Dylan Hartley

Dylan Hartley won 97 caps for England, the most by any hooker, and as the England captain he had an incredible 85% win record. He led his country to two Six Nations titles – one of which was the first grand slam in 13 years – and a first away series win in Australia. Dylan also made 251 appearances for Northampton Saints and spent eight years as their skipper. His career was not without controversy, with the hooker racking up almost two years’ worth of bans for foul play.

TRANSCRIPT

Dylan Hartley

JAKE:   We are both highly intrigued today to be spending the next little while with our guest, the most capped England hooker who had an 85% winning record when captaining his country but who also had bans totalling almost two years of playing time, which I find a sort of an amazing mix.  I can't wait to get into that. What are you looking forward to getting out of this?

DAMIAN:         I think one of the key things of high-performance is emotional control, and I think our next guest has learnt that whilst on the job, and I think I’m really intrigued to get into some of the lessons that he applied.

JAKE:   Maybe we should start right there then.  Um, hello Dylan Hartley.

DYLAN: Certainly not an athlete.

JAKE:   What!

DYLAN: Well, you're a professor, you xxx be a professor.  I'll tell you why you're not getting in my head.

JAKE:   So Damian was saying that he’s looking forward to discussing the fact you’ve had to learn self-control on the job.  Is that a fair, is that a fair point?

DYLAN: I've learned some pretty, valuable lessons on the job, certainly.

JAKE:   But not self-control?

DYLAN: Well I've been in trouble - it's a bit like a cat.  But I got eight bans.  So I didn’t quite get nine.  But we could say retirement was my final life.  Um, and I never, I got in trouble obviously a lot. That is a lot. I racked up a lot of suspensions, um, but still managed to forge, um, a pretty long career in the game at what we would probably say that, well one of the highest levels, um, which I'm pretty proud of.  But never did the same thing twice. Did I learn my lessons? I'm not sure. I always seem to find myself getting in trouble, but not for the same thing.

JAKE:   So you learned not to do the same thing again, but you didn't learn not to get yourself in trouble again?  Oh, this is so interesting for me because when someone says to me ‘an elite athlete’, I think about someone taking responsibility for the manager, for the team, for themselves. And you did exactly that. You captained your country on numerous occasions. So you're able to take responsibility at the very highest level. But then at the same time, for whatever reason, you kept on sort of getting yourself into trouble. I'm just so interested about how you managed to do both or maybe why you think you did both.

DYLAN: I think um the captaincy stuff and that responsibility for England came at, you know, later in my career. I think I had one sort of blip in that time. And I always took my, my role really seriously. Um, I was really organised, um, kind of, I was really note, you know like notebook focused.  So I always wrote everything down in a day and age where phones and iPads all of a sudden are creeping up and meetings and you hear people typing away, tick, tick, tick, tick. It always pissed me off. I’ve always been kind of old school, write things down. I'd always prepare before meetings, I’d always take notes. And I took that really seriously and I learned that over a period of time, you know.  What I've always kind of done and still do now is I watch, and I evaluate people, how they sit, how they stand, how they deliver, you know, how do they opened?  And I always think, that's good or that's bad. How could I do it better than them?  Should I try that?  So I'm always trying to take something from wherever I go. And at 23 years old when I was kind of thrown into the deep end with the captaincy at Northampton and asked to kind of captain a group of men, uh, that young age, was quite daunting. But I looked at kind of senior professionals and I learned.

DAMIAN:         So what was the rationale to choose you?  At 23.

DYLAN: Uh, I was a regular player. Um, I was vocal.  I’d like to think I was never a glamorous player, but I was, I was committed and I kind of joke about it.  I think I forged the career for 15 years without an ounce of athletic ability, but through work ethic and mentality I managed to sustain a long career because I basically worked hard and I learned how to be a good professional.  And you know, it comes down to, you know, like game day we all see. But my hardest role with the captaincy, especially with England, was Sunday to Friday. That kind of every day was a game for me.  That was performing, uh, whatever you’re going to call it, acting, performing, turning up every day and making sure myself and the team were preparing well. So on Saturday we played well, and that kind of fell on my shoulders to do that. So I don't know what the rationale was. Maybe, maybe the person who chucked the captaincy to me saw a good work ethic and a good mindset.

DAMIAN:         Cause that sounds to me very much like a concept that I've written about is, I used the phrase a cultural architect in the team, somebody that sets the, sets the standards, sets the tones by their own behaviours.  So how did you cope with people that didn't live up to your work ethic, your, your willingness to go the extra mile?

DYLAN: I think in these high performance environments, whether it's Northampton or whether it was with England, ultimately it didn't fall with me. You know, we set the standards and if you've got the majority of the team with you, it's obvious who falls outside of that. That could be in reference to drinking culture, it could be reference to training standards, uh, dress standards, these sorts of things. You make yourself really obvious. So if you don't come along with the rest, you make yourself clear as day that you're, you're not in it. And ultimately in these things, if you stand out like a sore thumb for the wrong reasons, you don’t last.

