Performance Under Pressure

In some cases this sense of connection is so complete – and the self-consciousness so absent – that the barriers between the individual and the environment seem to disappear, and performers say they feel completely at one with their setting.

Some activities are so dangerous – doing BASE jumps, surfing huge waves or free-climbing vicious rock faces – that they demand full attention to the external world. Any major internal diversion risks serious accident or tragedy. During these activities, extreme athletes need to be completely in the zone.

The zone isn’t something that we can simply think our way into, but we can certainly think our way out of it. If we’re completely absorbed by our environment and responding intuitively, then thinking is the last thing we should be doing.

Most athletes can recall one or two times when they were in that perfect zone. But most of us don’t perform in a situation where we need to focus so completely on the external world, or in dangerous physical environments where our physiological state is heightened, or else! Is the zone – that perfect sense of connection – even a reasonable target? If the zone makes things seem effortless, then making an effort to get there feels like the wrong thing to do.

Perfection – aiming for the zone – can be a trap. Instead, let’s return to the simple idea of trying to connect with our external world and removing our focus from our internal world. Let’s put more emphasis on the process of how to get where we want to go, and less on how we feel about where we are at the moment. Let’s regard being in the zone as something we may, or may not, achieve.

Being in the zone – physically and mentally – is an outcome. The process we use to get there is to control our attention. We set our external target, lock on to it and maintain our focus of attention, with full acceptance of our internal world. If we become diverted by internal discomfort, we just notice it then return to the task at hand.

When it comes to dealing with turning overthinking into connecting, acceptance beats resistance. Being deliberate about our external focus and allowing the discomfort to subside kick-starts our BLUE mind and allows us to find our RED–BLUE balance and get moving smoothly. And occasionally, very good things can happen.

Cast your mind back to the best 10 minutes of your best performance. How did you get into that state of mind? Was there anything deliberate you did other than focus intently on the task in front of you? Or did it just come out of the blue?

Yes, that’s right. It did indeed just come out of the BLUE.

Split Attention vs Dual Focus

Split attention

‘Pay attention!’

Growing up, how many times did we hear that from parents, teachers, coaches and others?! The reason why we heard it so often is that it’s great advice! It cuts right to the heart of performance under pressure, because the prime issue is our control of attention.

But as sound as it is, this advice is so familiar that it washes over us. We hear it all the time and so we stop hearing it. How ironic that the single best piece of advice we can receive for performing under pressure – ‘Pay attention!’ – doesn’t get our attention!

All those adults saw what was going wrong inside our head: we had lost our focus. We needed to learn how to deliberately pay attention to what we were doing, to hold it there despite potential diversions, and to shift it to a new focus when needed.

It sounds so straightforward because these are everyday mental processes that we take for granted. Surely something so basic and commonplace cannot be so important for performance?

It’s not only important, it is core to performing under pressure. In most demanding situations this most fundamental mental ability of all – how well we pay attention – has the largest influence on the outcome. If we don’t get that part right we are definitely going to struggle.

The emphasis on attention is important because it is arguably our greatest limitation. Our capacity to pay attention seems very big but it is, in fact, very small.

Remember that under pressure, the rules change, and the capacity of our working memory plummets. When the task in front of us is demanding, we can really only focus on one thing at a time. For conscious, demanding tasks, multitasking is a myth. No problem to talk on our phone while shopping at the supermarket: two easy, almost automatic tasks. But even then, mistakes can occur – we accidentally pick up the wrong item, we miss things that were on our list. Now add some pressure – a screaming child, time pressure to get to an urgent appointment – and the errors flood in. At the brain level, RED has disrupted BLUE and our once-clear mental screen has shrunk down and clouded over.

When we take on a demanding task but our attention is split, we go downhill fast. Doing two tricky things at a time – such as playing the piano while reciting verse – makes our performance deteriorate not just a bit, but dramatically. The fall-off is more a cliff than a gentle slope. I often tell athletes that when their attention is divided, they are half the player.

The magical question to ask ourselves when reviewing our performance under pressure is: ‘What were we paying attention to in that moment?’ Paying attention in performance situations is our most powerful – but vulnerable – mental tool, and so understanding what disrupts it is a revealing starting point. One of the most common attention traps is the negative content loop: a self-defeating, circular pattern of thinking and feeling. Instead of focusing fully on the task in front of us, we find our attention diverted towards potential or past negative outcomes, such as losing, making a mistake, or missing a deadline. We see threat in the situation, our negative perception of the threat sparks an emotional response, and our emotions lead to unhelpful behaviours. Those behaviours reinforce our negative perception, starting the loop off again, causing a self-reinforcing, downward spiral.

