Tag Archives: FIFA World Cup

An Understanding

Sport in childhood. Association football, show...

Like many of you I’m glued to the World Cup. Despite some horrible officiating and the US’ exit over the weekend, I still think it’s the greatest sporting event on the planet.  It’s great to see that others around the last great nation to get on the football train are waking up to the world’s game.

As with any sports, soccer has its own language which may be a bit indecipherable to the new audience.  Touch line, bi-line, a clock that’s not really the clock – all of these things may take a bit of translation.  There’s also a term you may have heard in passing and it’s that one from which we get today’s business lesson. Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Consulting, Helpful Hints

The World Cup and Your Style

Wembley Stadium, London England

I love the World Cup.  Besides being a month-long celebration of the world’s most popular sport, it’s always great to watch any sport being contested at the highest levels (as an aside, this is also my favorite sports week since the U.S. Open happens on one of my favorite golf courses but more about that later in the week).

What’s really intriguing, especially for the millions of Americans who don’t watch soccer on a regular basis, is how you can really tell the different teams by their styles.  In fact, if there is anything really noticeable about the US team, aside from how good we’ve become, it is that I don’t think we have a real distinctive style which, in itself is our style.  In a way, that totally makes sense.  After all, we are a nation of immigrants playing a game invented elsewhere and we’re amalgamating the styles from all those nations.  But there are some business lessons here as well. Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Helpful Hints, Thinking Aloud

Character Guys

This was a big sports weekend.  Baseball playoffs going (let’s go Yankees), the NFL is heating up, NASCAR is halfway through its championship series of races, college football is getting interesting (Michigan wins it all in 2010 – you’ll see!), The President’s Cup was contested (and was closer than the results would have you think), the US qualified for The World Cup, and the NHL is back in action.  As I was watching almost all of the aforementioned sporting activity (now you know why I work in sports!), I got to thinking about one guy who is common to each of those teams.  Nope, not the fan, although we OUGHT to be front and center on each of them.  I have another guy in mind. Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Reality checks, Thinking Aloud