Why You Should Present Multiple Options To Clients - Separated By Risk And Reward

How Great Britain went from 36th to 2nd in the Olympic medal tables and why you should consider presenting options to clients rated by risk and pain involved.

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How A Painful Strategy Drove Great Britain From 36th To 2nd In The Olympic Medal Table

Great strategies always looks obvious in hindsight

At the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, Great Britain finished in 36th place in the Olympic Medal table (just behind North Korea, Algeria, and Ethiopia) with 1 gold medal, 8 silver, and 6 bronze. Since then, performance improved at every subsequent Olympic games from 2000 to 2016.

At the 2016 Olympics, Great Britain ranked second with 27 gold medals, 23 silver, and 17 bronze. That’s a stunning turnaround.

The strategy of UK Sport to achieve this feat was brutal but effective.

First, spending increased four-fold from £37m to £227m (controlling for inflation). All things being equal, the UK should have performed four times-better. But spending surged in most other countries too.

Second, they stopped spreading resources equally amongst all sports. Instead, they selected sports wher…