Wayne Gretzky

Prepare for what’s next

Don’t settle for just being great today, prepare to be awesome tomorrow. When the next opportunity arrives make sure your name is on it.

Describe the future. No one can get the future 100% right, and the truth is you don’t have to be perfect here. Those who give it their best effort will be closer than those that just let the future happen to them. Do the research, talk to the experts, look for commonality between the past and the possible outcomes and describe the future in simple ways. Do this and you’ll find that you will be close enough when the future comes to make any needed last minute adjustments.

“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.” – Wayne Gretzky

Design the plan. Now it’s time to understand what it will it take for you to be where the future is going. I use these three questions in developing my plans: What do I need to know? Who do I need to know? What am I going to do first? The answers to these questions guides the decisions you will make about how to invest your time. Of all the options, which ones prepare you best for the future you have described?

“You have to rely on your preparation and put yourself in a position to succeed.” –  Steve Nash

Deliver the win. Being prepared removes the doubt, worry and stress of the future. When you’re prepared, you are looking for the future so that you can implement all that you have prepared for. You will succeed because you prepared to succeed.

“I will prepare and someday my chance will come.” – Abraham Lincoln

The one way to team success

team success - common visionThere are three common ways used to achieve team success, only one works over the long-term:

Do what the leader says is right, do what you think is right, and do what the team agrees is right.

“In the end, team success only comes when working towards a common vision.”- Denis G. McLaughlin 

 

 

Do what the leader says is right, follow the rules. Which leads to this….

  • – Short term activities that have no long-term vision attached
  • – Waiting for direction
  • – No sense of belonging to anything bigger than the activities
  • This may lead to short-term success, but over the long haul it falls short. Rules from the top can never cover every decision that must be made in every circumstance.
  • Mike Krzyzewski, the first coach in NCAA Division I basketball history to record 1,000 victories said, “The truth is that many people set rules to keep from making decisions.”­
  • Do what you think is right, make up the rules. Which leads to this…
  • – Short term activities that have no team-centered vision attached
  • – Searching for direction
  • – No sense of belonging to anything bigger than yourself
  • Even if every person has the best of intentions, they come from a limited perspective. Each individual can have a unique view of success for the team and will head in their own direction to pursue that success.
  • Hockey great Wayne Gretzky said, “Hockey is a unique sport in the sense that you need each and every guy helping each other and pulling in the same direction to be successful.”
  • Do what the team agrees is right, agree on the rules. Which leads to this…
  • – Short term activities that lead to achieving the long-term, team-centered vision
  • – Having a direction
  • – Belonging to a group who together achieve success
  • Vince Lombardi, one of the most successful NFL coaches and namesake of the Super Bowl trophy said, “Individual commitment to a group effort – that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work.”
  • In the end, Team Success only comes when working towards a common vision.
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