I entertain in this post three paradoxes from sports that extend to all aspects of our lives. Humans tend to carry their habits and patterns anywhere and anytime. What sportspersons do in the field they do everywhere.
The Paradox of Scoring
You most likely watched games such as soccer in which an attacker failed to score an easy chance but yet scored from almost an impossible angle or position. Why do we miss up on easy opportunities is the question.
I recall my own experience. The examiner put five questions for students to solve four only. However, a student who wished to get an A had to solve the last and most difficult question. The questions were ordered from simple to most difficult.
I managed to solve the last question and yet answered wrongly the simplest one.
Do we become faulty when we see things are so easy that we become neglectful?
What do you think?
Sportspersons Who Show the Least Sportsmanship
Sportsmanship calls for certain and respectable behaviors. However, I am sure most of us have seen acts by sportspersons that are from the spirit of sport. Impeding a player or even pushing him down, players fighting and players refusing substitution and when they do they act horribly when leaving the pitch are typical examples.
This behavior we see in other aspects of our lives. Employees who leave a company may start abusing their previous company and try to pollute its reputation.
I recall this story. In an interview, the candidate replied to a question on the reasons for leaving his previous the candidate job and criticized his previous company bitterly. He cursed the management and the culture prevailing there. The interviewer asked him how long he worked for that company. The candidate replied by saying almost eight years.
Do you want to tell me that you worked for such an awful company that long?
The interview terminated and the candidate lost the job.
The Losing to Winning Paradox
I recall a match between Liverpool F.C. and Barcelona F.C. in which Barcelona won by a high score to nil at home. Liverpool had very slim chances of winning the return game. They did and scored the winning goal in the dying seconds of the game.
This turning losing to winning happens frequently. My analysis is that as the players get less time they try harder. This is besides being the underdogs they have the challenge to prove their quality.
This paradox again extends to other aspects of our lives. We say give people as much time as they need and I add, in even slightly less time than they need. This makes people try harder and succeed and restore their prestige.
For more on this paradox, you may enjoy watching this relevant video
Paradoxes in life as in sports have great lessons to teach us.
I have no doubt, as a practicing athlete, to understand and share the contents and reflections of this brilliant (as always) article. In fact, sport teaches values such as respect, collaboration, orientation to results, competition, sacrifice, discipline and perseverance, integration and belonging and also arouses emotions in those who practice it. Obviously we all know that sport alone is not enough but it certainly constitutes an important factor in contributing to improving the behavior and growth of young people, helping them to control their character, respect the commitment made and be more responsible and better able to structure their time.
This results in many “skills” and attitudes necessary to face personal and professional life. There are many points in common between sport, and its values, and the activity of those who have to lead a company and those who have to build and make work groups work.
Whether we are talking about sports coaches or business managers, the magic word is leadership. The task of the leader is to maximize collective performance, so that it is greater than the mere sum of individual performances.
Aldo Delli Paoli Deeply grateful to your outstanding comment that deserves my celebration.
You summed up the values and practices of sports and what sports teach us to carry over to all other activities.
“Whether we are talking about sports coaches or business managers, the magic word is leadership.”
The first question that springs into my mind whay don;t we call business leaders as business coaches?
If we accept this suggestion the relevance of the two becomes as clear as you explained in your comment.
Tell me how good a sportsman you are I can tell you how good business leader you shall be.
Brother Ali,
Winning and losing and paradoxes is an appealing inquiry. I do struggle with sports analogies.
I follow no spectator sports and while I played a little American football in middle school, I don’t have much team sports experience. The only sports I have engaged in are all individual, running, skiing, backpacking and my mindset is only competitive vs. my wn previous performance.
Having said that, I still have observed your paradoxes.
“That’ll be easy” – I learned that if I heard myself say this at work It was a disas2ter waiting to happen. Often this was in the context of taking on another project when I was already at capacity, or taking on a project for unreasonably low money and/or short time beacuse I thought I had seen the problem before. Things immediately fell apart. “That’ll be easy” was my Murphy’s Law trigger -everything that could go wrong did and at the worst possible moment. Nothing is ever easy -and thinking it is means you lose focus.
Sportsmanship and the lack of it:
Clearly -it’s how you play the game that counts -hyper competitive behavior on the field and in the office can float over the line to cheating and othe dispicable behavior.
The rubber band effect has followed me for much of my career. My challenge is procrastination not just from a reluctance to start, but as much because I love the adrenaline rush of last minute heroics.
Certainly the losing team plays harder and better if the score is close and if they don’t and loose a squeaker then they play harder next game. When I miscalculate my last minute heroics capacity and fail, the next time I plan more and start earlier.
Thanks for this engaging analogy.
Alan Culler Brother and man of wisdom from nowhere
Thank you for relating the post to your personal experiences and sharing your vulnerability. This means you are strong.
When there is will there is hope and when there is hope people are more willing to do more.
I used to be like you- a last minute pressure and produce more. However, I change more than thirty years ago. I give myself less time than needed so as not to procrastinate but enough time to work under “green stress”.
The rubber band effect- I a, thinking about it. If work is my beloved women and she takes a step backwards then the right thing to do is that I take a step backwards only. What happens in the spaces between us requires careful monitoring.
How did you deal with this effect?