How competitive are you?
After my recent Lightminded article “A Good Loser? – Nonsense, winning is everything!” I received a lot of comments. Mostly from people agreeing, but also a few nasty ones from people with bruised toes. Hopefully this article will give you all a better perspective of the winning game. It is actually a Treoc Times article for Platinum members only, but I have decided to share it with all my readers this time because I want you all to be WINNERS!
According to the recently released World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report 2011-2012, South Africa has improved its global ranking by four places to attain 50th position this year. We remain the highest-ranked country in sub-Saharan Africa and the second-placed among the BRICS [Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa] economies. Of course, there is always room for improvement. But this is the beauty of competitiveness – it creates room for improvement – not only for our country, but for our businesses, for us as individuals, and for our competitors.
In light of this, let’s consider what exactly it means to be competitive. Being “competitive” is often regarded as a negative trait. But in reality being “competitive” is absolutely crucial to achieving success, continuous improvement and ongoing innovation and progress.
An example will illustrate. If two boxers step into the ring and neither is particularly competitive – in other words, neither is particularly interested in winning – it will be a disappointing fight indeed. They will simply prance around the ring, throwing half-hearted punches and, in the end, no-one wins, especially the spectators.
If only one of the boxers is interested in winning, it will also be a disappointing fight, since the winner will not win by merit, but simply by default – and every person who has ever experienced the ecstasy of winning fair and square against a worthy opponent will know that there is no glory and no pleasure in winning by default.
A competitive boxer is one who has learned the skills and techniques, honed these to perfection, trained hard, pushed the boundaries, and finally .........................
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Hi Coert
Once again I have to disagree with you, the only person you will ever really compete against is yourself, nothing or no one else matters, once you look inward and connect with spirit miracles occur and you find your flow no need to concern yourself with what anyone else is doing for it makes no difference, it appears as though you are unable to let go of ego, which is always seeking to compete to keep itself alive.
This mentality when analysed is in essence a scarcity mentality in other words you need to defeat and deprive someone else in order to gain something, we live in an abundant Universe, where there is more than enough for everyone.
The so called competition you mentioned is underpinned by greed and has landed the world in the worst financial crisis mankind has ever seen and more of the same will not transform the situation, the only solution is spiritual transformation, solutions the ego has provided has failed us.
Kind Regards
Wayne Bruyns
Comment by saxonsec@mweb.co.za — September 30, 2011 @ 5:39 pm
Hi Coert
A healthy competing environment is essential for any type of business to excel in what they do. I have experienced it repeatedly in my life. The moment you are in competition with another business, you up your game and the easiest way is to give better service, advise and some specials, not necessarily lower prices. For the customers and yourself it is a massive win – win situation, as this stimulate interest in your business and I found that not only were my customers service jacked up, but my turnover also showed a healthy growth.
I am going to use this article as base for my next staff training session, thank you.
Comment by CJH — January 3, 2012 @ 1:00 pm
You are welcome!
Comment by Coert — January 3, 2012 @ 1:47 pm