Failing The Challenge
There are moments when a politician stands before a packed auditorium and shares a world view that brings every single person in the room to their feet.
Yet, when these same words are viewed later in the news, other people will cringe.
When we are close to the topic, the struggle to gain clarity at either or both edges can be a challenge.
This week, a message from a movement in which I was involved for many years met me at the opposite edge of the spectrum from where I previously stood.
As part of the “10 Year Challenge,” a viral social media campaign in which people share photos of themselves in 2009 and 2019 as a way to portray and discuss life changes, the International Olympic Committee posted this photo to their 2 million followers on Instagram. Take a look below:
While social media users played along and shared all kinds of change and progress from the past 10 years, this organization says, “Not us. We do not change.”
I can see how posting an image like this was an effort to impress followers with the Olympics Games’ self-portrayal of durability and longevity. Or perhaps, it was an attempt at being cheeky.
But particularly between 2009 and 2019, this message reaches me at the Olympic movement’s intersection of pain, arrogance, and self-indulgence.
During that decade, great cities walked away from opportunities to host an Olympic Games because they knew it was a bad deal.
Innovative and agile new media groups and fan-friendly sports movements gladly took advantage of the Olympic movement’s protective measures of remaining stagnant. These enterprises have created wildly popular events that continue to grow and adjust with changing technology and consumer sports consumption preferences.
Then there was the International Olympic Committee’s United States affiliate which stood by as decorated and honorable Olympians endured horrific abuse.
It has been a bad 10 years for this entity that associates itself with athletic excellence. They only make it worse when they suggest that nothing has changed — that nothing should change — and that they are above change.
I sometimes ask myself why I write these posts every Sunday. The best answer I have come up with is:
Because humans ARE change.
With gratitude,
-Joe
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Hi, I’m Joe, the owner of 5 With Joe Performance Coaching. My clients are leaders, organizations, and teams who utilize my Olympic Gold Medal performance strategies and 40 years of navigating whitewater river rapids to streamline decision making and actions when engaged in complicated river currents of business and life.
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