Chak De: Fighting tooth and nail with a team spirit

Chak De: Fighting tooth and nail with a team spirit
15 Sep, 2007, 0316 hrs IST,Apurva Purohit,

Team games have long been seen as character building sports by the world. In Chak De, the allegorical reference to hockey has been used to talk about larger issues assailing our country and much has been written about that, from gender empowerment to the eternal battle between the attention paid to cricket versus all other sports.

For me the movie was, however, a reaffirmation of how sports can teach us some basic lessons in manage-ment, which help mould us as managers and corporate executives, for the better.

Among the many good things my alma mater, Stella Maris College in Chennai, believed in, a 360 degree effort to develop the mind, the soul and the body was key. As such, willingly or unwillingly all of us had to sign up for a sport the moment we entered the hallowed portals of the greatest women’s college in South India.

Serendipitously, I joined the hockey coaching sessions and much to everyone’s surprise, including mine, ended up getting selected as part of the college team. To everyone’s further surprise and shock my short sporting career graph rose sharply with me playing for the Madras University and the Tamil Nadu state team in the three years I spent at Stella.

What was even more surprising was that I ended up enjoying the sport very much! The early morning practices, the gut wrenching situps, the straps chafing into ankles, the navy blue bruises all over our legs, all paled into insignificance against the camaraderie of the team, the satisfying thwack of the ball into the opponent team’s goal post and the glory of various saves made with a courageous leap at the ball.

We were a motley group of girls from all parts of the state from sophisticated Chennai to not-so-sophisticated North Arcot and Selam. One of the first tournaments we played was at the All India National Women’s annual meet. Of course, we were no match for the strapping players from Punjab, the hardy Haryanvis, or the quicksilver teams of the North East . We lost the first two matches by a wide margin and it was rare for the ball to even cross into the opposite side of the field.

As the goalkeeper of the team, I decided that I was culpable for the losses and got into an extremely defeatist frame of mind. I was convinced I would be dropped from the next game and for the next match while the rest of the team went about the business of practicing and warming up, I stood around moping and made no attempts to get into the spirit whatsoever. The team was announced and I was indeed, dropped as the goal-keeper.

We, of course, lost that match too. My coach walked up to me later on and told me that she had decided to drop me, not because of the previous losses (according to her it was the team which had as a whole failed and no fault could be ascribed to any single individual) but I was dropped because she could not afford to have a goal keeper who had lost the desire to win and as such would not even attempt to play well It was not losing the game but my negativity and unwillingness to warm up and get going which had de-termined whether I would be part of the team or not.
Through my demeanor I had clearly indicated to her that in my mind I had already lost the game much be-fore stepping on the field .As coach her duty was to send on the field a team which was willing to at least try till the final whistle even though the odds were clearly stacked against us!

This happened nearly twenty years ago but I have never forgotten that lesson. The reality in life is that one has to keep trying ceaselessly and continuously in whatever one under takes. Wins and losses will be part of every endeavor but to give up at any stage, till the very end, cannot be an option. Especially as managers and executives, everyday there will be something that will not go our way but we have to keep pushing, striving, trying.

( The author is CEO of Radio City )