When Success Isn’t Seen to the Outside World
Based on the Internet and the readily accessible world of data, results have never mattered more. Add to that the instant gratification needs of so many, progress normally has to be so brilliantly seen and experienced to actually be considered a success.
But what happens if success is growth but not seen as a total win?
If you know me, you know that I love Nebraska football. The last 15 to 20 years have been an experiment of great frustration in tantalizing mediocrity. This two-decade run comes after some of the best college football in the history of the game. A 50-year span of no losing seasons, nine-win years annually, bowl games as a regularity, national awardees commonplace running through the program, and national championships. Now Nebraska hasn't been to a bowl game since 2016 because we haven't even had a winning record to qualify. That's the longest streak in all of Big Boy college football. And I still go to the games, wear that red N on my chest, and believe.
Last year, after another dreadful multiyear run, Nebraska hired a new football coach. He just finished his first year. A 5-7 record and another losing season. Another failure, correct?
That all depends on how you define success. Sometimes success should be defined as improvement in intangibles rather than just outcomes.
Interestingly, one of the villains of the Nebraska football world qualified for the College Football Playoff. Four years ago, Texas hired a new football coach. I listened to him this afternoon as he discussed the journey of the last three-plus years. He didn't talk about wins and losses. He talked about improvements in culture. In accountability. In intangibles that lead to stronger relationships in the locker room and amongst the team. In clarity of purpose for both coaches and players. In year one it was establishing the benchmarks. In year two it was finding the people who would buy into them. In year three it was beginning to understand and utilize them. And now in year four Texas went 12-1 and is a participant in the College Football Playoff.
It sounded like a similar story to what I'm experiencing in Nebraska after this first year.
The Texas football coach also articulated that there were a lot of unhappy people in the first and second years. And he said something also critically important. The things that he witnessed that the public could not see are what gave him great comfort in where they were going during those first two-plus years. There was growth. There would be more opportunity. But those things couldn't be seen strictly through a win-loss record or on certain Saturdays when the football team didn't win.
I think we all fall into these patterns. We look for the only thing that seems to count. The end result. And yet we shouldn't expect people to go from zero to 60 without some growing pains, failures, and less-than-perfect outcomes.
I'm hopeful for my Nebraska Cornhuskers. Maybe more now than I have been in the last 15 or 20 years. Here's hoping that this understanding of a long-term change can also be applied to many other parts of my life, and yours. That growth isn't about the ultimate end result but the systemic improvement from both public and nonpublic measurable metrics that can lead down the road to an ultimate triumph.
