It Couldn't be Done!

by Edgar Allen Guest


Somebody said that

It couldn't be done,

But he with a chuckle replied,

It may be that it couldn't,

But he would be one

Who wouldn't

Say so till he tried.


So he buckled right in

With a trace of a grin

On his face

If he worried

He hid it.

He started to sing

As he tackled the thing

That couldn't be done

And HE DID IT!


Somebody scoffed,

Nah . . you'll never do that.

Hurmp. . . at least no one

Has ever done it.

But he took off his coat

And the first thing we knew

He'd begun it.


With a lift of his chin

And a bit of a grin

Without any doubting

Or quit it.

He started to sing

As he tackled the thing

That couldn't be done

And HE DID IT!


There are thousands to

Tell you

It cannot be done.

There are thousands to

Prophecy failure.

There are thousands

To point out

One by one

The dangers that wait

To assail you.


But just buckle right in

With a bit of a grin.

Just take off your coat

And go to it.

Just start to sing

As you tackle the thing

That can't be done

And YOU'LL DO IT

Are you prepared to rise to the occasion?

HOW TO TURN NOTHING INTO SOMETHING
Have you ever wondered how to turn nothing into something?
by Jim Rohn
First, in order to turn nothing into something, you've got to start with some ideas and imagination. Now, it might be hard to call ideas and imagination nothing; but how tangible are those ideas? That is a bit of a mystery. I don't believe that ideas that can be turned into a hotel, ideas that can be turned into an enterprise, ideas that can be turned into a new vaccine or ideas that can be turned into some miracle product, should be called nothing. But tangibly, you have nothing. Interesting! Think of it, ideas that become so powerful in your mind and in your consciousness that they seem real to you even before they become tangible. Imagination that is so strong, you can actually see it.
When I built my first home for my family in Idaho all those years ago, before I started construction, I would take my friends and associates out to the vacant property and give them a tour of the house. Is that possible? Is it possible to take someone on a tour through an imaginary house? And the answer is, "Yes, of course." "Here is the 3 car garage," I used to say, and my friends would look and say, "Yes, this garage will hold 3 cars." I could really make it "live." I would take them on a tour throughout the house..."Here is the fireplace, and look, this side is brick and the other side is stone." I could make it so real..."Follow me through the rest of the house. Take a look through the picture window here in the kitchen, isn't the view great?" One day, I made the house so real that one of my friends bumped his elbow on the fireplace. I mean, it was that real.
So, the first step of turning nothing into something is to imagine the possibilities. Imagine ALL of the possibilities. One of the reasons for seminars, sermons, lyrics from songs and testimonials of others is to give us an idea of the possibilities; to help us imagine and to see the potential.
Now here is the second step for turning nothing into something, you must BELIEVE that what you imagine IS possible for you. Testimonials like, "If I can do it, you can do it." often become a support to our belief. And we start believing. First we imagine it's possible. Second, we start to believe that what's possible is possible for us.
We might also believe because of our own testimonial. Here is what your testimonial might say, "If I did it once, I can do it again. If it happened for me before, it could very well happen again." So we believe not only the testimonials of others who say, "If I can do it, you can do it. If I can change, you can change. If I can start with nothing, you can start with nothing. If I can turn it all around, you can turn it all around." Then we also have the support of our own testimonial, if we've accomplished something before. "If we did it once, we can do it again.
If we did it last year, we can do it this year." So those two things together are very powerful. Now, we do not have actual substance yet, although it is very close.
Again, step one is to imagine the possibilities. Step two is to imagine that what is possible is possible for you. Here is what we call step two - faith to believe. In fact, one writer said this, "Faith is substance." An interesting word, "substance", the powerful ability to believe in the possibilities that are possible for you. If you have faith to believe...that faith is substance, substance meaning "a piece of the real." Now it's not "the real", it's not this podium, but it is so powerful that it is very close to being real and so the writer said, "The faith is a piece of, the substance of". He then goes on to call it evidence, substance and evidence. It is difficult to call substance and evidence "nothing". It is nothing in the sense that it cannot be seen except with the inner eye. You can't get a hold of it because it isn't YET tangible. But it is possible to turn nothing, especially ideas and imaginations, into something if you believe that it is now possible for you. That substance and evidence becomes so powerful that it can now be turned into reality.
So the first step is to imagine what is possible, the second is to have the faith to believe that what is possible is possible for you. And now the third step is to that you go to work to make it real. You go to work to make it a hotel. You go to work to make it an enterprise. You go to work and make it good health. You go to work and make it an association. You go to work and make it a good marriage. You go to work and make it a movement; you make it tangible. You make it viable. You breathe life into it and then you construct it. That is such a unique and powerful ability for all of us human beings. Put this to work and start the miracle process today!
BFS/Be An 11!
by CoachFreeb
I am often asked how BFS/Be 11 schools able to turn things around in a very short period of time? After some recent discussions in our Be An 11 Class, conversations with coaches and some recent clinic experiences, I can offer up the following explanation.
I recently read a piece by Jim Rohn entitled "How to Turn Nothing Into Something" which got me to thinking about how I have used BFS/Be 11 principles to reestablish winning traditions at several schools that I have had the privilege to coach or taken schools with winning records to ever higher levels of performance previously thought to be unattainable. Of course, there are hundreds of coaches across the nation that are doing the same as well.
It is especially gratifying to turn a program completely around. There is no greater thrill for a coach than to see the change that takes place on the faces and in the hearts of kids when they go from O-For to Champions, to literally turn what others may think is a "Nothing" program into "Something," a Championship program.
The process begins with an idea, a vision, one that is so real, so compelling that it stirs you to action. I now live at the end of the Oregon Trail and have often wondered what kept those pioneers going day after day, 10 to 15 miles a day, hardship after hardship, tossing out their belongings along the way to lighten the load. The next time you speed along the interstate at 70 mph between Missouri and Oregon, remember it took more than five days to travel what you do in less than an hour. What kept them going? It was the vision of a better tomorrow. They had dreamed of making a better life at the end of the trail. They were now on that trail in the active process of bringing that dream to life. As Rohn states, "Dreams are a projection of the kind of life you want to lead. They can make you skip over obstacles; they unleash a creative force that can overpower anything in your path."
So it is with BFS. Invariably at BFS Clinics and Seminars athletes achieve at levels they had not previously not thought possible, much less envision. At a recent clinic there was a group of athletes whose goal for the year was to dead lift 350 pounds. On the night of the clinic two of the athletes pulled 405 pounds and two more went on to pull 525 pounds. They astounded themselves . . . and their teammates . . . . and their coaches, as well as everyone else in attendance. They all began, right there, to think of themselves differently and what they might possibly be able to do as a team, as a school, if they committed themselves to Being An 11 and making that effort to help each other achieve at the highest levels, to encourage each other to make a State Championship Effort each day. Creating this vision of what might be possible is putting Power Axiom #1 into action: Establish Noble Goals (Visions).
BFS reignites the fires of the imagination and people envision all the possibilities. Coaches, athletes, communities catch on fire with what is possible. When athletes see their teammates smash their records, they begin to adopt an attitude, a belief, that "If they can do it, I can to." Everyone then goes to work to perform at levels previously thought to be out of reach.
They also begin to create a picture of what their future athletic seasons will be with their newly created size, strength, speed and explosiveness. Like those Oregon Trail pioneers who had a dream, these kids dare to dream again, BIG Dreams. Those pioneers created a compelling vision that pulled them along. In their minds they were already on the other side of the mountains, living a better life in the Williamette River valley. Their bodies just hadn't gotten there yet. Stories in the Be An 11 Guidebook like Kevin Wilson, Jeffrie Banks and Andrew illustrate that point. When Kevin Wilson was in the hospital and wrote "Today I Win," he created a vision of what was possible, of what was going to be. His body just had to catch up to the vision. He overcame the greatest obstacles to don the uniform again when everyone said it would be impossible. He created a compelling vision of the future to pull him along into reality.
BFS helps people believe in themselves and their teammates. Once everyone on the team starts to realize the benefits. Once those eight or more records a week begin to fall, teams begin to imagine all the possibilities. As their individual and team strength develops, so does their vision of the future. They allow themselves to Dream the Biggest Dream again. They develop a picture of the perfect end result that pulls them along. The harder they work together (Power Axiom #2: Work Ethic) the clearer and compelling the vision becomes. Just like those Oregon Trail pioneers, BFS/Be 11 athletes are already in the Champions' Circle. Their bodies just haven't gotten there yet.
Rohn concludes, "So the first step is to allow yourself the freedom to imagine all the possibilities, the second is to have the faith that what is possible is possible for you, the third step is to go to work to make it real. You go to work to make it a movement, you make it tangible. You make it viable, You breathe life into it and then you construct it." Think about it. You are performing CPR on your own dream making process. That same process that you used when you were five years old and able to envision worlds to conquer on a daily basis.
When you put this process to work, you will achieve success previously thought to be impossible. Outside people will search for reasons why. They will call you lucky. They will say it's a "miracle season." They are people who do not have the strength of will to create a vision and work hard to breathe life into it and make it real.
The process works. It has been done hundreds of times in hundreds of schools across the nation. There are schools right now in the process of realizing their next Dream Season. We will write about them in the BFS Journal. It all begins with an attitude, an expectation, a dream coupled with a commitment to work to make it happen.
What are you waiting for?

