, quit or carry on. If you choose to carry on, you have to also choose to have a different attitude and stop behaving like it's not a choice. Nobody likes a moaner."
You can bet your bottom dollar that if he's moaning to me, he's probably moaning to different people in the company and that's terrible for morale. That is not leadership. Leadership is sticking to a really good attitude as an example to everybody around you.
He is a bright guy and understood what I said and decided to carry on and work on his attitude.
I said to him, "A key ingredient to the success of this transformation is to realise you that you're senior enough to choose what you're going to focus on."
Then we started to talk about what he really wanted to focus on and what he was really good at and where he could influence and where he couldn't. He started to say no to certain things. Where he couldn't influence, he stopped interfering and worrying about these issues or moaning about them. He began to realise that often he had made no positive impact to certain areas because usually they weren’t even his forte and he had been stifling others.
He started to focus on his priorities and strengths and forget about the rest, and of course that kind of tidied up his life because he wasn't worrying about things that really had nothing to do with him. I said, "Look, if people don't pull their weight and that messes up, not your problem, relax about it. Somebody will have to tidy it up or they won't, but make sure everything you do is positive and good." The reality was he began to trust his colleagues when they began to manage just fine without his interference.
It's a fantastic story of what getting the right mindset can do. The benefits that began to flow through by tidying up his life were certainly better for him, for his colleagues and family as well. Happy people are more productive and fun to be around.
The nugget for this week is to think carefully before you say you have to do things like you have no choice. Often it is a poor habit or an excuse when the fact is it is your decision whether to take on a project, accept an invitation or simply say yes because you are too afraid to say no!
You can quit your job completely or as with this director, quit certain elements of your job in order to do better in other areas. What in your life do you need to quit and where you are committed do things with a positive energy?
Check out MindsetCollege.co.uk where you will find a pathway to help you navigate your way to a successful mindset for elite performance.

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As head coach of the Bath Academy, I prided myself with the help of Barry Scollo in building what we call a team of leaders that encourages everybody to be every open and not afraid to speak their minds, and by and large people do speak their minds, especially with big issues.

But we've had a couple of situations which really proves how quickly fear can grow in an organisation that is very open and it all comes down to the hierarchy. I'll give a quick example. A senior coach took a player to a tennis tournament who was battling with his serve. The junior coach in charge of this player was not present so the senior coach took matters into his own hands to try solve the problem to help him win his next match and altered the serve. What happened next.....

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Good day, good evening, good morning, wherever you are in the world. And here is another one of David Sammel’s nuggets. I'm just about to leave Melbourne to travel back to the UK after a pretty successful trip where I was involved with the ATP cup and then of course, Liam qualified to play Nick Kyrgios on the John Caine arena, and unfortunately went down in that match where he effectively did very well dealing with a very hostile crowd, and a player who is a master at psychological warfare, and using the crowd.

Now, a lot of people have said that they feel like it's unfair the way Nick uses the crowd. Personally, I disagree, I think is fantastic for the sport. And you know, just like Muhammad Ali before him, he understands how to get under people's skin and in their heads, and get the opposition to think about him, rather than what they need to do. And he's done that successfully against the top 10 players of the world and actually has winning records against most of them. So, a very, very tough customer because, besides from his ability to work the crowd and to use that energy for himself, he can back it up with some excellent tennis as well.

This brings me to the nugget which is locker room power. Now I've written a book, which you can get on Amazon in paperback or Kindle or audiobook. And this is where I explain how the best in anything in the world have an aura about them and a feeling of invincibility, total confidence in themselves, and therefore are extremely difficult to beat.

