Steve Hansen: Building The Greatest Team In History

For a long time, the all Blacks didn't want to admit to ourselves that we were chokeers at World Cup. Then I came up with the idea of, okay, let's be the greatest sports team in the history of the game. What I wanted to do was be able to say what that looked like and would feel like. We had a whole group of people collectively owning that idea, trying to achieve it. We're going to be screw-knots. When you start feeling that, what are you going to do? We don't ever play it in, and you're feeling it, you're gone. What is it actually about the all Blacks? It's a question that comes around every time they play, and with New Zealand and South Africa, going at each other again right now, it's been as more than usual. People reach for the hacker or the jersey or a cliched line. Yet legendary head coach Steve Hansen will tell you, it's none of that. It's a set of decisions somebody made and then held onto. If was the head coach for eight years, 107 tests, 93 wins a World Cup final. Almost nobody in professional sport has run anything that long at that level. What struck Jake and I when we sat with him was that it doesn't talk like a man protecting a record. Steve told us that culture is the most overused word on the planet, and the handy the question he uses instead. He'll tell you why he hates rules. He'll tell you about the two times he wanted to win so badly that he stopped caring about his own players, and he had to go back and apologize to a whole squad. Almost nothing is really about rugby, and near the end when we ask him what's away, he can't quite finish the answer. Here's the all Blacks legendary head coach, Sir Steve Hansen. Steve, thanks for joining us. It's a pleasure and looking forward to it. Let's start then with the question that I guess defines the name of this podcast. What is your version of high performance? It's a number of things really, but if you're looking at skill, it's been able to perform the skill at the highest level under the most pressure and keep your mental fortitude in the now as opposed to in the past or being distracted by what's going on around you. How off-fuel it's about making sure that you're doing the little things that make you better. We often, I think, understand the on-field stuff, but we struggle a little bit with the off-fueled, particularly young athletes when they start, and that's where we have to educate them a bit. Where did your own personal desire to find high performance to improve yourself and those around you begin? I'm not sure, I think my father was a coach well before his time. We talked a lot about rugby and sports, and I'm reasonably competitive in human being, so our competitive, not very, probably too competitive because my pride gets in the way what I used to, probably still does a bit. However, I think when you start doing things and you don't do them as well as you'd like to do, then you find ways to get better, and if you want to win things and you don't want them, you find ways to get better. It grows within you, and it's like something that's just tapping away in the back of head all the time, demanding that you've got to front up. I was lucky in my early coaching career, I came straight out of playing and went straight to coaching, and I had a coach who'd been a teacher, a coach all his life, and he taught me something that's stayed with me forever after the game, and you haven't won or haven't played as well. It's not about what the guys haven't done, it's what could you do better during the week to help them be better, and he said, "That's the question we've got to ask ourselves." That stuck with me, and I think that's been wonderful to help. I'm a son of a coach as well, my dad was a boxing coach, Steve, and I think sometimes in this modern day and age, we often overcomplicate a lot of the messages, and I think common sense is common practice, and it goes right the way back. Don't get me going on common scenes, go on. Well, I shouldn't be cold common scenes because not that common. The job of the coach is to take something that's complex and complicated and make it simple. The simpler you can make it, the easier it is for your athlete to be able to go and do it. The athletes have got to think about what they're doing, then it doesn't matter what sport it is, they're going to be slow at it because they're too busy thinking rather than doing. I always say, "You drive your car, you don't think about how you drive it, you just drive it." Until someone needs to catch you off, we just have an accident, and the next 15 minutes, you're the sweat coming off the brack, because you're thinking that much, but you're not going very fast, and it's the same. You can ask for it continually, we overcoach them, we overcomplicate things that should just be simple messages. It sounds simple to say, "Make it simple." How did you do it? Good question. Well, I think over time come to understand, for the game, I wanted to play, and the players I had to play it, I wanted to find out what's critical, and you can't have too many. There's a lot of important many things, but what's really, really critical, if you know we do those really good, we'll give ourselves a chance to win, so identifying those, and then for each one of those five things, you find two or three things that are really critical for them to be successful. What were the five? For me, set piece, breakdown, tackle, catch and pass, and then position specific skills like clicking for full works and stuff like that. So we're among making the game of rugby more simple, comes the culture, the messaging to the players, getting to their heart, not their head. How do you make all of that simple? Because the people that listen to this podcast are constantly looking for ways in their own lives to do that. Culture is probably the most overused word in the planet, I think, because is there a culture as just how you live, and so once you establish how you want to live, and then you go about living it from the top down rather than the bottom up, things are either going to be great or they're going to be dodged, because there's only two types of way to live, it's either right or wrong. So it's a matter of establishing what's not negotiable, what is negotiable, and then getting aligned on it, so from my point of view is making sure the other