When you are a team losing in sports, politics or business every leak of information, disagreement, client or player lost is magnified in the court of public opinion, fuelled by the media. My local rugby team, Leicester Tigers,
once Europe’s dominant club, have been battered from pillar to post this season, and dangle precariously over the trap door to sporting irrelevance. Coaches fired, player dissension aired in the media and calls for the Board to resign.

The truth, of course, is in business, you are not as great as your best accomplishments might suggest, nor as poor as your biggest failures might suggest.

The sporting cliche suggests you “keep your head down and work harder”. That is rubbish. Why would you retreat from the limelight and merely work harder to achieve the very same disappointing results with increasing risk for your immediate future?

Wouldn’t you be better served keeping your head up and working smarter? Directing the time, energy and efforts towards those, who have greatest need for your value (competitive advantage), confidently articulating the dramatic and relevant value you confer to the widest pool of buyers, and focusing on a winning future without a fear of failure?