The Slight Edge Principle

The Slight Edge is a book written by Jeff Olson who explains the secret to a successful life. And of course, that secret is The Slight Edge principle.

The Slight Edge Principle is a detailed system that will help you see how consistent effort can make a difference in your life.

The Slight Edge Principle has a variety of definitions. For example: Simple actions, repeated daily over a long period of time, lead to massive results. If you consistently do a little more than others, you will consistently have more than others.

Another definition is: Small changes over time make a big difference.

In other words, doing little things or putting in a little more effort can make a big difference and lead to massive results in your life.

On the surface, those little things may not seem relevant at the time but over time they can have an enormous impact on your wealth. The small efforts you put in now will result in great reward down the line.

Slight Edge Finish:

There are three ways for you to get this knowledge:

1) Studied Knowledge

2) Activity Knowledge

3) Modeled Knowledge

STUDIED KNOWLEDGE. Books, tapes, seminars, training; read, listen, and attend everything you can; then, read, listen, and attend some more...study. READ 20 PAGES OF AN INSPIRING, INFORMATION - RICH BOOK EVERY DAY. Pick books that make a contribution to your goals. You're either building someone else's dream or building your own. When you read romance, mystery, or detective novels, whose dream are you building-yours, or the author's and publisher's? When you read Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich-a book that took 20 years to write, that interviews the richest and most successful men and women in the world and reveals their 13 success secrets-whose dream are you building? Read 20 pages per day of an empowering book. Is that easy to do? Sure. And that simple discipline compounded over time, like a penny doubled daily for a month, will send you to the top! Is it easy not to do? SURE. And if you don't do it, will you destroy your life and work today? No way. But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time, will pull you down and take you out of your life!

Listen to a self-improvement cassette tape for 15 minutes every day. You can listen to music on the radio in your car, building Michael Jackson's dream or Barbara Streisand's. Why not choose instead to build your own dreams? Listen to Jim Rohn's tapes. He's a master-and he'll help you build YOUR dreams. Is listening to a tape for 15 minutes a day easy to do? Of course. Is it easy not to do?...And if you don't do it, will that ruin your life right now?...

Do a self-improvement seminar or training every few months.

Better yet, do one every month. Take a course. Take two. If you don't have the time to do that, because you're playing softball every Tuesday and Thursday night, you just don't get it! If your bowling average is over 180-you're losing your Edge, right now! Skip the bowling league. Take a class instead. Is that easy to do?... Is it easy not to do?...And if you don't do it, what will happen today?... But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time WILL kill you! You'll end up a willing participant in the "conspiracy of mediocrity" that 's destroying 95 percent of the people in this country!

ACTIVITY KNOWLEDGE. Life is not a spectator sport-fish or cut bait. Lead, follow, or get out of the way. And life is not a result, either. Life is not the goal-it's the PROCESS. The road to success is always under construction. Marx was wrong: Life is both the ends and the means. Emerson said, "Do the thing and you'll have the power." You can't just go get the power and then do the thing. The only way to have the power is to do it, just do it. People constantly ask me for the key to success. "What's the one thing I can do to guarantee my success?" My answer is always the same: Be here- actively immersed in the process-one year from now. That's the right answer-don't you agree? It's The Slight Edge answer. Commit to the process. The process is THE SLIGHT EDGE. Is it easy to do?... Is it easy not to do?

MODELED KNOWLEDGE. Did you know that your income will tend to be the average of your ten best friends' incomes? (If having more income is a goal of yours, either get new friends or raise the income of the friends you have now!) If you want to raise the quality of your life, hang out with people who have been there and done that. If you want to be a great public speaker, hang out with great speakers. If you want to be a success in business, hang around successful business people. If you want to be a terrific parent, spend lots of time with men and women who have mastered parenting. Do you know why birds of a feather flock together? Because they're all going in the same direction. They share a common vision. If you're after a goal-any goal-go find the people who have achieved that goal, or who are well along the path to attaining that goal, and be with them, hang out with them, camp on their doorstep. It's called the Law of Association. It's a Law because it always works. The first commandment of The Slight Edge:

Thou shalt educate thyself.

Is it easy to do? Is it easy not to do? And if you don't do it, will you fail today? But that simple error in judgment, compounded over time, will ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY, GUARANTEE YOUR FAILURE! LEARNING TO LEARN is committing to the process. The Slight Edge is the process.

"The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn." -Carl Rogers Freedom

To make The Slight Edge work for you, you must learn how to learn.

Alvin Toffler, author of Future Shock, wrote:

"Learning is an approach, both to knowledge and to life, that emphasizes human initiative. It encompasses the acquisition and practice of new methodologies, new skills, new attitudes, and new values necessary to live in a world of change. Learning is a process of preparing to deal with new situations."

Clearly, we live in a world of change. Constant change. Rapid change. Today, we accomplish in five years what our grandparents and parents took 50 years to do. And everything's getting faster! Learning to learn is a mandatory for success today-and especially for tomorrow. Learning to learn is committing to the process. The Slight Edge is the process. Learning to learn is a choice. You make that choice moment to moment-not just once and then you're done with it for the rest of your life. Each new moment will present you with a new choice. Choose to read 20 pages a day-and you'll have to make that choice every day. Choose to model and associate with winners-and you'll have to make that choice every day as well. You have to choose to make The Slight Edge work for you-moment to moment.

IS IT EASY TO DO?

IS IT EASY NOT TO DO?

FreeNote: I tell the kids: The answers are simple, not necessarily easy, but simple. You have to have th discipline to do what has to be done. The best quote I heard this week? Your Belief has to be greater than your Fear.