coaches, the management were aligned, then we take it to our leaders, get them aligned and give everybody the opportunity to disagree and robustly discuss it and eventually someone may still be disagreeing but they have to commit to it because the majority wins, then you take it to the rest of the group and give them the same opportunity. So we all own it, it's not just Steve's idea, it's everybody's idea right down to the guy that's just arrived first time in the obliques, and his opinion is just as valuable as everybody else, so give them the opportunity to, as I say, robustly disagree or agree, at some point, boys are okay, well, we've still got a 23 split here, what are we going to do? Obviously, the 20 are going to be out by the three, so you guys coming with us and that means if it works, you get the credit, if it doesn't work, you can't sit there and go, well, our target wasn't going to work, we're all in it together, so we disagree and commit to it, and that's been the first loss of fee for a long time and then living it from the top down, I think, you know, it's really, really important. So what were the non-negotiable expectations that you did sat then? The first one was team first and individual second, and I always felt that I wanted to care about athletes, but I didn't want that care and love and support to get in the way of making tough decisions, so if I made the team more important than the individual, then the team would demand that I'd make those tough decisions, and if we could educate our athletes and our management to understand that as well, then we'd all make the right decisions in the moment that we needed to make them because it was more important for the team that it was for myself, and we didn't get that up right all the time, you know, there's guys, they're young men and they make mistakes, but you know, we got it right a lot of the time, so that was non-negotiable, having alignment was non-negotiable, so it couldn't do it if we didn't agree that we had to be aligned, and then the third one was that the players would drive that alignment, they would lead it both on and off the field, you know, I wanted them to drive the bus, as opposed to me being the driver. I love what you said there about caring about players, because I think often people assume elite sport is quite a brutal harsh environment, and yet to hear somebody's successful yourself talk about caring and wanting to get along with players is important. Would you explain for those outside of that world then that maybe it would be surprised that having that, why it is so important? Well, it's a tough job, as you've just said, you know, it's a really, really mentally pressured environment, and human beings just want nature, want to be loved, people to care about us we want to be valued and when I start a coach I always, like I'm a reasonably simple person, so I'd always use the philosophy of my own career and things that happened to me, the good and the bad and the bad things I didn't want to happen to other people. Like people not being brave enough to tell you the truth about selections, not being honest enough to say we are sitting and pecking what are not caring enough to be able to say, well look, you know, you don't need to be here today, you go and sort that, what's happening at home. So I just naturally took that into, you know, in over years you refine it and you get better and you grow as you have more experiences. So whilst it's really important the team comes first, your team's made up of a whole lot of different people who have different things going on in their lives and need support, some need to kick in the bum and some need to cuddle, but you know no one's ever been hurt by giving them a cuddle however. It's an interesting one, isn't it, this caring for people because it's the right thing to do, but your job actually at the end of the day is to win games of rugby and win trophies. So can you give us an example of when you knew that caring for individuals actually translated to performances on the rugby pitch? Oh, there was no like ball moment that said that I just knew that that's how I wanted to catch and when I did it, I knew I had an athlete who would give me more. So I guess that maybe that was a like ball moment I suppose, but the more you knew the athlete knew that you cared about him and you trusted him and you were able to be vulnerable enough with him to share things and normalise things, the more they would give you. Can we talk about alignment as well because that's something that's coming up in the conversation three or four times already. I think we all learn more when things aren't going right, when they're going well. Could you give us an example of a period in your coaching career when you've, the alignment has not been right and it's, you've had. Oh, there's two times probably. The alignment wasn't right with the process and it was my fault because I became too out calm and focused. When was that? One was my second year as a canary coach we'd won the competition the first year and we're away flying and I got so demanding because I wanted to win again that it got in the way of actually caring about the athlete and you know came across as a prick really and didn't care enough and value them enough and started missing things because it was all about winning and probably the last time it happened was 2/17 and the Lines Tour again because I really, really wanted to win that and it became more important than actually doing what was right. But you recognize it and both times I went back to the groups to different groups and said look off stuff that's up and this is what I've done and apologise and it started again. So how do you avoid complacency then because that's a really interesting challenge when you describe that first year of it can't be winning and then wanting to win again but without wanting to compromise your values? I think it's about setting up a blue print that you can go to when you're successful. So for us we had 5 things we had if you thought about them in columns. The first column was about who we were, what's our identity, what's our legacy and I'll come back to them. The second one was about how fast can we learn every day about what's going on not just in our game but in take information from all over the place. Third one was what are the inconvenience