JAKE:   So there wasn't a sort of a collective responsibility.  If the players are, you know taking a football story. I work a lot with Rio Ferdinand, and I remember saying to him when a new player came into the dressing room at Manchester United, what did Sir Alex Ferguson used to say to let that player know the standards that have been set?  And Rio went, he didn’t say anything.  That was up to us.  We let them know.  If they weren't running off the pitch at half time we let them know.  If they were celebrating a win he talks about signing a new player who celebrated winning, and they’d pin you up against the wall and said, what the f*** are you doing?  We don't celebrate wins in the Man United dressing room.  We celebrate titles.  And we said about trophies, don't come in here celebrating a victory because that's not how we operate.  And that was really interesting for me, cause as a non professional sports person, I've always assumed the manager takes that role. But the players are key to carrying out the manager’s desires, right?

DYLAN: Don’t know, rugby might be a bit different.

JAKE:   Is it?

DYLAN: But the team is the teams.  It's not the manager's team.  There’s on field stuff that is kind of shared and sometimes dictated by coaches.  But culturally I think the team runs itself. I think the best coaches are the ones that you, you feel. You walk in, sounds kind of almost cliché, but you see it and you smell it and you, you know when you, when you walk in that changing room or you go onto that training field, you know what's expected.  And if you've got anything about you, you look for the way that people conduct themselves and you think that's what's acceptable. And if someone's taken a liking to, they might give you a little nudge and say, you know, this is how we do it here or you shouldn't be doing that, you know.  Next time do this. Um, a coach is something that you see.

DAMIAN:         So when you've been part of a bad culture, then Dylan, how have you, what steps have you taken, especially as a senior leader to address that and tackle it?

DYLAN: Do you know what?  Bad coaches is probably a bit too far to take it, because I can think of examples in my early, England rugby days.  The culture, xxx what it was at the time. We still trained hard, we worked hard, we prepared hard for the time that we were in. But looking back, the alcohol culture surrounded that, you know, times have changed since then. At the time it was accepted. But looking back at it now, it wasn't right. And as a young kind of, you know, young England player coming through at 21, 22, my role models in the team, the bulk of the team were doing that.  And then Johnny Wilkinson was over there doing his thing. And I'm like, why didn't I just tap into that, and tap into his psyche?  And as I grew and I matured, I obviously got to a point where I looked back and I thought, f*** I should have spent more time with Johnny and tapped into that. But the bulk of the team, um, were shifted one direction and I went with that, cause I was young and I was gullible and, yeah.

DAMIAN:         So when you went into Northampton then, Dylan, the, I imagine the culture there isn't that dissimilar to what you've experienced with England and that setup.  And you've been appointed as a leader.  What kind of things were you doing then to bring more of that Wilkinson mindset that you said you wish you'd have identified early on?

DYLAN: I think you got to strike a balance between um, uh, international sport and club sport. I think international sport is really cutthroat and it is 110 miles an hour, you know, wherever I played for England it was for three weeks, or longest period might've been seven to eight weeks.  So it's in there, it's intense. It's mentally you’re on, physically you're on the whole time.  But you can't sustain that within a club environment week in week out.  So you've got to be able to not lower your expectations but change your expectations of what is acceptable and the high performance thing with with England rugby, if you're not coming to the party, you stick out like a sore thumb and you're gone and someone else is kind of chomping at the bit to come in and have a shot. Whereas at club footy you need to kind of educate people.  You’ve got 35 year olds and you've got 18 year olds straight out of school.  So you can't blame an 18 year old for not seeing and smelling things straight away.  You need to educate them on what it's like to prepare. Now I caught a kid on Snapchat before a game the other day. He goes, yeah, but I like to be relaxed before a game. I'm like, you don't even know what it’s like to prepare for a game, you don't even know what relaxed is. And when the 35 year old, two-time world cup, when it looks over at you and sees you on Snapchat, he doesn't think you're preparing well.

DAMIAN:         So when did you learn to do that, then? Cause at 23 you've been thrown into this and now you're describing calling out a young kid for not preparing thoroughly.  So when did that transition of being a leader, a vocal leader happen?

DYLAN: I think I've always said it how it is, and if people are talking about it over here, saying we saw this happening, I'm like what have you told him?  And a lot of people don't do that.  And I , well find the right time for a start.  And just say that's not right.

JAKE:   Yeah.

DYLAN: And just don't say it's wrong, but maybe question it.  Is it the right thing to be doing?

JAKE:   And did you want people to be out with you when you were playing? If someone had an issue, come speak to Dylan and argue about it.

DYLAN: A hundred percent, yeah.

JAKE:   And how did you deal with it?

