The Limits of Planning
July 27, 2015
Like many Michiganders, I took a summer vacation. And as I always do, I planned the trip thoroughly ... from flights to sights to accommodations to restaurants, but still leaving a few details to spontaneity and serendipity.
This summer's trip was to Newfoundland, where winter was very grudgingly giving up its grip. Everything about summer was slow in coming, and the thousands-of-years-in-the-making icebergs that had drifted down from Greenland were several weeks later than usual to disappear off Newfoundland's coast.
It was a trip that once again reminded me of the limits of planning.
Understand, I am an ardent advocate of planning. First, I am my mother's son who would often say that "Happiness is having a plan." Second, I'm so obsessed with planning that I committed to writing two decades ago what should happen when I die, which actuarial tables inform me should be even longer than two decades in the future.
But once again, all my planning for this vacation failed to provide its best moments. The best accommodation was the one I did not book in advance; the best restaurant was the one I had not heard of before we departed from Michigan; the best iceberg adventure was the one we had on our own after taking a wrong turn, not the commercial tours we took in groups.
Planning is a necessary part of leadership and it is essential for the success of any enterprise. But so is staying open to hunches, going with your gut and learning from mistakes. This often makes for the most memorable vacations as well as the most meaningful vocations.
A Backhanded Compliment
April 17, 2012
A year ago this month I listened to the attorney for another statewide high school athletic association pose this question: “Why is it that people quite readily accept inflexible age limitations over a broad spectrum of American life, including sports, but presuppose it is wrong for school sports?”
This attorney was in the middle of a controversy that more recently has visited the MHSAA: an overage student seeking relief from a universally applied maximum age rule. The speaker was perplexed and frustrated by the double standard.
Part of the reason for the double standard rests in the reality that people value the school sports experience so much more than other parts of life, including other sports experiences. Because they want the opportunity to play, they resort to litigation in an attempt to create the right to play.
Another part of the reason school sports is challenged on an issue on which other programs get a free pass is that school sports has a centralized authority, close to home. State high school associations are readily accessible targets, easier both to find and to fight with than most other entities with age restrictions.
And, of course, part of the reason for the double standard is the proximity of interscholastic athletics to academics – the former extracurricular, the latter curricular – the former a privilege for most teenagers, the latter a right of all citizens to age 26.
The reasons school sports are attacked on this issue while other entities are not are reasons really complimentary to school sports: the program is popular, accessible and connected to education. None of these features of school sports, or its age limitation, should change.