By Tom Grandy
I live in Kentucky and I am an avid University of Kentucky basketball fan! However, I used to live in Durham, NC home of the Duke Blue Devils. Back in the mid-seventies Duke had five high school All-Americans on the team which during those years was quite unusual. Each was an outstanding individual performer at the high school level but they never made the transition to becoming an outstanding university basketball team.
Fast forward about 40 years. The University of Kentucky under John Calipari routinely has multiple McDonalds All-Americans on the team. As of this writing the Wildcats have five freshman McDonald’s All-Americans on the floor this year. They have already signed six All-Americans (number one recruiting class for 2017-2018) on the roster for next year.
Lots of teams have great players but great teams have found a way to teach highly skilled individual players how to become unselfish in order to create a “winning team”. John Calipari seems to have mastered that art.
When it comes to creating a great team within the trades industry the same principles apply. Individual talent is great and needed but if all the players are not willing to sacrifice individual glory for the sake of the team … there will not be a winning team.
Year after year I have watched very talented players on U of K’s team die to being the star they were in high school for the sake of the team. Even though they may not have been the star they hoped to be in college many of those unselfish players have been drafted into the pros where they have had outstanding careers.
There is something about being a team player that benefits all the members. Are you a team player or do you simply want to be the star performer? The real star performers are those that take time to help and encourage their teammates. The Three Musketeers had it right, “one for all and all for one”.
