the brand builder blog

What I learned at the Clemson Triathlon this weekend.

0 comments Published 20080510 by Olivier Blanchard.

1. I need an aggressive and consistent training regimen in the pool.
2. I need an aggressive and consistent training regimen on the bike.
3. I need an aggressive and consistent run training regimen.
4. Racing without being well prepared is a dumbass thing to do because it kind of hurts, and to top it all off, you don't win anything.
5. For me, the difference between being race-ready and or not in a sprint distance tri is about 10-12 minutes on the clock.
6. Some of the finest people I will ever know are triathletes. True class acts. Eric, Dave, Mendy, Julie, Janice, Holly, Roby, Beth, Jay, Hal... the list is long and I apologize if I didn't include you here. (You're on my long list.) I am VERY lucky to count these people as my friends.
7. There's no bullshit in triathlon. There is nowhere to hide. The clock doesn't lie.
8. Racing reveals every single flaw. There's no escaping it. What you do with those flaws is your choice - which is pretty eye-opening in and of itself.
9. Triathletes are a bunch of VERY fit and VERY twisted people.

Yeah, I had a blast.

Labels: hincapie triathlon team, sport, triathlon

Mike Wagner on building real value from within.

0 comments Published 20080501 by Olivier Blanchard.

Awesome little post by Mike Wagner over at "Own Your Brand":

“What position did you play?” seemed like an innocent enough question coming from my six-year-old grandson. Basketball is on his mind, as it is everyone’s this time of year.

The conventional answer, “I played center.” says so little. I’d rather tell him what I accomplished for the team - it means more.
My high school coach, in his “John Wooden-like” wisdom gave me an outcome to achieve. My position of “center” was just for the program.
We were a very short team competing against much taller teams. My assigned contribution was to get the opposing team’s center to foul out - Period. “How” was up to me.
Some of my opponents were temperamental and easy to frustrate into fouling me. Others were so confident they couldn’t wait to stuff the ball down my 5-foot, 11-inch frame every time I tried a shot - they were easy targets as well.
My position was “center” but my contribution was “strategic foul generation”.
In the business world, the word “title” is exchanged for “position”. People want to know what others do for a living - many reply with their title. But a title says so little!
In your career, it’s better to focus on the outcomes you bring to the team…
Contribution is more important than title – Titles mean a lot in the pecking order found in any organization or business community. However, in terms of ultimate brand impact, titles are about as substantial as cotton candy. Focus on your contribution regardless of title.
You get “playing time” by contributing to wins - Titles come and go. When tough economic times require a hard look at “head count” how do you think decisions will be made - “We can’t let Jim go. We have to have an Assistant VP of Marketing!”? Not likely. To solidify your place on “the team” link your day-to-day outcomes to the brand’s success.
You own the “how” of what you contribute - Own your outcomes. Don’t wait for someone to show you how - it may never happen. Find a way to deliver what the organization needs. Be creative. Be determined. People who know and own their contribution are what every team needs.
Titles do not create great brands. It’s great performances produced by people who contribute like “owners” regardless of what it says on their business cards.

I have nothing to add. Perfect.

photo by christopher wray-mccann

Labels: brand ownership, contributing, sport, titles

Runners vs. everyone else - How discipline outside of work may impact the quality of your work.

0 comments Published 20080225 by Olivier Blanchard.

My good friend and super personal trainer Holly DiGiovine sent out an email over the weekend that struck a cord with me. Here's some of what she had to share:

When you have a goal that is as huge as the marathon-it will "keep you honest." It's not like a smaller goal that you can announce and then put off or fake your way through. Once you sign up, commit months to training, and take your first step on race day-you better have done your homework.

The beauty of this is that it goes against 99% of the natural tendencies of our culture that favors gratification without effort or devotion. But is that kind of achievement ever as satisfying? Linda Hill once told me she loved the quote, "There is no glory in training, but there is no glory without training." In no way is this more true than in running.

And business.

One thing I've found over the years is that many of the folks I train with (and race against) are for the most part as devoted to their jobs (if not more) as they are to running or cycling or triathlon.

Unlike participation in say, golf or softball or basketball - no offense to club/league sports - the type of determination, discipline and emotional focus that comes with training day in, day out for extremely challenging endurance events (often by yourself) tends to bleed over into people's 9-5's.

