Preface

Charlie

Two of the highlights of my thirty-three years as a sportscaster at NBC-TV were the 1988 Seoul Olympics and the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

In Seoul, I covered all the excitement of track and field. This was Flo Jo’s Games. She took home three gold medals and a silver medal. It was also the Olympics of Ben Johnson’s world record of 9.79 seconds in the 100 meters that lasted only forty-eight hours before he was disqualified for steroids, all live, in prime time.

In Barcelona, it was the historic comeback of Pablo Morales in swimming, plus the diving venue featuring the most beautiful setting in Olympic history, with the entire city of Barcelona as the backdrop.

After this, naturally I was looking forward to my assignments at the 1996 Games in Atlanta. That is, until I received the phone call informing me I would be announcing rowing, canoeing, and kayaking.

Rowing, canoeing, and kayaking are watched only by rowers, canoers, kayakers, and their families, and they’re on television at seven in the morning. The venue was Lake Lanier, an hour’s drive outside Atlanta. I wouldn’t even be at the Olympics.

Let’s face it, when I arrived there a week before the Games I wasn’t the happiest camper in the world, but then my broadcast partner, Bob Ernst, head crew coach at the University of Washington, and I started interviewing Olympic rowers from all over the world.

Not knowing the sport, I started with basic questions such as “What if it’s raining?” The answer was “That’s outside my boat.” I asked, “What if the wind blows you off course?” Answer: “That’s outside my boat.” “What if you break an oar?” Same response: “That’s outside my boat.”

Finally I began to understand that these Olympic rowers were interested only in what they could control, to try to win an Olympic medal, and that was what was going on inside their boat. Then it slowly began to dawn on me that my assignment was “outside my boat.” Dick Ebersol, then president of NBC Sports, hadn’t called and asked me what I would like to cover; he had simply given me this venue. What I did with it was up to me.

Once I realized this, I was able to let the assignment go; it was “outside my boat.” What was inside my boat, what I could control, was how Bob Ernst and I broadcast rowing.

From that point on, this became by far the best Olympics of my life. Bob and I had a great time together, from sharing doughnuts in the lobby of the Holiday Inn at 5 A.M. to our gourmet dinners across the street at Popeyes Famous Fried Chicken. From the friendly people of Gainesville, Georgia, without question the Hospitality Capital of the World, to broadcasting rowing, canoeing, and kayaking, truly pure Olympic sports.

I learned a great lesson from these Olympic rowers: let go of what you can’t control, it really is “outside your boat.” When I returned from the Atlanta Olympics, one of the first persons I shared this concept with was Kim Doren, my coauthor.

Kim

My first thought when Charlie told me his “That’s outside my boat” experience was how much I needed to take this lesson to heart. I had just begun a planned yearlong sabbatical from corporate life and would soon be heading off to tour Europe and Central Asia. I was immediately reminded how much is outside my control when I’m traveling, particularly when my plans included a trek through Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Perhaps that’s why I enjoy travel—it’s always an unpredictable, exciting adventure and a constant challenge.

From my years in the golf industry I came up with the acronym “par” to remind me of what I can control: my performance, my attitude, and my response. In other words, focus on what I can control—“par”—and stop worrying and wasting energy on things I have no power to control. It sounds so easy in the abstract. Of course, what is simple in theory is not necessarily simple in practice. In fact, I’m not sure I have a much better chance of shooting “par” in life than I do on a golf course!

Charlie and I realized that knowing what to do is definitely easier that knowing how to do it. That’s Outside My Boat uses the power of the personal example to demonstrate the variety of ways business executives, scholars, artists, and athletes have succeeded by focusing on what they decide is important and letting go of what they can’t control. Their various perspectives and experiences can help you discover how to apply “That’s outside my boat” to your life and to your business. We hope that their stories will empower, inspire, and enlighten you. They certainly did that for us.