Remember Tony? He’s running late for another important meeting; this time he’s due to present an important pitch to senior colleagues. In his mind he can already imagine the looks of judgment as he walks in late. He’s angry with himself for miscalculating how long it would take to get ready, and at the same time he’s worried about the potential fallout for his pitch. He feels anxious and tense, his thoughts are racing and he can’t concentrate. Despite a late night rehearsing, his mind is suddenly foggy about his presentation and he feels himself starting to freeze. That alarming realisation only reinforces his negative self-judgment, and the negative content loop is set up.

Initially Tony had a positive picture in his head about how the situation would ideally work out. But the threat within the situation – his lateness and the negative attitude it will spark – has changed his perception. What he wanted and what he is likely to get are now at odds with each other. His fantasy and the reality clash, creating an internal conflict.

It’s almost as if he has one mind trying to do its best to prepare for his performance, and another mind that’s much more concerned about how he’ll be judged. He’s caught in two minds.

Instead of focusing on his presentation, he finds his attention stuck on exactly the outcomes he didn’t want. Sure, some of his attention still seems to be carrying him along, so that it’s not as if he’s completely stopped functioning. But a good chunk of his attention is now caught up in the negative spiral. He’s drowning in a flood of pessimistic thoughts and uncomfortable feelings, and is fast losing focus and effectiveness.

And it all seems to feed into the loop and strengthen it, so Tony finds it more and more difficult to get back on task. The loop becomes a downward spiral: the deeper he goes, the harder it is to climb out.

The reason why a negative content loop is so damaging for our focus is that it takes us out of the current moment. It diverts our attention from the present into the past (a mistake or missed opportunity) or the future (negative outcomes and the criticism and judgment that will result). Our mental horsepower is cut in half right when we need it most.

This looping into the past or future also gets our mind and body out of sync. Our body can only exist in the here and now, but when we are trapped in a negative content loop our thoughts are fixated on the past or future and drag us there mentally. This mind–body split takes its toll on how we think, feel and act.

One classic negative loop is the ‘poor me’ loop. Something goes wrong in our environment. We start to feel sorry for ourselves, seeing ourselves as the victim of circumstance. Life is unfair; we don’t deserve this. This swirl of feelings and thoughts makes us uptight, frustrated, angry. We get stuck on the injustice, feeling more and more self-righteous. And the situation just keeps compounding itself.

In a nutshell, we’re sulking. This kind of behaviour is meant to be restricted to children, but adults can turn it into an art form. Sulking involves both passive and aggressive elements: we withdraw and go silent, but make sure that everyone knows we are far from happy! We’re moody and resentful, and our sullen, brief replies, when we give them, are intended to annoy others.

Many of us demonstrate this behaviour. A lot.

From the performance point of view, sulking is a very unhelpful mental state to adopt. It leads to a lack of action and movement. Not only that, but the sulker also deliberately affects those around them. Because they feel like they are being punished, they punish others back.

Some people really know how to hold grudges. They are so adept at sulking that they can remain in that state not just for minutes or hours, but days, weeks, months, even years on end.

Next time you’re watching a sporting event, follow the competitors’ eyes. When an unfortunate incident occurs, they often look downwards, which can show they’re stuck in a ‘poor me’ loop, turning their attention inward. Or they may look upwards, questioning whatever higher power they deem responsible for the injustice. The origins of this type of ‘poor me’ behaviour lie in the attachment behaviour we looked at earlier. When the parent is well attuned to their child’s distress, they can provide comfort through non-judgmental facial contact and a soothing voice, but when the relationship is unpredictable or unresponsive, the child will come to associate their discomfort with a lack of eye contact. Later in life, when the same individual faces disappointment and discomfort the same pattern will emerge. The ‘poor me’ loop, and other negative content loops, are a deadly attention trap for performance. This kind of mental state doesn’t matter that much if we’re just going about our everyday tasks. But when we’re in a more demanding situation, it can become our sworn enemy. It sucks away treasured attention that we could be using to extract maximum information from our environment, solve problems or overcome obstacles.

Think about our golfer from earlier, feeling anxious as he takes the final shot in his first big championship. He might be focusing on where he wants the ball to go, but because his RED mind has taken over, part of his attention is also diverted to the water trap and where he doesn’t want the ball to land. He starts to worry about the water trap and a negative content loop is triggered. Out of nowhere, some self-defeating self-talk – ‘I’m going to miss the shot … I’m going to lose the championship!’ – and negative feelings – shame, frustration – seem to burst onto the scene.

