Cath BishopIn December 2020, Leadership Relay were thrilled to speak to Cath Bishop. Cath had a very successful rowing career. She competed in three Olympic Games and won a Silver Medal at the 2004 Games in Athens alongside Katherine Grainger, before becoming a Diplomat with the Foreign Office. Following this, she has worked with a number of different organisations developing their leadership capacity. Earlier this year, Cath had her book ‘The Long Win: The Search for a Better Way to Succeed’ published. We have read the book and consider it to be very powerful and thought provoking. It has challenged the way we think about teaching and they have changed aspects of their teaching as a direct result of reading the book. If you would like to know anything about the changes made, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. Leadership Relay would like to thank Cath for giving up her time in what was an extremely busy period for her in the build up to Christmas. Thank you, Cath. We hope you enjoy the interview as much as us |
The Interview
LR - Can you briefly tell me about your career so far?
CB - Sure, to keep it as brief as possible, I started out with a rowing career for 10 years and I competed in 3 Olympic Games. I then moved on to become a Diplomat with the Foreign Office and worked abroad as part of that. I focussed quite a lot of that time on issues around conflict, pre conflict, post conflict and during conflict. I worked in Bosnia and Iraq and had a fascinating time. After that, I’ve worked for 7 or so years, in the world of leadership development, teaching at business schools, looking at the question of performance and I’ve recently drawn all of my experiences together in a book called ‘The Long Win.’
LR - That leads me nicely to my next question. Your book, The Long Win, is so powerful. What was your motivation for writing it?
CB - I wanted to look back to try and make sense of my own journey and find out about its meaning. It is so intense at the time and it’s hard to step back and think about the bigger picture. The language of winning is so prevalent in society; in business, politics, education and particularly sport. I wanted to dispel some of the myths about what success looks like and redefine what success might mean in the future. There is a very narrow framework around it and I’ve been thinking, is this actually helping us?
Then there have been stories from winners like Jonny Wilkinson who has spoken very eloquently on the subject and about how he felt no joy even when he was ‘winning’. It has shocked me seeing how many athletes who win medals, even the Gold Medalists have been left feeling depressed, empty, thinking is that it? That is not a picture of success that I think we should hold up to young people as something they should be aiming for. It showed me that something has gone wrong by us defining winning so narrowly. It made me think that if the winners are feeling like this, what is it like for the rest of us?
I wanted to challenge assumptions about the way we think and act. Winning cannot be a momentary point, that moment must be tied to a bigger story of the journey you are on and the experience you had. I think 2020 has shown us more than ever that results can be wiped away and a whole lot of people are re-evaluating what matters in a way and on a scale that I never could have imagined and that has opened up the whole topic enormously.
LR -You mentioned politics, thinking about the pandemic here, I recently saw an article and it all seemed to be creating a race about which country could come up with a vaccine first.
CB - If we look at politics, certain politicians overuse the language of winning repeatedly. I saw that the Oxford Group is collaborating with a group of Russian Scientists at the moment, but this fact hasn’t been picked up by the media or government. Sometimes the media can help push the winning narrative and create a battle about ‘which country can create the vaccine first.’ When I speak to scientists, I find they are keen to collaborate across fields and share expertise which is the only way to make progress. I’ve heard some say they are mortified about how the stories are sometimes portrayed within the media.
It’s particularly damaging when the key issues of the 21st centuries are complex and global, whether it’s climate change, inequality or global health, no single country has the right answer and we need to collaborate to find ways of working together more effectively and pooling our expertise and perspectives.
LR - You’ve worked in and with a number of teams throughout your career. From your point of view, what have been common characteristics of successful teams?
CB - I think the successful teams that I’ve worked in have all had a clear understanding of what success means to them. The definition of what success looks like is critical to which behaviours we choose to develop and reward. The successful teams I’ve worked in have had a curiosity about them, they explore what is possible and are always seeking improvement and excellence. They are able to take something from everyday and enjoy the journey rather than the result. There has always been a clear criteria around how to behave, how to communicate and how to have challenging conversations. They aren’t always harmonious environments, but that is okay when it’s respectful and done in an environment to help get the best out of each other.
