Actions Not Words

Over the past two years I've gone through a lot in regards to my professional career.  I was thinking about it this morning on my walk with my dog and how much the craziness of two winters ago completely changed my life.  I won't go into details but it seemed like national news and I was completely engulfed in it.  It was all a bad movie with me being a co-star.

I'm just going to go over all the things that I've learned over the course of the last two years.

Too many times in our lives we "talk the talk" but we rarely "walk the walk." What I mean by this is, most people preach about doing the right thing but rarely will they do the it especially in a group setting.  Rarely will others come before the individual when times get rough or a tough decision needs to made.  It's simply self-preservation.

Most people will never admit that they are looking out for themselves but that has become the norm.  You would hope that the "leader" in whatever organization you belong to looks out for everyone rather than themselves. If you find that out that "your leader" operates like this, it might be a good idea to try and find a good organization.

As a leader, it is your job to make tough decisions.  It's really hard to make the right decision when the decision process is rushed.  Leaders shouldn't be making decisions that are rushed because they can't properly gather all the facts.  I'm not saying that ever decision should take two weeks to resolve but all the facts need to be gathered to make an informative decision.

When dealing with bad decision making of high school or college students, the number one goal for administrators should be to educate.  I'm certainly not saying that there shouldn't be consequences (suspensions) for their actions but administrators need to make sure that something is learned even if it's not the person that made the wrong decision. Below is a statement made by Oklahoma State after the Marcus Smart and Texas Tech fan altercation this past basketball season:

Oklahoma State coach Travis Ford, whose voice cracked with emotion as he answered questions for some 20 minutes, called it a "serious mistake" but a learning experience for a 19-year-old.

"I know Marcus Smart. I know his family. I know what he stands for, and I know he made a mistake. But that doesn't keep me from loving Marcus Smart, supporting him, loving him. Part of our job is to help him learn from this so it doesn't happen again."

The above incident is a perfect example of how social media has created many firestorms over incidents like this.  Social media can be a great thing but with how quickly word travels now, incidents like this or the one that I was a part of, there tends to be an overreaction from people that aren't truly "in the know."  I'm not downplaying what happened or what happens in the future but opinions are thrown out there by the media and/or people that don't know or will never know the facts.

Last but certainly not least, this point hits home the most.  If you know someone that has gone through a tough situation, contact them. It means a lot.  Even if you don't know what to say, say something.  The people in the situation will appreciate it greatly.  Over time people that go through something life changing will learn who their friends truly are.  I can honestly say that I learned a lot about a lot of different people.  I also distanced myself from people after they distanced themselves from me.

I truly feel that I'm in a much better place now after what went down two winters ago.  I have a beautiful wife, a couple of great jobs, and a wonderful dog that greets me every time I get home.