Heir to a Dream

Maravich Biography by Amy Kinzie

Pete "Press" Maravich instilled in his son, "Pistol" Pete Maravich, a love for the game of basketball that carried throughout his life. Press, a naval aviator and former professional basketball player turned coach, began showing Pete the fundamentals of the game when Pete was seven years old. Together, father and son devised creative and fun ways to help Pete master the fundamental skills needed to excel in basketball. Named everything from around the world and the space clap to the scrambled egg and the flap jack, these drills improved Pete's quickness and hand-eye coordination while strengthening his self-confidence. Pete was obsessive about improving his skills, spending hours upon hours practicing shooting, ball handling, dribbling, and passing in an old gym. Press went to great lengths to keep the drills interesting for his son - even going so far as to drive his car at varying speeds while Pete leaned out the passenger window, trying to control the ball he was dribbling!

Pete's high-school basketball career did not begin well. Being a short 5"2" tall, ninety pound eighth-grader shooting warm-ups with varsity boys who were five years older and ten to fourteen inches taller left him wide open for jeering and laughing comments from the crowd. Maravich tried to ignore the humiliation, determined to prove his skills on the court. However, his debut game did not go well. Once he passed the ball for the starting play, he rarely got to posses the ball again. It was a terribly frustrating and disappointing first game for Pete, who had never before experienced being cold shouldered by his own team. The next game seemed to be more of the same until the final few seconds. As the clock ran out, there stood Pete, alone and unguarded. Amazingly, the ball was passed to him. As the buzzer sounded, "Pistol" Pete shot from the hip . . . the ball was up and through the hoop for the winning score!

"Pistol" Pete's reputation quickly began to spread and he suddenly found himself under double coverage. This kind of coverage forced him to use behind the back and no look passes, which the crowd loved. Encouraged by the applause, Pete continued to play the style of basketball he had learned with his father. His characteristic showmanship style of playing soon began to draw large crowds of spectators who loved to watch his sleight of hand artistry with the ball.

When his father accepted a coaching position at North Carolina State, Pete began playing for the Needham-Broughton High School Caps. Although he had grown to be nearly six feet tall, he was still a slight 130 pounds. Opposing teams tried to capitalize on Pete's slight stature with elbows to his ribs and he was often deliberately knocked to the floor. As a result, Pete developed a form of retaliation - he often drew the foul by stumbling backwards or falling. He had found a way to deal with the physical obstacles, but learning how to handle a loss was an even more difficult obstacle to overcome, and Pete began turning more and more to alcohol to beat back the dark memories of defeat.

After graduating from LSU in 1970, Pistol Pete made league history when he was drafted into the National Basketball League (NBA) by the Atlanta Hawks with a $1.9 million dollar contract. Although Pete continued to succeed at the professional level, his team performances were far from stellar and he was never quite able to reach his most coveted goal - receiving a championship ring.

A leg injury forced "Pistol" Pete to retire on September 20, 1980. Overweight and despondent without basketball, the next two years were the darkest period of his life. Pete said he continued to search "for life", trying yoga and Hinduism, even something he called UF-ology. Then, in 1982, he finally found peace in Christianity.

He became a lay preacher and traveled to churches and basketball camps to relate his story to young children. His message was simple, the man he had become in his late 30s was far more important than the alcoholic basketball player he had been. As part of the speech he delivered in 1982, Pete said, "There is nothing wrong with dedication and goals, but if you focus on yourself, all the lights fade away and you become a fleeting moment in life. I lived my life one way for 35 years, for me. And then the focus came in on what I really was."

On January 5, 1988, while playing a pickup game of basketball at the Church of the Nazarene in Pasadena, California, "Pistol" Pete Maravich collapsed and died of a heart attach at the age of 40.

The number of schools still participating in their state playoffs goes down dramatically every week. In the end as the Highlander movies say, "There can be only one." For the rest . . . well for all the players who will be back on next years team, the Dream shall never die. The Dream is still with them and you who coach and support them. When the season ends, it is like a death in the family, but "The Family" lives on. It is up to the next generation to pick up the torch and press forward. We are BFS would tell you to take time off to celebrate the season and grieve the the death in the family, perhaps till after Thansgiving. Then it's time to get back into preparation for the birth of a new season. There's no time to lose because as Coach Tom Osborne of Nebraska said, "75% of winning takes place before the season starts." In Two weeks it is time for the team to come together, establish next season's goal, and develop a plan of action to make it happen. That is what our BFS Be An 11 Seminar is all about. Dial me up (503.312.2138) to schedule your Seminar today, or call our clinic coordinator, Kelly, 800.628.9737. Get started on that 75% winning percentage today.

Spartans stun Cats for biggest comeback in I-A history

EVANSTON, Ill. (AP) -- Nearly an hour after the game, Drew Stanton was trying to digest what he'd just been a part of -- the greatest comeback in NCAA Division I-A history.

Trailing 38-3 in the third quarter, Michigan State rallied Saturday for a 41-38 victory over Northwestern as the Spartans ended a four-game losing streak in dramatic fashion and momentarily took the heat off coach John L. Smith.

"It hasn't really sunk in yet," Stanton said.

After a frustrating losing stretch that began when they blew a big lead late against Notre Dame, the Spartans finally got a chance to experience the other side. It felt pretty good.

"Hopefully this can be a turning point in our season. I definitely think it can be and people can build from this," said Stanton, who shook off a late hit in the third quarter, one that sent him sprawling into concrete around the bench and knocked him out of the game for a series.

Michigan State (4-4, 1-3) got back in game when Ashton Henderson returned a blocked punt for a TD early in the fourth, and the Spartans won it when Brett Swenson kicked a 28-yard field goal with 13 seconds left following a key interception by Travis Key.

Smith, who's been under heavy criticism, took no questions in a postgame news conference. He pointed to his staff and especially his players.

"The ones who really deserve the credit are those guys," Smith said. "They played the game, they believed in each other. They continued to fight, they pulled together and deserved everything they got today."

Until this riveting game, the biggest comeback in Division I-A was 31 points -- when Maryland beat Miami 42-40 on Nov. 10, 1984, and when Ohio State defeated Minnesota 41-37 on Oct. 28, 1989.

Northwestern (2-6, 0-4) led 24-3 at the half, and the crushing defeat sent the Wildcats to their fifth straight loss.

"As difficult a loss as I've ever been a part of," said first-year Northwestern coach Pat Fitzgerald, who took the blame for his team losing momentum and eventually the game. "It hurts very bad."

Michigan State trailed 38-3 with 9:54 left in the third quarter after Northwestern's C.J. Bacher threw his third TD pass, a 5-yarder to Shaun Herbert.

Stanton, battling assorted injuries, tossed a TD pass of 18 yards to Jehuu Caulcrick with 7:03 left in the third. A.J. Jimmerson's 4-yard run, after a 19-yard pass from Stanton to Kerry Reed, made it 38-17.

After a 64-yard run by Tyrell Sutton, Northwestern was ready to go ahead 45-17 but Kaleb Thornhill turned away yet another Wildcats scoring drive by intercepting Bacher in the end zone.

Moments later, Stanton later was knocked to the sideline on a late hit by Northwestern's Corey Wootton and replaced by Brian Hoyer for a series.

Michigan State then made it 38-24 early in the final period when Devin Thomas blocked a Northwestern punt and Henderson returned it 33 yards for a TD.

"I think the blocked punt is when people really started believe we had a shot to come back," Stanton said.

Stanton re-entered the game on the next series and immediately drove the Spartans 60 yards, completing three passes for 34 yards and carrying 12 yards for the TD with 7:54 left, making it 38-31.