facts that we've prepared to admit to ourselves out loud as opposed to paper over the cracks. Fourth one was how fast can we adapt in a Justin game is when things aren't going the way we want them to and the last one was okay what's the big audacious goal that we're going to try and achieve. So we sat down and tried to identify what they were and it was interesting because when we went to the identity and it was a word that we used a lot you know our legacy et cetera et cetera and I asked in a leaders meeting I think there's 12 players and a bit full management and that we couldn't answer it as distinctly as we wanted to. So I should write out well we have to find out what that is so what we did was we interviewed every living all black past and and current and asked them what were the values or the core things they saw that made them cherish the all blacks and we came up with a series of things and then we put players attach players into those different areas from the past and that's okay that's what we're representing so that's what we have to deliver on every day. We went at the inconvenient facts and admitted to ourselves right away well let's look at the teams we're playing what are they as good as they'll be better at some things than us they'll be the same as us at some things and then they'll be not as good in something so we've got a stone in front of them in this area catch up here and try and get ahead of them here so that things you do every day and that allows you to not just concentrate on what you've just done so it's bigger than that and then the you big good day she's got like as was when I first got the job we just won the World Cup in 2011 made to go to this interview and I'm thinking well what am I going to say to them you know like the number one in the world so I can't come and say well we're going to be number one in the world and I'll go where you already are and I look like a dick so and I thought about it and talked to Tash my wife about a lot and then I came up with the idea of okay let's be the greatest sports team in the history of the game and then once we had this Davis what I wanted to do was be able to say what that looked like and would feel like so I came up with these ideas and anyway that's what I said to the board when I went to the job they gave me the job then I took it to the team and did what I was talking about before give the management the chance to rip it apart and they all had a crack at it and but they liked it enough to keep it the way it was then we took it to the leaders and they liked it and then we took it to the young guys and they all liked it so they basically stayed the same but what it did do was it moved people's asses from being comfortable in the back of the chair to the front of it and I don't even know if some people thought we could we could achieve it and I don't know if we did or we didn't achieve it doesn't matter what what mattered was we had a whole group of people collectively owning that idea trying to achieve it and you know as I said to the group it doesn't matter whether we achieve it or not guys it's what the public there's a story we leave behind they'll tell us if we've achieved it and and you know like you're only going to achieve it to have to do it again so it's never ending and then we would set you know immediate goals for up and coming competitions and then the term goal so as an example like when we come here in 215 the World Cup one of the goals we wanted to do was become the second most supported team behind England so for the English fans because if they got knocked out who were England going to fan support and we thought well why can't they support us it'd be nice to come to took it in for a change and have them shout out for us so everything we did off the field had that in mind and again the boys all bought into it really well and you know the time we did get here we did have a great fan base it was English based would you truly take us inside what life is like when you take on the all blacks because there can be very few sports teams where the pressure is similar yeah well that's the pressures the the word it's the one constant it's you know that and we would talk about a lot during my time and every time we'd come back together we'd we'd talk about it we'd go right oh well one constant thing we're going to get here guys is pressure because we're going to be scrutinized but don't be frightened by that actually embrace it and understand that whatever the external pressure is we'll have an internal pressure that's even higher so therefore that that external pressure can't touch it right we lost an 07 and a card of people go you know they don't know what to say but they say some stupid stuff oh yeah really she's really annoyed me when you lost that game and I said well what do you think it did to me you know like I'm not a two pal you know he's like yeah but I had to fly all the way over and I had to fly all the way home and and they sort of get it but they don't get it it's because they love the game and they love the team and you don't want that's what you don't want it to change yeah you want that people to be there really rooting for your team because it's a hard job and they're not but you need to understand it's there you need to admit to yourself it's there and then you can put some plans around it so what what do you appreciate you feel might be different to the pressure I feel what don't feels could be different to both of what we feel identify what it is and then what do we what's your plan when you start feeling that what are you going to do because when you've if you don't have a plan and you're feeling it you're gone you're not going to pull it out your back side and so on we're going to do this now because you're not in just camp what sort of plans would you put in place then for because obviously some players would thrive under pressure and we've all seen you know players who were 'Tough I've under pressure because I've prepared for it. Right, it's not the pressure that's making them thrive, it's the preparation that's making them thrive. And they're playing for, okay, when this gets hot, and you know, take a walk sort of time in the heat of the game, they're not worried about the scoreboard. Their plan is forget the scoreboard. Their plan is to stay right here when my feet are. Staying