Wooden's Wisdom | Leadership Resource Center

Issue 227 - The Next Level of Success


Wooden's Wisdom - Volume 5	Issue 227
Craig Impelman Speaking \| Championship Coaches \| Champion's Leadership Library Login
THE NEXT LEVEL OF SUCCESS Between 1966 and 1969, John Wooden's basketball teams at UCLA won 3 consecutive national championships. The most consecutive Men’s National Championships ever won in the history of college basketball by any other school was two. Coach’s teams continued, and by 1973 they had won seven consecutive national championships. They lost a total of five games in seven years and had three undefeated seasons. The second place record for most consecutive men’s championships is still two. Between 1973 and 2003, Southwest Airlines and Microsoft both delivered a return on investment that was more than 55 times greater than the average return in the stock market during that same period. Microsoft performed 118 times better than its industry competitors. Southwest Airlines performed 550 times better than the rest of the airline industry. John Wooden's Basketball Teams, Southwest Airlines and Microsoft achieved this next level of success by not adopting the motto: If it ain’t broke don’t fix it. The approach these three took would be better described as: If it’s working great, let’s make it better. After each season for twenty seven years, Coach Wooden researched a different area of basketball by reading all he could on the topic and surveying the most successful coaches in that discipline. He then determined the changes from which he could benefit. This research project continued after each of his first nine national championship seasons. He retired after his tenth. The next of level success people are not just willing to listen to new ideas, they are consistently and actively pursuing them. This doesn’t mean they don’t have a strong fundamental system and are constantly looking for the idea of the week change. It means they are consistently seeking new ideas and evaluating them to see if they have value. In today’s environment, technology has made researching new ideas much easier. Technology produces new methods and ideas at warp speed. In today’s environment, if we are not consistently pursuing new ideas, we have very little chance of sustaining success. Coach Wooden summed it up this way: It is what you learn after you know it all that counts. It has been said: The human mind is like a parachute. It doesn’t work unless it’s open. How’s your parachute working? What new ideas are you researching now? Yours in Coaching, Craig Impelman www.woodenswisdom.com Twitter: @woodenswisdom	COACH'S Favorite Poetry AND PROSE Some Favorite Thoughts from Coach Wooden's Poetry File (Part Two) “Look up and not down, Look forward and not back. Look out and not in. Lend a hand.” ******** “The more you love, the more you'll find That life is good and friends are kind For only What We Give Away Enriches us from Day to Day”. – Helen Steiner Rice ****** “Kindness is a language which the blind can see and the deaf can hear.” ******** Getting together is a Beginning Keeping together is Progress Working together is Success
For more information visit www.woodenswisdom.com