Whether you're training for a marathon, a century or the Ironman triathlon, one thing you quickly find out is that there's no room for bullshit out there on the pavement. You either do the work or you're screwed. Politics won't get you to the finish line. It doesn't matter who you know or how well you can work the system. When you're out there, every weakness bubbles up to the surface and stares you in the eye. Lack of prepapartion, lack of motivation, lack of dedication will all come back to bite you in the ass. there's nowhere to hide. They will all find you and jump up on your back to stop you dead in your tracks. The choice becomes this: Do you let them stop you, or do you accept them and keep going?

You learn a lot about yourself, training for that type of event.

You learn a lot about how to break thresholds and get past your own little ego, training for events like these. When you're tired and sore and hungry but you still have four miles to go, guess what? You still have four miles to go. How you get through these last four miles is entirely up to you. Nobody cares whether you walk those last four miles or run, or hail a cab. Nobody made you set 26.2 miles as a goal. Or 100 miles. Or 144+.

Once you've broken past your lack of will and learned to keep going, you are transformed. A similar thing happens to Marines during training. At some point, who you used to be before you went beyond what you thought your limitations were, before you kissed excuses goodbye, before you left all of the bulllshit that stood in your mind's way ceases to exist. You become someone else.

That someone else, the marathoner, the long distance cyclist, the triathlete, the Ironman, he or she walks into your place of work with you every morning.

I work with two types of people: Partisans of the least amount of effort, and dedicated professionals.

The latter aren't all marathoners and triathletes, but I have yet to meet an Ironman or marathoner who didn't take his or her intensity and dedication to their job.

Not that there's anything wrong with drinking a case of beer and watching sports on TV all weekend, but who you are outside of your work does have parallels with who you are when you are at work.

Something to think about.

Labels: discipline, focus, mentality, running, sport, triathlon

Restoring a tarnished image: Levi leipheimer, team Astana, and the Tour De France

0 comments Published 20080218 by Olivier Blanchard.

If you want to see me get heated, ask me about doping and sports. Hopefully, you aren't a football fan (American rules) or a baseball fan - as my opinion of steroid use is pretty cut and dry. You see, I'm a purist when it comes to athletic performance. Any athlete who uses a drug or other substance to enhance their performance, strength, endurance, recovery, etc. is a cheater. Period.

I understand the need for bigger and bigger hits in football, I understand the need for baseball players to be able to hit the ball out of the park with one arm, time and time again, and yes, I understand the need for track athletes to break speed records in the 100, 200, 400 and 800.

More to the point, I completely understand the temptation to dope in the world of grand tour cycling - especially when I am sprinting up a steep hill, my heart beating so hard I can taste blood in the back of my throat, and I still get dropped by guys more talented and better trained than me. If only I could take a pill or drink some kind of special shake that made me just 5% faster. 5% stronger. Gave me 5% more endurance. Yeah, on the verge of puking my guts out at the top of a climb, I often wish Accelerade or GU came up with a little magic pill that would make climbing a wee bit easier.

And as competitive as I may be, I am just a recreational athlete.

Imagine if I were a pro, and my paycheck depended on my getting to the top of a mountain in first place as opposed to... fifth or sixth or seventh place.

Imagine if the difference between success and failure depended on just 5% more output from my body.

Imagine if the majority of the athletes I competed against were doping up, and the only way for me to even-up the scales were to shoot up?

What if I lived and worked in an environment, a culture, an industry that not only encouraged me to cheat, but also made it easy for me to do so? What if every single day of working in this environment, everything led me to rationalize that... well, if everyone else is cheating, it isn't cheating since all I am really doing is evening the playing field?

It would be difficult. I can sit here on my high horse and pretend that the choice not to dope is easy, but it isn't. It can't be. Not when the culture of your sport and the incredibly high stakes make doping the solution of choice when it comes to not getting churned out like a chump.

The problem with professional cycling is that blood doping has been at the core of the Grand Tour culture for quite some time, and it is nigh impossible to change that kind of behavior overnight. But some athletes, teams and directeurs sportifs are trying. They really are. The problem is that we still can't tell for sure who's cheating and who isn't, because doping science is always just a step ahead of testing science.

