Everything I know about business I learned playing golf

by Alan Fine

Business, like golf, is a mental exercise that tests your character and causes you to feel both joy and pain. And the dilemmas you face in golf parallel the challenges you encounter in business every day.

For example, in golf, why do some people freeze when they have to play over water? What drives someone to make a mess of a relatively simple shot at a crucial stage in a match? Why can a person hit the ball well on a practice round but never play as well in competition as we know he or she can? 

As we venture into business, the questions may change, but the themes are the same. People freeze when they confront a challenge that daunts them; they mess up a relatively simple project at the crucial stage of development; they know their presentation by heart, but they stumble when it’s time to present to that big client.

Fortunately, you can apply the lessons you learn on the golf course to the business world for enhanced productivity and increased profits. Below are a few of the golf lessons that can guide you to business success.

Clarify your goals
Why do you play golf? To win? To have fun? To make business contacts? For social reasons? For the challenge? Most people play the game with some sort of goal in mind. Likewise, you need to approach your business endeavors with a goal as well. To make your goals useful, you need to make them SMART – that is, Specific, Meaningful, Achievable, Relevant and Time-phased.

Specific: Goals need to be specific so that we can easily identify what they are and where they will lead us. Simply saying, “I want to be a better golfer,” or “I want to increase sales,” is so vague that no matter what you do, you’ll never feel as if you’re doing well enough.

Meaningful: As you get specific with your goals, make them meaningful for your unique situation. When your goals are meaningful, you’ll want to take action and achieve them. You’ll have a burning desire to push forward, despite any challenges you may encounter.

Achievable: Next, make the goal achievable so it’s not boring or threatening. After all, if you think the goal is too difficult for your skill level, it will intimidate you and cause worry, anxiety and fear.

Relevant: When a goal is not meaningful to you, then it becomes hard to muster the energy necessary to go after it. Goals imposed by other people, or those that you adopt because you have seen other people be successful with them, usually don’t have enough relevance to excite you.

Time-phased: When do you want to achieve your goals by? The time-phase you set is an important factor in determining how achievable and relevant the goal is to you.

Using this SMART approach, a well-stated goal would be: “I want to be able to hit nine out of 10 golf shots with a full-body turn by the end of the month. I can do six at the moment, and I practice three times a week,” or “I want a 50 percent sales increase from this quarter to the next. I will make five additional sales calls per week. Last quarter I made three additional sales calls per week and increased sales by 40 percent.”

Define your reality
When you’re on the golf course, you rely on your senses to gather information about your surroundings so you can make your next move. You see the ball at your feet. You observe the shape of the hole, the position of the bunkers, and the proximity of the trees. You feel the way your body moves before, during and after a shot. You feel the wind and wonder how it will affect your stroke. At the same time, you hear the swish of the club as it swings through the air, and you hear the voices of other people. All these external stimuli give you important information about the current play.

In addition, you have an internal world that you see, hear and feel. You have a set of beliefs based on your expectations of future events and on memories of past events when you were in a similar situation. And just as the external stimuli you experience affects your interpretation of any given situation, the internal stimuli also shape your perception and therefore your reaction.

In business, you have external and internal stimuli that shape your reality and determine your success. External factors include your customers’ needs, the market conditions, economic factors and your employees’ effort. Your internal stimuli are your own beliefs regarding your skill level and your past experiences.

To define your business reality adequately, you need to take all the factors into consideration and then determine how they affect one another. Too many business people focus only on one or two stimuli and never completely define their business’ reality, resulting in missed opportunities for growth. Generally speaking, the better you analyze all the factors and define your reality, the more effective your company’s performance will be.

Don’t try too hard
No one has ever mastered golf in a single season. And, you’ll find the game particularly frustrating if you approach it with stiff and inflexible expectations. In fact, the harder you try to meet unrealistic expectations, the worse you usually do.

For example, consider what happens when you’re on the practice range with a driver, trying to hit the ball as far as you can – let’s say 250 yards. Although you try very hard to hit the ball a long way, your best effort barely crosses the 200-yard marker. 

With only six balls left, you give up. You decide to relax and just enjoy hitting them. You’re not trying to hit them a long way – you’re simply having fun. What happens? Your muscles relax, you coordinate your swing, and your ball sails past the 250-yard marker.

“That’s it!” you say. “I’ve got it. I’ll do that again.” As soon as you say that, you’re right back where you started. Your mental state is back in the trying-too-hard mode, your muscles tighten and your ability to create clubhead speed is lost.

When working on a tough business issue, trying too hard to solve the problem will cause you to falter. In your effort of trying, you lose focus on the true issue and get off track. Rather than try harder, you need to keep your mind focused on the elements of the issue you can control. When you maintain such focused attention, you relax your mental state and can see the issue more clearly, resulting in your ability to devise effective solutions.

Focus on the present
Every golf stroke creates a result. Sometimes the ball goes in the hole; sometimes it lands in the water. But rather then focusing on the result they currently have, most golfers tend to focus on either the result they would have preferred (which is merely wishful thinking) or on beating themselves up for being so stupid (which is painful). Smart golfers, on the other hand, learn from every swing. If they aren’t getting the results they want, they find the reason. They change their setup, their grip, their swing or other routine until they get the results they desire.

Observe the results you obtain in your business. Are they favorable? If not, what are you doing to change them? Einstein once said that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is a mark of insanity. Analyze each result, whether it relates to sales volume or client satisfaction, and determine if it meets your desired outcome. Make adjustments as necessary and track your progress. The more willing you are to learn from past results, the more apt you are to ultimately succeed.

Play to win
Business, like golf, is a game. And whether you’re playing golf or growing your business, you have a potential champion inside you waiting to get out. By applying these golf course lessons to your business today, you can enhance your company’s performance, enjoy the challenges you face each day, and maximize your game on and off the course.

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