So I am finally bucking up the courage to start my own website/blog/personal expression around business strategy, leadership, high performance and story telling.
I grew up with dreams of making the NBA. For a skinny kid from New Zealand this is not a regular dream. I represented New Zealand and basketball and volleyball. I think sports is an amazing way to make better citizens.
Sport teaches you hard work, taking feedback, goal setting, communication, dealing with adversity, setbacks, victory, defeat, thinking abstractly, learning to adjust. It is a great way to learn about yourself.
I went on to get a scholarship to Brown University where I was trying to live that dream of making the NBA. Unfortunately, I got injured and that dream disappeared in the fracture of an ankle. Now I am just randonly tall.
After graduating and two surgeries later I ended up back in New Zealand trying to restart my life. In the US there was value in my degree, in New Zealand I was considered a dumb athlete with a degree they didn’t understand. I was starting from scratch.
I thought about what I enjoyed and what I wanted to get into. Rather than something sensible, I decided to try something equally difficult. I went to film school and tried to get into the film industry.
I worked on big sets, made some of my own short films, gave a helping hand to many friends that helped me, worked at Weta Digital, directed part of a feature film but I was working on other people’s sets rather than making my own films so I thought I would go back to school and get an MBA to start making the big bucks to then pay for the films.
The MBA was great, it just gave me different ways to look at problems. There is always many ways to approach issues. Lots of time the issue is not the problem in front of you but the emotional resistance from the people making the decisions.
With my fresh and shiny MBA I thought I would be an ideal candidate to start to take over the corporate world. I ran smack bang into insecurity, fear, and a lack of direction.
I kept hearing all these stuff about high performing teams but not seeing any of the processes to create them. I kept hearing about leadership without anyone acting like leaders. It was so much lip service for managers who wanted to feel special at the expense of creating value for the organisation and developing/promoting/encouraging the work force to be amazing.
I think people can be amazing if we let them. I think managers should be renamed helpers. If they were measured on how much better they made their staff rather than some artibary KPI then they would create more value and enjoyment at work. And a happy worker is a more productive worker.
This is not to say that work should all be sunshine and lollipops. Just as with sports at the beginning, work requires hard work, taking feedback, goal setting, communication, dealing with adversity, setbacks, victory, defeat, thinking abstractly, learning to adjust. It is a great way to learn about yourself.
I am going to use frameworks and strategies from Sports, specifically basketball, film making around story telling, and business to promote a healthier work environment, getting the best out of your employees, focusing on what matters, and just trying to make the world a better place.
Enjoy.
Luke
Luke McMeeken-Ruscoe 