Earler this year I was catching up with my colleague Terry Lyons on ideas big and small, and we turned to the ideas of what needs to be brought to the table when trying to take a spark of an idea and make it bloom in a time challenged world. Like the book I was reading by Ryan Holliday, folding these pages over to go back to mentally can help move opportunities big and small along, and make the storytelling narrative just that much easier.
We boiled it down to four C’s that need to almost always be checked. Mind you this was not some deep discussion…it just flowed from conversation, but because we were LISTENING to each other this came about.
Credibility
Context
Consistency
Contacts
I thought about these four C’s on this snowy Sunday for a number of reasons gleaned from recent reading and watching. The first was a quote pointed out by my colleague Abe Madkour in the recent documentary on John Elway. “I always believed that it takes just as long to be a nice guy as it does to be an asshole, and I chose to be a nice guy.”
He also talks about admitting being wrong and growing and adjusting as a leader. Leadership is not dictatorial. It is about finding the best path forward for all. Every military leader I have met, & I have had the honor to have met many, talk to that. Being selfless. Admitting but learning from mistakes and losses. Common human traits. No, “yeah but”…pretty straightforward.
The second time was in a story in The Athletic on Seahawks QB Sam Darnold. The piece by Rustin Dodd talks about how Darnold learned introspectively from his mistakes and re-thought how he approached his job as QB, not as a thrower but as a point guard.
“When I changed my thought process as a quarterback to kind of just getting the ball in my guys’ hands, that’s really where it unlocked for me.”
It might sound like Purdy was arguing for a change in style. But rather he was outlining a shift in mindset, a mental trick to simplify the position, an idea that can be expanded beyond the sports realm — the power of the point-guard mentality.
The argument: When people stop thinking of themselves as the hero in their personal narrative — and instead focus on how they can set up others — their own performance can benefit.
Those two quotes brought me back to the four C’s especially when there are so many startups being bandied about, bad ideas that somehow become a “thing” and good ideas that never seem to make it to the light of day. They all come down to these four C’s in many instances.
Credibility. Do you have the credibility, often with strangers, to get their attention event for a short period of time. Is your unwritten resume (which I have written about before) strong enough when they go and ask or google or search you to make it worthwhile for them. Is their baggage in your personal search to cause red flags?
Context. Why is this important to them and to the narrative ongoing today? Explain quickly to me the “why” and the “why now” for what I am doing. Did you do your homework going in so that you understand what I am doing and that this fits for me? If you are the QB of the company, are you making sure you are setting people up for success?
Consistency. Are you coming back hammering home the same goal over and over again or are you all over the place. In a time challenged world, focus is so key, especially if you can understand what my goals are going in and listen enough to adapt your approach to what makes sense.
Contacts. Lastly, we are a business of relationships. Who do you REALLY know, not are just Facebook or LinkedIn contacts, which can help us collectively address and issue, answer a need or create a discussion. Your old-fashioned rolodex, means a great deal, and it has to be authentic. It’s why we get out and about and meet people, you can’t forge relationships just through a handheld device or a piece of glass. Elway and Darnold, both learned, and continue to learn, to grow.
None of these are easy and sometimes they just aren’t fully addressable. But if you start here and go in with a curious problem-solving attitude, you may be able to bridge the holes by strengths in other areas. Regardless, the four C’s create a solid path for success, relationship building, and moving things along.
Bookmark them, maybe they will help simplify the most complex opportunities, sports or not.
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