DYLAN: You take it for what it is. And again, like you come across terms like performance conversations, so no-one’s feelings get hurt.  But you hear about things like that. And Eddie Jones taught me something.  You know when teams finish training and they huddle together and they debrief training, and you resolve things post-training in the huddle.  So tomorrow we'll work on that.  We’ll be better. It's too late by then. Traditionally we've always done it, but it's a shit tradition. You should always like review after training. But how come you're not reviewing during training? It's too late by the end of training, to wait till tomorrow to revisit it.  Like, call it as you see it.  If you're not getting what you want, tell the person. So performance goes up.

DAMIAN:         So when, these occasions we alluded to at the start where you'd been sent off or you'd been facing a long suspension, who told you then?  Who called you out on it?

DYLAN: Those, so all my incidents were kind of like blip moments. It's not like it was a negative downward spiral of that led to them.

JAKE:   Yeah.

DYLAN: I'd always trained hard in the week and prepared well.  And then if anything, probably got a little bit too much into it. Tried impacting the game in a good way. But there's is one the other day where I swung my arm and almost decapitated um, Sean O’Brien, which I apologised for.  And it looks ugly looking back at it, but I remember watching it, Northampton at the time was struggling, I was club captain, I'd been away at, I think it was the autumn internationals.  So that’s four games away. My club team that I'm captain of are struggling, big European fixture against xxx, you know.  We’re 20, 30 points down.  I'm on the bench and I'm thinking I'm responsible for this, this performance. So I’m like get me on and when I go gone, I want to make an impact. Let’s do something good, let's do something really physical. We're being really soft in the contact area.  Opportunity presents itself to smack someone, physically dominate someone.  Technique all wrong, and almost take his head off.  Red card within 30 seconds of being on the field.  And it’s like, that is not good.

DAMIAN:         And that sounds like there's a, there's an awful lot of contacts that you've explained about and that, but would you not have wanted one of your teammates to say that was a lack of discipline or that was a lack of control that you came on and you were too in disciplined to just raise the tempo without having to swing around like that?

DYLAN: Thing is, I was always pretty self aware. I knew I'd done something wrong. And then off the back of that, I've worked for probably eight weeks on tackle technique on my days off to go and work with England defence coaches.  So my life became hell off the back of that.  The realisation that it was a technique issue.  For me, the intent behind it was good. That's what made me the player I was, cause with zero athletic ability I had a good mindset and a good work ethic.

JAKE:   So what about the incidents where it wasn't bad technique, where it was …

DYLAN: So I bit someone's finger.

JAKE:   Loss of, so loss of control, right in that…?

DYLAN: No.

JAKE:   What was that then?

JAKE:   Wow!

DYLAN: I bit someone's finger.  He had his hand in my mouth and he's pulling my head and … I  xxx put my hand in your mouth and pulled it, you might bite down.  So I got banned for that, and I admitted that. I said, look, this has happened, but there's a hand in my mouth and it's pulling my head.  I didn't even mean to bite them but I’ve bitten.  I'm sorry. So that happens.

JAKE:   So is there ever an incident where you, where you think actually you did lose control?  Or of all of these ban actually…

DYLAN: Yeah, like, I’ve punched people, I’ve elbowed people.  Um, do you know if someone, I’ve worked with one guy.  I don't know if he's a professor.  Not justifying any of it, but this is understanding myself and being self aware, he explained to me that I might be like a caveman, and everything out there is like the jungle. So I act on instinct. So when someone grabs me from behind and I don't like it, I say get off. It's a threat. I deal with it. So maybe a hand in my mouth, I deal with it.  Um, can, can you?

DAMIAN:         Well there is around that.  There is around that when you're under attack, your primitive instincts come out and you either go freeze, flight or fight, and you're describing that fight response.  We will all perceive a threat in different ways, but our response is that some people might fake an injury for example in a game and look to get off the field when they've been considered like a big hit’s gone on them.  Some players will go in their shell and go freeze response or some will become wild and sometimes ill-disciplined or lash out.  But what intrigues me is that you described saying like a swinging arm that you described where you’d ended eight weeks of tackle techniques to improve it.  And, but the examples of where you've lost discipline like that by sticking your finger in somebody’s eye, or whatever it was…

DYLAN: That was reckless.

DAMIAN:         Right. So, so what was the …?

DYLAN: It was on James Haskell as well.

DAMIAN:         There's a certain justification then, you might argue.

DYLAN: He’s one of my best friends.  We forged a great relationship off the back of it.

DAMIAN:         Right. But what was the penance that you put yourself through there?  What was the learning that you then said that I want to do my equivalent of eight weeks tackle technique to improve next time I'm in that position?

