Leaders Performance Podcast The Leaders Performance Institute

David Dunne describes a perennial problem for practitioners in elite sports.“There’s a fundamental mismatch between what practitioners can deliver and what athletes actually want and desire,” he told Joe Lemire and John Portch on the People Behind the Tech podcast.“So we pivoted towards the COM-B model.”During this episode we spoke at length about Hexis’ continued growth following a successful seed round, technology’s ability to influence the evolution of the practitioner, and the fundamental union of academic rigour and those so-called softer skills.COM-B was a major part of that conversation. It has been integral to Hexis’ growth. The company used it in tandem with elements of design thinking which, as Dunne explains, stems from his time working for teams including Harlequins and Ryder Cup Team Europe. The model is a framework for understanding and changing behaviour. It was developed by Susan Michie, Maartje van Stralen and Robert West in 2011. The model posits that behaviour (B) is a result of an interaction between three components:Capability (C): this refers to an individual’s psychological and physical capacity to engage in the activity. It includes having the necessary knowledge, skills and abilities.Opportunity (O): this encompasses all the factors outside the individual that make the behaviour possible, including social and physical environmental factors.Motivation (M): this includes the brain processes that direct behaviour, such as habits, emotional responses, decision-making and analytical thinking.Listen to the full conversation.Joe Lemire LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lemirejoe/) | X (https://twitter.com/LemireJoe)John Portch LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/) | X (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.

“Everything is based upon the game for us,” said Ryan Alexander.“Understanding how the physical demands and fitness is going to be interpreted on the field as it is going to relate to the technical and tactical execution of a certain style of play.”Alexander, the Director of Sports Science at Atlanta United, was speaking to John Portch and Joe Lemire on the People Behind the Tech podcast ahead of the new MLS season, which began in late February.He also spoke about the club’s groundbreaking work with i-Brain Tech, a neurofitness training aid that has transformed their skills and cognitive training and led to players having “higher levels of conversations with their technical coaches."Elsewhere, Alexander explored:Finding the level of confidence in the data to challenge or support [9:30];Knowing when to take calculated risks with players [18:00];How i-Brain has been integrated into the players’ training plans [27:00];* His efforts to meet players and coaches at their 'level' when it comes to data [35:30].Joe Lemire LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lemirejoe/) | X (https://twitter.com/LemireJoe)John Portch LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/) | X (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.

At November’s Leaders Sport Performance Summit at the Oval in London, a coach was overheard saying: ‘I have a team looking at AI but I have no idea what they do’.Gary McCoy is the CEO of Peak AI, which has been shortlisted in Sports Business Journals' list of the 10 Most Innovative Sports Tech Companies of 2023.Peak AI uses psycholinguistics to enhance performance and Gary has a firm view on that coach’s comment.“If you don’t know what they do, go and lead them because they probably don’t know what they’re doing either,” he tells Joe and John on the latest edition of The People Behind the Tech podcast.“Artificial intelligence and data, as a general staple in sports, needs guidance,” he continues, “it needs transactional guidance to evolve the athlete.”Gary spoke at length about the need for coaches to fully engage with AI and also dipped into a range of areas, including:* Preventing the injuries that may be a consequence of practitioners “asking the wrong questions” [20:00];* The need for the sports industry to develop a collective ethos for using AI [23:00];* The significance of an athlete’s cognitive load on their ability to train and perform [30:30];* Why analysts who better understand performance will better understand how data transacts [46:50].Joe Lemire LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lemirejoe/) | X (https://twitter.com/LemireJoe)John Portch LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/) | X (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.

