Winning and losing are opposites.  We have all experienced both and if asked which one we prefer, I’m sure most, if not all, people would choose winning.

Winning cannot be guaranteed especially in a highly competitive environment.  When competing against the best in the world it is not even possible to guarantee losing, as the outcome always depends on multiple factors.

I’ve seen it all before

Through my role as facilitator I have witnessed the differences between winning and losing in every way possible.

I have seen the impact of being prepared before starting out.

I have seen the impact of thinking on one’s feet during a challenge and making critical changes en-route to the finish line.

I have seen the impact winning has on motivation and confidence.

It has become clear to me that it is import to approach any challenge with winning in mind.

So often I hear people refer to the power of learning from mistakes, learning from successes, learning from the mistakes of others and even learning from the successes of others but sadly many of these “Sayers” are stuck in the realm of insanity.

One big contributor to losing would be the idea that losing is inevitable.  When losing should be expected.  Based on the principle of working with the end in mind, expecting to lose will result in a loser approach.

Now what if losing becomes a part of culture

There are clearly teams that have a winning culture so the opposite must also be true.

Revisiting The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, we are reminded of the habit of “Thinking Win Win”.  If thoughts impact behaviour, then thinking anything to do with winning should be good.  Is it all good though?  I don’t think so when it comes to one of the opposites of thinking win win and that is thinking win lose.

Sticking my neck out quite far, I’m of the opinion that thinking win lose has and continues to become the operating culture within Team South Africa.  When we push-in in traffic or in other forms of queues we are practicing win lose.  When we speed we are practicing win lose.  When we defraud, when we are corrupt, when we slacken-off, when we come into the office in a bad mood, others are “losing”.

Consider the losing aspect on the other when:

• You want to keep your power base and don’t share your knowledge.
• You close sales without considering the impact on your delivery team.
• You receive a letter of thanks from a customer without sharing it with your team.
• You mindlessly blind copy people in our your mails because it makes you feel better.
• You interrupt your productivity in areas where people are waiting on you for a quick cigarette.

Our thinking impacts our behaviour

I encourage everyone who reads this blog to have as many conversations with as many people as possible to promote a culture of thinking win win.  Notice that the first win (your win remains intact).  The second aspect of win lose is the important thing to change – so that the other party also wins.

This call goes out to:

• Parents
• Teachers
• Politicians
• Business leaders
• Heads of departments
• Religious leaders
• SOE’s
• Political parties
• World leaders
• Motivational speakers
• Comedians
• Journalists and every other person alive who impacts outcomes of any firm or nature.

By Louis Gerke

Development Facilitator – The Ripple Effect

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