Fit. Kennaugh Warren

of the Institute of Coaching (Harvard Medical School Affiliate), Warren assesses individual and team capability and designs and implements bespoke coaching programs for professional athletes, sport officials and senior executives.

      Warren has conducted over 14 000 hours in projects ranging from coaching elite coaches, advanced leadership, human capital due diligence, athlete profiling for performance enhancement and consistency, personal career planning, sales and strategy development, and team development in both sports and business.

      Past and present clients include AMP, ANZ Bank, Aon, ARU Wallabies, Australian Cricketers Association, Australian Federal Police, BT Financial Group, BUPA, Colonial First State, Cricket Australia, Equestrian Australia, European PGA, Fairfax, Herbert Smith Freehills, Hewlett Packard, ING Group, Jacobs Engineering, Johnson & Johnson, KPMG, Macquarie Group, Manpower Services, Melbourne Storm (NRL), Merck Sharp & Dohme, NSW Waratahs, Pfizer, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Smith & Nephew, Sydney Roosters (NRL), Thiess Construction, Toyota Motor Company and Westpac Banking Corporation.

      The tools outlined in this book, and 21 years of experience helping others unlock their highest potential, have given Warren an uncanny knack for getting to the ‘seed' of an issue and uncovering accurate predicators of behaviours, and therefore outcomes. These insights make it possible for individuals – whether elite sports stars, senior executives or business leaders – to appreciate what sets them apart, how to enhance that ‘bright side' capability, understand their internal drivers and manage their ‘dark side', which can, if left unchecked or unappreciated, so easily derail even the most promising career.

      Once understood it is then possible to orchestrate ‘best fit' in terms of the individual, team role and the environment, accelerating consistent high performance through feedback and subtle behaviour modification.

      Warren writes regularly on LinkedIn (@warrenkennaugh) and blogs regularly on his website www.warrenkennaugh.com. If you've ever watched sports stars implode or senior executives make poor business decisions and wondered why, then be sure to follow Warren on LinkedIn and Twitter (@Warren_Kennaugh). His engaging, witty and direct approach shines a light on human behaviour that is not only fascinating but also extremely useful for personal discovery and improved performance.

      Warren has also been published in The Wall Street Journal, HRMonthly, INTHEBLACK, Business Review Weekly, AIM Magazine, The Australian Financial Review and AGSM Magazine.

      ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

      Writing a book can be a daunting challenge: collecting thoughts, theories, research and practical examples, and distilling it into a body of work that is simple, adds value and enriches the lives of those that read it. It's a task that has glorious moments and many mind-numbing challenges; it's a task that I couldn't have completed without assistance and support from a band of loved ones, friends and colleagues.

      It's these groups of believers who over many years have provided insight, challenged my thinking and kept me on the path. I'd like to acknowledge their contribution.

      Business leaders – More than 60 large corporations and hundreds of senior executives have contributed, over many years, to my bank of knowledge. Special thanks for their support go to David Mathlin; Steve Weston; Brian Benari; Trent Alston; Jennifer Wheatley; Mark Smith; Anna Gladman; Cheryl Williams; Varina Nissen; Leanne Christie; Angela Howard; Drew Hall; Andre Szarukan; Trevor Scott; Dean Nalder; Russell Peace; Neil Duncan; Steve Cullen; Jeremy Topple; Quentin Jones; Lincoln Crawley; Gary Waldron; and Mark Busine.

