Truth Thursday
Twelve 9- and 10-year old boys tear up the soccer field each week. One of them is mine. He is my third child, my youngest, and he is a great all-around athlete. While I thought I had already paid my dues on the soccer fields and the basketball courts, with two older children who have participated in and enjoyed sports much of their lives but who have never played on high-performing teams, my youngest is on a soccer team that has just made a leap from "rec" to "classic" games, which means everything is now being played on a higher level.
This team has been playing together for five years already, and my son joined three years ago, a relative newcomer. Thankfully, he quickly became an integral part of the team, respected by his coaches and teammates alike for his skill on the field and his good sportsmanship. It's great that he loves the sport. But the most exciting thing about watching the games is seeing the team coalesce and function as a singular unit. While each boy on the team is a strong and enthusiastic player, this is a case where the whole is even stronger than the sum of its parts.
This is a team that works. The coaches have identified each player's strengths and help each one harness his assets and improve his skills in areas where he might be weak. They have taught the boys on-field strategy and given them training in their positions, so that they understand how each position is a cog in the larger machine. They have taught the boys how to work with each other, talk to each other during play, and rely on each other as they move the ball up and down the field.
As a result, this team functions like a well oiled machine. While they aren't going to win every game, they play as one unit; they all believe in the team and they all play hard and with each other to win. While they each are proud of their own special skills, they cheer each other on without being prompted and they all feel the thrill of their victories and the agony of their defeats together.
Being neither an athlete nor an sports spectator, I have never experienced this kind of teamwork before. It's a revelation to me – I had always assumed that a team relied on the individual strengths of its members … and it does. But, when the team is really working, it also relies on an invisible force field in which the teammates are inter-connected and need each other to make the play, pass the ball, make the goal.
I have been thinking a lot about this kind of teamwork this week in the wake of completing one of the most successful events I have planned in my professional life.
For the past year I have been planning and coordinating a fundraising event honoring the 20th anniversary of the associate director of the organization for which I have been working, on and off, for nearly 19 years. She is a friend, a colleague, and a mentor. It was an enormous pleasure to host an event in her honor.
She was also a wonderful honoree – with an enormous list of people who love her and who wanted to celebrate with her. As a result, we raised a great deal more money than we had anticipated, and we had a large crowd at the reception we held last week.
But what was most surprising for me was the pleasure of planning and executing this event with a colleague by my side.
I have run many fundraising events over my career. In some cases, including my very first dinner, I managed the entire thing, soup to nuts, on my own. I have also had the pleasure of working with other staff members on an event but where I remained the lead planner and the one ultimately responsible for everything.
In the case of my most recent event, however, while I was still the lead planner, I had a colleague by my side every step of the way. She and I took complete ownership of the event – together – and as a result, we each had our eyes on every moving part. I relied on her for certain tasks, and kept others for myself, but I never did anything without including her in the process. We were a team.
Now, usually when I get to the finish line of an event, especially when I have carried the burden of planning almost entirely on my own, I am so stressed out and overwhelmed and exhausted that I can't begin to enjoy the moment when it comes.
But this time, the teamwork paid off. While both my colleague and I were high on nervous energy the few days leading up to the event, we kept going over our to-do lists and wondering if we were missing anything, as everything seemed to be on track and ready for the big day.
And when that day arrived, we were there waiting for it. Our planning process paid off, and there was nary a detail out of place. The event ran smoothly, accomplished all its goals, and most importantly, I didn't feel like I would rather have been run over by a Mack truck the morning of the event rather than have to get through the day. I actually enjoyed myself at the event. Immensely.
I realize that it was team work that made running this event the pleasure that it was. It was that intangible force field that my colleague and I created, operating like a well-oiled machine, running the ball up and down the field and ultimately kicking it into the goal.
Score.
photo by lorenkerns via Flickr
Comments