They carry themselves in a way that makes you feel almost automatically that you're the underdog. And the way to combat that is to a be good enough to lock horns with them. But also, be able to not buy into this intimidation. All top people have this because it makes their job easier. They get their own way more often, and therefore don't have to fight as hard against every single opponent. It's something that you can build for yourself. And of course, understanding locker room power also helps you with the antidote. Whilst Liam is fully aware of locker room power, it's one thing, understanding it and hearing it from myself and reading it in the book, it's another thing to actually experience it firsthand. Most people struggle to overcome it at their first encounter with somebody who has this charisma. Also understand how brave these people are because they will do special things. Nick Kyrgios with the underarm serve in a stadium in front of everybody against anybody in the world. It's no different from somebody taking a penalty kick and having a one-step run up and chipping the goalkeeper, supreme confidence that they can carry off these feats. And of course, they don't have to do it every single time. But they do it enough to really put fear into opponents about their abilities. The main objective is that you think about what they're going to do and you worry about what they are going to do rather than sticking to your own processes and making your own statements and taking them on with your game. You're effectively saying I'm going to match you and I'm not going to fall for any of this in the same way that Borg never fell for McEnroe's stuff, and therefore McEnroe behaved against him because he knew there was just no mileage in any antics against Borg.

So as a recap, locker room power is something that exists and knowing about it is important. Learning how to combat it is also important. I wish you well for the week and go out and grab my book or the audio book and see what your take is on locker room power and find out how much locker room power you have in your field. Thanks a lot. Bye

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Good morning, good afternoon. Good evening, wherever you may be in the world. Welcome to another David Sammel’s nugget podcast, with short and sharp little tidbits that maybe help you in whatever you're doing. So hopefully you enjoy this one too. We are come to on the cusp of the Australian Open, where Liam Brody has qualified for the main draw, having come through three very, very intense, and tough matches a superb effort.

By the time you listen to this, possibly we will know the result from his first round. And who knows where this tournament will take us. But as I've said many times to athletes, - if the result doesn't go your way, are you going to quit or are you going to carry on? The answer is, almost always, I'll carry on.

And when you have a challenge and don't get your way in something that is important to you, you're always faced with the same question, quit or carry on. If you're going to carry on, then it's important that you understand that it's just another step in the process to get better, win or lose.

There are no silver bullets. But there are some key fundamentals.
• You need to have good people around you.
• You need to have a work ethic.
• You need patience.
• You need a sense of humour, and a sense of perspective.

I also often say to athletes that I work with; If I'm ill, I don't want Roger Federer showing up as my doctor, I want a really good doctor. And if my toilet is broken, Tom Brady is not the guy I want coming around, unless, of course, he's got good plumbing skills, I want a good plumber. So, in life, we're all good at something.

Certain jobs and certain professions bring media attention, and therefore people can get better known. But there are many professions where there are equally fantastic people who are performing miracles in their fields that nobody hears about, because it's not a media focused profession. But these people are equally expert in what they do. Therefore, just because you happen to be fantastic at tennis or football or rugby, or any sport on the planet, and have media attention does not mean that you are good at everything, and that somehow you have a greater knowledge of life or the world than others. It just means you happen to be a fantastic tennis player.
The fact that you can be a fantastic carpenter or plumber, or scientist or researcher, a brewer making fantastic beers, a wine grower, whatever it is in a world of such diversity, a fantastic place with so many wonderful people, people to meet and get to know who have expertise that we can't even dream about, needs to be celebrated.

So, at the end of the day, we're at an amazing event here, the Australian Open, and hopefully it continues to go really well for us. But if it doesn't, well, we will be showing up to the next tournament and trying to get better. And that's all we can do in life. But it is important to keep a sense of humour and enjoy what you're doing. You know, work ethic is great and very necessary but it also has to be enjoyable. Of course, every job has its grind moments, but by and large it’s so brilliant if you can, enjoy what you do.

So next time I speak to you we will be in the second week of the Australian Open and we will see where that has us placed Thank you and have a really fantastic week

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Hello, everybody, and welcome to another mini podcast of David Sammel Nuggets.

This week's nugget is about controlling the controllables. I have a question: Does it depend on your lens, the way that you see things. We hear a lot about controlling the controllables which makes it somehow seem like it's the same for everybody. But the reality is very different for each person and changes according to our perspective of what is controllable.

As an example, an accountant will find budgeting easy and controllable, whereas an untrained entrepreneur in accounting could easily struggle to understand how to control cash flow.

