WHEN WE LEARN EARLY IN LIFE TO PLAY HARD AND FAIR

Pic.:Amrita Jeurkar 

This is my second Post, inspired by Satya Nadella. And, in this post, I wish to highlight on a very valuable insight he provides on leadership: The team spirit.

From whatever I have read about Nadella, particularly his own confessions in interviews, I have realized that Nadella has a very high sportsmanship spirit. It has come from his passion for playing cricket. He says, “I think playing cricket taught me more about working in teams and leadership that has stayed with me throughout my career.”

It is incredibly true. Anyone who learns to play a hard, competitive game – and play it fair – in the grounds out there, knows how to play every game in life in the same spirit. And, cricket demonstrates this truth so well… A strong team is one which plays as a team… A team’s success lies in bringing out to the fore the complementary strengths of each member of the team in the best form… The team’s captain draws his strength from it… Yes, a team which doesn’t play as a team, crashes. The leader is, always, as good as his team… even though it is believed to be the other way around…

Recently, in his farewell speech at Wankade stadium, Sachin Tendulkar had appealed to all of us that, in life, when young, we all should learn to play at least one competitive game… Because, as he put it, what we learn in the playing ground - playing a hard-and-fairly-fought match - we will never be able to learn anywhere else.

The mindset of every good sportsman is to ‘win’… For that, he learns to play hard, and play fair… And, the amazing thing about that mindset is that he knows one of the two players can only win and the other has to lose… So, when the inevitable happens, how he reacts to the outcome of the game indicates how good sportsman he is…

In life – as in games we play outside in the fields – we win some, we lose some…

A true sportsman goes home tucking more wins in his bag than losses… And, I think, that’s a very re-assuring truth about life…

And, yes, there is that ultimate hallmark of sportsmanship:

“Being magnanimous in your victory; being graceful in your defeat.”

Both, a good cricket-team and a good corporate-team, play their games guided by the same principle…

Satya  Nadella’s confession is an apt testimony to this.

GERALD C’CUNHA