Continuous professional development is a key part of any management development programme and sport can play a crucial role either in persuading people of the merits of training and coaching or using language that is easily understood in order to make it more effective.
UCD Smurfit Business School held its annual Executive Edge Day in Blackrock yesterday with 200 business leaders attending from a variety of organisations including Aer Lingus, Allianz, Aviva, Microsoft, ESB and VHI Healthcare.
Sport for Business went along to see what lessons could be gained from the very business focused halls of academia that the School houses.
Here are ten things we picked up on the day that are relevant between the worlds of sport and business.
- Attracting and retaining talent is the biggest challenge that companies of all sizes and sectors appear to be facing.
- Star performers become so largely because of the people around them
- Star performance can be transformational for an organisation. The best Blackjack dealer at Caesars Palace Casino in Las Vegas keep players active for five times longer than their average colleague.
- More alarmingly the best transplant surgeon in the US has six times the average long term success rate than the average.
- A key role of coaching is to help people pay attention to themselves and to the situations they find themselves in. Awareness leads to improvement.
- The best way to get a result from coaching is to set a goal.
- The most important element of a coaching session is listening to the individual or group and holding up a mirror so they can see for themselves how behaviour and attitude can impact on performance.
- Sponsorship of broadcast programmes is becoming a much more powerful medium than traditional ‘disruptive’ advertising.
- Creating networks of influence using a common interest is a powerful way of building out your own ability to effect change. Sport is the most common popular interest.
- You will learn more about the character of people when you play with them than when you work alongside them.
Sport for Business works with major companies from Aer Lingus and Accenture to Ulster Bank and UCD, and with organisations like the GAA, the Government and the Irish Sports Council to discover ways that sport and business can work closer together and gain a mutual benefit. Find out today how we might be able to work with your organisation.
