Compass No.38
Break everything, developing strong ground, and the difference between rigidity and discipline
Thought Provoking Strategy
In her new book, Strong Ground, researcher and author, Brene Brown, shares an excerpt from F1 Atlassian Racing Team principal James Vowles’ interview on the High Performance Podcast.
In 2023, Vowels inherited a team that was consistently finishing at the bottom of the pack. Think last or next to last. It was a far cry from the organization’s glory days in the 1980s and 90s when the team won 9 team championships and 7 individual driver champions. Fast forward to the current 2025 season - Williams is fifth in the team standings, yet Vowels says he isn’t satisfied. He’s building with the intent to have Williams win it all again.
Here’s Vowels comments in the aforementioned interview on the strategy he’s communicated to his team to propel the transformation:
“I don’t care about ‘23, I don’t care about ‘24, and I really don’t care about ‘25. Sounds strange, doesn’t it? But that’s not what of interest to me…. ‘23 and ‘24 we can finish last. Break everything. This is an opportunity you’ll never in your lifetime. Break everything.
You have carte blanche from me. You have a free pass. If we can do it better, let’s do it better. Let’s talk about it. Don’t carry on with the same way we’ve been doing it for twenty years. And we’'ll go backwards as a result of that. Break everything. Learn and use the experience…
Try something you haven’t tried before. Doesn’t matter if it’s a setup direction, it’s a driving style, it’s how we do data, it’s building performance engineers, it’s how we use the factory. Learn on those weekends…You'll never get this opportunity again. Break everything.”
Podcast Insights
Recently Adam Grant interviewed Brene Brown on her Dare to Lead podcast to talk about the findings from her latest book.
Explaining the metaphor behind the book’s theme and title: Strong Ground
In the world of athletics and physical fitness, the lack of a strong core can cause serious injury because other muscles can become impaired in the process of overcompensating for a weak core. Likewise, leaders run into trouble and can get hurt if they don’t have a strong organizational core and mental ground to stand on.
On why she’s a strong proponent of coaching to support the development of a leader’s strong ground:
“Leaders are the only people in the world where high performance is expected and a coach is not normative.”
Grant shares his favorite quote from the book:
“The false dichotomy persists that leaders can either invest in training and coaching specifically developed to increase performance, revenue, and growth or they can invest in culture initiatives and coaching that result in more courageous, connected and collaborative human beings. if this feels like your ROI dilemma, I suggest you back away slowly from the quarter zip consultant with the 200 page slide deck. Fully alive and connected human beings are unstoppable.”
Grant asked Brown how she thinks about straddling the tension between adopting a set of routines to ensure you have strong ground and also being able to break routines so you don’t get trapped in the past:
She said, “The near enemy of discipline is rigidity. Rigidity masquerades as discipline. When discipline fails to deliver agility and the capacity to reflect and change, it is no longer discipline.”
“Rigidity is trying to control the environment in order to protect yourself.”
Question to contemplate
Where in your life is rigidity masquerading as discipline?