The Championship Performance Mindset featuring Kieran Read

Kieran Read (0:00)

It's quite crazy, we're only 5 million people here, but we're better above our weight, and we've got one of the best winning percentages ever in sport, right? Get your preparation right. The performance will be what it is. You can certainly help that through mindset and everything, and then make sure that we reflect, take the learnings, take the lessons, the good things, and then go again. So you might be doing everything you can as an individual. That small piece actually isn't enough if you don't have it connected to the people around you.

But it's become quite a big thing down here is they build that connection. You build it first through trust, care, showing that you turn up and talk to the young guys who come into the team.

SPEAKER_2 (0:39)

Welcome to the Selling from the Heart Podcast on the From the Heart Business Network. You've joined a global movement of sales professionals who are dedicated to being authentic and building trust. We call it Selling from the Heart.

Together, we're on a mission to bring sincerity and substance to the sales profession we all love. Get ready to be inspired and equipped as we join our hosts, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy.

Darrell Amy (1:14)

Welcome to Selling from the Heart. I'm your co-host, Darrell Amy, here today with Larry Levine and we're joined by Kieran Read, a former professional rugby player for the New Zealand All Blacks, who's now passing on the leadership lessons of his career. Kieran, welcome to Selling from the Heart. It's great to have you here today.

Kieran Read (1:32)

Thanks so much, guys. Very privileged to be on the show. Looking forward to it.

Larry Levine (1:37)

So are we. We're going to have a good time, Darrell.

Darrell Amy (1:40)

As we get started, Kieran, the question we ask every guest on this show is simply this, what does Selling from the Heart mean to you?

Kieran Read (1:47)

Yeah, I guess it's a strange one for me. I'm not necessarily in sales, but I think as a former All Black captain, like I kept in a lot of my rugby sides, you do have to sell the dream, right? You have to sell to your team while you're going out there to perform. So for me, I always look back to where you're connected to. So connect to where you've come from. So I guess your values, who you really are, your identity and what you stand for. So what that is for us in the All Blacks and in New Zealand, and then also connect into where we're going. So the vision of who we want to be and those dreams and aspirations that we have. So I think for me, in terms of from the heart, you got to really connect in to where you've been, and also I guess where you're going as well.

Larry Levine (2:31)

Oh, I really like this. And you brought up values and I just be curious if you can expand on and share if you don't mind. What are some of your core values?

Kieran Read (2:39)

Yeah, I think values are so important for anyone. You know, if they're looking to make every decision you make basically comes out of that value set that you hold personally, right? So my values are built up over a lot of time. I think about being really respectable. I feel like for me that encompasses holding myself to account, obviously paying respect to others around me. But also when I do commit to something, I want to respect that and go after it as well as I can. So that's certainly one of them and that kind of came up through my childhood.

I didn't go to a big school that put me on a system to make professional rugby. I kind of grafted my way into the system. So I think that kind of came through there. And also, as I mentioned, I think the ability to hold yourself to account. And I think that certainly came through my early years where you have to push yourself, right? And I certainly value that within myself and that certainly helps me when I progressed and made it into professional rugby.

Darrell Amy (3:47)

Well, I'm curious, because obviously in our listeners, some listeners are all in on rugby and know exactly who you are. Other listeners go, rugby is maybe not their thing. But I got to say, we're talking to a legend of rugby in New Zealand. And I know that one of the things that you did, and this is where the vision and the accountability, I think, intersects, is you're a player on the team, but you're also a leader on the team in that. I know there was coaches and all of that, but I can tell that you played a really, you took leadership very seriously on the teams that you were a part of.