Blog post 31 Innovate

INSIGHT 24 | PREPARATION MATTERS

Some will go to any lengths.

Others nowhere near far enough.

How far are you really prepared to go?

Would you go fishing to win a Formula 1 race?

in²⁴ | Preparation Matters

Grab a parachute... Jump!

The importance of preparation really hit home to me when I had the good fortune to witness Frank Stephenson in full flow as guest speaker at the Design Innovation in Plastics Student Design Awards.

The longest standing award of its type and one in which I was a finalist many years ago; longer than I care to mention. But these days, I’m proud to be associated as an organising committee member, alongside a fantastic, eclectic group of peers.

Franks career has spanned brands such as Ferrari, Maserati, and McLaren, yet is renowned for his approach to the redesign of the iconic Mini.

To achieve a believable transformation, he imagined how it would naturally evolve throughout the eras of influence it transcended. As such the original mini of micro proportions morphed into a compact yet distinctly Mini design under the badge of BMW.

Lesser known is the extent to which mother nature influences his work, indeed you might consider him to be the Darwinian of car design. Notably Frank shared an anecdote about his first week working at McLaren, which illustrates the extent to which he was prepared to go in order to succeed.

Taking a break before he joined his new employment, Frank was fishing in exotic waters and recalled his fascination with the speed and grace of the Sailfish, the fastest living creature in the ocean. This stunning specimen can accelerate from stillness to full burst within a split second, faster than a formula one car over its body length. You can see why Frank was captivated. So much so that he shipped a specimen back at great cost to his new employer.

Once back at Mclaren HQ the Sailfish was subject to aerodynamic analytics within the confines of a wind tunnel. This seemingly bizarre request unearthed how mother nature had evolved the intricate geometry of the Sailfish scales for pure speed. Armed with this data, Frank led his team to develop carbon fibre body work that replicated this technology, evolved by evolution, to extract an advantage on the track.

Now Frank never designed drag racers so there was never any need for a parachute. But let’s not fool ourselves, there are occasions when you might need one.

Take Douglas Bader for example, bailing out of his spitfire over occupied territory with only one of his prosthetic legs in tow. (I’m not being funny, but I just love the purity of the Spitfire and would probably have gone down with it, in a mad moment of Top Gear attachment to engineering perfection).

Now if you’re tandem skydiving someone has got your back. Literally strapped to it. But flying solo as Douglas did, braving the mission with at best a wingman, then pack that chute and pack it well. Realising your ambition depends on it.

Preparation is not about doing the obvious. True preparation means going deeper than others would. The most successful innovators do homework that seems irrational to others drawing inspiration from parallel sources.

Preparation is the quiet work that lets you jump with conviction, the invisible work that makes the visible outcome look effortless.

Because when the moment finally arrives, all the preparation in the world is meaningless unless you act. And that’s where we’re heading next.