The Spartans then stopped a third-and-1 by the Wildcats, who had to punt, and Stanton completed six straight passes in a six-play, 58-yard drive, capping it with a 9-yard TD pass to T.J. Williams that tied the game with 3:43 left.

Key then intercepted Bacher at the 30 with 2:59 left and State moved in position for Swenson's field goal.

Bacher completed five of six passes on Northwestern's first possession, a 71-yard drive capped by Bacher's 5-yard TD pass to Ross Lane that made it 7-3.

On their next series, with the aid of two pass interference calls against the Spartans, the Wildcats moved in again, going 74 yards with Bacher hitting Jeff Yarbrough on a 14-yarder to the 2 and then carrying the final couple of yards for the TD early in the second quarter.

Joel Howells kicked a 30-yard field goal to make it 17-3 on the next possession. Eric Peterman took a Bacher swing pass, broke two tackles and raced 47 yards to the Spartans 9 before the drive bogged down.

An 18-yard halfback option pass for a TD from Brandon Roberson to Herbert made it 24-3 late in the half. Bacher's 22-yard pass to Lane gave the Wildcats a 31-3 lead early in the second half.

Stanton completed 27-of-37 for 294 yards. Bacher, who made his first college start, moving ahead of announced starter Andrew Brewer, was 15-of-29 for 245 yards. Sutton finished with 172 yards on 21 carries.

Northwestern linebacker and leading tackler Nick Roach broke his right leg early in the second half and is likely finished for the season. He was carted off the field after being hurt while covering a punt with 12:20 left in the third quarter.

The Tigers hadn't beaten the Sooners since 1998. Of course in that time there are some big losses, namely the 2007 and 2008 Big 12 Championship games. In 2007 the winner would have been in the national championship game. So Pinkel has played big games before but Mizzou had slowly been gaining the reputation as a team that can't win th...e big game.

They proved the doubters wrong on Saturday beating Oklahoma 36-27 in Columbia, MO.

Pinkel understands how important it is to beat Oklahoma. He opened his press conference this week saying to reporters that he knows he hasn't beaten Oklahoma and if you want to be considered one of the best you have to beat Oklahoma.

In his career he was 0-6 against the Sooners before Saturday night. That's a pretty big mountain to climb. Oklahoma had beaten Missouri 19 of their last 20 meetings. The Sooners were 7-0 against Missouri in the Bob Stoops era. That helps describe how huge this was for Missouri.

I didn't even mention that this game was nationally televised. So the world was there to see Pinkel finally beat Oklahoma and it put Mizzou on the 2010 college football map. The significance of this win can't be understated.

Now Mizzou goes from a bubble team in the top 15 to legitimate contenders. The test doesn't stop there though. They'll travel to Lincoln next week to take on Nebraska.

We first met Coach Pinkel when he was QB coach for U of Washington in 1988. He then went to Toledo (my Master's Degree program) and then on to MO. He has a great work ethic and of course, he perseveres.

As QB coach, he wanted his QBs to lift along with the linemen, to "lead them in the weightroom just like on the field." We loved that work ethic!

The "Miracle on Ice" was a medal-round men's ice hockey game during the 1980 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid, New York, on February 22. The United States team, made up of amateur and collegiate players and led by coach Herb Brooks, defeated the Soviet team, which was considered the best hockey team in the world.

Team USA went on to win the gold medal by winning its final match over Finland, who finished 4th. The Soviet Union took the silver medal by beating bronze medal winner Sweden in its final game. As part of its 100th anniversary celebrations in 2008, the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) chose the Miracle on Ice as the number-one international hockey story of the century.

The Soviet and American teams

The Soviet Union entered the Olympic tournament as heavy favorites, having won the ice hockey gold medal in 1956 and every year since 1964. In the four Olympics after the Soviet squad was upset by Team USA at Squaw Valley in 1960, Soviet teams had gone 27–1–1 and outscored the opposition 175–44. In head-to-head matchups against the United States, the cumulative score over that period was 28-7. The Soviet players were classed as amateurs, but soft jobs provided by the Brezhnev government (some were active-duty military) allowed them to essentially play professionally in a well-developed league with world class training facilities. They were led by legendary players in world ice hockey, such as Boris Mikhailov (a top line right winger and team captain), Vladislav Tretiak (considered by many to be the best ice hockey goaltender in the world at the time), the speedy and skilled Valeri Kharlamov, as well as talented, young, and dynamic players such as defenseman Viacheslav Fetisov and forwards Vladimir Krutov and Sergei Makarov. From that team, Tretiak, Kharlamov, and Fetisov would eventually be enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Herb Brooks conducted tryouts in Colorado Springs in the summer of 1979. Of the 20 players who eventually made the final Olympic roster, Buzz Schneider was the only one from the 1976 Olympic team. Nine players had played under Herb Brooks at the University of Minnesota. Four more were from Boston University. Assistant coach Craig Patrick had played with Brooks on the 1967 U.S. national team.

The Soviet and American teams were natural rivals due to the decades-old Cold War. In addition, President Jimmy Carter was at the time considering a U.S. boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics, to be held in Moscow, in protest of the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. On February 9, the same day that the American and Soviet teams met in an exhibition in New York City, U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance denounced the impending Moscow games at a meeting of the IOC. President Carter eventually decided in favor of the boycott.

Exhibitions

In exhibitions that year, Soviet club teams went 5–3–1 against National Hockey League (NHL) teams, and a year earlier the Soviet national team had routed the NHL All-Stars 6–0 to win the Challenge Cup. In 1979–80, virtually all the top North American players were Canadians, although the number of U.S.-born professional players had been on the rise throughout the 1970s. The 1980 U.S. Olympic team featured several young players who were regarded as highly promising, and some had signed contracts to play in the NHL immediately after the tournament.

In September the American team started exhibition play, playing 61 games in five months against teams from Europe and America. The last exhibition game was against the Soviets in Madison Square Garden on February 9, 1980. The Soviets crushed the Americans 10–3. Viktor Tikhonov later said that this victory "turned out to be a very big problem" by causing the Soviets to underestimate the American team.

Olympic group play

In Olympic group play, the United States surprised many observers with its physical, cohesive play. In its first game against favored Sweden, Team USA earned a dramatic 2–2 draw by scoring with 27 seconds left after pulling goalie Jim Craig for an extra attacker. Then came a stunning 7–3 victory over Czechoslovakia, considered by many to be the second-best team after the Soviet Union and a favorite for the silver medal. With its two toughest games in the group phase out of the way, the U.S. team reeled off three more wins, beating Norway 5–1, Romania 7–2, and West Germany 4–2 to go 4–0–1 and advance to the medal round from its group, along with the Swedes.

In the other group, the Soviets stormed through their opposition undefeated, often by grossly lopsided scores – knocking off Japan 16–0, the Netherlands 17–4, Poland 8–1, Finland 4–2, and Canada 6–4; easily qualifying for the next round, although both the Finns and the Canadians gave the Soviets tough games for two periods. In the end, the Soviet Union and Finland (who overcame a disastrous start after sensationally losing to Poland in their opening game of the tournament, but then rallied to upset Canada) advanced from their group.

Preparing for the medal round

The U.S. and Soviet teams prepared for the medal round in different ways. Soviet coach Viktor Tikhonov rested most of his best players, preferring to let them study plays rather than actually skate. U.S. coach Herb Brooks, however, continued with his tough, confrontational style, skating "hard" practices and berating his players for perceived weaknesses.

The day before the match, columnist Dave Anderson wrote in the New York Times, "Unless the ice melts, or unless the United States team or another team performs a miracle, as did the American squad in 1960, the Russians are expected to easily win the Olympic gold medal for the sixth time in the last seven tournaments."

