MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, Boston
The amazing Sue Bird, Celtics’ Brad Stevens, performance coach Steve Magness, and author Michael Lewis spoke to us here about peak and clutch performance among athletes. Some of their points apply to other competitive performance realms including business. I attend this event annually because its focus on performance, competition, confidence, leadership, and the underlying data analytics is interesting and applicable across so many endeavors.
Stevens spoke of the “habits of clutch coaching” and, therein, the importance of emotional intelligence in peak and clutch performance situations. “If I’m on edge and scattered in the huddle, it’s probably not going to be successful,” he said. This is a crucial point for all leaders to understand. Losing your cool is generally not conducive to attracting and retaining the best people and ensuring their peak performance.
Bird and Magness warned about overthinking and worrying in ways that elevate heart rates in stressful situations. Lewis asked Magness how he might have advised the ill-fated Dallas Cowboys kicker who missed four consecutive PATs in a game this year. “Before he went out for the next kick, I’d dunk his head in ice water. It reduces the heart rate and refocuses the brain.” Experts call this the mammalian diving reflex. Well, that’d make for good television, but I do get the point. No doubt there are certain staff meetings where you would like to have that bucket of ice water on standby.
Bird said that in clutch moments there's a danger in overthinking, “I zone in and block everything else out." This is reminiscent of Rooster telling Maverick as they fly at a maximum stressful moment in the movie Top Gun: Maverick (2022), "Don't think, just do." Bird added that, "You always have to be prepared for the spontaneous,” too. Stevens agreed saying that you have to help people “become comfortable with the uncomfortable.” This is readily applicable to business planning and execution where "stuff" happens all the time.
As an aside, how amazing is Sue Bird? How about five Olympic Gold Medals, four WNBA championships, two NCAA crowns, and five EuroLeague titles? Oh, and one of the three major conference rooms here bears her name.
Brad Stevens, Steve Magness, Sue Bird, and Michael Lewis at the MIT Sloan Sport Analytics Conference.