Dear Friends,
As a former teacher and a coach, there were often times in my
career when I would stop what I was doing in the classroom or on the basketball
court, look straight into the eyes of a student or player and utter the words,
“Attitude Check.” Those were two of the most often used words in my
teaching and coaching vocabulary. I don’t know if they were always uttered in
the form of a question or an exclamation, but they always had the same
intent-to help a student or a player change his/her attitude. I always sought
to immediately treat ‘attitude disease’ when I discovered it, because I knew
how contagious it could be.
Attitude is the difference maker for me when evaluating students,
players, or staff members. If I had to choose between attitude or aptitude, I
would choose attitude every time.
If you were a boss and you were interviewing two people who had
similar skill sets, experience, backgrounds, and one of them had a great
attitude and the other had a poor attitude, your decision would be
easy-attitude would be the difference maker every time.
Attitude was always on the top of my list as a teacher, coach or
pastor when assessing the potential of a student, player, or staff member. No
matter how competent and experienced a person may be, he or she will never be a
good fit without a good attitude.
In his book The Winner Within, highly successful NBA coach
Pat Riley, who is now the general manager of the Miami Heat basketball
team, writes about the ‘disease of me.’ He says of team members who have it:
“They develop an overpowering belief in their own importance. Their actions
virtually shout the claim, 'I'm the one.'” Riley asserts that the disease
always will have the same inevitable result: “the defeat of us.”
The late John Wooden who was considered by many to be the most
successful basketball coach of all time said to one of his players, “You are
not the best player on the team, but the team plays the best when you are on
it.” He was simply saying I choose attitude over aptitude. Attitude is
the difference maker.
Whether in athletics, or the classroom, or in the professional
world, always choose attitude over aptitude. It is not the only thing you need
to look for, but it should be the main thing.
What better verses to sum up the quality we should be looking
for as teachers, coaches, employers, and yes, parents, than the Apostle Paul's
words found in Philippians 2:5-8 where he writes, "In your relationships
with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: who, being in
very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his
own advantage; Rather, He made himself nothing by taking the very nature of
a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as
a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death-even death on a
cross."
Yours in faith and friendship,
Tom
P.S. “You’ve got to have great athletes to win….You can’t win
without good athletes, but you can lose with them.” Talent is never enough
without attitude.” Lou Holtz, former outstanding football coach. The 17
Indisputable Laws of Teamwork, John Maxwell, p. 105
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