"Do you believe in miracles?"

The Field House (capacity 8,500) was packed. The home crowd waved American flags and sang patriotic songs such as "God Bless America." The rest of the United States (except those who watched the game live on Canadian television) had to wait to see the game. After the Soviets refused to consent to moving the game from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. for American television (this would have meant a 4 a.m. start in Moscow for Soviet viewers), ABC decided to broadcast the late-afternoon game on tape delay in prime time. Before the game, Brooks read his players a statement he'd written out on a piece of paper, telling them that "You were born to be a player. You were meant to be here. This moment is yours."

First period

As in several previous games, the U.S. team fell behind early. Vladimir Krutov deflected a slap shot by Aleksei Kasatonov past U.S. netminder Jim Craig to give the Soviets a 1–0 lead, and after Buzz Schneider scored for the United States to tie the game, the Soviets struck again with a Sergei Makarov goal. Down 2–1, Craig improved his play, turning away many Soviet shots before the U.S. team had another shot on goal (the Soviet team had 39 shots on goal in the game, the Americans 16).

In the waning seconds of the first period, Dave Christian fired a slap shot on Tretiak from 100 feet away. The Soviet goalie saved the shot but misplayed the rebound, which bounced out some 20 feet in front of him. Mark Johnson sliced between the two defensemen, found the loose puck and fired it past a diving Tretiak to tie the score with one second left in the period. The first period ended with the game tied 2–2.

Second period

Tikhonov replaced Tretiak with backup goaltender Vladimir Myshkin immediately after Johnson's tying goal, a move which shocked players on both teams.Tikhonov later identified this as the "turning point of the game." and "the biggest mistake of my career". Myshkin allowed no goals in the second period. The Soviets dominated play in the second period, outshooting the Americans 12–2, but scored only once, on a power play goal by Aleksandr Maltsev. After two periods the Soviet Union led 3–2.

Third period

Vladimir Krutov was sent to the penalty box at the 6:47 mark of the third period for high-sticking. The Americans, who had managed only two shots on Myshkin in 27 minutes, had a power play and a rare offensive opportunity. Myshkin stopped a Ramsey shot, then Eruzione fired a shot wide. Late in the power play, Dave Silk was advancing into the Soviet zone when Vasilev knocked him to the ice. The puck slid to Mark Johnson. Johnson fired off a shot that went under Myshkin and into the net at the 8:39 mark, as the power play was ending, tying the game 3–3. Only a couple shifts later, Mark Pavelich passed to U.S. captain Mike Eruzione, who was left undefended in the high slot. Eruzione, who had just come into the game, fired a shot past Myshkin, who was screened by Pervukhin. This goal gave Team USA a 4–3 lead, its first of the game, with exactly 10 minutes left.

The Soviets attacked furiously. Moments after Eruzione's goal, Maltzev fired off a shot which ricocheted off the right goal post. As the minutes wound down, Brooks kept repeating "Play your game. Play your game." Instead of going into a defensive crouch, the United States continued to play offense, even getting off a few more shots on goal. The Soviets began to shoot wildly, and Starikov admitted that "we were panicking." As the clock ticked down below a minute the Soviets got the puck back into the American zone, and Mikhailov passed to Petrov, who shot wide. The Soviets never pulled Myshkin for an extra attacker, much to the disbelief of the Americans. Starikov later explained that "We never did six-on-five", not even in practice, because "Tikhonov just didn't believe in it."[29] Craig kicked away a Petrov slap shot with 33 seconds left. Kharlamov fired the puck back in as the clock ticked below 20 seconds. A wild scramble for the puck ensued, ending when Johnson found it and passed to Morrow. As the U.S. team tried to clear the zone (move the puck over the blue line, which they did with seven seconds remaining), the crowd began to count down the seconds left. Sportscaster Al Michaels, who was calling the game on ABC along with former Montreal Canadiens goalie Ken Dryden, picked up on the countdown in his broadcast, and delivered his famous call:

“Eleven seconds, you've got ten seconds, the countdown going on right now! Morrow, up to Silk. Five seconds left in the game. Do you believe in miracles?...YES! ”


The March 3, 1980 cover of Sports Illustrated that ran without accompanying caption or headline. In the locker room afterwards, players spontaneously broke into a chorus of "God Bless America". As his team ran all over the ice in celebration, Herb Brooks sprinted back to the locker room and cried.

For its March 3, 1980 issue, Sports Illustrated ran a cover with just a photograph by Heinz Kluetmeier, without any accompanying caption or headline. Kluetmeir said, "It didn't need (any cover language). Everyone in America knew what happened."

Charting Your Course to Success


Winning: Defining It! Achieving It!

by Chris Widener

If you ask most people whether they would like to be considered a winner or a loser in life, they would most assuredly reply that they would like to be a winner. But this begs the question: "What does it mean to win at life?" In some things, it's easy to define a clear winner. In a basketball game, whoever has the most points at the end of the game is the winner. In a game of hearts, my favorite card game, whoever has the least amount of points when one of the players reaches 100 points is the winner.

But it isn't quite as easy to decide what it means to win in the game of life, is it? And that is because people define winning in different ways. For many, winning is through the accumulation of money or material possessions. "He's a success, a real winner," they say. Others think winning means living the longest. Still others say that it is to have their body in tip-top shape. Some say it is to have a happy family. Some say it is to regularly enjoy their hobbies.

All of these are fine, in and of themselves. But I would like to encourage us to think about winning or success in a different way. Generally, people think of winning as overachieving in a particular, chosen area. I like to believe, however, that to truly win at life is not to overachieve in one area, but to succeed in maintaining balanced achievement in numerous areas.

Let me repeat that: To truly win, to be a success, is not to overachieve in one area, but to maintain balanced achievement in all areas of our lives.

For instance, is a person a success if they earn millions of dollars but lose their family? Is a person a success if they garner national fame but have no friends? Of course not. In fact, they may live the most pitiful of all lives.

First, Define

So the first thing we must do is define what we will consider "winning in life." As you ponder this for yourself, I would like to recommend that you focus in on three overarching areas: body, soul and spirit.

The body is that which has an actual connection with the physical world and would encompass physical health, financial health, family, work and relationships.

How is your health? How are your finances? Are your relationships, both with your family and others, all that they could be? Is work fulfilling? How would you define winning in these areas?

The next area, the soul, is that which deals with the emotions, will and intellect. It is our thoughts, ideas and attitudes.

How are you emotionally? Are you able to exercise your will? Are you growing intellectually? Have you done an attitude check lately? How would you define winning in these areas?

And the spirit is the part of us that transcends this life, the part of us that communes with God. Zig Ziglar said, "Money will buy me a house, but not a home, a bed, but not a good night's sleep." So true. Inner peace comes from something much deeper.

Have you thought about going back to your spiritual roots? Are you able to spend time in quiet solitude and prayer from time to time? This is an extremely important area that is all too often neglected. What would you like to achieve in this area? How would you define winning in these areas?

As we experience balance in these areas, we will find ourselves much more at peace with ourselves than if we were to experience tremendous success in one area but loss or failure in the other areas. We were designed to work as congruent, balanced people. This is how we get to the end of our lives and say, "I won."

Second, Prioritize

Once you have defined what it is that you would like to achieve in each of these areas, you have to prioritize them and let other, non-important areas drop off the chart. Commit to developing a plan to succeed in a balance of areas. Exercise your will. Choose. Dwight D. Eisenhower said: "The history of free men is written not by chance, but by choice-their choice."

