Cracking the Code: Unity creates success
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Last week Lynnda and I attended a national church congress in Indianapolis, Indiana. It was held in Lucas Oil Stadium where the Indianapolis Colts play professional football. There were over 60,000 attendees from all over the U.S. and countries around the world. The Indianapolis Convention Center was also fully utilized. The exhibit hall and breakout rooms, some with the capacity of over 5,000 people, were located there.
Attendees were all ages, races and ethnicity. It was an enthusiastic crowd with many young people. A Christian rock band opened on Friday night. Young people rushed the stage like any other concert. We've heard young people are rejecting organized religion. Not true in Indianapolis. There were also hundreds of ordained men and women. Most in their 20s and 30s.
The purpose of the congress was to revive our personal spirituality with the focus on Jesus Christ. We hear about bad priests, disunity and disagreement in the church. Even in our little country church people disagree and have conflicts on secular things like the music, whose job something is or how a church dinner should be done. There was unity in Indianapolis. It is difficult to get 60,000 people to agree on anything. We all agreed on the reason we were there, the love of Jesus Christ. With that as a common basis we can move forward and work together to resolve other conflicts. One speaker said, "We love everyone without qualification."
Recently, I shared the story of our 2021 State Championship game. The key to success was unity in the focus on the dream to be State Champions. When facing adversity at the end of the second half, team members could have chosen to blame the players who committed the fouls or point fingers at each other for allowing our opponent to score. Instead the leaders chose to refocus the team on the dream and the work ahead.
At Shale Crescent USA we are doing the difficult work of following up on the global prospects from SelectUSA using emails, text messages and Zoom calls. This is challenging as many Europeans take the entire month of July as "holiday." We are also having meetings with the states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and other organizations we work with. People, states and organizations all have different objectives and ways to do things. We are unified on the main objective; to create high wage jobs in the Shale Crescent USA Region. Working together we will achieve the objective.
These examples show success comes from unity not by focusing on differences that divide. We hear from many sources we are a divided country. I'm shocked. Actually, I'm not. The U.S. is a melting pot with over 300 million people. We have many differences that can divide us. It takes leadership to unite such a diverse group. These examples show unity is possible. Will we find a servant leader who cares enough to find the commonality to unite us as a nation?
In business, families, communities and other organizations it takes leadership to unify people with a common goal they all agree to and will work to achieve. Common goals are essential for a successful team in athletics, business or any organization, even a nation.
Lynnda and I left Indianapolis on Saturday and headed to Toledo, Ohio. Our daughter was spending the weekend with her former college roommate, now a surgeon in Toledo. When we crossed into Ohio near Defiance there was a massive windfarm on farmland. All the windmills were turning. Lynnda quickly did some research and learned the Ford Motor Company built the windfarm to power one of their Ohio plants.
On Sunday in Toledo Dannielle and I did a run together. She teaches outdoor school in Maryland. Every sixth-grader in the county spends a week at outdoor school. They come Monday and sleep in cabins. The students learn about nature. They take hikes during the day and at night. Conservation work gets them wet and dirty. They have fun. Students learn first-hand about the environment. This type of hands-on program could be beneficial for all grade school students. It creates unity. I told Dannielle, "Do you realize today we have the cleanest environment of my life." She responded, "That's true here in the USA. It's not true in the developing world. What they do impacts us." Dannielle is right. Our challenge is how to fix the world? To be successful unity is required.
On the way home Sunday, north of Columbus, we saw another windfarm. The wind wasn't blowing. Not a single blade was turning. An automobile plant can't run on intermittent power. A dependable backup power source is required. Batteries only store energy, they don't create it. Natural gas is a dependable backup energy source. A farmer in Maryland is off the grid by putting solar panels on the roof of his buildings. After dark his natural gas generator takes over.
Most people and companies care about the environment. They don't agree on the solution. Unity isn't created by telling people on their utility bills they can have green power if they check the box and are willing to pay more. When thousands of people working in the fossil fuel industry are told the goal is to eliminate fossil fuels and their jobs, it doesn't create unity.
In soccer to win we must score at least one goal. Coach Joe doesn't care how. He wants our players to be creative, take shots and gives them permission to fail. We win a lot. To create unity and solve the global problem, the goal is to reduce emissions and be carbon neutral. It means leaders and government NOT dictating how. It means decarbonizing fossil fuels, not eliminating them. It can mean using oil and gas drilling technology to develop clean geothermal energy like Iceland. It means working together, not blaming, being creative, looking at ALL potential solutions. Leaders creating unity is the ultimate key to success in any endeavor.
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Greg Kozera, gkozera@shalecrescentusa.com, is the director of marketing for Shale Crescent USA. He is a professional engineer with a Masters in Environmental Engineering and over 40 years experience in the energy industry. Greg is a leadership expert, high school soccer coach, professional speaker, author of four books and many published articles.