Decisions….Decisions… 

 

It seems that from the time you approach High School the questions start coming, “What are you going to be when you grow up?” or “Are you going to follow in your parent’s footsteps?” Giving you the sense that if you DON’T have your life planned out by the time you hit your final year of High School, then you are pretty much DOOMED to fail!

Why the pressure? Why the necessity? I believe that parents and friends don’t actually think this acutely and equate a lack of planning in a teen as potential DOOM, but there are those who feel there needs to be some type of a discussion about it. This is why the questions are asked and often teens rebel and go against the wishes of their parents, seeking out that journey to “find” out what they truly want to be!

That is absolutely, perfectly NORMAL!

Discovering who you are is a part of life. Some “get it” and know exactly what they want, where some “don’t” and take much longer to figure out the details. A prime example of this happens each year when I speak to the first year class whom have enrolled in the Professional Golf Management Course at a local College here in Ontario. Their class is “Intro to Golf” and a variety of speakers come in and talk about a variety of subjects.

I always ask the class these 3 questions:

1. How many of you would like to be a Head Golf Professional some day? – to which about 1/3 of the class puts up their hands (out of approx. 35 kids)
2. How many of you would like to work in the Golf Business after graduation but not necessarily as a professional? – to which about 1/4 of the remaining kids put up their hands.
3. How many of you have NO CLUE on what you want to do upon graduation from this course? – This always gets the highest amount of hands raised.

In my first post “Golf Professional 2.0 Redux” I wrote about Golf being an alluring sport, dangling thoughts of fame, notoriety and recognition as a reason people enter the profession only to find that it is a business and not all about putting the ball in the cup. So I believe this is why there is a vastly different # of graduates from the PGM programs than those who start them.

However deciding on EXACTLY what you want to be this early is somewhat of a “generational” thing. Let me explain: I once listened to a speaker explain that when I was entering the workforce 25 years ago, my resume showed one maybe two employers typically in the same genre of work. This would indicate to potential employers that this person was dedicated, loyal and a team player. Today the resume you will receive from the starting “the career” search might include five, six or seven different types of work ranging in all type of genres. They call this “EXPERIENCE”.

In fact I read a statistic that my son (who is 9) will be applying for jobs for occupations that haven’t been invented yet!

Will the business  evolve, grow and learn to change in order to capture the BEST professionals who will be vying to take our place in the positions we have helped create? The golf professional in 2037 will be doing things above and beyond our wildest dreams?  Think about the driver, or the golf ball and how much they have changed in 25 years. What changes are  going to be made in the profession? How can the environment known as the Golf Business improve? Will there be a mentoring / leadership / coaching component offered. How do we engage those to follow in our footsteps? These questions are the ones we should be asking ourselves.

If you can’t figure it out,  the answers aren’t right there, or maybe you think that you need a boost on how to create those ideas for growing, drop me a line at:  Doug@focusgolfgroup.com , follow me @FocusGolfGroup on twitter, or ask to be friends on Facebook.

– Doug

A Networking, Social, Relationship Building, Motivational, Influential PGA of Canada Golf Professional, Coach, Instructor, Mentor and lastly a really great DAD! Doug Lawrie is the CIO (Chief Influencing Officer) of the Focus Golf Group, and has been a proud member of the PGA of Canada for 20 years.