When we manage our time and schedule, we are simply making choices in regard to our priorities. For most, their priority is to take action on whatever is screaming the loudest at the moment. For those who become winners, they reflect on what they desire to achieve, make a plan and decide to eliminate the rest.

Last, Do It

OK, you have defined winning. You have prioritized your life. Now, the hard part: doing it. This is where we are all alone. We all make this step on our own, but having a written plan is as good a preparation as you can get. Rather than saying that you are going to do this for the rest of your life, take the next week to implement your new balance of winning. If a week sounds too long, just focus on today. Spend some time, be it ever so small, enhancing your life in these areas. Exercise a little. Read for a while to challenge your mind. Deal with your emotions. Spend time in silent contemplation to renew your spirit. Give some time to your spouse and children. Will Rogers said, "Even if you're on the right track, you won't get anywhere if you're standing still." There has got to be action.

As we do this over time, and balance our lives out, we will begin to finally feel like we are winning at life. That will be exciting, as will the process!

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Attitude Is Everything by Jim Rohn

By Jim Rohon

The process of human change begins within us. We all have tremendous potential. We all desire good results from our efforts. Most of us are willing to work hard and to pay the price that success and happiness demand.

Each of us has the ability to put our unique human potential into action and to acquire a desired result. But the one thing that determines the level of our potential-that produces the intensity of our activity and predicts the quality of the result we receive-is our attitude.

Attitude determines how much of the future we are allowed to see. It decides the size of our dreams and influences our determination when we are faced with new challenges. No other person on earth has dominion over our attitude. People can affect our attitude by teaching us poor thinking habits or unintentionally misinforming us or providing us with negative sources of influence, but no one can control our attitude unless we voluntarily surrender that control.

No one else "makes us angry." We make ourselves angry when we surrender control of our attitude. What someone else may have done is irrelevant. We choose, not they. They merely put our attitude to a test. If we select a volatile attitude by becoming hostile, angry, jealous or suspicious, then we have failed the test. If we condemn ourselves by believing that we are unworthy, then again, we have failed the test.

If we care at all about ourselves, then we must accept full responsibility for our own feelings. We must learn to guard against those feelings that have the capacity to lead our attitude down the wrong path and to strengthen those feelings that can lead us confidently into a better future.

If we want to receive the rewards the future holds in trust for us, then we must exercise the most important choice given to us as members of the human race by maintaining total dominion over our attitude. Our attitude is an asset, a treasure of great value, which must be protected accordingly. Beware of the vandals and thieves among us who would injure our positive attitude or seek to steal it away.

Having the right attitude is one of the basics that success requires. The combination of a sound personal philosophy and a positive attitude about ourselves and the world around us gives us an inner strength and a firm resolve that influences all the other areas of our existence.

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Ordinary to Extraordinary

From Ordinary to Extraordinary

By Dr. John C. Maxwell

When you hear the word ordinary in reference to a person, a restaurant, an athlete, an actor, or anything else what comes to mind? If you're anything like me, you automatically think of words such as average, plain, common, and every day. You're probably not thinking in specifics, ordinary people and places simply aren't that memorable.

Now switch mental gears and ponder what you think of when you hear the word extraordinary. Are words such as amazing, outstanding, brilliant, and exceptional coming to mind? I expect so. You might even be thinking of a particular individual who fits this description, an incredible football player, a captivating public speaker, a Nobel Prize-winning poet, a gifted pianist, or cellist.

This little exercise might seem to indicate that there is a huge gap between being ordinary and being extraordinary. It might lead you to believe that if you're an ordinary person with an ordinary job, you have no hope of ever achieving success or doing something that really makes a difference.

This is a commonly held belief, but I'm here to tell you, it's not valid.

Think of it in terms of professional baseball. If a player on your favorite team had a lifetime batting average of .340, you would consider him to be an extraordinary hitter, definite Hall of Fame material. At the same time, if another player on the same team consistently averaged around .240, you would probably think he was just okay�if you even knew who he was at all.

There would be worlds of difference between these two players when it came to fan recognition, playing time, and, of course, salary. But think about it. What do their batting averages really say about these players? For every 10 visits to the batter's box, the first player gets a hit 3.4 times, compared with 2.4 times for the second player.

Percentage-wise, that's not a great difference. And that's my point. In baseball, as in other areas of life, there's not much difference between ordinary and extraordinary. But that little bit makes a huge difference in four key areas. Extraordinary individuals:

1.Garner more respect.

2.Add more value to other people.

3.Make much more money.

4.Are perceived differently by the people around them.

Look closely at the two words we've been discussing: ordinary and extraordinary. What's the difference between the two? Five little letters that make up the word extra. That's it. Just put "extra" in front of ordinary and you get extraordinary.

So what does it take to move from ordinary to extraordinary? Think about it in terms of the topics covered in recent issues of Leadership Wired. If you want to go from ordinary to extraordinary, in your role as a leader or in any other area of life, give a little extra effort. Spend a little extra time. Seek a little extra help. Possess a little extra realism. Make a little extra change. That's all it takes: a little extra.

Let me add two more areas where a little extra will help you make the leap to the next level.

1.A little extra attitude.

You see, motivation determines what you do, ability determines what you're capable of doing, and attitude determines how well you do it. When I see a person operating with excellence, I know it's because he or she has a good attitude. In writing about the Olympics, the late sports columnist Jim Murray commented that, in the history of the Games, the difference between gold medalists and silver medalists in all the timed events was less than one.tenth of a second. "That's not ability," he said. "That's attitude."

1.A little extra planning.

Robert Eliot, a cardiology professor at the University of Nebraska, has some great advice about this. He said, "It's important to run not on the fast track, but on your track," "Pretend you have only six months to live, and make three lists: the things you have to do, want to do, and neither have to do nor want to do. Then, for the rest of your life, forget everything on the third list." What does it take to come up with such lists? A little extra planning.

You might think of yourself as pretty ordinary right now, but what would happen if you moved your life up just one notch? What would happen if you added a little extra in any of these areas? Remember: the distance between ordinary and extraordinary is not that great, but the resulting difference in your life when you make that leap could be far greater than you could even imagine.

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Seeing the Future

Regardless of position, every leader has the duty to picture a brighter future, and to inspire others to create a better tomorrow.

"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth." ~ John F. Kennedy, May 25, 1961

With those words, President Kennedy cast the vision for perhaps the most spectacular feat ever undertaken by the United States of America. His ambitious vision captivated the imagination of the Americans, and it motivated the nation's brightest scientists and astronauts to pursue a seemingly impossible mission.

No one, even a generation earlier, could have fathomed a man walking around on the moon. Consider that only 50 years before Kennedy's speech, most Americans were traveling by horse and buggy! In those days, sending a man to the moon would have seemed just as ridiculous as traveling backwards in time. Amazingly, NASA accomplished Kennedy's daring vision when the crew of Apollo 11 landed on the moon in July of 1969. Within a dozen years of JFK's speech, 24 Americans had walked on the surface of the moon. America had done the impossible, and the entire country took pride in the accomplishment.

In their article, "The Higher Plane of Leadership," Ken Blanchard and Mark Miller give seeing the future the top spot on their list of qualities held by servant leaders. When so many people float through life without a strong sense of direction, a leader serves by linking others to a purpose greater than their own self-interest.

In the case of President Kennedy, the vision to land on the moon rallied millions of Americans with a sense of meaning, and it turned a fanciful dream into a concrete reality. However, Blanchard and Miller caution against assuming that vision comes only from world leaders or history's heroes. In their words, such assumptions, "fuel the myth that creating and communicating a compelling vision is someone else's responsibility." Regardless of position, every leader has the duty to picture a brighter future, and to inspire others to create a better tomorrow.

