Swimmers vs. Waterwalkers

#19 - 01.24.21

Brother -

I am sharing a memo created by an executive at P&G many years ago. He sent this to his employees around year-end performance reviews to help them understand what separated the good from the great. Or, in his words - the swimmers vs. the waterwalkers.

A former boss shared this with my team in my first year in corporate post-university. To this day - it has remained one of my favorites, and I re-read it every six months during our bi-annual review cycles. As I've progressed up the chains of middle-management, I've created a habit of sharing it with my employees as well.

 I find that when my best employees read this, they are humbled by it. They will recognize where they excel, but more importantly - how far we all have to go to operate like a waterwalker. Once in a while, you get an employee who thinks they are exceptional in all six areas. These are the classic ones who lack self-awareness, with an ego far greater than their contributions. 

It's a longer read - but worth it. Without further ado:

Subject: "Swimmers" vs. "Waterwalkers"

Having observed a vast array of different corporate training courses, there is a not-so-surprising consistency from our younger participants during the Q+A sessions. They ask, "What is important to succeed in business?" and "how do I become top rated?". This makes sense. All P&Gers are assertive, ambitious, and inquisitive, and this is a very logical line of questioning to ask of more senior leaders. 

As I have listened to many answers to these questions, one could note that the initial questioner is often not wholly satisfied with the answer. Sometimes it is because the response is more conceptual and less actionable, along the lines of, "Be a courageous leader," "Have social intelligence," and "Know your consumer." I would agree that these are important for success, but it is sometimes hard for younger people to visualize how to behave differently the next day. 

The second issue is that everyone at P&G is suberbly talented, and the question isn't about success and failure. The problem is how to thrive in an environment where everyone is superbly talented, and in reality, become the "best of the best." 

This is where the concept of "Swimmers" vs. "Waterwalkers" comes into play. I'd argue everyone at P&G is so talented that we all can "swim" pretty well. But only a few ever get to the performance level of being labeled as a "waterwalker"—the kind of person you LOVE having on your team, and if you ever leave to start your own business - you want them to come and be a partner with you! Now, I think what people want to know is, "What separates the swimmers from the waterwalkers?"  

In trying to answer this question- I've focused on behaviors vs. attributes. I went through the cases in my past when I had "waterwalkers" working for me and what it was about them that made them earn this elite designation. I came up with six behaviors that waterwalkers consistently do, vs. swimmers. 

1. When confronted with a severe business crisis - Waterwalkers focus all energy on how they will overcome the crisis and still deliver. Swimmers will often focus instead on doing a superb job of "selling" a lower base.

Waterwalkers see commitments as something one simply does not break—ever. They don't give up, and they don't accept missing. They will come to you with issues—but also with a plan to make up the gaps. Swimmers view commitments as a bit more malleable, and when the crisis hits, their first course of action is first to figure out how to explain it. They invest lots of time refining the slick argumentation that allows them to "go down" yet still retain the appearance of being a waterwalker. It is a classical case of "substance vs. style." Swimmers focus on the style of preserving standing despite the real delivery of the business dropping. Waterwalkers go for the substance of simply putting the plans in place to deliver the targets. 

2. Waterwalkers consistently focus on self-improvement and asking themselves, "How do I get better every day?" Swimmers focus more on self-promotion and ask themselves, "How do I sell myself and get myself positioned to get the promotion I deserve?"

Waterwalkers have noticed the real truth—everyone is talented, and the difference over time comes down to who keeps growing every day. They realize any career is a "long race" like a 26-mile marathon, and it is those who plan for the full 26 miles who win, not necessarily who is ahead at mile 5. They believe that by improving and delivering, they will "get what they deserve" over time. On the other hand, Swimmers have been led to believe that advancement is all about lots of secondary factors—skill in self-promotion, the degree to which you "sell yourself," who you know. They thus come off looking political—no matter how "good" they think they are at disguising it, and they miss the importance of continual improvement. And along the way, the waterwalkers, who may have even been behind them, pass them by. 

3. Waterwalkers make any assignment a great assignment; swimmers think success or failure is based upon having a "good assignment." 

Every time I have seen someone complain about the assignment and how it did not allow them to "showcase their skills," I have come to learn over time, these folks were not even remotely waterwalkers—they were swimmers at best. Waterwalkers find the ways, are creative and innovative, to take even the tough assignments and make them great. They see the potential in the business and the people where others see only doom and gloom. And they see the futility of standing around complaining and wasting energy on the specific assignment. While the swimmers complain about it, expend energy worrying about it, and convince themselves of the "lost cause" in a form of self-fulfilling prophecy, the waterwalker is off transforming the assignment into something special. A job is what one makes of it. 

4. Waterwalkers always approach a topic from the standpoint of "how crisp and clear can I make it?" Swimmers tend to measure success by how long, how many charts, and how many numbers they can put on one page. They erroneously equate quality with quantity.

Waterwalkers are great to work with. They take pride in having such clear thinking and well-defined plans to meet for only 5 or 10 minutes; they can present their ideas in 1 or 2 slides. You never find yourself frustrated at the slow pace of things, and they keep it moving along and don't waste your time! Swimmers miss the power of clarity and simplicity and thus measure success by quantity. They give you business reviews that look more like books than incisive analyses; they have no qualms to book your schedule for always a minimum of 2 or 3 hours or even half-days. Even for simple ideas, it takes 30 or 40 slides to get the point across. They simply miss the big picture and get mired in small talk. 

5. Waterwalkers recognize the power of developing people as THE way to achieving their business goals; Swimmers tend to prefer to "go it alone" and consistently believe they alone must be the major driver.

One often sees swimmers as "one-person shows." They work incredibly hard, and they have huge personal productivity. But they never seem to be able to get teams and people below them "thriving." They are too focused on getting "their" work done. Waterwalkers, on the other hand, know the key is getting others up to their pace, so they invest as much time, if not more, into training and development as they do anything else. They know that having 2 or 3 people, on top of themselves, cranking the projects at top quality is far better than one person alone. Whenever confronted with a choice, they ALWAYS go for training first. 

6. Finally, waterwalkers tend to be thinking, "How do I change the game?" while swimmers work on, "How do I grow the business?"

Waterwalkers realize that changing the game to our favor is the essence of great strategy, and they spend their time defining out-of-the-box ideas and plans that always involve an element of risk. They know that breakthroughs only come via game-changing approaches. Swimmers are far more incremental. They tend to look at "just growth" vs. breakthrough and never go outside the box of current business approaches. They tend to "play it safe" and stay within the boundaries of what has been "done before." 

I hope this is provocative and a bit helpful. Please share with your teams as you see appropriate. Of course, this is one man's view, and I would not expect everyone to agree. But if it challenges your thinking in a new way, it served its purpose! As always, happy to talk and debate any of this as you see fit.  

-J.M. Lafferty 

Personally feel that I excel at #4, fail at #5, and need to get better at #6. I check in frequently with this framework during each review cycle.

Let me leave you with a quote and a question.

"We judge ourselves by our intentions and others by their behavior." 

-Stephen M.R. Covey

Where are you a Waterwalker? Where are you a Swimmer?

Enjoy the dance,

Nate