in there, what's the job I've got to do? Let's do that job as really good as I can. And hope like hell with the guy across me, he's worried about the scoreboard. He's worried about the mistake he's just made. And I think that's the difference. So having those mental skills, for a long time, the all blacks didn't want to admit to ourselves that we were chokeers at World Cup. And the reason we didn't is because the people at the top didn't have to own it because you got the sack. So the next guy coming in, well, not my fault, I didn't choke. So I'm not a choker. But in '07, we got the opportunity to do it again, and we had to sit there and say, "Well, shit, what are we going to learn from this? What can we take out of this pain and put it into a wee parcel that's going to make us good? We want to World Cup's because of the fact that they allowed us to have another go. And we took the learnings, and you know, Bob Jrankel got the job done. So what were those learnings? A little bit of pressure we have to admit to ourselves that there isn't a lot of pressure. So how are we going to deal with the fact that we haven't been in a final before? What is that pressure doing to each of us individually that we haven't been there before? Things are going to go wrong. So what are we going to do if they do go wrong? I don't know if you remember 11, but we lost more first 5s and most teams have not done us. So we get into trouble because we don't expect some things to happen, so we feel threatened by it. And then we either get aggressive fight, flight or freeze, which we all understand that term. We don't know how to deal with it. The simple thing is, we go there every day. We, we, something all threatened us that we didn't expect. So the more things we can plan that might happen that we don't want to happen, the better we'll be off to react to when it does happen. Does that make sense? Yeah. That can't take you away from what we want to happen. So this is how we want to play. This is what we want to do. This is what we want to achieve. Okay, so we've got that and we've, we've spent our week making sure that we've got clarity, add the intensity. And once we've got that clarity and then we add the, the accuracy, right, okay, we're ready to rock and roll. But have we taken any time to think about, okay, what if we don't get that? Where we're going to go, both individually and collectively. So we would spend a lot of time, we used to call them what ifs. So what if this happens? And most of the time, it's pretty successful. So what I'm fascinating on that is because it makes perfect sense, but it challenges, again, this, this notion outside of that world of thinking that everything's got to be positive that you can't allow room for the negatives in. Yeah, particularly this generation, I think, of Z generation. They like the world to be positive. We also like to have an opinion. And they also like to voice it. So, okay, we'll give them that opportunity to do those things and have, and take some ownership of it. And, okay, what does positive look like? Okay, well, now what's going to happen when we don't get that boys? We can't go holy valley and so on, we don't want that. Yeah, in opposition, they're going to stop. I look back at the 19-wheel cup and the hardest thing to do at wheel cups, that's why they're so hard to win. There's go back to back to back. You've got to have three great performances to win it. If you're in a draw on the side of the draw, where you've got real big opposition. Like we played France in 15, we played South Africa and we just got through that game. And then we had Australia. Probably the hardest game we'll South Africa. 19, we had a few problems with Ireland. That beatness, I think, just before the wheel cup. And we came out this nationally. It played really well. Then it was about getting ourselves back in the right frame of mind. And I'm not, you're not talking about a big drop. You're talking about one, two, three percent across the board of the team. And you're comfortable. But you can't go into a test match. A wheel cup semi-final, comfortable. England had come off a disastrous 250-wheel cup. That was Hungary's heck. And they wanted us. But what happened to them the next week? They couldn't reproduce it because subconsciously they thought they'd done the job. It's not a conscious thing, it's a subconscious thing. So you've got to work hard at those things as well. So I am conscious. As I'll tell you, that hindsight is the foresight of a gob-shite. So. As well, Steve. When you look back on that period now, what do you think you maybe could have done differently to have spotted those signs? Oh, I should have known. Because you were always vulnerable straight after that. And I did feel it in my bones. But at the same time, we had a couple of injuries. One of them was a skipper. And I didn't want. We didn't know if he was going to play or not. And I didn't want the group going in and shit, we've lost the skipper. You know, we've got just been in it, demanding, demanding. Now we lost the skipper. Like, we can't win this. So you're trying to keep positive around that. And I think probably we've got two positive. And it's a slippery slope. Explain two positive. Well, you know, we were in the right space, boys. And we were ready to go, you know. And knowing of Rida wasn't there, then we'd lost a big chunk of who we are. We had a lot of belief in the skipper. He was an important part of the cock. So you're trying to. I wouldn't have done a user with Bullshit to make them feel good. But you're putting them in a place where. Well, Rida's not here, but we're still OK. We're ready to. Coach says we're ready to go. We're ready to go. But probably in hindsight, I might have been better. I was just. If he's not there, then he's not there. I'll cope with that. And let's be really focused on being demanding. And let's sit there in a two-wheel. We're going to take this game rather than wait for it to happen. Like England came out and took the game. We waited and got smacked. You know, smacked, smacked, smacked. Oh, shit. Now we're going to start there. Because this is not what's meant to be happening. Yeah, it's very interesting getting the line right, isn't it, between building them up. And so even if there's a coach, you're having some slight concerns. Is it ever a bad thing to say to the