Ben Baroody is a big believer in psychologist Michael Gervais’ idea that the apex of well-being and performance is human flourishing.“It means a lot to us,” he tells Henry Breckenridge and John Portch on the Leaders Performance Podcast, which is brought to you today by our Main Partners Keiser.“The aim and approach of all of our programs, processes, and our building blocks, is based on the foundation of the human psyche, the psychology of healthy minds and lives. And we try to take that evidence-based research and build it into baseball frameworks and development for the rest of the organization.”As the Texas Rangers’ Director of Leadership & Organizational Development, Player Enrichment Programs & Mental Health says, the goal is to unlock potential versus extracting performance.“That’s what we’re striving towards. It’s an aspiration that’s ever-evolving,” he says,Elsewhere in this episode, we cover:* How the Rangers have been the ‘victims of buzzwords on a wall’ [10:30];* The balance of challenge and support in the Rangers environment [23:00];* How Ben’s development as a leader helped him to identify imbalances in his own life [30:15];* Character development practices at the Rangers [37:30].Henry Breckenridge LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/henrybreckenridge/) | X (https://twitter.com/HenryBreck)John Portch LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/) | X (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.

“How do we design tech and tech solutions to almost combat [other] tech solutions and distractions?”The question is posed by Brian Cunniffe of the UK Sports Institute [UKSI], who is Joe Lemire and John Portch’s first guest on The People Behind the Tech podcast for 2024.Brian, a performance lead at the UKSI who works primarily in canoeing and who also served as the British and Irish Lions’ sports scientist on tours of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, is discussing the power in gamifying training, particularly for younger athletes.“There’s a slight irony in there but how do we bring it back to the stuff that matters, not just for players but for staff as well?” he continues. “How do we help coaches on a journey to understand not just the stuff that players have completed but maybe some of the decisions that we need to take on a journey and learn from that so that we’re not replicating or duplicating and can be more efficient with our time?”Elsewhere, Brian delves into:* The reasons why he is not driven to be a domain expert [6:00];* The mismatch of the tacit knowledge of coaching and the newer objective of monitoring athletes [13:00];* The under-appreciated importance of design thinking and bringing people on a journey [18:00];* The performance promise contained in epigenetics [31:00].Joe Lemire LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lemirejoe/) | X (https://twitter.com/LemireJoe)John Portch LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/) | X (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.

Lydia Bedford, the Head Coach of the Brentford men’s under-18s team has some firm coaching advice.“There’s no shortcuts, even though everyone seems to want them these days,” she tells Henry Breckenridge and John Portch on the Leaders Performance Podcast, which is brought to you today by our friends at Keiser.“Time on the grass, working in different environments, working under different people as leaders will help you to understand what it looks like for you.”Bedford, who has also coached with underage women’s teams at the Football Association [FA], Leicester City Women in the WSL, and served as an assistant coach at Arsenal Women, talks enthusiastically about her first six months Brentford.In her new role she is a pioneer. One of the few women coaches operating at the top level of the men's game. Elsewhere in this episode, she delves into the importance of her mentors, who include Mo Marley, the current Head Coach of England Women’s under-23s.Bedford recalls a time at an FA training camp when, at Marley’s side, she encountered the senior women’s England squad. She says: “Every senior player that walked passed her gave Mo a hug and I was like ‘I want to be Mo, I want to have that impact’. But actually, the more I worked with Mo, whilst I love her to bits and still have tremendous respect for her, how Mo leads is not how Lydia leads.“You learn loads of things, good and bad, from people that you work under and then you find your own way.”Elsewhere on the agenda, Bedford spoke about:* Her status as a pioneer in the men’s game [12:30];* Facilitating challenge and support in an environment where results are less significant [17:00];* Her relationship with her assistant Jon-Paul Pittman [30:00];* Integrating players who are not used to academy environments [33:30].Henry Breckenridge Twitter (https://twitter.com/HenryBreck) | LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/henrybreckenridge/)John Portch Twitter (https://twitter.com/JohnPortch) | LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-portch-696a4366/)Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/leaders-performance-podcast/id1124488318?mt=2), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/4EKIUuWYk5SWWqRWRQfw3z?si=epSPBhLdREOwtHiGYJnvEg), Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/leaders/the-leaders-performance-podcast) and Overcast (https://overcast.fm/itunes1124488318/leaders-performance-podcast), or your chosen podcast platform.