“We’re  Gonna Win”

“We’re  Gonna Win” 150 150 Ben Coker

“We’re  Gonna Win”

Remember Cassius Clay/Mohammed Ali?

He always said “I am the Greatest” – well before he won the heavyweight boxing championship. No-one challenged this statement, no-one else said “No you’re not, I am” – at least, not at first . . .

So he won – it was inevitable.

There was never any doubt in his mind that something ‘might go wrong’, and no thoughts like ‘it’s not the best conditions for us’ or ‘someone else is better than me right now’ that you and I hear from so many sports people from time to time.

You and I can see it in their eyes when they’re interviewed before the event and we just know they aren’t going to win.

This was never the case with Ali – until someone came along who had an even stronger conviction that he was going knock him on the floor of the ring.

And there are some top business people who think the same way; there’s no concept of ‘failure’ when they start a new project. The same is true of some political and military leaders – the prospect of not succeeding doesn’t exist.

The trouble is, that unless you and I operate in a close knit team who think the same way and are, like a sports team, pursuing the same goals, things can start to go wrong when ‘other people’ get involved as is often necessary if our projects are going to come to fruition.

The thing is . . .

‘Other people’ often don’t think the same way as you and I. Even though they may ‘sign up’ to whatever you and I are proposing, they often don’t fully come on board.

Often within an organization, you and I hear that some people are not given the ‘full story’, they don’t know what the end result of their involvement is envisaged to be, they don’t know – usually because someone thinks that “they don’t need to know” – what the real goal is for the project in hand.

Very often you and I need ‘other people’ (outside our ‘family’ team) to help in our endeavor, because we and our core team can’t do everything and the success of the project needs more hands to the pump.

Time and time again I’ve heard people being told “just focus on your bit and everything will work out fine”; and sometimes even “you don’t need to know why you’re doing this, just get on with it”.

They are thus denied knowledge of the ultimate goal and the opportunity to buy into it. They are denied the right to embrace the goal, to understand the purpose of the endeavor, and to be ‘part’ of the outcome.

But what if people (usually ‘employers’) who need others to ensure the success of their enterprise, did, as you and I would, fully share the ‘why’ and fully share the vision they have of the end result?

What if they empowered their ‘people’ with the reason and the vision and thus gave them the ability to think positively, know where they were going and know that together, even as a really large ‘team’ pursuing the same goal, they would be invincible?

There are a lot of great companies and corporations around the world who do this, as there are a lot of ‘smaller’ operations who do likewise.

It’s not a cast iron guarantee of success because the more people who are involved the more likely it is for the ‘nay-sayers’ to sneak in. But it’s the best shot you and I and anyone else involved in any sort of enterprise can have.

And as individuals (like Mohammed Ali) you and I must do the same.

Know our reasons, know our goals, know our targets, know that we can ‘win’.

That’s ‘know’ not ‘think’ remember?

There’s a great song by Bryan Adams on the album ‘18 til’ I die’ – “We’re gonna win”.

Try it out if ever you have one of those days when your ‘dark side’ is whining on about things going wrong and trying to persuade you that you’re wasting your time.

And when that happens as you and I are well aware, suppress that sneaky negativity with clear thoughts and affirmations like “I am the greatest”, “I am the winner” and “I am (now) (whatever the purpose of my quest happens to be)”.

Go on, just say it . . .