DYLAN: Ah, so, so what I learnt is like you go through this, um, you kind of get the trial by social media thing and you get the like a shame, a guilt and anxiety kind of sickness.  Going to rugby court is like going to like high court. It's full of suits, there’s a whole lot of words you do not understand. It's not a comfortable place. So once I'd done that process a couple of times, and bearing in mind I got banned eight times, gearing up to go down to the Hilton at Heathrow was horrible experience, or you know the Holiday Inn at Coventry, like literally sent to Coventry, was, was not an enjoyable process. So as soon as you're cited, you know it's like, oh shit, not again. It's like a nervous sicky feeling, cause it's the unknown. And then when you come out it's like you've got eight weeks for this, you've got 10 weeks for this.  And that is the good, the good part. You can actually then put it behind you and look forward.

JAKE:   Your mindset goes to the positive immediately.  Even if it's an eight week ban.  Straight away, you're like right, done, let's go.

DYLAN: That was the best bit.  As soon as you get your, your time, it was like, right I can plan um.  I really enjoyed everyone saying, you'll never play for so-and-so again, you're not good enough. We don't want players like that playing. And I actually really enjoyed the narrative of coming back from it. So I always made like mental goals. I used to write certain things down. Um, it wasn't anything long winded. I will play for England again, write down a date, you know, six nations, 2000 and whatever it was, and I'll train towards it.

JAKE:   I always think one of the mistakes we make, in modern life particularly, is we love to deflect responsibility.  Oh, I can't do that because I xxx the victim, you know.  We revel now in victim culture. Do you think at any point you were a victim or have you had to put yourself in the mindset of, you take complete responsibility for anything that happened on the football field?

DYLAN: I’ve had to, and I understand that it kind of came with the territory. I almost made a rod for my own back and whatever happened happened whether I agreed with it or not. If anything it was one of those things I’ve kind of challenged myself to front up. So I've got so many friends that can't do, and it’s pathetic, but social media, like I was like f*** it, let’s xxx, let’s read it.  Let’s reply to a few people, it doesn't matter.  Uh, media, put your shoulders back, put your suit on, front up.  Um, 2013 when I got a red card in Northampton’s first ever grand final in the premiership.  You know, I thought I could get in a cab and go home or I can front up, go collect my medal, and let people say their thing.  But I always just thought, just front up and deal with it.  Cause if anything, these are all kind of small lessons in life that that sport teach you, and now I'm on the other side sport’s such a bubble, I look back at it, and go, it was all bullshit.

JAKE:   Yeah, yeah.

DYLAN: But at the time when it was my world, it was bloody difficult.  Playing in a rugby town like Northampton where we are the dominant sporting team, having to go to the supermarket after losing the town’s final was a difficult thing.  But I thought I've got to do it. I've got to deal with the old old boys and old girls who want to chuck the 2p at you.  And when I look back at it, it is nothing. But I felt that sort of shame and I carried it, but I didn't shy away from it, I thought I had to front up.  And even taking the England captaincy, it was like I had that whole record behind me.  And I basically knew for a good month every interview I’d do, and be like, do you trust your discipline to lead this team? And I kind of thought the build up to Six Nations was a fortnight of media. I'll just front up and I'll do it and I'll just roll out the same answer and I'll stick by it and then I'll just start playing and I'll play well and we'll win and that will deal with that.  And then we'll start talking about other things.

DAMIAN:         That leads into an interesting question, though.  Eddie Jones speaks around one of his great observations when he took off as England coach was that there was a lot of people being highly rewarded for delivering quite mediocre performances and results. So why do you think he chose you as his captain, when that's an observation of the culture that he's brought in?  What do you think the purpose of your selection was?

DYLAN: I think he wanted to change. Uh, and then when you look at your group, I think I ticked the box in the fact that for about seven years I captained my club.  So there's kind of a little bit of experience there and we'd had a successful period. So I think I ticked that captaincy box.  And then after talking to him, I think he saw the group was fractured. I think he saw me as a people's person. Um, again, not the most talented player, but I had something, a connection with everyone in the room. I worked really hard at knowing my players, having a little in-joke with everyone and just probably naturally being one of the older guys as well who’d been around.  The three of those things put together, maybe he saw me as that kind of foundation captain and we, we agreed to do it for the one tournament.  And then, um, the workload came my way and it was, it was some workload.  I’d never been mentored like that, but then Eddie starts firing stuff at me. Look at this guy, read this, listen to this, tell me what you think about these three things.  You know, feedback after meeting, next time you do that, and I'll, I, I loved it.  I absolutely loved it.  And that's why I speak so highly of him - the sort of time that he invested in me to develop me is, um, not only as a captain, but as a player… yeah, I’ll be forever grateful.

JAKE:   What do you think it is that Eddie did for you more than anything else?

DYLAN: Unlocked probably my personal potential, and after a really checkered career, that I basically finished my last three and a half years or four years with some really good memories.  And if I didn't have that I wouldn't be sat here.

