Pursue Greater Personal Significance

 

On July 1^st and again on July 8^th, I present virtual keynotes to groups based in Toronto and in Singapore. One speech is 20 minutes long and the other is 15 minutes long. One session includes a 10-minute Q&A.

The theme of these talks will be Pursuing Greater Significance.  My objective is to encourage attendees to commit and achieve the goals assigned to their teams, while helping them to recognize that the skills and behaviors they will need to exhibit in achieving the team goals will serve each of them very well as they pursue other personal goals. If I am successful in helping the attendees define what greater significance means to each of them, and helping them see the link to team performance, then I will be successful. What would greater personal significance mean to you?

Pat Riley: The Winner Within

During the speech, I refer to a book from basketball executive, former player, and former coach Pat Riley.  Riley coached the NBA Los Angeles Lakers, New York Knicks, and Miami Heat. I recently read his 1994 book The Winner Within: A Life Plan for Team Players.

Riley has some tremendous stories to tell and amazing experiences. However, I found the book difficult to follow, because during long passages continuity was lost as the text veered from game 7 in the NBA finals, to a speech the author gave to some business executives, to thoughts on the Japanese car industry, to a touching story about a Vietnam veteran.  All of the content is good, but the abrupt switches made it difficult for me as a reader to organize and process the messages. Structure matters.

Team Goals

However, late in the book, on page 211 of the 272 pages in the copy I was reading, Riley offers a quote from a friend of his and I thought the quote was gold. I’ll use it in my speech.  The friend is identified as Dr. Lew Richardson.  He doesn’t seem to have a book, but if he did I would find it. The Richardson quote reads as;

“Teams break when they don’t have a goal, or the goals aren’t clearly defined by the leaders. Goals have to be firmly entrenched, otherwise, people begin to operate as independent entrepreneurs in a system that really needs cooperative work.”

Gold. This applies to basketball, and to any team sport.  It applies to any work team.  I note that this does not exclude individuality and individual achievement, but does assert that team goals need to be clear and team members need to direct energy and attention to accomplishing them. I will add that the goals, progress, and helpful behaviors require frequent reminders with the team.

Personal Significance

Within the speech, I will speak to my pursuit of significance in various roles including some in Toastmasters International, my past volunteer work with L’Arche, and my current mentorship work with newcomers to Saint John.

I plan to connect each attendee’s personal ambitions and search for significance, to the work and skills required for my audiences to meet their defined team goals.

If successful, I can further develop this new material and theme.