His mind now contains images of two ‘targets’: the one he wants to hit and the one he doesn’t. And because he’s trying to perform while he’s split in two by doubt, his shot inevitably falls somewhere in the middle.

Cast your mind back to a recent performance moment when you lost mental focus. What diverted your attention in that moment? Did you get trapped in a negative content loop and partially fixated on what you didn’t want to happen? It was as if part of you was doing everything it could to defeat you in that moment.

You were caught in two minds.

Dual focus

For a head chef in a reputable restaurant, which is more important: having a laser-like focus on the food, or keeping an eye on her team, the supply chain, the wait staff, the table service and a long list of other factors? Narrow focus on food, or broad focus on the general restaurant situation?

The answer is that both are necessary. The head chef cannot afford to take her eye off the overall situation, and she most definitely cannot let substandard food pass. Both the overview and the specific detail are required. One without the other would be a recipe for disaster.

Our actions should always take place within the big picture of what we are trying to achieve, which requires attention to context. At the same time, we need a narrow focus on the specific task we’re engaged in, which requires attention to detail.

While the RED mind can process many things unconsciously at the same time, the BLUE mind is linear, allowing us to concentrate on only one thing at a time. The head chef is intuitively aware of both the wider situation and specific tasks through her RED mind, but still consciously focuses on each in turn. It seems simple, but it works.

A dual focus requires a tight, constant feedback loop between the overview and the specific task, with each informing the other. At any one time, our dominant focus will be on either one. The key is to move back and forth between the two, rather than splitting attention between them.

Here’s a puzzle: dual focus and split attention both imply that our attention has to be in two places at once. So why does dual focus feed performance, while split attention starves it?

Let’s use an example to paint a picture of the differences.

Leo has just dropped a simple catch and gifted the opposition the upper hand in the closing stages of an important match. In the minute or so that follows, his mind goes back and replays the memory of his fumble and the moans of the watching crowd over and over. At the same time, he’s constantly looking at the clock and seeing the final seconds of the game tick by, and his mind keeps flashing forward to the devastation of his teammates in the dressing room after the game finishes. His attention is split between the present, past and future. His RED mind becomes hyperactive and he loses the capacity to think clearly. Mentally pulled in different directions, he becomes stuck – a deer in the headlights, frozen to the spot.

Now, imagine Leo is able to use dual focus to keep his focus in the present moment. He glances at the scoreboard and sees that he has two minutes left. He has the overview.

He then focuses on the immediate task, which is to help get the ball back in a coordinated team effort. The team have practised two-minute scenarios many times in training to prepare for this type of situation. He has the specifics.

He goes into dual focus – moving flexibly back and forth between the situational overview and his specific tasks – as the end of the game unfolds. There is a vague feeling of discomfort at the back of his mind that seems to be calling out, but he just accepts it and focuses his attention on communicating with his teammates. It’s time to hold his nerve, find his move and nail any opportunity to emerge, while maintaining a good RED–BLUE balance. In the final two minutes, Leo sets up teammates in good attacking positions three times. Although his team fall just short, afterwards Leo’s coach praises his ability to rebound from his disappointment and remain focused and engaged in the game.

Split attention divides attention in time and place; the different parts interfere with each other, and they all seem to occur simultaneously. Dual focus keeps the connection in the present moment.

Dual focus also trumps split attention because of the type of information being processed. When our attention is split, the diversion is inevitably about the negative meaning of a situation. Problems become jumbled up with solutions. When we have dual focus, we’re tightly focused on the process of completing our task (detail) while constantly reading shifts in our environment (overview). It’s about looking ahead without disconnecting from the moment.

I find that many people assume they already routinely use this two-level control of attention without any significant interference, when in reality they habitually fall into attention traps that lead them to think too much or too little.

Some fall for one-level attention, becoming preoccupied with either the overview or the detail, but not both. Having a single focus is simplistic: we will either miss shifts in the wider context and react slowly, or miss crucial detail in the specific task we’re working on.

Others add a third element to the dual focus and let themselves be diverted by a negative loop. Having a triple focus is too complex when it involves a RED mist that interferes with BLUE clarity.

Yet experts across countless fields have the capacity to switch their attention between perspective (the overview) and precision (the detail) when the heat is on. Skilful control of attention – avoiding negative content loops and maintaining their dual focus – is what separates them from the rest.