JAKE:   And how did he do that? By basically developing me and it wasn't fun at the time.  It was ugly because high performance - that's what we're here to talk about - is ugly.  We see Saturdays as really fun, polished, you know, thing, a game or whatever it might be. But all the work that goes in behind the scenes is ugly, and it hurts, you know.  Every, every other player’s there just trying to be a good player.  And I was there trying to be a good captain, trying to be a, it's almost like a member of staff, kind of preparing the team, debriefing training with every different department. Everyone, you know, the organisation that went into running that team, like I said from Sunday to Friday cause cause performance was habitual, you know.  We had to train while Monday. Uh, we had while Tuesday.  We had to recover. Like we were training on Wednesday. It wasn't just pop down the spar anymore. It was like timed ice baths.  It was bang xxx.  And to start with staff were kind of managing there until the players took responsibility, and guess who the players was?  The players was me and a couple other senior players that had to get that message, that culture spread throughout the team.

JAKE:   So the people listening to this who don't operate in a sports world or rugby world, what would you say about creating an elite environment that Eddie Jones does so well that other people could apply to the world that they operate in?

DYLAN: It starts at the top. It starts with him. He is relentless. His work ethic is second to none. So when he's like that, it lets you just trickle down to the coaches, to myself, to the senior players, to the wider group.

DAMIAN:         And is there a regret for you that, I mean it sounds like the mentorship that he gave you, relatively late in your career, you were open to and you speak with real affection about how it developed you.  Do you wish you'd have been on the receiving end of that six or seven years earlier?  As a leader do you feel it could have helped you become even better to have achieved a higher performance?

DYLAN: If I had the ultimatum, he ultimately gave me an ultimatum saying you can finish now, you can play so many games for England, or he kind of said you can work really hard, you can develop physically as a player. You're not really going to change. And he said you can win some things towards the end of your career.  So he kind of unlocked my potential, and then within working with him and in two months with grand slam, the first time we've done that in I don't know how many years, 15 years.  So I was like, shit, this is good. You know, I want a bit of this. And then the team started, you know, day one he said, you're going to win the World Cup and you’re going to be number one in the world. And he got the team to number one in the world and ultimately just didn't win the World Cup.

DAMIAN:         To me, like it's intriguing when you speak because looking at your story of leaving New Zealand at 15 and coming over to England and doing that on your own, that seems pretty extraordinary.  So do you feel that you'd been very self driven up until that point and you'd always just learned on the job?

DYLAN: Yeah, it was, it was my decision to, to school exchange here and I ultimately stayed and never went home. I was always self-driven and do you know what, without justifying all the things that have happened in my career, and now my dad and mum are great parents, but they've never been involved in my career, you know.  I could probably count on my hand how many times they've watched me play live.  So I actually went through, you know, at 16 years old, at 17 I joined the Academy. I went in like squatted in like university halls at 17 I found my way for a couple of years in Worcester.  I signed myself to Northampton. I kind of did my early deals by myself, and then 15 years later I forged a career.  So everything that happened on the way, I never had like my parents involved.  They’d no idea about what money I earned.  I was just overseas playing rugby. So I reckon a lot of the, if we’re delving into why I've got in trouble, maybe I was just finding my own way and working it out myself.

DAMIAN:         But it does seem that you've had this independent streak that's run through you from that young age, and it's interesting the role of a mentor that Eddie obviously played in terms of taking you to another level.

DYLAN: Yeah. I mean I had mentors earlier in my career as well, but then more around probably creating like um, more of a family environment for me at 18, 19 when I didn't have that.  You know, I'm thinking about all the Christmases that, you know, my Academy counterparts would go home to families and I was just by myself and …

?H:       On Christmas day?

DYLAN: Yeah, I remember reading like, um, you know those things that you hear about like, oh, you got to train Christmas day because what's your opposition doing?  So I did all that sort of all that sort of crap. You know, you tag onto Christmases with people, and you'd make it work. But yeah, I just found my own way.

JAKE:   Is that the way you wanted it or was it just that the sort of parents that you had.  They were just letting you go off into the world…

DYLAN: Yeah, they let me do my thing.  But it's funny now. So we see all these young players now. Their dads are involved with contract negotiations. They want to know this.  They debrief their games, you know.  You don’t want that from my parents, and I never got it, which I'm thankful for.  But I'm just so happy when I look back at it. The ups and downs, the undulating kind of nature of my career has just taught me that you know, shit's going to happen. Good things happen, bad things happen.  xxx a moment. Enjoy the good ones when they happen.  The bad ones will happen. They won't last, you know, and that there'll be another moment just around the corner.

JAKE:   So even when you get a moment like being omitted from Stuart Lancaster’s World Cup squad for 2015, how do you deal with that? Do you go to anyone? Do you, do you internalise it and deal with it yourself?  Do you do what you did when you got the result of your bans and you immediately take a positive look at it? And go, right, you watch, I'll, I'll get my way back in?