I think that within the most successful teams, all team members feel empowered to make suggestions and they feel their voice is going to be heard, regardless of hierarchy within the team. Successful teams also have the ability to reflect on when things have gone well as well as looking at areas that can be improved, regardless of outcome. Sometimes there is too much of a focus on only learning when things go wrong. Learning needs to be constant and a collaborative process. When I worked as a diplomat in a hostile environment of conflict in Iraq, it was an incredibly supportive team environment where there was a clear focus on well-being. Nobody took wellbeing for granted and our care for each other went across roles and hierarchy. We’ve perhaps seen how important that is in the ‘hostile environment’ of 2020, it’s something we shouldn’t only do in tough times.
LR - Thinking about the language of winning was one of my biggest takeaways from reading the book. Words associated with winning seem to be everywhere and they are often used to motivate people. What can be done to improve this?
CB - I’m glad that you’ve noticed! I find the language of winning everywhere: companies talk about wanting to ‘build winning teams’ or ‘be number one in the marketplace’. There is all of this winning language, yet often at the same time low levels of staff engagement and motivation. So what’s going on? When you look behind what winning means, often there isn’t much of a deeper purpose. I think we need to develop clarity around what matters to us. It’s about more than short term metrics and outcomes and being first. We should look to develop more of a learning approach through personal growth rather than always measuring against external results we can’t control, and look to be proactive in developing our relationships with others. I don’t think we’re making sensible choices at times about how we describe success and what we value in society. If success is about being first and outdoing those around us, then we are setting up most people to fail and creating environments of fear and limitation rather than possibility.
Today's world brings different challenges whether it’s the pandemic or inequality and we need to think differently in order to challenge assumptions within our culture that aren’t helping us any more. The language we use is crucial and it underpins how we think, how we behave and how we interact. When we hear phrases around winning, we have the opportunity to ask more questions about it, what are you trying to win and why? We need to ask ourselves what is the long term difference you’d like to see and what can you do in the short and medium term to build towards that?
LR - Do you think it’s a time or convenience issue? You mention in your book that pupils in schools are competing with each other from an early age, even when they are putting their hands up to answer a question. I’d definitely agree that this happens in schools and I do it myself sometimes if I’m pushed for time. Usually I get the pupils to discuss answers in pairs before randomly selecting a pupil. Another personal example is sometimes when I’m trying to get my children quickly changed I might say ‘who is going to get changed first?’
CB - There are always time pressures and deadlines to meet and it’s at times like these that your beliefs are really tested. What I find works is being very clear about what it is you’re trying to get out of situations. If we look at the getting changed example, this might work in the short term, but think about what skills are you trying to develop? If we think more long term, we are trying to encourage the children to be more independent. Ideally we’d like the children to be intrinsically motivated so it’s looking for ways to develop this to help instil more of a deeper lasting value. I believe it’s always better to compete against your own time from yesterday rather than another sibling or peer.
As a personal anecdote, playing Scrabble with my son has totally transformed since we now play for the highest joint score we can get and highest scoring individual word of the game. My child no longer gets upset if I get a good word, as it will help our collaborative tally, and in fact, we help each other, so we get even better words than we would have come up with ourselves. It’s so much more fun, and it has increased, not lowered the standard of play.
LR - In the book you talk specifically about education and everything that you write is so true from giving house points, to hands up, to teaching to tests. What do you think schools can do to improve the situation?
CB - You’re probably better placed to answer this question!! I think we all have a duty to develop tomorrow’s leaders. Employers are crying out for more creativity, innovative thinking, collaborative working and complex problem solving skills in their workforce. A few countries have shifted towards greater collaborative learning projects and peer learning with fewer exams notably across the Nordic Countries and the Netherlands. There is a whole body of learning around cooperative learning which is proven to be a richer experience There are two authors, educational expert Alfie Kohn and Canadian psychologist Terry Orlick who have hugely influenced and further developed my thinking around success in education. Alfie Kohn is a US academic who does a lot of work to develop ‘cooperative learning’ approaches in the classroom. They both confirmed what I was already seeing and working out in the business world and sports environment.