guys? Look, this is the situation we're in. No. It's not a bad thing, bud. I think, like, when you look at that week, you know, it works for me. But when I look at the whole time, the 107 test matches as he'd coach, you know, we've got most of those works right. So can I keep giving myself an upper cap? Yeah, I probably can, but you know, get over it, Stephen. How harsh are you on yourself? Yeah, I'm pretty harsh, yeah. Does it benefit you? Sometimes it's not. No, no, no, I've finished coaching. It doesn't benefit me to keep still beating myself up. I can't change it. I can't say, Eddie, can we replay that game? How will rugby, can we go back and have that week again? So we can fix it. So you do have to get over it. You know, you go put your big boy pants on and get on with it. And I've said, do you speak about you have an alter ego? Sometimes it comes out of cover. The name you gave you, alter ego, when you get hyper-competitive. Oh, Stanley. Stanley. Yeah, I didn't give it my wife and a couple of friends gave me that. But Stanley, Stanley comes out because he just becomes a bulldozer and there's no care. There's no love. He just charges on winning with playing cards, whatever it is. And what often tends to stand the out, what the circumstances where that happens. No, ego and pride because you want to win. Your pride is the biggest something block in the world because it doesn't allow you to admit your mistakes. It doesn't allow you to lose, you know. And it's just another word for ego, really. So you go, we all have an ego. And we just got a master. And when your pride becomes a problem, you don't master it. So it gets in the way, I guess, and so then Stanley comes out. He's just charging. And just Stanley, Stanley only come out playing cards with the family or doing stuff. Or did he also come out in your coaching? Well, I think Stanley came out in the second year with that kind of routine. That was something about in 2015. Lines you, I think Stanley came out there, but we didn't have a name for it back then. Stanley's reasonably new. It's probably come out more often. I haven't got that avenue to be competitive. So we're going to control on that. See, most of the time. So I mean, that's something I can identify with. I'm sure a lot of our listeners can't. How have you learnt to control that side of your character? Well, you see the reaction it has on other people. No one wants to play cards because Stanley's going to come out. Right. So I want to play cards, so I've got to check Stanley. And the kids don't want to play. Well, I want to play with it because I've got to allow them to win it easily. That's what happens. I want to see the reaction of what you're doing to other people. Like, I'm reasonably sharp-tungged. And we'd be quite often people would say, "Oh, you know, he likes last word Steve." And I'll go, "Well, it's because I can think of the last word." However, I've come to understand that it's not a bad thing sometimes. Like, "Well, you can have that and walk away from it." Because early doors, I've probably punished hurt people. And not necessarily because I wanted to, but because of what I wanted to do. what I, you know, just to one then out, you know, that bent a conversation. The reason why that's interesting is because obviously, you know, you create these really fascinating and winning cultures with your rugby teams, but where you can't control is outside factors. So, you know, spoken about your players coping with external perception. I wonder how you coped with external criticism. I'm thinking mainly from the media and a, you know, a lot of people listening to this won't be in the position you're in, but they will feel judged and challenged by other people. What advice would you offer them? Yeah, look, I think none of us like to be judged in a negative way, like we're all pretty happy to pick up the positive judgment. Yeah. But we certainly hurt when you get the negative stuff, but you've got to come down to understand that you're doing the best you can. If you can look in the mirror and say, look, I've done the best I can here. I've been honest. I've got a lot of trauma ourselves. Is there anything else I could be doing? No. Do these people know all the circumstances? No, most of them don't. Are they hurting because they're not getting what they want, which is a team winning or whatever it may be? Yes, probably. So, just forgive them and move on, like it's because it's beautiful your own mental health. People have perceptions because you win all the time while you must be a great coach. They have the same perceptions if you're losing or you must be a shit coach. And I often, I have a chuckle to myself because I coach a team that has the most losses in the row at test level and I have a team that has won the most. So, I'm a shit coach and a great coach. I just say to myself, we're just a coach, Steve. So, don't let it knock you in. You know where you want to go. And if you're taking the group with you and they want to come there too, then eventually you'll turn it around. Sport is so good because it doesn't let you win all the time. It just doesn't. No one can. So, eventually you get a kick in the bum and as you said before, we learn a lot more from that because we go deeper because it hurts as adversity. And that was one of the things it was just to say to the boys, why do we have to lose to learn? Why can't we learn when we're winning? If we can do that, we're going to win more often because that's what we all want to do. Excepting that, we're still going to get beat in the case because some coaches, we're going to get comfortable. And once you get comfortable, then you'll make mistakes. It's talking about high performance like you compare yourself to a surgeon and you're going to do an operation on your knee. You don't want him getting comfortable. I want him doing the best job he can do on that knee. And we would talk about that. And I would say, boys, we're going into doing operation here. We're going in at 95 here or we're going to totally commit it. That's part of our performance, isn't it? If you get comfortable, you're going to get punished. So what would you say you did judge your coach in success by, because like you say, you've had the most losses and the most wins. So if I can just give you an example of when a coach gave us a really fascinating answer