Sports disciplines offer solutions for businesses
A team's success or failure exposes good or bad leadership

September 30, 2009 Edition 1

Workplace staff

SOUTH African businesses are increasingly turning to sports solutions to find clues to team building and problem solving, says Liza van Wyk, CEO of Johannesburg-based executive and business support training organisations AstroTech and BizTech.

"We've had a feast of great sport recently in South Africa, with more to come, and we find more business people are looking at sportsmen and coaches for clues to success'," she says.

"Jake White and Francois Pienaar are popular business coaches and business leaders pay large amounts of money to hear Tiger Woods discuss how the discipline and strategies of golf can be applied in business."

How to be a "total team leader" has never been more important. Van Wyk says Springbok rugby coach Pieter de Villiers is an example of a total team leader. "He has learnt how to focus on motivation, empowerment and the development of his team.

"We find that in this sports-mad country there is a strong positive response from discussing sport successes and failures to demonstrate leadership success and failures in business.

"The anxiety around Bafana Bafana's performance, particularly around the World Cup, is an example of how a team can influence morale within a country or an organisation. "The way the nation is united behind Caster Semenya is an example of its powerful uniting capacity, and the conduct of Athletics South Africa chief, Leonard Chuene, was an example of how poor leadership can wreak havoc."

Van Wyk points to some of De Villiers's winning advice that business executives and business support staff respond well. He is reported as saying the following: · "Great teams have a great team spirit. You need players who don't expect anything from the team but give everything for the team. You need players that can handle the pressure of performing in front of thousands of people. When the opposition comes at you with all guns blazing, you need to be up to the task. A great rugby team stands up as brothers."

"It's not necessarily how you play when you're winning that's important, but how you react to defeat as well. If you work as hard as you can, you'll do well. It's good to endeavour to be the best that you can be. The road to success is always under construction." He says the best leaders bring "calmness and direction to the team".

"I respect people and that's how I get the best out of them. If you understand and respect people, you can get the best out of them." What De Villiers says about the role of the team leader is particularly important, Van Wyk says.

"De Villiers has said for a team leader goals and targets are essential for business success if employees know and understand them. "At BizTech we offer the Total Team Leader course which also puts an emphasis on goal setting and how to get maximum buy-in.

It is not just about building a team but maintaining it and dealing with challenges that may arise.

"People are not easy to deal with, especially when they are faced with a lot of external factors that can affect their performance," cautions Van Wyk. "There is no 'I' in team and the South African rugby team is proving this to be true," said Van Wyk. On a different subject, Van Wyk believes productivity is rising in companies in South Africa despite the extensive retrenchments that are going on. "We are getting feedback from companies that despite, or perhaps because of, extensive retrenchments, productivity, which tends to be a problem in South African companies, is suddenly seeing rapid gains," she says.

"This appears to be following global trends as anxious workers perform better to keep their jobs. Whether it will be sustained remains to be seen. "But the economic crisis has also forced businesses to be more innovative, to seek new and better solutions, and that could be a contributing factor.

"The economic crisis and retrenchments mean that businesses are trying to get the most out of their teams right now and if managers are skilled they will achieve that," Van Zyl says. "A big driver for training at Biztech is to seek ways to boost productivity. In our own business we have become smarter.

"As an example, instead of hiring outside agencies to pursue debtors we now do it in-house and are getting better results. "Companies report taking a hard look at their business and shifting people around to improve performance. There is also better performance management and closer monitoring of work.

"We used to have two people a day calling clients and between them they averaged 15 calls. We brought in one more staff member and the call ratio went up to 30. If you have one person in a team who is ambitious, it often boosts the productivity of everyone."

The next Total Team Leader course will be held on November 30 to December 1 at the AstroTech Conference Centre in Parktown, Johannesburg.

For more information call Biztech on 011 582 3211 or visit www.biztech.co.za