If visions only started with Presidents and CEO's, then we'd have a small number of elite leaders surrounded by a sea of mindless followers. Blanchard and Miller argue that leaders must have visions aside from those of their leaders, "Although vision from the top is critically important, it is no substitute for personal vision, vision for your team, your department, or your division." One could argue that President Kennedy's vision to land on the moon was made possible by countless supporting visions of NASA scientists, engineers, and astronauts. By himself, JFK would never have been able to put the pieces in play to see the future come to pass. He relied on the visions of leaders at every level of government to develop the vehicles, systems, and programs to make landing on the moon possible.

Are You an Optimist or a Pessimist?

I can even look forward to my failures because they will be steppingstones and learning tools to be applied to my future success.

by Chris Widener

I have been giving some thought lately to optimism and pessimism. Basically, these are attitudes-attitudes that shape and formulate our entire existence. I mean, have you ever met a happy pessimist? Of course not.

In short, our optimism or pessimism is this:

The way we interpret the past

The way we experience and view the present

The way we imagine the future

Have you given much thought about how your attitude, whether you are an optimist or a pessimist, affects you business, organization or school? Have you thought about how it affects you personally? And what about the team you are a part of?

What is optimism? It is the belief that things in our past were good for us, even if that means they were hard and taught us lessons. It is also the belief that things will be better in the future.

Here are some contrasts between optimism and pessimism and how they affect us:

Optimism breathes life into you each day.

Pessimism drains you.

Optimism helps you to take needed risks.

Pessimism plays it safe and never accomplishes much.

Optimism improves those around you.

Pessimism drags them down.

Optimism inspires people to great heights.

Pessimism deflates people to new lows.

There is only one way that optimism and pessimism are the same, and that is that they are both self-fulfilling. If you are an optimist, you will generally find that good things happen to you. And if you are a pessimist, you will find yourself in the not-so-good situations more often than not.

So can a person just become an optimist? Yes! We can choose to look at the world any way we want to. We can choose to look at the world and think the worst, or we can tell ourselves the good things about each situation. As you find yourself looking at your enterprise, begin to view it through the eyes of an optimist, and you will reap the rewards listed above, and so will the people around you.

There are tremendous benefits to being an optimist, as stated above. But there are some pessimists out there who will say, "But that isn't realistic." I say, "Who cares?" If things go awry, at least I have spent my time beforehand enjoying life and not worrying about it. And, being an optimist, I would view the "negative" situation as an opportunity to grow and learn. So I can even look forward to my failures because they will be steppingstones and learning tools to be applied to my future success.

Have you ever met a successful pessimist? Become an optimist, and see your world change before your eyes!

Building and Leading High Performance Teams

Column by Chris Musselwhite

You don't have to be Michael Jordan or Mia Hamm to have the skills you need to build and lead high performing teams.

When a sports team is working well together, it can feel like magic. We've all experienced it, either as a team member or as a fan. Fortunately, you do not have to be Michael Jordan or Mia Hamm to have the skills you need to build and lead high performing teams in your organization.

An important leadership competency for any size organization, the ability to build and lead high performing teams is especially critical in small-to-midsize businesses. Here, people must work closely together, wear many hats and work effectively across the organization to get tasks accomplished quickly enough to remain competitive. vIn order to understand the competencies needed to build and lead high performance teams, it is helpful to first define a team. Here is a simple but effective description from The Wisdom of Teams (Harvard Business School Press, 1993.)

"A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable."

Using this definition, we can outline three important competencies for the effective team builder and leader.

Promoting understanding of why a group of people need to be a team. The team needs to understand its shared goals and what each team member brings to the team that is relevant and crucial to its overall successes.

Ensuring the team has adequate knowledge to accomplish its task. This includes information relevant to the team's goals and individual job competencies.

Facilitating effective interaction in such as way as to ensure good problem solving, decision making and coordination of effort.

Characteristics of Highly Effective Teams

To better understand how these competencies create effective teams, let's examine some characteristics of highly effective teams.

An effective team understands the big picture. In an effective team, each team member understands the context of the team's work to the greatest degree possible. That includes understanding the relevance of his or her job and how it impacts the effectiveness of others and the overall team effort. Too often, people are asked to work on part of a task without being told how their role contributes to the desired end result, much less how their efforts are impacting the ability of others to do their work. Understanding the big picture promotes collaboration, increases commitment and improves quality.

An effective team has common goals. Effective teams have agreed-upon goals that are simple, measurable and clearly relevant to the team's task. Each goal includes key measurable metrics (that are available to everyone on the team), which can be used to determine the team effectiveness and improvement. Understanding and working toward these common goals as a unit is crucial to the team's effectiveness.

An effective team works collaboratively, as a unit. In an effective team you'll notice a penchant for collaboration and a keen awareness of interdependency. Collaboration and a solid sense of interdependency in a team will defuse blaming behavior and stimulate opportunities for learning and improvement. Without this sense of interdependency in responsibility and reward, blaming behaviors can occur which will quickly erode team effectiveness.

The Roles of the Effective Team Leader

In order to encourage this level of collaboration and interdependency, the team leader must provide the necessary support and structure for the team, starting with putting together the right people. Team members should be selected and their tasks assigned with their natural skills in mind. Not every person is capable of doing every job.

The team must also have the resources and training required to develop the skills needed to do their jobs. This includes cross-training. Cross-training gives team members a greater awareness of how their jobs are interdependent, increasing the team's flexibility and improving response time.

The quality of the team's response is highly dependent on the timeliness of the feedback received from the team's leader, other team members and customers. Receiving timely feedback is crucial to the effectiveness of the team. The effective team leader ensures that feedback reaches the entire team on its goals and metrics, as well as feedback to each individual team member. This feedback must be received in time to make adjustments and corrections. Often, feedback is received too late to have any practical value in the moment, and consequently, it feels like criticism. While it might be useful for future planning, it does not promote immediate corrections in performance.

Feedback is a form of constructive communication, another necessary tool in the effective team leader's tool chest. No matter how traditional or innovative the work design, consistent and constructive communication throughout the team is essential. The act of constructive communication can do more than anything else to improve quality and productivity. Timely and appropriately delivered feedback can make the difference between a team that hides mistakes and a team that sees mistakes as opportunities.

When a team views mistakes as opportunities for improving the team's process and results, it's a sign that the team leader has successfully created an environment that promotes problem-solving. People are problem solvers by nature. When they are allowed to create their own solutions (rather than having expert solutions imposed upon them) team members are more proactive and engaged. Teams also have greater ownership of solutions they discover for themselves.

Creating an environment that promotes problem-solving is part of creating an effective team structure. Poor team structure can actually create negative, ineffective behaviors in individuals and impede communication. The responsibility for poor performance is usually a function of the team structure rather than individual incompetence; yet, it is individuals who are sent to human resources or training programs for fixing. If team members feel like they are pitted against one another to compete for rewards and recognition, they will withhold information that might be useful to the greater team. When a team has problems, the effective team leader will focus on the team's structure before focusing on individuals.

Conclusion

Remember: a "willingness" to participate collaboratively as a team member does not guarantee the desired outcome. People thrown into a collaborative situation, especially those without experience operating in this mode, need assistance to guarantee success. Managers who are skeptical of team participation to begin with often throw their people into an unplanned, unstructured decision-making process, responding with "I told you so" as they watch their team flounder.

