Lessons from the Olympics

 Michael Phelps a Metaphor for Life…             and how organizations avoid the same fate

   Michael Phelps, with 19 Olympic medals—the most ever one by a single competitor—is arguably the greatest Olympian ever.  Phelps’ Olympic swimming career spans three Olympics, 12 years of his 27 year life. 

   Sadly, the London Games have shown that while still a world-class athlete, Phelps isn’t the swimmer who dazzled viewers in Beijing 4 years ago.  His finish in the butterfly Tuesday of this week exposed him as vulnerable in the event he had won at two previous games.  He led for most of the race but was edged out for the gold by South African Chad le Close by just 0.05 seconds.

   At just 27 years old, Phelps is retiring from competition; there are younger swimmers who are now in the limelight.  In an event like swimming, the speed, strength and endurance required to win favors the young.

   Michael Phelps, retiring from competition, will soon focus on coaching the next generation.  This is the way of life for individuals: The young have the energy for competition--speed and strength—the older have the perspective and wisdom earned by experience. 

  While this dynamic plays out with individuals, organizations avoid the loss of competitive edge by a constant process of reinvigoration and reinvention.  Reinvigorated with young, eager, upwardly mobile talent and reinvented by dynamically responding to changes in the marketplace.  Organizations can, by these processes, be (unlike Olympic athletes) perpetually competitive.   

   But, only if there is an organizational culture that promotes reinvigoration and reinvention: Providing an environment that offers continuous opportunities to grow and learn through frequent changes in roles, responsibilities and projects as well as the strategic vision to change as change dictates. Reinvigoration is the realm of the young and eager; reinvention is the realm of the experienced and wise.

   LaserShip is invigorating.  Our offices pulsate with the energy provided by the many young and eager-for-opportunity individuals who have found their way to LaserShip.  As with our past—and deeply ingrained in our culture—many will quickly rise to leadership roles.  25 years ago, the energy came from drivers recruited into dispatch roles.  Today, the entry level jobs are often freight coordinators who rise to lead, supervise and manage processes and people.  They bring with them the energy to perform, the eagerness to learn and the yearning to belong and advance, thus reinvigorating us from the bottom up.

  LaserShip is inventing.  We continually reinvent ourselves:  Seeing the future of delivery and moving in that direction; spotting new technologies and introducing them to our systems; creating new processes and incorporating them into our procedures; searching our improvements and adapting them to our purposes.

   Michael Phelps has a future; it is just not in competitive swimming.  That is the way of life. 

   LaserShip has a future; it is in the business we have created and recreated.  That is the way of organizations that have created a self-perpetuating mechanism of reinvigoration and reinvention.      

Update: Michael Phelps displayed his professionalism, competitiveness, dedication and sportsmanship by winning additional in the 2012 Olympics making him the greatest Olympic champion of all time.