{"id":1247,"date":"2020-11-29T12:59:09","date_gmt":"2020-11-29T11:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1247"},"modified":"2023-04-05T23:35:15","modified_gmt":"2023-04-05T22:35:15","slug":"how-to-build-the-great-future-that-you-want","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1247","title":{"rendered":"Building the great future that you want"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
It\u2019s the gift that keeps giving<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
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Organisations need high-performing employees and high performing employees want satisfying jobs. In this piece I will discuss how what I learned from racing superbikes can help both get what they want.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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My early career with Anglian Water was not great, my youthful self-confidence running into organisational inertia and coming off second best. However, I was bright enough to knuckle down and start learning about laboratory testing and the science of water treatment, albeit doing just enough to get by.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Faced with a job I found unchallenging I took up motorbike racing, mainly using my road-bike in the production class for near-standard machinery and sometimes in the open class against the purpose-built superbikes just for the fun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 1<\/strong>: make the most of what you’ve got<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I expected to be blown away by the race-prepared superbikes, but this did not happen. They weren\u2019t making best use of what they had, while I almost matched them on a road-bike just by doing the basics right. A valuable lesson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 2<\/strong>: Do what you need to, not what you want to<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Racing the Italian sports-bikes against Japanese machinery was hard work, but when I finally switched to a slow (only 145 mph!) but sweet handling 750 Yamaha top five results were a regular occurrence with, on one occasion, two outright wins. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I learned from this not to keep doing the same thing just because you like doing it if you want to progress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 3<\/strong>: Know when to move on<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

My final lesson was learning when to give something up. I replaced 750 with its 1000cc big brother, figuring the extra power would make me a regular winner. Sadly the 1000, while fast enough to win an open class championship, was hard to ride and unreliable. After one blow-up too may it had to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A somewhat expensive lesson but a valuable one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Applying the lessons to work<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

After one crash too many I re-focused on my job, making a conscious decision to be the best at any task, no matter how routine. This was noticed by the lab manager who moved me onto project work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being appreciated for problem solving rather than following a recipe was a great step forward, and success on the first project resulted in more project work and an eventual escape in an operational role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clearly, my superbike racing lessons are a gift that keep giving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lessons<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 1: <\/strong>Be great at the basics<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 2: <\/strong>Once great, move on<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson 3: <\/strong>If something you\u2019ve tried isn\u2019t working, change it<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

I hope that you have enjoyed reading this post. If you have thoughts on what I have written so far please leave a comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also if you have an idea for another business topic let me know and I\u2019ll be delighted to find a space for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thanks again<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bob windmill<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s the gift that keeps giving Organisations need high-performing employees and high performing employees want satisfying jobs. In this piece I will discuss how what I learned from racing superbikes can help both get what they want. My early career with Anglian Water was not great, my youthful self-confidence running into organisational inertia and coming […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-career-development","category-doing-well-at-work"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Bob Windmill","author_link":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/?author=2"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pajodT-k7","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1247"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1568,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247\/revisions\/1568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.windmillinsights.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}