‘Nobody likes a bad loser’. These words rung in my ears through my childhood. Being a bad loser was one of those cardinal sins like not sharing with your siblings, taking more than your share of cake or not writing thank you letters to elderly aunts. I can remember shouting matches at the end of games of monopoly, with the board upended and me (or one of my brothers or sisters) storming out of the room.
I learnt over the years to be a good loser, particularly when I was doing something for the pleasure of doing it – a game of table tennis for example. Winning is the motivation but the play is the pleasure. But not all competitions are like that. Industry awards for example – one does not enter these for the pleasure of filling in the forms. There are of course consolations (‘finalist’) but winning is the only real reason for entering. We all put a brave face on it at the awards ceremony, but that moment when someone else gets the prize – however well deserved – is a bitter edged one. Just look at how the camera always cuts to the fixed smiles on the losers’ faces at the Oscars.
When you look at sportsmen and women – in tennis for example – bad losers are everywhere. Not only that, but the bad losers are often the best players. The drive to win is so strong that anything that frustrates that attracts rage, whether it is the umpire, their opponent or themselves. That relentless drive to succeed, to overcome whatever obstacles are put in the way is what allows many successful people to reach the top in their field, whether it is business, sport, or something else.
Of course, this is all dependent on how success is defined. Many sports and business people complain in later life that their focus was too narrow – that in concentrating only on a narrow set of criteria (winning gold medals, grand slams, their first million) they missed enjoying the rest of life – relationships, family, holidays and so on. But if they hadn’t defined their success with such narrow criteria, would they have got to the top? Probably not; and of course very few of us are able (or indeed would want) to get to the very pinnacle in our field. In any case, once you get to the top, there is only one way – down.
But even with more realistically defined criteria for success – a closer alignment of life and work in other words – the drive to succeed is important. Settling for second or third best is something that we all have to get used to, but only if we still yearn to achieve number one.
So please, at the next awards ceremony, try not to look at my face – unless I am winning that is!
March 23, 2017