DYLAN: That one was slightly different because there's a week I kind of thought I could train, I'd get back. Stuart would take me to the World Cup, but he didn’t.  But then at the time - silver linings - I had my first child. And, are you father?

JAKE:   Yeah.

DYLAN: Are you a father?

DAMIAN:         Yeah.

DYLAN: So, your first child, nothing else matters.

JAKE:   xxx play at World Cup.

DYLAN: No, er, I wasn’t, er I wasn’t bothered.  Yeah.

DAMIAN:         When you mentioned there about being a father, you've, you've had a pretty extraordinary upbringing yourself in terms of coming away at 15 and the things we've just discussed, plus you've had some powerful mentors that pushed you to another level.  For anyone that was listening to this podcast that is a parent that wants to take lessons that maybe they can apply to their own children, how are you going to do that?

DYLAN: It's difficult when it's your own children. If anything, I just want to provide a platform where my children can one, focus on school cause I never focused on school. But, secondly, provide the platform for my kids to play whatever sport they want and let them find their own way doing it.  Not force them to play a game that they don't want to play, but ultimately if they commit to something, they’re going to have to commit to it. They can't just go, oh it's raining, I don't want to go. It's boring. I don't like it. They'll have to see the season through and … And it's not really good advice for parents, but my daughter's only four, so we haven't really reached that...

DAMIAN:         Yeah, yeah, of course.

DYLAN: … that moment yet. So I'll probably need to ask you, what do you do? Because I'm, I'm a young parent, you know.

JAKE:   What about failure?  What's your take on failure in your kids? Because we all try and create a world where our kids don't fail because we don't want to see them fail.

DYLAN: Good. Right. I had this conversation with my wife the other day. I was like, so when you have kids you want them to have a really nice world. But I was thinking, cause I've, I talk about my career and why I think it's kind of forged me, who I am.  It’s cause I’d struggle, you know I didn't have money at a young age, you know when my Academy counterparts did. So I found a way to make money and I found a way to train harder to earn more and that's a… I was thinking my daughter, and I've got another one on the way. How do you create struggle for your kids without making them struggle? I don't know the answer to that.  But I totally agree with what you're saying. I think struggle and hardship, you know, forges the sports, the sportsman.

DAMIAN:         It’s very much around that growth mindset, isn’t it?  That kids that are told they’re talented will coast on their talent until they hit roadblocks, and their resistance to difficulties lowers.  Whereas kids that are told you work hard to be talented, when they’ve hit obstacles, do what you've done and they just work a bit harder.  They dig a bit deeper for it.

DYLAN: Yeah. And do you know what? I reckon rugby is a really good example of what you're talking about there. I'd say there's probably two or three kids in a rugby team that are like talented – out and out athletes, don't really need to watch diet, don't need to train that well.  They’re fast, they're strong, they're explosive, they’re skilful, they get away with it. I'd say the majority of rugby players are probably more of what you're talking about, that growth mindset about working harder than their opposite.  Because they're not talented or athletically gifted they work harder. And I would say the majority of rugby players are that guy, which is hard to understand because when you watch at the weekend you're like, these guys are amazing. Yet everyone playing international, or club rugby you think, amazing athletes.  But there's a reason why …

JAKE:   Yeah

DYLAN: … they look that way in the way that they execute what they do, because they work incredibly hard.

JAKE:   The average member of the public, and I would include myself and Damian in this by the way, cause we haven't done what you've done xxx xxx, they say things like, um, Wayne Rooney is a bit lazy, isn’t he?  Do you know what I mean? Those members of the public could never get to where he has to get to in the gym.  Ninety nine percent of people don't, don't see the struggle.  And maybe that's how it should be. Why should they see your struggle?  They should just see the joy on a Saturday, you know, winning a game.  But it is a frustration of mine that people don't see the hard xxx that go into success. I don't know how we, I don't know how we change that mindset for people.

DYLAN: I love this. I went to watch Aston Villa the other day. I don't watch much football but I got invited to the Holte End at Villa, and I stood in there.  I had to stand as well.  We had a seat, I could have sat in it, but you don't have to sit in the Holte End. You got to stand.  So I was standing there and I was kind of mumbling away to the songs.  And there's people screaming at the players and I was like, oh these dick heads.  Like I was still thinking like the guy on the field. I'm like, you just do not understand. Even like, running 20 metres and then sprinting back, what that guy has just gone through.  The psyche that that player has got to do that. But it wasn't quite good enough cause he's up against another guy that's doing it just the same. And I think what you just said about Wayne Rooney, it's the Monday in rugby, Monday to, or Sunday to Friday work that no one sees.  The mental attrition to get up on a Monday morning when you've got to walk sideways or almost crawl out of your bed, downstairs, get to training, do things that hurt, stretch, mobilise, ice bath, get yourself up for a day's training, and get out on the field and go and do it.  It's like that mental capacity to do it.  And if it was easy, people wouldn't be standing in the Holte End, they’d be on the field playing.

