Legacy: What the All Blacks Can Teach Us About the Business of Life

by James Kerr

The teams that will thrive in this VUCA world are those who act quickly and decisively to seize competitive advantage; adjusting and readjusting along the way. You either adapt, or you lose;

Pondering the strategic objective – to create ‘an environment . . . that would stimulate the players and make them want to take part in it’

‘and to do that we used storytelling.

‘The emotional glue of any culture – religion, nation or team – is its sense of identity and purpose,’ says Owen Eastwood. What we identify with are the ‘things we recognize as important to ourselves – to our deepest values . . . this kind of meaning has the emotional power to shape behaviour’.

‘The goal was never to beat the competition or to make a lot of money. It was to do the greatest thing possible, or even a little greater.’

They take responsibility for adding to the legacy. They also play for All Blacks yet to be born. Fatherhood is an important theme within the All Blacks; this handing down of knowledge across the generations, this stewardship of the future. ‘The reason your children turn out right is because their parents are right,’ says Sean Fitzpatrick. ‘The naughty little bastards are the ones where the parents are generally . . . it’s a generalization, but are the ones that have been badly directed.’ ‘What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.’ Ubuntu. A dent in the universe. In the All Blacks, in parenthood, in business, in life, it’s about leaving the jersey in a better place. And it takes character. ˜ ‘Never let the music die,’ Jock Hobbs told the team at the start of the Rugby World Cup. Everyone in the room knew about his cancer, that it was