to this was, when we sat down with Rob Baxter at Existor Chiefs, and he said it took him 10 years into his coaching to realise the most important question was, would I be happy for my son to be coached by me? What would you say your credit? I've always had the same criteria from the day I started to the day of I finished coaching. And it's the greatest pleasure I get is when I can get an athlete to achieve something that he or she wants to achieve and couldn't achieve until you came along and gave a little help or him a little help. I get a real buzz out of that. I get a buzz out of teams, individuals within teams being able to achieve what they're trying to do. And you can do that at any level of coaching. I was never ever worried about getting a sack because I knew, well, that's what I get a buzz from. So just go back to me and have a local club and don't come here. And how much freedom in your setup is there for you? Are you a control freak? Do you want to know everything that's happening at all times? I would say that I'm an impere about when I first started I was probably a control freak because I think we all are because we think that's what we have to be. And we're not trusting enough in our own abilities to not want to know. But as time went on, I hopefully others would say, yeah, he would let us do our job. I'd be demanding though. And we had one mantra in the group in the management group was, if you're going to make a decision that's going to have or possibly could have an effect on the performance on Saturday, I want to know about it before we introduce it. If it's not going to do that, then don't have to tell me. So I saw myself as the helicopter over the group. We had a leadership system that went, coaches, which fozzie drove, well-being, which good would have no could drive, logistics and commercial, which Darren Schandrave and then the leaders driven by whoever the captain was. Now, the two captains were basically Richie or Rita. So they got on and did there, but then yes, you had moments where like, for example, Nick Gill's strength and conditioning coach. And we're having trouble with Dan Carter in 2015. He'd been pulling calf muscles for a couple of years. And one day I just, because I've got an interest in horses and I understand a long time ago, an old trainer said to me, it's done just because they're born mechanically. They're not, they don't have the right shape legs. It doesn't stop them from running fast. It'll just stop them being able to do that for a long time. If you look at Dan, he blind mechanically, he's a mess. And I thought, what if we took some weight off? And he wasn't fat. So I asked him, I said, well, wait, when you weren't pulling your calf muscles, and he saw, you know, 93, maybe I said, what are you now? 95. And like he's doing the jockey ads at 95. So there's no, it's muscle, it's not fat. So we ended galley, and we talked about it. And I said, why don't we take a couple of kilo off and see if, you know, because we both agreed by mechanically, it wasn't great. Would that help? Well, we did, and you ever pulled another calf muscle. So, you know, that, that's your role as the helicopter is not, not to get in the way, but to actually find solutions for some things and think about some problems that they probably don't have the time to think about. And so would you sit quite strict rules then, because that's the great thing about that is you're standing off and you're empowering your people. So are rules important? So they, they know exactly the parameters they're working to or not. I hate rules. I hate rules. I, expectations, I like, but I don't like rules, because they stop people from sometimes going where they should. And I often say rules are the other god that brave and and how about the foolish. They'll be people, though, listening to this, where that scares them a bit. They might be a business leader going, well, the rule is you coming at nine o'clock. The rule is you don't work from home four days a week. The rule is, well, you'll sit together for lunch, you know, that people often use rules to create culture. What would you say to those people? Well, you just repeat what you said. You use to create culture. Yeah. I'd say they use rules to force the culture. And if they're forcing it, they don't have a culture. It's got to happen naturally. It's got to be something that we all own and we want to be responsible for. So you can't create something with a rule. You can only force something with a rule. And every rule will get broken. So then what? Now what are we going to do? We're breaking the rule. If you break an expectation, well, we can live with that. Well, there'll be a consequence. But it's not the same as you grow old. He's breaking the rule. You're going to have to drop him or you're going to shoot him or whatever you have to do. I don't know. So personally, I'm about expectation. I expect you to live the values and the things that we've said we want to live. I want you to make decisions that are based around those things. I don't want to make a rule that's going to make you have to do that. Well, what I love about that as well is that allows people too far occasionally without being punished or ostracised or demonised for it. We all fall. I see players and all human beings from time to time who want to be perfect. I've never said, like, I go there guys all the time. I go, tell me the best game you've played. And he tells me, "Did you make any mistakes in that?" Oh, yeah. I said, "Well, there you go." So stop trying to chase something that no one is ever going to do, because it's always human nature, so I could have done that better. I could have done this, but just be satisfied that you're actually doing these things really, really well. And then what is it we can take out of that performance that we can keep and what is it that we can go away and grow and get better at? What about people, then, that they're in your group and you're allowing the culture to mold them into the people you want rather than the rules, but they're just not getting it. They're just not right. How would you advise people to deal with that? Well, again, I think there's an old old saying that we use who can't change the man, change the man. At some point. If they're not going to come with you, then that's not the place for you to be. And what did you