What a tremendous amount of responses I’ve had, in regards to my last post! Thank you to all that responded. I love reading over suggestions, as well as researching hot button topics and issues. One common response is this idea that the Seahawks were just lucky. I wanted to take a look at this, and really examine whether it was true. I am not contesting the fact that luck occurred during the game, but to contribute three touchdowns only to luck, seems to negate how the Seahawks kept themselves in the game–eventually leading to a win.
Jim Collins, a Stanford business professor, is the author of Great by Choice. In this book, he discusses his study of luck. Collins studied whether luck played a major role in great companies and teams, alongside good companies and teams under bad circumstances. Richard Wiseman also discusses a ten year study in which he examined people who seemed to be luckier than others, in his book The Luck Factor.
Collins argues that luck is not what causes the success of companies and teams, which have made the jump from good or great. Each company or team he studied (great and average companies), experienced around the same amount of lucky events. The companies that were great (Microsoft under Gates, Apple when Jobs return, 3M, IBM, UCLA basketball under Wooden) saw the greatest return on their luck, when their competition squandered it. Collins’ study concluded that the great companies and teams have certain principles in place that assist in achieving the best return on the luck they received.
I believe that the Seahawks have established themselves as a great team, in having led the NFL in total defense, two years in a row. Only one other team has ever accomplished this–in ’84 and ’85– Chicago Bears. Another uncommon event is that they will be returning to the Super Bowl for the second year in a row. They made a great return on the luck they received, by scoring a touchdown after the recovered on side kick. The Green Bay Packers squandered (in the words of Jim Collins), by failing to score touchdowns on the Seahawks’ five turnovers. If they had done so, the game would have been well out of reach for a comeback. The Seahawks also gave themselves the best chance for a turnaround, by maintaining the principles they had in place, which I discussed in my previous article.
In a Richard Wiseman study, he examined which characteristics helped people to be luckier than others. What he found, was astonishing. His ten year research concluded that people who are more relaxed, positive, don’t get down on themselves when they experience bad luck, and constantly look for a way to make things positive, increase the number of lucky events in their lives. Those in his study that were closed minded, had low trust levels, were more tense and really got down when they experienced bad luck, tended to not be as successful, and appeared to acquire more bad luck in their lives.
The Seahawks, led by their coach Pete Carroll, were always positive during the game. Even after the turn overs the coaches consoled the players, and did not yell or scream at them. In comparison, when Green Bay lost the onside kick, the coaches were yelling at Brandon Bostick in front of cameras for all viewers to see. He completely shut down after that, and I argue that if he had a chance, would not be able to make a positive play in the game. Wilson and Kearse were not down, but had complete focus on a positive outcome.
The other factor that worked in the Seahawks’ favor is that the Green Bay defense seemed to switch their thinking, after the interception at the five minute mark. The guys were hugging and celebrating on the side line as though the game were over. Normally, it would have been over, had the players and coaches not been trained by Pete Carroll and their sports psychologist, on how to remain focused, stay positive, compete, and play hard to the very end. By the time Seattle got the ball back, the Packers defense mentally checked out and it showed. There were no leaders or coaches that called a time out and rallied the troops to focus. By the time Seattle recovered the onside kick, Green Bay’s defense had no chance. I credit Pete Carroll for taking the time to have people work with their players on these situations, so they are never mentally absent. This was not a lucky event for the Seahawks, but a coaching blunder by Green Bay. It showed that the Packers never worked on their mental game with their coach or a sports psychologist.
Let’s look at all the luck factors, compared to factors that the Seahawks controlled. The recovered on side kick had a 21% chance for success, so the fact we got it was lucky. The two point conversion play was a lucky play. The things that were not lucky were the defense holding Green Bay to 19 points before they started to come back, Lynch having a great game, the coaching and players staying positive despite the circumstances, injured guys playing for each other causing everyone else on the team to sell out, the Green Bay defense checking out mentally after the interception with 5 minutes left and Wilson trusting Kearse to make the touchdown winning catch. As you can see, there were far more things that the Seahawks did to increase their chance of luck, and they got a great return on the luck when it happened.
To simply state that the team was just lucky is a big mistake. We lose the lessons that we can learn not only from the Seahawks but all great teams and companies. What can we do to give ourselves the highest percent to be lucky? How can we position ourselves to take advantage of luck when it comes our way? The failure to ask these questions is a lost opportunity to teach these lessons to our teams, companies, children and ourselves. I hope the Green Bay Packers can learn from these lessons and not blame one person for their loss (and also stop bad mouthing the Seahawks). To attribute everything to the other team just being lucky will not allow you and your team, or organization to grow.
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