Words Don’t Teach – And All That Jazz!


Words are only symbols of something else.

OMG…I am not a team player…now what do I do?  Don’t I fit in? (NO…) Don’t I play well with others? (YES, I do!)  Should I just say… “I am a team player!” Will I be more accepted then?  Being a TEAM player is acknowledged by the best companies as The Way To Be.  Often you hear, or see, great presentations about the word TEAM and what those letters stand for.  Another one I’ve heard is “There is no I in T-E-A-M.”   This is a very old paradigm.  The word team teaches nothing…the Experience of Being on a team can teach you everything…I like to use the very ancient words from the HAGAKURI. “Learn one thing, learn a thousand.”

My favorite way to put a TEAM together would be to use the analogy of JAZZ.  Each single person is an I AM or I WILL kind of person.  A person who can hold his own, alone if necessary, yet allows others to play as well to the best of their ability.  If you watched and heard a Jazz quintet play together, you would hear each musician do his or her own “thing.” It becomes a thing of beauty, and it’s called JAZZ.  Each player can SOLO as well as join in the tune with accompaniment.  It’s a joy to  be in the presence of this type of TEAM.   The Piano man, the percussionist, the base, the horn, and the guitar – WOW!  Put […]