Does It Matter?
A few years ago, a former manager and I had a conversation about success and how a person treats others en route to their success.
The conversation centered around Elon Musk, his tremendous success with Tesla and SpaceX and we had both read Ashlee Vance’s book, Tesla, SpaceX and the Quest for a Fantastic Future.
My manager and I found ourselves on opposite sides of the question: Does it matter how leaders treat people enroute to their success? After having read Ashlee’s book, I understood that while Elon was undeniably successful, he did not treat his employees well. My thinking was that, yes, it does matter how a leader treats their people and if Elon could be successful (when not treating his people well), how much more successful could he and his companies be, if he empowered his people, trusted them and worked well with them. My manager was on the other side of the fence and his thinking was that it was permissible for a leader to not treat people well while achieving success. It was one of those conversations where we very politely and respectfully agreed to disagree.
That conversation never left me and in 2020 I came across a CBC Sports article on Canadian figure skater, Keegan Messing, reflecting on Canadian and World Champion skater, Patrick Chan. According to the article, Patrick “…was an even better person that he was a skater.” Now that is saying something!
Keegan said, “I can definitely say that’s something I strive for every day….It doesn’t matter how I skate on the day of, but what I think matters every day in practice is how you treat your fellow skaters or how you approach any person on any day. The person you are off the ice is much, much more important that the person you are on ice. If you can better yourself every day off the ice, you know it’s got to do something on the ice.”
Keegan’s perspective resonated with me. I copied that section of the article into MS Word, printed it off, and hung it on my cubicle wall at work.
Keegan’s perspective was a lesson that was reinforced in 2022 from Darren LaCroix, the 2001 Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking when he stated, “Who you are off the stage is more important than who you are on the stage. What do people think of you offstage? That is often more important.”
This reminded me of my previous competition history. When Dave and I took our horses to Dressage shows, I always made sure to be polite and not grumpy in the barn. How hollow a victory would have been if I was crabby to the people who supported me. Rather, for me, it was a team effort.
When competing in speech contests, there were times of stress, but I never took it out on my coach or those who were helping me prepare. While I was the one who had to “deliver on the day of,” I had a team behind me supporting me and I treated them accordingly.
How about you; who are you “off the ice/stage”? What is people’s experience of you? Are there some adjustments you would like to make?
Recommended Resources
- Tesla, SpaceX and the Quest for a Fantastic Future by Ashlee Vance.
- The Great Traits of Champions by Mark Tewksbury and Debbie Muir
Monthly Challenge
- Reflect with a piece of paper: how do you treat the people around you enroute to any success you may be seeking?
- Reflect: who are you “on the ice/stage,” and who are you “off the ice/stage?”
- Reflect: what are people’s experiences of you? Are there some things you would like to change? Share this with a trusted committed partner and ask them to hold you accountable for any changes you would like to make.
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*Note: I was unable to locate the specific online CBC Sports article, but credit is due them for the quoted material.