Finish Strong!

By Tom Emison, vice president of Strategy and Innovation

Back in my collegiate competitive swimming days, I was coached by Dr. Marty Knight at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota.

At the time, NCAA Division III colleges and universities had robust competitive swimming and diving programs. Marty became a legend in Minnesota swimming, known for his technical precision, empirical approach, demanding workouts and ability to get the most from ordinary athletes. I was less than ordinary.

He won multiple national championships. High school athletes who did not want to attend a major university, or who did not receive a scholarship, often chose to swim at the Division III level. I had not swum in high school, so collegiate competitive swimming was not only new to me, it was a shock.

Two-a-day workouts. More than 7,000 yards per day in the slow lane, where I started. By my final year, I was in the fast training lane with swimmers working to meet qualifying standards for the NCAA Division III National Championships in April.

From September through March, in the middle of a Minnesota winter, we pushed one another in the fast lane. Every week or two, we competed against another team, and we were holding our own.

Midseason, Marty pulled me aside for a long conversation about life and swimming strategy. Swimming may not seem strategic, but it is a great team sport because of how points are counted. There is also significant strategy involved in the 500-yard freestyle.

It is a roughly five-minute aquatic punishment fest. The training required to get there is a topic for another article. Once you are off the starting block, the 500 requires total focus on technique, holding the pain threshold just below the red line and keeping an eye on the competition.

The day Marty pulled me aside, he shared a lesson about the 500 freestyle that has stayed with me and relates to the 2016–2018 Strategic Plan.

“Tom, in the 500, it is very important to swim your own race. You and I both know your red line. But it is important to push beyond your limits to stay in the race, especially if there is a faster swimmer in your heat.

“You want to stay in the race and stay close to that guy. Do not let him get out of your range. Keep him within five yards or so. That is going to hurt. Then, with 200 yards to go, make your first move. See if he responds. Try to be even with him with 100 yards to go.

“The fact that you are finishing strong will demoralize him. When you pass him, do it very fast. That is your second move. Hammer it. With 50 to go, your pain will be way past red line. But if you want to win, finish strong. Do not leave anything in the water.”

That year, I met the NCAA Division III national qualifying standards. Marty had faith in me, and I finally had a measure of self-confidence.

Here we are in November 2016, nearing the end of another calendar and fiscal year. We had been implementing 14 specific initiatives tied to the 2016–2018 Strategic Plan. Each year, those initiatives were recast so Annual Action Plans remained tied to the organization’s overall strategic direction.

By the end of 2018, the team would develop a new direction. Until then, the work was to finish strong every year.

If you were working on one of the strategic initiatives, my advice was the same as Marty’s advice to me: Finish strong.

We needed to make progress in each of the 14 areas. Keep up the great work. If we wanted to win, that was the time to make as much progress as possible before resetting plans for the following year.

Thanks for all you were doing to make strategic progress possible.

Learn more about the Unified Strategic Plan update, the Leadership Development Program and on-the-job leadership development.