Teaching Three Mistake Routines

By: Colleen M. Hacker

Originally Published in: Achieving Excellence

Provided by: Human Kinetics

Flush It

The idea with this routine is that it is important to flush a mistake or error. A toilet is flushed immediately after use, and whenever that action is required, no one dwells on the contents of the flush or revisits the contents with multiple teammates or friends and family members. We too should flush mistakes - learn from them and move one. Stop thinking about them throughout the day or ruminating over them with friends. That moment is done and over. Flush it.

• When the mistake occurs, determine what the relevant lesson is, make the adjustment in your mind, and then flush it.
• Some NFL and MLB teams have kept small, nonworking toilets on their sidelines and in their dugouts to visually remind everyone to flush their mistakes.
• Youth sport teams have created a flush it signal to hold each other accountable and, when an error is committed, they pretend they are flushing a toilet to signify that mistake or error is over and the next play is right now.

Fudge, Fix, Focus

This is a technique that Dr. Hacker implemented with the national team.

• When a mistake happens, you say to yourself "fudge" or whatever fudge-like word resonates with you!
• The immediate follow-up step is to fix it. Remind yourself not of the error, but of the correction (e.g., head down, lock the ankle, follow through to target, take a breath, stay balanced).
• Once you have fixed the error, then you focus. Focus on the next play, the shoelaces, the racket, the strings, the ball. Wherever your attention should be, whatever the next responsibility is, that is where you should direct your focus.

Park It

This is another technique that Dr. Hacker implemented with the USWNT

• Imagine you are driving to the mall or your favorite place to shop. The purpose of going to the mall is to shop, not to park your car. You might take a picture of your parking place so you remember where it is when you are ready to head home.
• When you start walking into the shopping mall, you don't keep checking on your car. You don't walk a few feet, turn around, and check to see if the car is still there. You don't keep revisiting where it is. The point of the trip is to go shopping, so you park your car, you know where it is, and you will come back to it when it is time.
• Do the same with mistakes. You don't want to forget about a mistake; you want to "park it," because what is important is this moment, this game, this responsibility. Park it. Play the game. Per-form. Then go back and analyze the mistake.
• Analysis could also quickly happen during a dead ball, during a timeout, at halftime, between presenters, at the end of a meeting, in the dugout between innings, or in other moments that allow space to reflect and analyze what happened and what could be done differently.