The GAME is UP. Or is it?

The GAMEs are over! At least The Games of the XXXIII (33rd) Olympiad are over. But your GAME never ends. The race to the finish for the year is now on and in full swing. You likely closed the books on the first 7 months of the year and you now have choices for the remainder of the race.?

1. Are you going to let up and coast to the finish line, risking some competitor coming from behind?
2. Are you going to lose focus and stumble or miss a handoff as the American men did in the relay?
3. Will you keep up the pace and run through the finish line?
4. Will you, ever so slightly, let up in the last couple meters and miss setting a new record?
5. Will you dig down deep inside yourself and your company to accelerate toward the end?
6. Will you get pushed aside as in the steeplechase and come back to nearly win a medal?
7. Will you miss the opportunity of a lifetime and race while not feeling well?

The choice is yours. What is your GAME plan? Every one of the 10,000 athletes and their coaches had a plan for how they would run their race. They had contingency plans in case something went awry. It took hard work, courage, encouragement, discipline, practice, attitude, blessings to get to the tournament and finish—regardless if they won or lost in the end.

Think of GAME in four different contexts as an acronym.

1. Grow And Make Earnings
2. Guide to Achieve Major Expectations
3. Gather—Analyze—Make—Execute
4. Gather—Analyze/Agree/Adjust—Make/Measure—Execute

The American football season of 272 games starts on September 5 (https://operations.nfl.com/updates/the-game/2024-nfl-schedule-announced/). You can bet the players have been doing some training between seasons. The coaching staff has been gathering information by thoroughly researching the other teams and their coaches. They are analyzing what those teams do in a variety of situations. Then, they make their own plans to defeat each of the teams they will play. They write those plans down on laminated cards they carry into each game. And, they execute. In the Analysis phase, they get agreement with the other coaches and the players. While in the middle of the game, they measure everything and adjust the plan as needed, on the fly.

Sounds an awful like business day-to-day to me. Given how important your business is to you, your people, and their families, give it the same level of attention. It’s more than a GAME!