Belonging: The Ancient Code of Togetherness: The International No. 1 Bestseller

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Extrinsic motivation weakens a team: while extrinsic motivation can help motivate individuals (usually in the short term) with things like money and status, this emphasis on the individual weakens the team. The team needs to have a strong sense of collective intrinsic motivation: a shared story and set of goals that everyone is striving to reach. That diversity is a massive strength, he says. “In that when the English people look at the team, they are seeing an expression of the diversification of the country. And you’re seeing them as people who respect and care about each other, they celebrate each other’s success, they are joyous being one. Gareth has spoken about that, this is somewhere for English people to look at what our identity as a country looks like and feel proud about it.” Eastwood believes responsibility for culture must sit at the top of sporting organisations. He argues that boards should be setting the “cultural blueprint” for their sporting environments, not leaving it up to the whims of the latest head coach. A copy of Eastwood's new book, Belonging, was given to every England player when they reported for duty at the European Championships' - Telegraph

Connecting to the future requires asking what the team’s vision is - what they are working towards and what the environment needs to enable and drive towards.It is a phrase I remember Southgate using during his first World Cup campaign as England manager in 2018, confusing journalists who had asked him what success looked like, expecting him to respond with a World Cup finishing position. Eastwood reframes what ambition and success in sport should be. The most important question every leader must answer: What is the optimal environment for this group to perform to their best? The answer always contains a component of belonging. The challenge. To create an environment where everyone feels like they belong, regardless of who they are and what they believe. Social Anthropologist, Harvey Whitehouse, says that sharing difficulties or pain can create ‘identify fusion’, and have two tangible benefits for the group. Firstly, the group creates more intense togetherness through the sharing or a mistake or a difficult moment; secondly, reflecting on the painful moments often creates practical lessons for the future. Finally, a huge thanks to my sponsors, Puresport. Their range of CBD and Nootropics supplements have had a significant impact on how I sleep, manage stress, and focus throughout the day. I can’t recommend them enough.

We leak energy and focus by obsessing over the unsafe environment and relations around us and the pressure builds. And then you pass it on, along with the stories, the values, the rituals and tradition, to those who come after you– and that’s something we dive into in this conversation. Owen's work and outlook really resonate with me. His philosophy has real depth and value. [It's] so of the moment - at just the right time, at just the right place, with just the right message' - Simon Mundie Gareth Southgate’s England Football Team– https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/jul/09/whakapapa-maori-belief-helping-england-find-team-spiritCulture never stands still. Every day it shifts. How we deal with new stations redefines who we really are and how we really do things. When new people come into the environment and others leave, the dynamic changes. One of the great risks in sustaining a strong culture is where there is a transition between leaders. He has recently been asked to work more and more within education, for obvious reasons: as recent research and reports have revealed, more and more pupils and their families - and indeed teachers - feel like they don’t belong in schools. That’s causing huge issues with the attendance and behaviour of pupils, the engagement of parents and the retention and recruitment of staff. Exclusive webinar for schools One of the wisest books about winning you'll ever read...Powerful lessons beautifully expressed.' - James Kerr But the England of Sterling and Kane, of Saka and Maguire is a very different one to Ottoway’s, surely? They are not trying to replicate anything from the past, Eastwood says. “We should be proud of our history, understand and respect it, but ultimately this is about us, a very diverse, young, technically different group of people. It’s about inspiration and a sense of belonging to motivate us to create our own story.” Aspects of Owen's unique approach finding your identity story; defining a shared purpose; visioning future success; sharing ownership with others; understanding the 'silent dance' that plays out in groups; setting the conditions to unleash talent; and converting our diversity into a competitive advantage.

But it’s also important that ritual and traditions have a presence beyond the induction of new members to keep everyone connected and maintain their collective sense of identity. These may include a ritual to commence a new campaign, closure on certain events or chapters, and rites of passage events such as milestones and, importantly, beloved members transitioning out of the team. Aspects of Owen's unique approach include: finding your identity story; defining a shared purpose; visioning future success; sharing ownership with others; understanding the 'silent dance' that plays out in groups; setting the conditions to unleash talent; and converting our diversity into a competitive advantage. Our need to belong, I think this is something that’s critically important, is that for all of our history I would say, including now, if you are alone, you won’t survive. Your health will be seriously compromised for most of our history that would have been fatal. And so that need to belong. That survival instinct that we all have, that was part of a band of people and the band had a leader. So the leader’s fundamental job was to take care of people. That was a fundamental job. That’s why our groups of humans existed. So when we think of it like that, why is that not obvious to us today? Why do we feel that we can go and pursuit of outcomes and sacrifice people and damage people along the way? It makes no sense to me. How he thinks about true leadership Neither do we exist merely to execute plans or strategies or KPI’s disconnected from an Us story. That is soulless.Unafraid to speak of spirituality (“it might freak your readers out”), he describes creating a great team as a spiritual challenge. “If you look at the definition of spirituality that is it: it is individuals connected to a higher purpose than their own and emotional communion between people.” For Eastwood, that crosses a red line. “I’d hope that people would see Gareth Southgate and Luke Donald and people like that and go: ‘I’d like myself or someone I care about to be in that environment. I think it would be a healthy place for them.”’ Youth suicide is a huge concern in Aotearoa and the world in general. If this book’s concept of belonging and the marvellous metaphor it uses to convey whakapapa could be taught to all children, surely fewer of our rangatahi (precious young) would question their place, their value, their purpose on Earth. And more people would understand their obligation to be 'good ancestors'. A copy of Eastwood's new book, Belonging , was given to every England player when they reported for duty at the European Championships' - Telegraph