In life, some people have great vision, some have limited vision. In leadership, vision is the ability to see further. Great leaders have this ability. The best leaders have the ability to inspire those they lead to run towards that vision without the ability to see the final destination. It is not limited.
Miracle on Ice
We generally kick off our team meetings at work with a leadership video. It could be something as simple as a speech, leadership lecture, inspirational story, or a movie clip. This past Friday, we led a meeting off with a clip from the movie Miracle.
It’s the story of the 1980 United States Men’s Olympic Hockey Team and their victory over Russia on their path to a gold medal. At that time, professional athletes could not compete in the Olympics. The U.S. was dependent on college hockey players, inferior talent to the Russians whose lineup was essentially built from “professional” players. They had dominated the world of hockey for many years.
Limited Vision
There is a SMALL scene in the movie that tells a BIG story. The legendary head coach of the U.S. Men’s Hockey Team was Herb Brooks. Following a poor showing at a game leading up to the Olympics, Brooks decided to fix some issues on the spot.
As the game was winding down, a frustrated Brooks looks at his assistant coach and says, “get a whistle.” The assistant looks back at him with unmistakable doubt. At the end of the game, the assistant meets the players as they attempted to leave the ice. He half-heartedly says, “Hold up…hold up, gotta get back on the ice.” One of the players responds with, “What for?” The assistant says, “We will find out in a minute won’t we, let’s go.”
Brooks is awaiting them in the center of the ice. He gives them a good old-fashioned talking to and tells them to, “Get on the line.” He unleashes his frustration on the team for their selfish play as they go from goal line to goal line. He reminds them that, “The name on the front is a hell of a lot more important than the one on the back.”
Each time the players line back up on the goal line, Coach Brooks looks at the assistant coach and says, “again.” With each blow of the whistle, the coach becomes more and more reluctant. The last time Brooks asks, the assistant hesitates even more, “Herb…” Finally, they had a breakthrough. One player stepped up and gave Brooks what he wanted to hear, that HE played for the United States of America.
The rest is history. They went on to beat the Russians in one of the greatest upsets in sports history. Here are two core messages that I saw for the first time last week:
The Follower
Previously, my biggest takeaway from the clip was the message that Coach Brooks sent about the Name on the Front of the Jersey. While it was extremely impactful, this time I took away another message. It was the unspoken message from the Assistant Coach. He didn’t trust the vision. His vision was limited.
Whether it was doubting the request to get his whistle, whether it was half-heartedly asking the team to get back on the ice, or whether it was reluctantly blowing the whistle time and time again, the assistant coach didn’t trust the vision. The message he sent was loud and clear.
We are all leaders, but most of us report to another leader. That leader has a vision for where they want to go and they want to take us with them. While we may not always see the destination, we must place great trust in their vision. If not, we may need to find a new leader.
The Leader
Coach Brooks had a vision for the team. That vision was to be Olympic gold medalists. This included what most felt like was an impossible task of beating the Russians along the way. The assistant coach and the players may have desired the same thing as coach, but they couldn’t see it. He could.
Brooks saw that vision clear as day. More importantly he saw the path to get there. He knew that it would take that moment, that night on the ice, where the team surrendered to his strategy to get to the desired destination. The point in which they realized that the team was greater than the individual.
One of the most discouraging and frustrating things in leadership is when we feel like our team doesn’t get the vision. Brooks probably felt that way that evening. Yet, he was relentless in his pursuit to get them to see the vision. One that most would only see that night when the National Anthem played as they stood at the top of the podium.
Conclusion
In life, we are greatly dependent on our vision to see things. Good vision helps us see where we are going, to get us to our desired destination. If we have poor vision, it requires assistance. It may require placing our trust in glasses, contact lenses, or corrective procedures to be able to see fully.
The same goes for leadership, having good vision is a necessity. Just like our physical vision, sometimes we are limited. We need help to see where we are going to get to our destination. As a follower, we may not always see the vision. It requires a lens of trust to see it.
As the leader, it’s our role to relentlessly pursue that vision. In the face of doubt, half-hearted buy-in, and reluctancy…continue to press forward towards the vision. It will be worth its weight in gold!
Clip from the Miracle on Ice Movie.