The lead violinist in an orchestra doesn’t just look at the music (detail) but also focuses much of the time on remaining in sync with the conductor and setting the rhythm for the whole orchestra (overview). This is so important that the second violinist turns the pages for their more senior colleague.

For flight crews, losing focus on the overview (called situational awareness) can and does lead to tragedies. Dual focus isn’t a desirable add-on, it’s a sharp-edged performance essential. It’s vital for flight crews to execute tasks accurately but it’s also vital for them to remain alert to changes in their environment.

It’s common for surgeons to face complications within an operation, or timing issues requiring careful rearrangement of their surgical list. Experienced surgeons have told me that as their decision-making abilities have developed in these areas, so has their execution. They make fewer errors when they make better decisions. If we are constantly updating our overview and continuously adjusting the specifics of the task we’re doing, we are in a good place.

Dual focus is nothing more than an ordinary, everyday mental process – paying attention – but maintaining this focus under an extraordinary set of circumstances is another matter again. High performers do not have different mental apparatus when it comes to paying attention. Everyone can check the overview and focus on the task, in ordinary circumstances. Whether you’re a surgeon, teacher, taxi driver or graphic artist, the trick is not letting your focus fall away into split attention when the pressure is on.

Under pressure, do you tend to get diverted into the RED and halve your mental efficiency, or do you do double time into the BLUE and accelerate with undivided attention?

Which are you more skilled at: the situational overview or the task detail? Would other people who know you well say that, under pressure, you are both aware and accurate?

Going APE vs Deciding to ACT

APE

Under pressure we all fail in predictable ways.

We’ve looked at how the same emergency reactions seen in animals – fight, flight or freeze – are triggered in modern-day performance situations, although usually more by social threats than physical danger. To help us translate them from the animal kingdom to our world of performance, let’s modernise the behaviours by renaming them.

Rather than fight, think aggressive. Under pressure, people raise their voices, threaten, bully, confront, insult, reject and exclude.

Rather than flight, think escape. Under pressure, people remove themselves from the fray by being late or not turning up, taking sick leave, resigning, or getting sent off the sports field.

And rather than freeze, think passive. People who can’t get out of a situation may not go completely immobile, but they go quiet and look down when volunteers are requested, always letting others go first and staying a step behind, just generally going through the motions.

For my money, the passive reaction is the invisible killer of performance. People can hide in plain sight by being present and operating at a minimum standard, doing just enough to avoid drawing attention to themselves as not contributing. It’s a silent epidemic that can completely undermine a team dynamic.

Many team-sport athletes know this type of player: the one who is on the field but never really gets their hands dirty, and always seems to be one step off the pace. Large organisations are often full of people who say the right things but whose actions lack impact.

Sometimes the passive state can be misread as being relaxed: a basic but common error in the sports world. Unless we are an animal playing dead and hoping to escape, it is a poor performance state.

These three styles of behaviour, aggressive, passive and escape – APE – are the three most unhelpful reactions we have under pressure. They all arise from RED, high-arousal reactions; even the passive reaction, involving low arousal, follows an initial high-arousal spike. The APE acronym reminds us that we share these responses with most members of the animal kingdom – and they are most definitely within us all.

In our early years, we all develop a personal pattern that means one of these three becomes our default reaction to extreme pressure. Or it might be a combination of two, or all three. Passive–aggressive behaviour is a classic example.

Recognising our personal defensive behaviour style and how it hurts our performance will show us what traps to avoid in the future. If we take this step, we are already in a stronger position to perform under pressure.

What APE pattern do you default to when you fall apart under pressure – A, P, E, or a deadly combination?

ACT

Under pressure we all succeed in predictable ways.

Peter is a foreman leading an expensive new house build that is just three weeks out from the date when the owners expect to move in. His team is facing pressure on several fronts. The architect has identified a large area of plastering that will need to be redone. One of Peter’s senior builders has had an accident onsite, which has triggered a health and safety investigation and left Peter short-handed. Plus, Peter’s usual subcontracting electrician isn’t available because of a family bereavement, and the replacement is not fitting in well with his team. On top of that, there’s been an extended spell of poor weather.

It would be very easy for Peter to fall into APE behaviours that block progress instead of moving his team forward. The pathway ahead, though, is clear.

First, he needs to stay aware of his internal reactions, to limit any APE behaviours. It won’t help for him to go deep RED right now!

Second, he needs to be clear about the proper process for the health and safety investigation, the repair timeline for the plasterers, and his expectations of the replacement electrician.