      Sports leaders – The elite sporting community has been a crucial partner in the development and practice of FIT. Their willingness to explore, provide feedback and focus on sporting outcomes provided strong direction; and excellent support has seen this material tested at the highest level on the world stage. Thank you to the coaches, players, managers and support staff in cricket, rugby union, equestrian, rugby league and golf. Special mention goes to Ben Smith and his PDMs; Sean Easey; Bob Parry; the NUP and UHPP; Simon Taufel; Andrew Coles; Lyndon Bray; Scott Young; Steve Walsh; SANZAR PMT; SANZAR Referee Panel; Joel Jutge; John Connelly; Robbie Deans; Chris Hickey; Mike Foley; Phil Waugh; Phil Thomson; Chris Webb; Prue Barrett; Eventing WEG and Olympic Teams; Tim Horan; Grant Hackett; Justin Langer; David Gallop; Paul Heptonstall; David Rollo; Brett and Sally Rumford; Ian Davies; Andrew and Ashley Dodt; and Pat Wilson.

      Hogan Partners – Without a strong, credible tool FIT would just be a difficult-to-prove concept. The team at Hogan Assessment Systems has supported my efforts over the past ten years and allowed me to take their inventories into areas where fit really matters. I'd like to especially thank Shayne Nealon; Peter Berry; Elliot Sparkes; Sam Fowler; Daniel Yee; Lynn Taravel; Trisha Haly; all the team at PBC in Australia; Bob Hogan; Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic; and the HAS Team.

      Professional colleagues – Sharing ideas and striving for accuracy and excellence would not have been possible without a strong peer network. Thank you to the team at Melbourne Business School, and for enduring support from Tony Pensabene, Ross Anderson, Terri Mandler, Doug MacKie, Michael Donovan, Craig Hawke, Michael Curtain, Peter Bryant, Ross Reekie, Murray Kelly and Stephen Balogh. A special thanks to Karen McCreadie for her wonderful editing skills and ability to assist in crystallising concepts, for providing guidance in times of chaos and for challenging my thinking as this book took shape.

      Family – My father, Lance, who has always seen my bright side; and my mother, Norma, who gave her loving support but passed before seeing the final manuscript published.

      And finally to my wonderful girls Jennifer and Sophia. Thank you for your support and encouragement in times when I needed it most, for your insightful perspectives and for believing in me.

      FOREWORD

      Few psychological topics have attracted as much lay interests as talent, and nowhere is talent more visible and astonishing than in professional sports. Yet the question of why top athletes, and indeed businesspeople, achieve such exceptional levels of performance is still widely debated, and there is no universal formula to turn an average human into the next Tiger Woods, Roger Federer or Richard Branson. One of the reasons for this disappointing state of affairs is that evaluations of talent tend to rely mostly on improvised, intuitive, and experience-based observations. In other words, there is no clear theoretical framework, no robust measurement tool, and, above all, an absence of objective, data-driven, facts about talent and human potential. As a consequence, even most experts play it by ear and we are left with interesting but anecdotal stories about top performers, which amount to mythological rather than scientific views on the subject.

      That's why this book is so important. Warren Kennaugh is unlike any other author in this area because of his vast expertise, not only in sports sciences, but also in personality assessment. He has pioneered the use of scientific profiling tools in competitive sports and in business, evaluating hundreds of athletes and managers, linking dozens of personal qualities, competencies, and traits, to actual performance metrics. He achieved this in a variety of business sectors and sports and with a level of rigour uncommon outside of academia, not only understanding, but also advancing the science in this field. More importantly, this book is an unprecedented attempt to digest all this evidence and present it in an accessible, non-technical, and user-friendly way. Fit is bound to become a benchmark work in sports psychology and in business, essential for anyone interested in understanding the key determinants of athletic and organisational performance, at the individual, team and corporate level. In addition, it will be an extremely useful resource for athletes and managers themselves, given the wealth of evidence-based advice on coaching and self-coaching. I also believe that Fit can be a game-changer when it comes to furthering people's interests in assessment-based solutions for professional sports. We have long assumed that rigorous profiling tools can be applied to enhancing performance in sports, much like they are in the world of education, human resources, and the military – thanks to this book, we now know it.

      Finally, Fit will no doubt surprise readers with one of its main postulates: the idea that talent is overrated, particularly compared to personality. Although this idea is counterintuitive, it mirrors our own conclusions from assessing millions of individuals