GET DELIBERATE

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In 2017, CrossFit Coach Ben Bergeron published a great book called “Chasing Excellence” which focused on the 2016 CrossFit Games, and particularly the two individual champions, Mat Fraser and Katrin Davidsdottir who were trained by Bergeron.

The book provides interesting insights into the common elements of mindset, skillset, and strength development for champions in any setting. Bergeron delves into different models, industries, and case studies from the past.

One of the concepts I found most intriguing was “deliberate practice”. This approach involves stepping outside our comfort zones and trying activities beyond our current abilities. The approach can be broken down into these four elements.

  1. It is designed specifically to improve performance.
  2. It is repeated a lot.
  3. Feedback on results is continuously available.
  4. It is highly demanding mentally, and not necessarily enjoyable because it means we are focusing on improving areas in our performance that are not satisfactory.

Bergeron makes the point that the requirement for concentration is what sets deliberate practice apart from mindless routines and playful engagement. Hard work is not enough, it needs to be “smart” hard-work!

I was reminded while reading this of our role as performance guides on performance management campaigns for oilfield project-teams.

All teams naturally improve over time, but you have to get deliberate to make an early step-change on a short campaign.

We are wrapping up support for a current client on what has been a significant demonstration of accelerated learning and performance improvement. The performance management campaign was a very deliberate investment by the client, and the above elements of deliberate practice were certainly evident, but so was a shift in results which saw the team halve their time to complete each abandonment with half the wells on the schedule still left to do!

In other words: same rig, same team, deliberate practice to high-performance.

If this concept appeals, get deliberate about reaching your goals.