What enables individuals to excel? Whether it's extreme sports triumphs or business successes, Martin Jenkins believes he can push you the extra mile.
When my editor commissioned me to interview Martin Jenkins, I was sceptical. Jenkins is the founder and EO of One Step Ahead Performance Consulting (OSA), a "peak performance" consultancy. I'm a journalist and paid to be cynical. This is not a match made in heaven.
But performance consultancy is all the rage in business circles, as highlighted by Jenkins' presentationto the assembled chairmen and chief executives at the August Equity 2007 Portfolio Conference. It had a tremendous impact on the attendees, with one chairman suggesting August Equity should get them in whenever they complete a new deal. OSA is a leader in the field, counting Fortune 500 companies, hedge funds and private equity firms among its enviable client base. These are bright people, so perhaps there is something in it.
We meet at Jenkins' flat in Little Venice. After tramping up five flights of stairs, I come face to face with the man himself. He is charming and depressingly young and healthy. The flat is sparsely furnished with expensive- looking leather furniture and a very, very large TV. We start with the personal questions. He comes across as open and honest, answering questions swiftly andbacking them up with extra information and anecdotes. "What car do you drive?" I ask. "I don't. I have yet to be convinced of the value of owning a car. I take taxis."
So, down to the detail. What does OSA actually do and how does it do it? Jenkins says it's all down to the "power of the made-up mind" and the "relentless pursuit of excellence". "Super-successful people make up their minds about a successful outcome in advance of the challenge and operate from that position," he says. Effectively, there are two sides: training the subconscious mind and delivering on the strategy. Jenkins is full of praise for Dr Tony Quinn, who pioneered the concept of "unconscious attention", a state of mind where there is total focus on the job at hand with no distractions whatsoever.
The conscious mind is capable of dealing with five to seven pieces of information, the unconscious mind four to five million. method: psycho-cybernetics, neuro-associative conditioning, unconscious attention and cognitive auto-suggestion.Taking just one, cognitive auto-suggestion is a form of mental conditioning that effectively assumes eventual success. It is the mindset adopted by the best athletes, including Edwin Moses, Michael Jordon, Sir Steve Redgrave and Muhammed "I am the Greatest" Ali. (To find out more about the science, visit www.osaperformance.com.)
Setting goals is crucial. "If you set your sights beyond the target, then it becomes more achievable," explains Jenkins. To use a boxing analogy - and many businessmen relate to the warrior aspect - you have to punch through the target and, when you are winning, punch even harder. Setting the target is not the key issue here - instead it's the why. "You have to have a big enough 'why'," says Jenkins. "Much of our work is focused on finding out the why."
Training the unconscious mind is the bedrock of achieving successful outcomes. One factor in this is the celebration of success. "One of the main failures of people is that they forget to celebrate success," he continues. "You celebrate success to store the memory. Then, when you have a desire to do something, yourmind will remember the celebration and that will drive you to achieve your goal." Following on from the scientific easoning comes practical applications for business success. Many of the practices are logical - even obvious - but at odds with human nature, which is driven by fear and greed.
You need to have a blame-free culture, no kidding conversations and be a tight-knit team. To coach companies, OSA draws on successful sports teams and Special Forces soldiers - people who have operated at the extreme end of teamwork and human endurance.
For a graphic example of the approach, look no further than Lewis Pugh, polar explorer and extreme swimmer. Pugh had his "whys": to be the first man to swim in all five oceans, to break world records, to beat the Norwegians in a polar endeavour and to raise awareness of climate change. There are lots of "whats", but the most startling was to swim one kilometre in the Antarctic, where the water was -1.8ÚC (saline water has a colder freezing temperature). Scientists believed he would die within seconds of entering the water. A team headed by Professor Tim Noakes of the Sports Science Institute in Cape Town monitored his progress during training, observing that his core body temperature rose as high as 38.4ÚC ahead of the swim. It takes professional cyclists 20 to 30 minutes of hard exercise to reach this temperature. Pugh's mental conditioning with OSA meant he could raise his body temperature by thinking about cold water. Noakes described it as "anticipatory thermogenesis" and asserts that Pugh is the first example observed in humans.
Ian Grant, director at August Equity, believes this form of coaching has a role to play in the private equity environment. "One of the issues everyone loses sight of when building a business is to focus on the key objective. Having everybody focused on that objective is immensely helpful." August Equity portfolio manager Martin Horne agrees: "Getting people to recognize their strengths and weaknesses enables us to work with management teams and recognise the extra skills that are needed to get to that three-year goal." As for me? I'm converted. It made a difference to my life and my aspirations of success. You'll have to come and ask me in five years' time, but I have no doubts.
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