An experienced athlete with years of managing his or her emotions will see them as controllable whereas a young teenager will see this as an impossible task when things are going badly. It's a good idea to understand this and begin to see controlling the controllables as a skill to improve and acquire based on what you perceive as uncontrollable.

Imagine what perspective needs to change in order to believe it is something that is within your sphere of influence. As an example, if you're a billionaire, you have the means to control a far larger part of your environment than someone who is a millionaire and can therefore not influence as much as a billionaire. Jeff Bezos and the Amazon company, which is obviously one of the biggest in the world, took control of WholeFoods, which was another very big company. In doing so, Amazon, then starts to exert a greater control over the food industry, something which prior to taking over WholeFoods, it had no control over.

So the circumstances with which in you live has a huge bearing on what you can and can't control. Hiring a tutor can help a student gain greater control on how well he or she does in algebra for instance, through increased competence and confidence. Clearly competence plays an important role in the lens from which we view what we can control. Let's be clear, a large reason we want more control is to predict and influence outcomes.

Therefore, focus on improving your skills in order to grow the scope of what you can control. To wrap up when you think you have no control examine how you're looking at the situation. Perhaps a shift in perspective or competence will quickly alter your viewpoint. Visit www.mindsetcollege.co.uk and give yourself a massive mental uplift. Learn more about our nuggets in a comprehensive mindset course that will transform your thinking.

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Good morning, good evening, good afternoon, wherever you are in the world. I'm currently in Sydney, and Happy New Year to everybody all around the world. Obviously, we saw it in a little earlier than most. But it's fantastic to, to be back in Australia after a two-year absence. I missed last week, because I was travelling from Miami to London, then up to Manchester then to Doha, and through on to Sydney, so I had close on four days of travel.

It was not possible to record last week's podcast, but I'm back and I hope you enjoy today's episode, which is an explanation of historic fear, how to update your mental software. What is historic fear? Historic fear is when we feel like something that we do is not very good, and we know we need to improve it. So, we work really, really hard to improve it and it becomes a lot better. But then at the first sign of something going wrong, we panic and then we don't believe that we've actually made those improvements.

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Good morning, good day. Good evening, wherever you are in the world, this is David Sammel. Again, and I hope you're enjoying my Nuggets. Each week, I just hope to bring you a little something that can bend your mind a little bit and make you possibly think slightly differently about a topic that you haven't considered before.

And even if you had, hopefully, it's a good reminder. Today I'm going to talk about the art of great questions. When speaking to people, it's good to ask questions, because you find out more about them. And it's a great way to break the ice in starting any relationship or at work, it's a good way to dissolve, or certainly lessen the impact of conflict, when you ask good questions, rather than defending yourself, or attacking the other person.

I'm going to give you some examples here of what I think are good questions that bend the mind. First question that I like is,
what do I need to know that you're not telling me? So you want questions that kind of get to the heart of the matter and it's very helpful if you can come up with some interesting questions, rather than bland ones. So another one is:
What challenges are coming our way at the moment?
How, why, how might we meet them together?
What conversation, if began early, could ripple out in a way that creates new possibilities for the future of this company?
What has become clear since we last met?
Where are you not looking?
What is it that you're assuming?
What will free you up? That's a good one if somebody is stuck.
Where are you being inflexible? Very good in a negotiation to come out with that question.
Or what are you willing to change? Again, very good in negotiation.
What might you be overlooking?
Or what might we be overlooking?
Or what do you think I'm overlooking.

So if you can just, you know, in your head break out and start to think of good questions that you need to ask. And after you've had some discussions with people, and you've asked questions, look back and say, was there a better question I could have could have asked, because in the moment, I know, it's very, very difficult. But with practice, you can get very good at asking the right questions, incisive questions that really move things forward. So going forward, I hope this helps. Just consider that questions are great way of making the other person think and also gives you a greater understanding of what they're thinking, rather than assuming what they're thinking. Take care, and I will be speaking to you again next week. Thank you very much.

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