If you were to ask me if doping scandals have turned me off from the Tour, my answer would be yes and no. No, I will never be completely turned off by the Tour De France because it is such an awesome event to watch and be a part of. It is inspiring. It is exciting. You can't be a cyclist and not watch at least the mountain stages of the Tour... or the TT, or maybe the first week's sprint finishes. But yes, I am a bit turned off because every seemingly superhuman performance raises a little red flag in the back of my head: Is this guy really that much of a badass, or is he on a very expensive cocktail of hemoglobin and top secret meds?

That's the part that sucks: Not knowing. Doubting that the performance is genuine. As much as I enjoy watching an athlete crush his competitors the way Lance Armstrong did a few years ago, not being able to buy into his victory 100% affects the value of the experience. It also affects the relevance of the event, and of the sport in general. And that sucks.

Today, there still is no definitive way to absolutely 100% identify cyclists on the juice from those not on the juice... and until that changes, the Tour De France will be only half the race it could be.

In light of this, here is an email I received over the weekend:

On February 13th, the Amaury Sports Organization (ASO) barred Team Astana from competing in any race or event organized by the ASO in 2008. The ASO owns premiere cycling events like Paris-Nice, Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, and the famed Tour de France.
To justify its decision, the ASO has cited the doping scandals of last year's Tour de France.There can be no comparison between the Astana team of 2007 and the new Astana. The entire organizational structure has been rebuilt under the direction of the team's new General Manager, Johan Bruyneel, who has thoroughly cleaned house. What's more, Astana has adopted the rigorous doping controls developed by anti-doping expert Dr. Rasmus Damsgaard, and Astana now spends more money on anti-doping controls than any other team in the pro peloton.
"That the happenings of last year...prompted the Tour organizers to leave Astana out of the season's most important race sounds understandable," notes Bruyneel. "However, Astana Cycling Team 2008 has nothing to do with the team of last year. We have done everything to change the dynamics of the team. New management, new riders, new philosophy. Only the name of the sponsor remained."
The ASO has turned a blind eye to Johan's efforts. By barring the entire team from competing in ASO events, outstanding athletes like Levi Leipheimer, who was not a member of last year's Astana team and who has never been implicated in any doping affair, are forced to sit on the sidelines while their life's work passes them by.
"When I saw the Tour de France on TV when I was young," laments Leipheimer, "I knew that someday I wanted to do that race. I sacrificed my life to participate. After finishing on the podium last year I want to do even better. Now I'm a victim of an illogical decision and have been excluded from the race."

I don't claim to know the exact chemistry of Levi's blood, but I'll say this: Give the guy and his team a chance to race. Punishing a team for past misdeeds when its membership, management and anti-doping measures have all been overhauled is moronic. Sure, the team's ownership may be rightly punished (something hefty fines would do just as well), but in the end, it is the riders and the public who suffer - and unjustly at that.

Whether in the world of sport or the world of business, when an organization completely rebuilds itself in the wake of a scandal and commits to rebuilding its reputation, why punish them? Why not embrace their effort and their spirit? Why not make them the poster child for the kind of change you want to see? Test them to death, scrutinize their every move, but let them prove themselves. Give them the opportunity to fail.

What could be worse than not punishing athletes and teams when they cheat?

Punishing the wrong people.

Though I am not a huge fan of Levi's riding, I admire the way he is fighting for his right to race in this year's Tour. His fight isn't about winning - it's about wanting to race, which is at the core of cycling (and sport's) very spirit. That is sonething I can both relate to and stand behind. So Levi, you have my vote.

To voice your opinion, click here.

Labels: cheating, cycling, justice, reputation management, sport

The USA Cycling Pro Championships Photostream

0 comments Published 20070901 by Olivier Blanchard.

As promised, F360's photo coverage of the USA Cycling Pro Championships can be browsed here.

(Yay to Flickr.)

Congratulations to Team CSC's David Zabriskie, who defended his Time Trial National Champion title today. (That's two in a row. Not bad.)

We will be updating the gallery over the next few days, so don't hesitate to come back to it often.

Have a great Labor Day weekend, everyone.

Labels: cycling, national championships, sport, USA Cycling Pro Championships, zabriskie