When systems revolve around grades, targets and rankings, this often results in teachers focusing narrowly on the particular subjects and skills required by the tests. It creates conformity rather than diversity, it creates fear of failure rather than the joy of exploration. (It also seems to result in large numbers of teachers leaving the profession.) There have been big improvements in this area in recent years, but I think there is still more work to do. I appreciate that schools need to work within the given framework, but schools need to consider their objectives and their purpose. Staff could have discussions around their own vision and what success looks like to them. They should absolutely pursue excellence, I’m not about lowering standards, but I am about broadening our vision of what success looks like. And we need to think much more about how we can challenge children in different ways, through a breadth of what is possible within your school, to open up questions and find more answers, not simply learn ‘the right answer’.
We could also look much more at the collaborative aspect of schools, rather than competition. This would enable us to invest in and value the relationships around us, developing a mindset to cope with setbacks together and keep learning from them. It’s about defining success on our own terms, agreeing what ‘the long win’ looks like together. I am very passionate about not putting people into boxes for example, categorising who is sporty or who isn't. We all develop at a different pace, it’s not a linear pace and we shouldn't be ranking or comparing people, as this would mean we could dismiss talent and exclude so many people who don’t ‘fit’ or meet the arbitrary ‘standards’.
LR - Yes, you’re right there. I’m quite fortunate that I teach in Wales and there is a lot of work going on at the moment with the New Curriculum. There are 12 pedagogical principles and one of those is around Collaboration.
CB - Yes, I saw the work that Welsh Government has been putting into the new curriculum. It’s an exciting time for education in Wales with the changes being made. I really think those are going in the right (long win) direction.
LR - Yes definitely. I think some countries are very responsive to the PISA tests and react to those. As it mentions in your book, this doesn’t measure well-being and in some countries, the rates of suicide amongst young people are higher. I do think that people involved in education could do with reading your book. It would be brilliant for Newly Qualified Teachers. For example, I saw a school putting out that they’d won a particular sporting fixture 20-0 or something like that. I can see the other side though, leaders want pupils to come to their school rather than the school down the road.
CB - I would love for all Newly Qualified Teachers to read the book!! I think that leaders can get out all the positives from their school out there without having to trash another school. To give an example, I’ve been doing some work with a Secondary PE teacher. They gave the real example of a group of pupils attending a rugby competition and pressure was put on the pupils to perform. Now this group were talented rugby players and went out and won the competition. The really sad thing is none of these players take part in the sport anymore. Too many young people are being turned off sport because the ‘pressure to win’ means the enjoyment is lost. This is a great shame as there are obviously many positive health and well-being benefits in taking part in sport. We see the social costs of children leaving school without an attitude of wanting to live a healthy life and that is far more important than the result of a fixture or a league position. I’d love schools to think about how many people they can keep in sport in 20 years time - that would be a really meaningful success metric. We should focus on a range of opportunities within sport for all children.
LR - You write about job titles in the book, and I’ve heard you discuss them in other interviews. I heard you mention giving people the opportunity to write their own job title. Have you seen this done successfully?
CB - Yes, there is some great research that crafting your own job title is an excellent way of connecting to your own role and explaining it better to others. This can help us get away from generic titles which can be quite meaningless and don’t help you understand anything about the person behind the role. People sometimes have no idea what others are doing everyday. When you go into a meeting and you see a job title and you start judging them.
You see these titles for example business manager, director of this or that and these rather inhuman titles. It’s far better to try and connect with the person behind the role, and for them to be fully who they are. I was involved in a project a few years ago when a charity wanted to create much more of a community across volunteers and paid workers. They did a job-title crafting exercise and it was brilliant to see when people wrote down what their job involved on a day to day basis. What happened then was people would say ‘oh, I never knew you did that, I can help you with that’, so it really helped build connections.
LR - Are there any books that you recommend all leaders read?
CB - I really rate all of Matthew’s Syed’s books. His last one, Rebel Ideas, was excellent. It was all about recognising the importance of having diverse teams. He weaves stories together and challenges hierarchies and makes us think about where the best ideas come from. This ensures that ideas are coming from different viewpoints and it’s very thought provoking. Dan Cable’s ‘Alive’ is a great read too, and includes examples of the benefits of crafting your own job title that you asked about above. As I mentioned earlier, the authors and academics Alfie Kohn and Terry Orlick have greatly influenced my thinking on education.
We hope you enjoyed this interview. Please do let us know if you enjoyed it!
You can read interview number 8 with headteacher and author Phil Denton here - https://leadershiprelay.weebly.com/phil-denton.html