Sports and business have much in common. Both rely on efficient leadership, teamwork, and accountability. Resilience, bonding and the ability to learn from failures are also commonalities they share. Thus any company looking to make itself more efficient should inculcate a culture of sports amongst its employees. It doesn’t matter if they excel in sports or not. It’s what they learn while playing sports that will enhance and better the company. Here are the top 5 ways that sports make a company better!
1. Leadership: Sports teaches the ideal values a leader must have. Leadership in sports is determined by an individual’s ability to command a team and execute decisions favorable to the team as a whole. The greatest and best sports captains are not the best players on their team, rather they are the best players to manage the personalities and traits of the other players on their team. These skills can be applied to a business scenario with ease.
2. Accountability: In sports, shifting the blame is not only difficult, it is also looked down upon. The team is the family and you cannot let your family down when it needs you the most. There is sadly a lot of blame-gaming in corporate cultures today. If company employees play sports together, they learn to rise above the pettiness of shifting the blame and start to look upon themselves as a unit. Thus, though a team loses a game, it is the captain and the coach who take the responsibility for it
3. Failure, the best teacher In sports (as in business), you cannot win all the matches you play, no matter how good you are This is a great tool as failing in sports gets one accustomed to understanding failure and not just getting abjectly dejected by it Companies who let their employees play sports will find that instead of getting nervous, scared or belligerent at the news of a loss, they will try and learn from it and understand how not to let the same situation repeat itself.
4. Teamwork: All companies rely on teamwork. No company gets successful on the back of one great employee and neither do they fail because of one employee. Bonding between people who work together is important especially considering how easy it is for people who share the same workspace to become competitive with each other. The best way to ensure that people bond is to have them play together.
5. Resilience: Winning is hard work! It is very easy to get dejected by early rejections and just give up. That is not an option when playing sports. No matter how bad someone messed up, they still have to be there for their team and give it their best. That accustoms people to make mistakes, and then learning from them (they can handle criticism) and moving on Soon, they are hardened veterans who take all temporary setbacks in stride because they realize that the ultimate aim is a victory.
It is noted that ex-sportspersons make very effective employees in companies. This is not an aberration, nor is this data limited to a particular country, race, gender or any other such demographics. May it be played or watched or even just talked about by the employees of a company, there is no doubt that sports can unite people. Don’t be surprised if employees who become close just by watching CNN tennis in the office end up to be the best tandem in your company. In sports as in business, what matters is not giving up and slowly moving towards the finish line.
