BRIAN'S BLOG

In Superbow XLII, Ron Jaworski picked the Patriots to win by 20 points. Dan Marino had the AFC Champs winning by 2 TDs. Mike Golic, Chris Carter, Dan Dierdorf, Chris Collinsworth and many other ex-football players and professional prognosticators picked the Patriots to beat the Giants. It seems like the only people who didn’t pick the Patriots to win were the Giants themselves.

And that’s why they play the game!

Throughout history, underdogs have risen up to beat opponents so invincible, that one was sure the outcome was decided long before the event took place. Who didn’t think the Patriots were a mortal lock to win Superbowl XLII??

The 1966 Texas Western Men’s Basketball Team, the 1969 NY Jets and the 1980 U.S. Men’s Olympic Hockey Squad were three teams involved in the greatest upsets of all time. Victory came when almost everyone in attendance, and the millions of people watching on TV, thought the underdogs had absolutely no shot at drinking from the cup of champions. And yet, those teams proved the critics wrong, just as the Giants did last night.

There is a valuable lesson, for all entrepreneurial companies, in the effort put forth by Eli Manning and his teammates in this year’s Superbowl.

No matter what the experts say, no matter what the research tells you and no matter how much people think you will lose, play the game. On any given day, it just might be your moment in the sun.

BELIEVE IN YOURSELF. It’s the only way miracles can happen.

Brian Moran
President
Moran Media Group

In recognition of Superbowl XLII, I thought I would share some quotes from a very good book I read almost a decade ago.

The book is called Game Plans for Success: Winning Strategies for Business and Life from 10 Top NFL Head Coaches. If you like football, this is a fun read with some great advice. Below are some of the tidbits that I highlighted, circled or put stars around as I read the book. Ten years later, they are still as relevant as ever.

From Joe Gibbs:

• There is an old football saying: The will to win is meaningless without the will to prepare.

• With good preparation, you greatly reduce the margin for error.

• Unless you have a quantitative way of measuring performance, you are operating in a vacuum. You cannot compete that way.

• I believe that picking the right people is the single most important thing a coach or boss can do. If you pick sharp, highly motivated people, you are going to be successful.

From Mike Ditka:

• It is very important for the head of any organization, whether it is a football team, a major corporation, or a corner store, to have a clear idea of what his business stands for. If you cannot define what it is you want to be, then you’re not going to be much of anything.

• If you want to win, you find people who have that quality and put them on your team. In business, you find good people who relish the idea of being part of something successful, of helping to build it and see it grow. You recruit them and then run with them.

• You must spell out your program, describe what your goals are, what your methods are for reaching those goals, how you expect to attain them. And that’s it. In football, we call it a game plan. You MUST have one.

• Your people must not lose sight of why they are with you, what their roles within your organization are, and how they can contribute. When the distractions of building a resume, tracking a career path, or monitoring outside investments become more important than everyday performance, I think you have to step in and set valuable employees straight. Or risk losing them, or having to cut them.

From Dennis Green:

• If you are the boss, you must have the courage to make certain demands. If you shrug you shoulders, look the other way and say, “Oh well, that’s good enough,” you never will fix what’s wrong with the business. It doesn’t mean being a tyrant, just someone who understands his responsibility to each individual and the group as a whole.

From Bill Walsh:

• You have to be committed enough to your ideas to stick it out. The worst thing you can do is kill an idea before it has a chance to develop.

• In business, you can have a brilliant idea, but it has to be weighed against what is practical. An innovative plan has merit only if the workforce is able to carry it out. If you are the idea man, you can’t be so bull-headed that you refuse to listen to reason.

• One mistake I feel some coaching staffs make—and many company staffs as well—is that while they may plan, they don’t contingency plan. Before a plan being formulated is approved, someone needs to ask, “If this starts to fail, what will we do?” If a person has the courage to bring that possibility up, and the other people in a planning meeting are smart enough to listen, then a contingency plan can be developed.

From Tom Coughlin:

• The key to surviving is keeping faith in yourself. No matter how bleak things may appear, you have to maintain belief in what you are doing as head coach. Lose that and you lose everything.

The other coaches profiled included: George Seifert, Bud Grant, Norv Turner, Marty Schottenheimer and Chuck Noll. If you can find it online or in a bookstore, I highly recommend it as a good play book for your business.

Carpe Diem!

Brian Moran
President
Moran Media Group

As we celebrate the birth of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr (January 15, 1929), click on the following link to hear his I Have a Dream speech.

In addition, below are several of his famous quotes which I have referred to many times over the past two decades.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. - Martin Luther King

Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. – MLK Jr.

Happy birthday Dr. King.

My brother Mark recently sent me an article, written almost 28 years ago, by Pete Axthelm. Pete was a family friend and former sportswriter for Sports Illustrated and Newsweek.

In the 8/6/79 issue of Newsweek, Pete wrote a poignant article titled “Where Have All the Heroes Gone?” It described his visit to the Alamo that year, and how, in 1979, America had to look much harder to find heroes to compare to Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, William Travis and James Butler Bonham, to name just a few. It’s a great article which I will gladly email to anyone interested in reading it (brian@moranmediagroup.com).

After reading his article, I wondered who Pete would write about when searching for heroes in the 21st century. Clearly, he would have been deeply moved by the brave men and women who died on 9/11. He would also write about the selflessness of our armed forces fighting overseas (tying in his love of sports by writing about Pat Tillman). And, I’m sure he would have dedicated an entire article to Jason Dunham, a 24-year-old Corporal who fell on a grenade to save the lives of two other soldiers while fighting in Iraq in 2004.

After reading several articles on today’s heroes, something clicked in my head. I decided to do a search on “entrepreneur” + “heroes.” What I found was an amazing collection of stories on social entrepreneurs who are doing their part (and more) to make the world a better place to live.

In one article, I learned about the Skoll Foundation, which awards millions of dollars every year to support the efforts of such social entrepreneurs. Another article talked about Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and the founder of Grameen Bank. Yunus is working to solve the problems of poverty, hunger, and inequality through micro loans to poor people (mostly women) to help them launch businesses and lift their families out of poverty.

The short journey I took from reading Pete’s article to learning more about social entrepreneurs was enlightening. I’ve always felt that the term “hero” was over-used, but definitely agree that some distinction is necessary for people who are willing to commit their time, energy and resources to making the world a better place. I imagine that the people honored for their work don’t consider themselves heroes either. They see themselves as people working to make a difference because they have the resources, and because they can.

And to them, I say “thank you.”

Brian Moran
President
Moran Media Group
brian@moranmediagroup.com

When you get to the end of all the light you know and it’s time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: either you will be given something solid to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly. – Edward Teller

Carpe Diem!