DAMIAN:         This is something that, um, I, I've spoken to athletes around this, and they call it the Dunning-Kruger Law, named after a couple of economists.  So it reasons that if you're smart at something, you're smart enough to know why you're good at it.  But on the flip side, if you're stupid, you're too stupid to know just how stupid you are.  So what I'm saying is when somebody sends you a social media post that said, I could have played better than you, that was the Dunning-Kruger Law, because they're too stupid to realise the sacrifice that the Sunday to Friday cycle.  So they just see the end result and assume that I could do better than that.

DYLAN: A hundred percent.  But then you get the old fan that thinks the other xxx.  You think, that guy, you're onto it.  You’re switched on, you empathise with me, you, you know.

DAMIAN:         Sure. But then when you speak to athletes, this is where the stuff around mentorship fascinates me.  Because when you speak to athletes and say, who were the five people that when they, when they speak to you and say, Dylan, that wasn't good enough, that you really would switch on and listen to?  And a lot of athletes I speak to might say their parents.  It might be a partner, it might be a coach, or it might be a team mate that they respect. Who would you say the five people that when they give you feedback, you do sit up and pay attention?

DYLAN: Any coach. So it's probably more than five, but someone always said to me, be coachable.  Being a good professional is be coachable. So nod your head, say yeah, work it out in your own head whether what they’re saying is good or, and how you can interpret that to your game. I think that's being open to feedback and criticism. That's what rugby's taught me. Um, to have direct conversations and be open.  Names?  Eddie Jones.  You know, he'd call it straight, you know, that's not good enough or that wasn't good enough. And then that afternoon you'd go and train well then straight away afterwards, well run today.  So no grudges held, it was just direct. It is what it is. And you appreciate that as a player. No kind of beating around the bush. Um, my parents never told me they were disappointed, so my parents had nothing to do with my rugby really.  They were just a support network.

JAKE:   How did they provide support for you if they weren't involved in sort of your day to day life?

DYLAN: By being just that, just being able to call them.

JAKE:   Cause a lot of people would think, why don’t my parents give a shit about my life? You know, I need some support here. I need you to have an opinion. It's, it's interesting that your, the support you needed was then not knowing about what was going on. It's interesting.

DYLAN: No, I just, I enjoyed them for what they were.  They were just my parents and didn’t… they offered..

JAKE:   But you still felt loved, and you…?

DYLAN: Yeah, hundred percent, you know.  I’m not… didn’t hurt me.  My parents don’t love me. That's why I've done everything I've done.  If it was anything it is the opposite.  They're great parents.  Later in life, um, your wife, so my girlfriend now is my wife. It’s funny how your support network and … you, you, everyone talks about their “why”, why they play the game, what motivates them.  You're obviously familiar with that.  When you're young, I was just on like this snowball that was, it was exciting, I wanted to be a professional rugby player.  I wanted to play on TV.  I wanted to play at big stadiums.  And then the byproduct of that, you want to have a nicer house, you want to move out of your Academy digs and get your own house.  I wanted to stop riding the muddy Fox with a shit flat tyre, and get a car.  You know, these sorts of things. So my reasons when I was younger to play were obvious. And then financial, you know, all that sort of comes into it. And then when you're 33, you're like, you know what, why do I enjoy playing? Why do I enjoy being in pain every day? And I'm not a special case. I think it's everyone that plays rugby, especially, lives in pain.  But it's just normal.  So you just get on with it. But my reason, my motivation was my wife, my daughter, um, it became financial, uh, it became almost like a legacy type thing. My daughter got to an age where she, she understood what I was doing and playing for England and playing for Northampton was great. So you, my reasons changed and you asked me the five people. So my coaches, Eddie Jones in particular, any coach, my parents always really level headed and probably my wife towards the end of it.  Because when you transition into retirement, that is where that support network becomes, you know, your coaches aren't there anymore. You’re left with your parents and my wife and my kids.  Cause you strip out the coaches, the rugby side of it, it's like, what have you got?

JAKE:   You’re setting out as a retired rugby player. Do you feel like your career is over?  Do you feel like a sort of a civilian as you described it, or do you still feel like a rugby player  in your head?

DYLAN: No, I feel like a civilian.  This is a good thing. This is what um, this is what the bans, the injuries, the non-selection has kind of taught me is that you don't matter.  That the game's going to carry on with or without you. The big machine keeps moving, and you're just a part of it, a small cog in that when you get your opportunity.  So all those sort of setbacks made me think that rugby will not define me because it hasn't just been like that, hasn’t been a smooth kind of ride for me.  It's been Rocky. So, um, I think all those setbacks kind of almost prepared me for retirement.  So when it happened, it was just another challenge, just like coming back from a ban.  I’m gonna sit down, make a plan about where I want to go next.  So if anything, the small lessons with all the disciplinaries kind of prepared me for civilian life.

