Wintonbury Hills Golf Course, Bloomfield, CT.

I just realized that I had not written for quite some time. It has to do with the fact that we are very close to the launch of some new and exciting systems (I would prefer not to reveal them publicly!) and also several things related to onboarding our first year students. I have been playing golf as always and thoroughly enjoying it. There is a lot one can learn by playing such a difficult game, and apply them both in personal and professional life.

Before I go any further, I want to say that I play golf because I love the game and I love to be outdoors for a stretch of time! Also, the outings that I have with my children are precious and priceless.

Golf is a hard game – Don’t let anyone tell you that it is an easy game to play. It takes most people a fair amount of time even to hit the ball half way decent. You need to get so many different things – your stance, the placement of the ball, keeping your head down, the swing, your mind, so on and so forth – right before you hit a shot that you can be proud of. As a CIO, I can relate to this and learn from it. Anything you do affects all those that you serve and trying to get everything lined up so that you feel satisfied with the outcome is pretty rare.

Lesson(s): The key components of a golf shot can be thought of as the equivalent of your team at work or the users. On a golf course, these things don’t always line up the way you want just the same way as how not all your team members or your user community line up with any given initiative! You constantly learn techniques to get that magical lining up, even if it is for a fleeting moment! Most importantly, you accept the fact that perfect lining up is a near impossibility and you look to get the most important ones to cooperate.

Frustrations & the Blame Game – Frankly, golfers leave a golf course disappointed more often than happy and one takes credit when he/she played well and the score is great but when things didn’t go well, one blames everyone and everything else. It is so easy to get frustrated while playing golf. Some get frustrated because others are playing better; others feel frustrated because they missed a birdie opportunity; some are upset either because the green is too fast or too slow! In addition, there are umpteen silly reasons to get frustrated – that a fellow player moved just when one is getting ready to putt or that the ground crew happens to mow the grass when we are about to hit the ball. Almost all of these are excuses for a bad execution of a shot or a putt!

There are parallels to these in our own work, right? When things go well we pat ourselves on our backs. But when things don’t go well, whether we say it out loud or not,  we think it is the user’s fault. The truth is always somewhere in between!

Lessons – Frustrations are normal course of business and many a times the result of avoidable mistakes. How one learns from mistakes and responds is far more important. You can blame everything else as much as you want, but how well you play and your score are the ones that count and they are in your own hands! Dwelling on past mistakes (missed putt or bad tee shot) almost always results in more frustrations and worst play. OK, did you lose a ball? Take a drop, move on and recover. Did you have a bad shot? You are not a Pro Golfer, so move on and recover.

Same way, at work, don’t let frustrations define you. As a leader, you are measured on how well you navigate past these frustrations and past mistakes! Learn from the past and apply them to do better in the future.

Commit to your shot – Depending on who you play with, you are likely to get a lot of free advice about any one of the many things you need to get right for a good tee shot or a putt. Or you may be the type who spends a lot of time watching YouTube videos or spending a lot of money to take golf lessons. The right mixture of all of these are essential for you to grow as a golfer. Someone you play with, that you trust and is a better golfer than you, can mentor you to become a better golfer. But you are the best judge of using these lessons and advice. Doing things prematurely or at the most inopportune time will result in disaster. Putting it all together and executing it is in your hands. You know whether this is a day that you are going to be slicing the ball all the time from the tee after a couple of holes, so line up accordingly for the next holes. Or that you think that the ball is going to break a certain way on the green (but you happen to be wrong), so just putt! If it didn’t slice the next time or didn’t break the way you imagined, you now know to make the next adjustment (and by the way, you may not get it right either!). The key here is “life long” learning and incremental improvement.

At work, we all benefit from having mentors and go to professional development, right? But having the right mix is essential for growth and improvement. Going to  too many seminars on leadership results generally in poor return on investment. No two day or no two projects that you will manage will be the same. Do the necessary research and once you have decided to move forward, commit to making it successful! Keeping on second guessing a decision doesn’t get us anywhere.

It is the case that you can take the word “golf” out from what I wrote above and replace it with a bunch of other choices and the same would apply.

OK, this is longer than I had intended. I have a few more lessons learned, but before I lose my audience, I should stop, get ready for my next round of golf. I want to get the same score or better that I got yesterday in the first nine holes (7 over par).