employ to try and get people to come with you? Well, you try all the things we've been talking about, you know, give them opportunities to understand that this is what the expectations are of the team, you're set through meetings, you're set through one-on-ones, we'll give you an example, Alfred Thomas, probably the second best athlete I've ever coached. It's a poor athlete, no, behind Sonny Bill and he'd be next. When I first came to Wales, he wasn't a leader, but he was seen to be a leader by his peers because when, you know, I always find it ironic when people name captains or you're a leader and you know who the leaders are when they're shittets of fan and everyone goes, "What are we doing?" And it may not be looking at the captain. Well, they would always look at Alfred, "What are we going to do, Alfred?" Anyway, Alfred, he was in a part of his life that wasn't quite clear for him and he was drinking and, you know, best physique you could ever see. So it was obviously training, but he'd come during the week and he wouldn't try, you know, he just didn't want to be better than anybody else or work harder than anybody. He didn't want to show, didn't want to bring his book and write things down. So we had a conversation and so I got to let you go. But the doors opened a few chains and then we'll look at bringing you back. So he went and, you know, I just lost my best athlete and I'm hurting, I'm thinking, "God, I hope you changed, man." And three weeks later, I got a ring from his coach and he said, "Oh, like you've got to have another, this guy's changed animal." So I said, "Okay, thanks." And I'm, again, back to the same horse trainer that taught me about the legs. I'd once said to him, "Oh, that horse looks really fit. You better put him back into training because we used to graze him on the farm." And he said, "You give me a gallon." And he said, "Oh, why is that?" And I said, "Oh, because he's backing." So he's backing today. It looks real fresh. So well, you give me a ring and when he's backing every day, I'll bring him back into work. So I put the phone down, I thought, "Right, he's really serious. He's changed. You'll ring me back." And another week's time to say, "Shit, I'm into you. Come down." What she did do, then I sent Scott Johnson down to Sam and Scott, he had a chat time and he came back and he said, "I think you need to talk to him. He seems to be on a different plane." And so we bought him in and sat there and we had a great conversation. And he said, "Right, I made old judge you from this day forth on the things that we've just talked about, that we need from you." And he went on to be one of the greats and capped in the lines and that was satisfied when you see him being successful. Because we tried to change him, we had to go right to the bottom of the well to do it. But we tried other things. But that's what I mean. If you can't change him, then you have to change him. So he had the change. We wouldn't have got him back, but he didn't. So you've got to be flexible enough in your thinking to be able to say, "Well, let's give him another go." Love you, serious, being we've got a great estimate. We always like to talk about a specific moment on high performance and just delve into it a little bit more deeply. And often, when it comes to the life that you've lived, it's about winning the trophies and the titles and all of that. But I'd really like to talk to you about the moment that you decided to walk away. Because I think that that is a really interesting thing. We spend our lives being told, "Never quit, never give up." Sometimes the best thing you can do is just to step away from something. Yeah, well, look, 20 years as you don't get 20 years for murder to do. So it's a long time. It's a long time without your family. You know, you owe them something. At some point, the team needs you to allow them to try something different. And you just know it's time. So pull the trigger and get out. I think I'm going to, you know, the emotion around the family is totally understandable. And I think sometimes it's only when you step back. And you're probably quite a reflective period of your life now where you look back on what happened. And I think we can't have a conversation about your success without actually paying them respects to the amazing blended family you've got and how the people around you had to allow you to do what you did. Be all that's right. And, you know, you keep talking about them, I'll keep crying. So, they miss that. I don't know how many birthdays you miss. I'm tasked with a wonderful job trying to keep everybody together. And then you come back and you're in and you're out. So it's easy for me, not so easy for everybody else. So you're just, you know, so grateful. Because we were allowed, I think we're in a great place as a family. Everybody's achieving the things they want to achieve. And they're all striving, I guess, to be better and within their own shared apps and they're still finding their own way. And that's fine, like that's life. But as a group, you know, we love and care about each other and you can't ask for any more than that. Thank you for that. Well, I think you've got acknowledged yourself that it's okay to feel emotion. And when you sort of are aware at the time, the cost is only something that you kind of realise when you're actually, when you finally are there for those things. Well, you do, you do. No, I think, you know, as you're going along, you can see it and you're overcompensate. And while you're overcompensating, you're not actually parenting as well as you possibly could be because you're feeling guilty about not being there, but this or that of an X-ing. And then you know, like, you can't come home and try and run the house. That was, you know, because you've got someone else that's been doing that and doing a great job of it. So I don't come in and stuff that up. So you've got to come home and find your place and sometimes, you know, that can be a bit awkward too. It's difficult. I think the other challenge you've got is, you know, I know that you've got a blended family and you've wanted all your kids to feel totally at home, whichever house they were in. I think what I love about that is you talk about team before self and your rugby career. It feels to me like that's your version of team before self in a family setting