BRAILSFORD: We’d look at hand-washing, for example, an area where we’d go to the Olympic Games and we’d be in great form and then we’d be terrified of the riders getting ill or catching a bug. So we started to think about, Wow, how are you going to optimize or reduce the chances of us getting an illness within the team in the Olympic Village for example, and then for that to run through the team and create havoc. So we got a surgeon in who showed everybody how to wash their hands properly. We had people who cleaned all the handles, cleaned the lifts buttons, we obviously encouraged people not to shake hands and be very mindful of this and use hand gels all the time. And I mean, it’s common practice now but when we were starting out, there were small little things that, we’d think, Is that going win us a medal? Well, no, it’s not. But is it going to contribute to it? Yeah, potentially.
DUBNER: How did you first come to embrace the notion that marginal gains could be fruitful? How did you go about learning or deciding which areas to apply it to?
BRAILSFORD: It wasn’t something overnight, like I just woke up morning and thought, “Okay, well, we’ll do it like this. We’re human beings. And when someone says, I’d like a perfect performance, that is daunting. So I thought, let’s break our performance to all of its component parts, map them all out, and then let’s have a look and see is it is possible to progress in each one of the areas? And can we be bothered to do it? Because it takes a lot of work and energy And then you’ve got something that people are in control of and they feel empowered to move forward.
So, yeah, they’ll say, “I might not be able to see how I’m going to get to top of that massive mountain over there, but boy I tell you what, I can improve a small amount in my nutrition, in my diet, I can move my weight program forward, I can get another five minutes sleep a night, I can do all the recovery protocols as necessary. You know, and on and on it goes. Now, there’s a big psychological component of this where there’s a team and support team — if everyone buys into that philosophy, you’re creating a culture which is actually moving forward and is actually kind of building a little bit of momentum.
http://freakonomics.com/podcast/in-praise-of-incrementalism/
DUBNER: How did you first come to embrace the notion that marginal gains could be fruitful? How did you go about learning or deciding which areas to apply it to?
BRAILSFORD: It wasn’t something overnight, like I just woke up morning and thought, “Okay, well, we’ll do it like this. We’re human beings. And when someone says, I’d like a perfect performance, that is daunting. So I thought, let’s break our performance to all of its component parts, map them all out, and then let’s have a look and see is it is possible to progress in each one of the areas? And can we be bothered to do it? Because it takes a lot of work and energy And then you’ve got something that people are in control of and they feel empowered to move forward.
So, yeah, they’ll say, “I might not be able to see how I’m going to get to top of that massive mountain over there, but boy I tell you what, I can improve a small amount in my nutrition, in my diet, I can move my weight program forward, I can get another five minutes sleep a night, I can do all the recovery protocols as necessary. You know, and on and on it goes. Now, there’s a big psychological component of this where there’s a team and support team — if everyone buys into that philosophy, you’re creating a culture which is actually moving forward and is actually kind of building a little bit of momentum.
http://freakonomics.com/podcast/in-praise-of-incrementalism/