DAMIAN:         Where will you go next, Dylan? What’s the, like, do you think you'll still be involved in rugby?

DYLAN: I do enjoy talking about what we're talking about now. And like I said, later in my career, I've tapped more into the growth mindset side of things and um, the mentoring side of things. I still work with, um, a couple of the guys just on throwing technique and mindset.  Now at Northampton I enjoy that.  But I'm undecided about what will be next. I need time to just re‑evaluate and I'm not saying no to rugby or coaching or something within rugby long term. Just immediately, I just need a bit of a cut ties.

JAKE:   We've got a few quick five questions. Do you want to use your phone at this point or are you just happy to crack…

DYLAN: I reckon I've got it.

DAMIAN:         So if I kick off then, Dylan.  What would you say are the three non negotiable behaviours that you and the people around you must buy into?

DYLAN: I'm not saying I'm a professional or a pro on this.  It's what works for me.

DAMIAN:         Sure.

DYLAN: I make that very clear to our listeners. The first thing is surround yourself with people that think that way.  Because you cannot be… I couldn't have been high performance if the environment's not high performance. And to get there, use people to help you be a high performer.  Cause that's what they're good at, you know.  I was good at, or kind of good at playing rugby, but you know the guy who's done so many years at university to understand strength and conditioning, use that guy.  And it wasn't till I was 31, 32, 33 I realised that.

JAKE:   What advice would you give to a teenage Dylan who was just starting his career?

DYLAN: Nothing.  I wouldn’t tell him anything.  So maybe that's a sign of what sort of dad I'm going to be. Work it out yourself. Cause the, it's the struggles, it's the, all the, the little things that kind of form you as a person. Um, obviously be there as a shoulder or an ear and guide when the question is asked maybe and try and guide them. But like with my coaching at the moment I work with a couple of hookers. I see things that they're doing that means they're not going to throw the ball well.  And I don't tell them what it is that I'm saying.  Are you thinking about what you're doing? Tell me what you're thinking. So kind of coach themselves to try and guide them. So I don't know what I'd say to a 16 year old Dylan.

DAMIAN:         So next question then.  How did you react to your greatest failure?

DYLAN: I mean, it depends what you perceive failure.

JAKE:   What do you perceive…

DYLAN: They are all good things.

JAKE:   Do you think failure’s good?

DYLAN: Yeah, hundred percent.  It's again, it’s struggle. It's, and it's easy to say now I've been through it, but I think failure is ultimately a good thing, as long as you don't let it define you.

DAMIAN:         So how important is legacy to you then?

DYLAN: Uh, it was.  I wanted to win the World Cup.  And my little girl and my son to be like, your dad did that. But ultimately when they're old enough to Google me, they'll probably just find out all the bad shit I did.  But rugby, I never wanted to define me, but for whatever reason, I've done it for the last 16, 17 years. So yeah, it has defined me. It is, it is my life to this point.  So I need to basically, you know, my legacy will be what sort of father I am to my kids and husband, and husband, and just in case Mrs Hartley’s listening.

JAKE:   And finally, the one golden rule that you have to live a high performance life?  The one thing that you put above all other things.

DYLAN: I think your anchor point. So people call it their why or their motivation. Um, I think you always need that anchor point on what's gonna get you out of bed. What is gonna make you do the extra work, what is gonna make you eat this certain thing? What is going to make you deal with the criticism? And if you read the media, the narrative in the media, what's going to make you see above that and keep you pushing forward? And I told you about my kind of reasons, my, my motivations, my whys, you know, early on, didn't really have one.  It that was pretty selfish.  It was just me, me, me.  And then towards the end of my career, it was for my family that kind of kept me pushing because when I talked about sacrifice, I never really sacrificed going, right. It was, it was a choice for me to go away and to work and go away into this environment that was, you know, mental attrition and physical kind of work that you went through was a hard place to go, a hard place to, to go and leave your family behind. But I thought if I go and do that and always reference back to why I hurt and why I'm tired and why I'm working from six in the morning to 10 at night, it's so I can leave a legacy for my kids and financially provide for my family. And then kind of selfishly, I wanted to basically make the most of an opportunity for myself,

JAKE:   Really interesting to sit and sort of break it all down. Cause I guess when you're in it, you just plough on through your career.  It just kind of happens and suddenly you get to your mid thirties and you've got a knee injury and you're reflecting.  So thanks for doing that with us.  Really appreciate…

DYLAN: Off to the glue factory, mate.  That's what happens.  It’s the cycle.

JAKE:   For us all.  Thanks a lot.