In his latest BBC column, ‘How keeping it simple makes me faster’, Lewis Hamilton explains his philosophy now that he’s driving for Mercedes, since moving from McLaren at the end of last season. I particularly found this an interesting read, not just as a big F1 and Lewis Hamilton fan, but because my job as an Organisational Change Practitioner helps people to improve work systems.
In the article, it was really clear that Lewis has great clarity of purpose, which helped him and his team focus on improvements that can support them in achieving that purpose.
“The key is to make it simpler, without getting rid of stuff that I might need to make the car go quicker.”
It also helps understand what is normal, what is unusual and what is special.
“I still want to be able to change my car settings… I want to have just what I need and not add extra stuff that I will only need once in a blue moon.”
F1 has always been at the forefront of technology, where small changes all add up to improve performance, so it’s not a surprise that Lewis and Mercedes realise changes don’t always have to be huge, but that small steps of continuous improvement make a difference.
“In total, that might be 100g which doesn’t sound like much but it all counts in an F1 car.”
I guess this focus and drive for improvement isn’t unique in either F1 or within many top sportsmen and women, but my experience shows me that it can be a challenge for some organisations.
Having clarity of your organisations’ purpose and that of the service within it may not be obvious, but it is really powerful. I recently worked with a Streetscene team where staff were working hard, but not necessarily working hard on the things that mattered.
One thing we did to change this was to get staff to agree the purpose of the service; this linked to the council’s overall objectives, but was from a customer’s perspective. This purpose and the principles that supported it made staff ask the question “why are we doing this?” and helped them focus on the tasks that really mattered.
I have found that small improvements get overlooked, as in themselves they are seen to offer little value. What is often overlooked is the culture of continuous improvement that can be fostered through celebrating small changes.
So, maybe we can all learn something from the F1 superstars…
We can:
- Focus on purpose
- Make improvements that help achieve purpose
- Continuously strive to improve performance.
The little things all add up. In short – ‘make the car go faster’.
Chris Lunn, ICE Creates Ltd (chris.lunn@icecreates.com)
