Our 8 year old son Quinn and I were talking about cheating this weekend and out of the blue he asks me where does cheating start? I thought – whoaa – good question from the little man, I better not screw this one up. I said that cheating can first start when no one else is looking and can snowball into so much more.
Quinn is a by the books kind of kid and cheating is not something we are worried about with him. What we are hoping to instill is that how you manage yourself when no one else is looking is often the best gauge for how you will perform when everyone is watching.
The beauty of the collegiate student-athlete experience is that it presents so many wonderful opportunities to not only experience what it is like when all eyes are on you, but also what it is like to be accountable when no one else is watching.
College athletics instills a sense of accountability at all times, something that is often overlooked as a key trait of success. When it comes to working in the corporate world, most jobs will not have the same amount of accountability that students are used to. However, for student-athletes, they’ve been accountable for every hour of every day for the last four years.
Because of that, we are not surprised when we see lower attrition rates and more success for former college athletes when they enter the real world. Just look at the examples of Emily Hughes or Bryan Brighton. Both were high-level athletes (one an Olympian and one a college football player at Michigan State).
Today, Emily is on a fast track to management at Google, and Bryan is an International Director for the Merrill Corporation.
Skills = Success.
