3 Reasons Why it’s Easier to Coach an Olympian than an Employee

I really love the 2012 Olympics.  What’s not to like? You get to look at elite athletes, nail biting competitions and the joys of winning.  It’s obvious the life of the Olympian is nothing but hard work, but I started thinking about how easy the coaches have it.  Think about it. How easy would your life as a manage be if:

1.    Passion was the norm.  Every employee would come in every day ready to hit the ground running.  Complain about hours or the drudgery of the tasks? Never! Elite athletes have to do the same thing, over and over and over for many more hours a day than a typical employee works and they can’t do it without an unlimited about of passion around what they do.

2.     Everyone was highly motivated to win. Imagine that your whole team was single minded focused on winning- all the time! Think how much time you’d save if you didn’t have to spend countless hours trying to set goals that would keep people challenged and motivated without making them feel defeated.  The only goal you need is to win!

3.     You can fire someone on the spot for drug or alcohol abuse.  Sure, if you work for a company that does random drug tests, maybe you can fire on the spot. But for most managers, we have to follow the letter of the law, document everything and hope they actually fail in their performance before you can do anything. 

Of course the most obvious disparity between Olympic coaching and managing employees has to be Mike Kryzewski. What is he even doing?  He has Lebron James, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Durant. Can you imagine how easy your job would be with these guys on your team? You’d be able to take off, go to London and watch the Olympics live!