By contrast, managers who focus on promoting good understanding, ensuring adequate knowledge and facilitating effective interaction, will watch the transformation of their job from one that required constant supervision, fire-fighting, and oversight, to one that allows the leader to focus on serving the needs of the team and each individual team member.

OBSTACLES ARE THE STEPPING STONES OF SUCCESS

by Harvey Mackay

A man was walking in the park one day when he came upon a cocoon with a small opening. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through the little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It looked like it had gotten as far as it could, so the man decided to help the butterfly. He used his pocketknife and snipped the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily, but something was strange. The butterfly had a swollen body and shriveled wings. The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected at any moment the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time. Neither happened. In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and deformed wings. It was never able to fly.

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to emerge was natural. It was nature's way of forcing fluid from its body into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom. Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives.

If we were allowed to go through life without any obstacles, we would be crippled. We would not be as strong as what we could have been. And we could never fly.

History has shown us that the most celebrated winners usually encountered heartbreaking obstacles before they triumphed. They won because they refused to become discouraged by their defeats.

My good friend, Lou Holtz, football coach of the University of South Carolina, once told me, "Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I'll show you someone who has overcome adversity."

Beethoven composed his greatest works after becoming deaf. George Washington was snowed in through a treacherous winter at Valley Forge. Abraham Lincoln was raised in poverty. Albert Einstein was called a slow learner, retarded and uneducable. If Christopher Columbus had turned back, no one could have blamed him, considering the constant adversity he endured.

As an elementary student, actor James Earl Jones (a.k.a. Darth Vader) stuttered so badly he communicated with friends and teachers using written notes.

Itzhak Perlman, the incomparable concert violinist, was born to parents who survived a Nazi concentration camp and has been paralyzed from the waist down since the age of four.

Chester Carlson, a young inventor, took his idea to 20 big corporations in the 1940s. After seven years of rejections, he was able to persuade Haloid, a small company in Rochester, N.Y., to purchase the rights to his electrostatic paper- copying process. Haloid has since become Xerox Corporation.

Thomas Edison tried over 2,000 experiments before he was able to get his light bulb to work. Upon being asked how he felt about failing so many times, he replied, "I never failed once. I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2,000-step process."

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, elected President of the United States for four terms, had been stricken with polio at the age of 39.

Persistence paid off for General Douglas MacArthur. After applying for admission to West Point twice, he applied a third time and was accepted. The rest is history.

In 1927 the head instructor of the John Murray Anderson Drama School, instructed student Lucille Ball, to "Try any other profession. Any other."

Buddy Holly was fired from the Decca record label in 1956 by Paul Cohen, Nashville "Artists and Repertoire Man." Cohen called Holly "the biggest no-talent I ever worked with."

Academy Award-winning writer, producer and director Woody Allen failed motion picture production at New York University (NYU) and City College of New York. He also flunked English at NYU.

Helen Keller, the famous blind author and speaker, said: "Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. Silver is purified in fire and so are we. It is in the most trying times that our real character is shaped and revealed."

THE UNIVERSE KNOWS�

by Jerry Clark

I'm about to make a statement that I think may shock some of you� In other words, it will sound a bit esoteric and I know that I don't get too esoteric in these Rhino Tips often� However, I am simply compelled to write this statement because it just came to me this morning as I was doing my morning "Think Drive" - which I call my "Round"� I simply wake up in the morning and take a drive around my city and simply THINK� During this mornings' "Round", I had a lot on my mind� Certain questions I had recently posed to myself, and certain decisions I had to make about various issues� One of the decisions was a very challenging one and I had a lot of emotions wrapped up in it� I simply wasn't sure of what I should do even though the answer was quite clear� Have you ever been in that space? Deep down inside you know what to do but you can't quite get yourself to act on that Deep "Inner Knowing"� Well, this decision I had to make was what I call a "Destiny Decision"� In other words, I was conscious of the fact that my decision would drastically impact my entire destiny� But something was communicating to me at a "Deep" level telling me what would be the more empowering decision and I was still "Stuck"� Have you ever been there? Well guess what? By the time I got home, I had realized that the Universe had notice my hesitancy on acting on the somewhat obvious and so it -- The Universe -- decided to Act on Me� Ok, Ok� I know without the specifics, you're pulling your hair (if you got some) saying what is this guy talking about and what does it has to do with me� Ok, here it goes� The Universe arranged itself in a way to allow for no other decision but the one I was hesitating to make happen� Did you get that? In other words, events had happened by the time I got back home that gave me no other choice but to act on what I knew I was supposed to act on all along� With this said, let me now give you the statement that I was compelled to write:

THE UNIVERSE IS CONSCIOUS�

That's right; I believe that the Universe is Conscious� Conscious of your thoughts, your desires, your aspirations, your fears and frustrations, your hopes and wishes� I believe that the Universe is Conscious of you as an individual, and of the part you are to play in the grand scheme of things� I believe that the Universe is Conscious of your Destiny and the path that is truly yours by Divine Right� Oh, Oh, Oh� Jerry "DRhino" Clark didn't just go down the Divine path did he? My dear friends� I've always been down that path; I just don't expose it in words too often� But don't worry, I'm not going to change the name of these tips to "The Divine Rhino Tips" or "Rhino Tips From Beyond" or anything like that� I just know that there are decisions you are faced with right now and you are struggling with figuring out what to do� The point that I'm making is that you already know what to do and whatever that is, is what you are supposed to do� Now don't confuse a Deep "Inner Knowing" with an Emotional Conscious Desire� And don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about because I know that you do even though you may be trying not to� It's ok� Just remember that when you're faced with a decision and you think you don't know what to do, you really do know what to do, and even when you still think you don't know what to do, the Universe Knows what you should do so just act on what the Universe Knows instead of what you know and what you always knew would still manifest� (Whew� I know you're going to read that sentence over again.)

Anyway, that's it for now� I just had to express this message to you�

Remember� THE UNIVERSE IS CONSCIOUS AND THE UNIVERSE KNOWS�

Until next time�

Go, go, go!!

Zig Ziglar on Personal Discipline (& Habits)

Personal discipline, when it becomes a way of life in our personal, family, and career lives, will enable us to do some incredible things. One of my favorite sayings is "When you discipline yourself to do the things you need to do when you need to do them, the day will come when you can do the things you want to do when you want to do them."

We need to understand the difference between discipline and punishment. Punishment is what you do to someone; discipline is what you do for someone. My friend and mentor Fred Smith points out that some people are very disciplined in one phase of their life and not in another. Pavarotti, for example, was a perfectionist in his music and yet totally unregulated in his eating habits. Elvis Presley's life points out the discrepancy between his discipline in his personal life and his creative life. Many noticed that he would sit at the piano, working for hours on his phrasing, going over and over it until it was exactly right. He was totally disciplined about his singing. Even some geniuses such as Ernest Hemingway, who lived a very dissolute and destructive life, said, "Every morning at eight o'clock I bite the nail."

Fred Smith goes on to say there are people with superior talent who will not submit to discipline and so are not known or recognized for their abilities. He met a young man who in high school could run so fast that he would run through the curves on the track. Coaches saw that he had world class speed and expected him to be an Olympian. He refused discipline, wanting to take the easy way of simply using his natural speed. He even lost his college scholarship. Laziness was his enemy.

Discipline is building good habits into reflexes which become part of our life. It's absolutely true that unless you can instill discipline upon yourself, you will never be able to lead others. Example is still the best teacher. As Fred says, "Discipline is building good habits into reflexes which become part of our life," and to this I would add that when it becomes a habit you will be able to control your impulses in each area of life and succeed in a balanced way.