Adam Kreek

12 years, 2 million practice strokes, 7,200 practices sessions, 13,000 hours on the water.

Olympic training statistics are remarkable. I know. I lived it. However, when discussing Olympic results, one measure of success and failure is often overlooked:

How many workers died in preventable safety incidents to create a successful Olympic experience? For me, it was 24.

Ten workers died preparing the Beijing Olympic facilities where I competed and won in 2008.

Fourteen workers died to produce the Athens Olympics where I competed just four years earlier.

These workplace fatality numbers break my heart, and many more life-changing injuries hide behind each fatality number.

But there is hope. The London Olympics pursued safety with an overt Olympic mindset and delivered the best safety performance on record for a summer games. Not one worker died due to workplace neglect. Now, that’s an Olympic record to strive for!

At the Beijing Olympic Games, my team’s goal was to gain one inch over our competition with every stroke. We won Olympic Gold by just over one second—or 220 inches. That’s one inch for every stroke.

The inches add up.

The same is true in business, entrepreneurship, career and life: quick fixes do not drive excellence.

Too often, we race for quick fix solutions, clinging to claims of easy success: “If only we could fail faster, schedule smarter or work harder”. We maintain unsuccessful strategies at all costs to evade slowing down, re-strategizing and regaining our focus.

The truth is, it takes focus and consistency to establish effective habits. We achieve peak performance when we prioritize the inches: powerful habits, strategies and tools that drive results.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result. It’s time to take time. Step back and implement the inches that will create and sustain peak performance.

An incredible power is released when we work effectively together. When teams function optimally, they can be excellent tools to ensure resiliency, manage risk, and maximize achievement in times of change. When the whirlwind takes over, busyness gains priority and stress levels run high. In a fast-paced environment, we often let communication and team dynamics suffer, and the costs are significant.

Strong team culture is essential to sustain success. How can we foster authentic and lasting team culture? Reunite your team under a higher goal. Embolden the professionals on your teams to lead from within. Adam combines inspiring stories with an interactive presentation to share the concept of Shared Leadership with teams across sectors.

It’s time to hit the refresh button. Empower your team to navigate current and future uncertainty with confidence. Participants will gain my best practices for managing change, and the tools that are necessary for consistent self-improvement.

What are values? What makes the practice of values identification so powerful? Can values create the foundation of an engaged workforce – and team culture that eats strategy for breakfast? How is the alignment of values and action essential to individual and organizational success?

We operate in an increasingly competitive, globally diverse economy. When our organization’s values are unclear and unlived, performance and productivity are sacrificed. It takes more than a fear of being fired or financial incentives to motivate employees. Without common, identified and actively embraced values, an organization will struggle to thrive.

In his interactive keynote, Adam brings the power of values to life, evoking professional passion and more fulfilling success. Adam teaches audiences to unearth their personal and professional values, and how to align them directly with action to be more engaged, productive, focused and ultimately effective.

As a society, we’ve been oversold the quick fixes. Be the boss now. Lose weight in one week. Get rich tomorrow. We want to believe there’s a secret cheat code, a hack, or a hidden short-cut. When the quick and easy routes fail, we often blame others: it’s the CEO’s fault, our partner’s fault, the client’s fault, the sales team’s fault, the operation team’s fault or even our parent’s fault. The list goes on.

In his engaging, thought-provoking and behaviour changing keynote, Adam shares his principle of The Responsibility Ethic, and teaches the practice of Self-Leadership. That is, we each can achieve any desired outcome (personal, professional and team) when we recognize our role in the current state of affairs. We must align our vision, plan and behaviour with our goals.

This keynote challenges and heals those who have been told to follow their dreams…but not given the fine print: will require hard work and consistent action.

Attendees are challenged to find the courage to tell themselves the truth, point the finger inward, and hold personal accountability for their vision, values, goals and actions.

Dreams transform into results with vision, planning and action. We alone create our direction and circumstance through our daily focus, choices and actions.