Being a rather competitive person, I’ve learned to carefully select the appropriate moment for winning…everyday will do nicely thank you. Now let me clarify that. I witnessed a spirited debate with clients recently when they talked about “winning”. For some, winning meant coming in first place, defeating opponents. For others, they looked at winning as everyone benefiting. I look at it both ways.

In our Big Fish sponsored dragon boat team, winning heats and races is easily identified as coming in first place. And then there’s the “sense” of winning just by cranking out our best effort…regardless of how we placed. We’ve celebrated 2nd place victories like lottery winners simply because we had out-performed a few long term rivals on our way up the competitive ladder.

A corporate dragon boat program we ran for a client last fall saw almost 400 novice paddlers fighting their way down a wavy course in several race heats. As the afternoon went on, the weather became nastier with a 5 degree wind chill…ya…Canadian eh. With so many paddlers we ran several heats of teams. By the last race of the day, the heats had been whittled down to a final few while the second and third-place winners headed for hot chocolate and cheered on the rest. The big insight from the day was the addictive affect of winning. Winning the earlier races inspired the teams to overcome weather and fatigue. They show up big for the last race!

Winning was contagious and they came back for more!

What a great metaphor for life at the office. Create opportunities for individuals and teams to define winning experiences, so they become self-motivated to create them every day!

Another recent dragon boat program saw a couple of paddlers overcome a life-time fear of boats and water…there they were, splashing and pulling with the rest! Now that’s inspiring! I think we win every time we face a fear. The fear is just a test to see how serious we are. We can create personal or team wins. Each time we step up to a challenge, we’re headed down the path of winning. My friend and colleague, Jody told me years ago that winning/success is not just a destination…”so long as we are in the process of creating what we want, we are successful…we are winning”. I still like that; and I add “I am winning when what I do ignites my spirit!”

…big shinny medals and trophies work very well too!