focus

(a repost from September 10, 2008)

Colonel McCoy, Commanding Officer 7th Marines, addresses a classroom full of Marines and CrossFit trainers on leadership. Below is an excerpt from his speech taken from crossfit.com


"To paraphrase: Your actions speak so loudly that your clients, your Marines, etc - they can’t hear what you’re saying.

We have a quote that we like to use from Pericles, 500 BC. 2500 years ago and it just shows you that human nature doesn’t change.

Of every 100 men in battle, 10 shouldn't even be there. 80 are nothing but targets. 9 are the real fighters and they make the battle. But 1 is a warrior and he brings the others home.

Our job as leaders and as trainers isn’t to develop those 9 as much, they’re already out there – you want to enable them. But our job, really, at the end of the day is to make those 80 fight like those 9, perform like those 9. And that comes through creating belief in themselves and in each other and holding themselves to a standard, accountable and transparent, to something bigger than themselves. And that’s what this [CrossFit] has done. This is the untapped potential. Those of us who don’t do that, in either the leadership or fitness industry, I will just say 'you will be the spectators to the slaughter of your people'. And that is the bottom line for us in combat, we can talk a good game but if were not doing it on the field every day and hoarding ourselves and inoculating ourselves to the stresses of combat, which is what CrossFit will do for you, then you WILL be spectators to the slaughter."

Loving people is messy... because we are messy. I am messy. But if we can all grasp unto this hope that we are made for something greater than ourselves and we have unimaginable potential.... that is people power.

Here's an excerpt from a New York Times interview with Tachi Yamada, M.D., president of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Health Program. Interview was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant.

"It always comes down to people. One of the things I’ve learned is that you can’t go into an organization, fire everybody and bring in everybody you want. You have to work with the people you have. I’ve gone into different organizations in completely different walks of life several times, and you walk into the organization and you realize that some people are very good, some people are average and some people are not so good. And if I spend my time focusing on everything that’s bad, I’ll get nothing done.

Or I could say, what are really the best things about the people I have? What makes them great, and how can I really improve them one or two notches? And if I spend my time on that, then I’ll have a great organization. Everybody has their good points. Everybody has their bad points. If you can bring out the best in everybody, then you can have a great organization. If you bring out the worst in everybody, you’re going to have a bad organization."

Excellent interview, by the way. Check out the whole thing here.

Good reminders to love people. Not being nice to people, necessarily, but hoping for and bringing out the best in people. And being humble enough to realize that I don't necessarily know what the best is for me, and I don't know what the best is for others. It's tricky, it's messy, it's hard. I love it.