Lesson on unity from little league
It was opening day for Little League baseball in my neighborhood this past weekend.
Kids wearing crisp red, blue and yellow uniforms met at freshly groomed ball fields where umpires and parents had gathered to watch them play. This familiar scene played out across the country where there is a predictable pattern to what happens next. Two teams compete with one another over a specific number of innings. Umpires officiate, parents cheer and a winner is determined based on which team scored more runs.
But once in a while something unusual and important happens. If one of the teams shows up without enough players to field a team, they will forfeit the game. This kind of thing never happens in Major League Baseball for obvious reasons, but in Little League you never know who might have an orthodontist appointment, SAT prep or a visit with grandparents that takes priority over the game.
Then the “winning” team will loan players to their opponent so that all the kids can play a scrimmage. It’s not an official game but a scrimmage has all the necessary elements: a field, an umpire and designated playing time. There are parents and coaches and, most importantly, kids who have prepared and want to play.
A scrimmage like this, even between arch rivals, is a clear reminder to everyone that any competition between two teams is secondary to the common commitment to baseball.
In our increasingly divided world, we would all benefit from more opportunities to scrimmage so that our US versus THEM identities could be suspended to remind us of our greater common goals.
So often I see professionals who become mired in narrow rivalries inside their own organizations. These divides might be related to different business mandates (sales versus marketing) or regional location (New York versus Houston). The gaps might be related to a corporate merger that causes otherwise intelligent professionals to prioritize legacy identities over revenue. Other divisions might be related to factors of identity including age, gender, race, ethnicity or nationality. No matter what cause of the US versus THEM divide, the results have a negative impact on productivity, innovation and collaboration.
Professionals would benefit from having an occasional scrimmage – an opportunity to remind everyone that sales, marketing, New York and Houston are all part of the same team. Without a clear WE mindset, any advances will be short-lived and rivalries will grow.
SO HOW CAN A BUSINESS HAVE A SCRIMMAGE?
Here are 3 ways any leader can foster a WE-mindset.
Job Shadow – create short term job shadowing opportunities for employees in different departments to share what they do with other colleagues. These encounters can be as short as an hour. The goal is to raise awareness and build understanding.
Temporary Job Exchange – while exchanging jobs may take more time to organize, observing a half-day or full day of another person’s work will provide deep insights and appreciation. When professionals understand the specific needs of another department, they often can make slight adjustments to better meet those needs. These types of small adjustments can make the entire organization more productive.
Permanent Job Exchange – this action is extreme, to be sure, but in some cases it can have big benefits. When I worked at Honda Motor Company there was a tradition of transferring assembly line workers to the Human Relations department which at first confused me. But I learned that the HR department’s largest constituency was assembly line workers, so it made good sense to have a person on the HR team with first-hand knowledge of that specific type of work.
Scrimmage opportunities can be as simple as a business trip to another office or as complex as a planned year-long WE-building Initiative. No matter how big or small, these valuable opportunities remind us that when we successfully collaborate across US versus THEM differences, it’s a homerun for everyone.
Want to talk about WE-building in your organization?
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