as well, which is then puts challenges on other people right now. It does. And, you know, their happiness is what's most important. Well, I'm so pleased to chat to you here in London where you get to have a bit of a break with the family. Before they get even louder outside, let's do this. We finished with a few quick fires. The first one is the three non-negotiable behaviours that you and ideally, the people around you would buy into. Honesty, loyalty and hard-working. Very good. What's your greatest strength in your biggest weakness? My competitiveness is both of them. Your greatest strength is always your biggest weakness. How important is legacy to you? To me, I think, you know, what you'll leave behind is pretty important. What story you want. Yeah, grand children to hear, massive. What advice would you give a teenage Steve just to know? I've been mentally more aware of how to use mental skills, be a little bit more patient. Don't be in a rush to think with certain parts of your body as opposed to your bigger head. And the final one is the people that have listened to this been a really fascinating conversation. It's the final question really that you'd like to leave with the answer ringing in their areas. What would you now say is your one golden rule for living a high performance life? Be the best version that you can be. Don't compromise yourself. Don't compromise your integrity. Just because you think it's going to be something being official to you. It's going to be a bigger cause than you. So try and be vulnerable enough to put your hand up when you don't know. And you don't have to tell the world everything you know. Sometimes a bit of a listen to what other people know. I love that. I think we've caught you in a really nice reflective period in your life. And thank you very much for spending a bit of time with us sharing the things you've done and the thoughts you have from it. Yeah, thanks. It's been wonderful. Thanks for the cheers. Let's have a top man. Damien, Jake, one of those conversations where when he speaks, you listen and he's quietly spoken. He's very considered with what he says, but so much impactful conversation in that in that chat. I think it was also privileged to be in the presence of somebody that you might dub them as old-school. But like he said at the start, he's just a a purveyor of common sense and helping make it common practice. And that's what I've taken away from it. I mean, I love the fact that, you know, he shared with us in pretty deep detail, you know, how he would run the most famous rugby team on the planet. And I love this idea of no rules because I think people get caught up with believing that, I mean, what about when I said to him, you need rules to create a culture and he's like, no, that's not creating a culture. That's forcing a culture. And I think it's a brilliant distinction. And it's well, not even considered, I'm like, right, set the rules. That's just the culture and everyone follows. And then he comes with a total curve born, you know, and it does leave you thinking long and hard about rules, doesn't it? Yeah, that lovely line that he used about rules are there to guide the brave and and then hibit the fillish, the hibit the fillish, a catching people out rather than catching people in. We know that people are going to make mistakes, why? Because they're human. So rules are there then to punish people for that. Whereas the distinction of having high expectations, non-negotiable expectations, goes back to them. You know that when we've had this conversation in the past around the work of a guy called Robert Rosenthal that did famous study called the pig malian effect, where he went into a classroom and picked kids out at random and said these kids are going to be high performers. And over the course of the year, those kids outperform the rest of the class. And then he revealed that actually he'd just picked them at random, but it was our expectations of those children that meant they lived up to them. And I think when you have high performance expectations, people will naturally want to strive to live up to them. Yeah, I thought it was really interesting. And you know, the thing I love about doing these interviews when you do them face to face is that you realize that the things they tell you, they actually live them. So he talks about family first. And you know, people need to understand that he had like six of his or five of his six kids were with him at Twickenham when we recorded the interview. And you know, they all went and had a load of drinks afterwards. And you know, to see him get an emotional while talking about his family is one thing. If he's then traveling the world, never seeing them, doesn't pick up the phone, isn't trying to create, you know, this great family atmosphere, then you question it. But the fact that he wells up talking about his family and you look to your right and you've got his five kids all standing in the room is a, is a really good reminder that he lives what he says. Yeah. Another example he talks about having this inclusive culture, you know, I brought my son along today and he's been adopted as a member of the Hanson family, you know, they've incorporated him into it. The million welcome that been interested and engaging with him. And again, it's another sign that this is a family that really does practice what they preach. Thanks mate. Thank you, mate. Well, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. The bit I keep coming back to is what he says about rules. Every leader I meet wants a culture and most of them want a beach for a rule to get one, being by nine, being the office on a Thursday, things like that. It Steve just turns it over. If you're having to force it, you haven't actually got one. He's a man who points out that he's coached both the team with the most test defeats in a row and the team with the most wins. So which one is it? And he asked the question that I haven't been able to shake off since I first heard him say it. Why do we have to lose to learn? Listen, if this episode's landed with you, why not consider sending it to someone who you think really needs it? But as always, thank you for listening and joining us here at a high performance. Remember to remain humble, curious and empathetic. And we'll look forward to seeing you next time on high performance.