Lessons in Team Building and Leadership from Super Bowl LVI Champion Los Angeles Rams

Winning in sports is the ultimate example of team building and leadership gone right.

Most of you watched Super Bowl LVI yesterday, which looks like it’s going to end up being the most watched Super Bowl of all time. I’m seeing an estimate of 117M viewers, though that’s an unofficial number. 

Not only was the Super Bowl in my hometown of Los Angeles this year, but the winning team, the Los Angeles Rams, had quite the “all-in” storyline this year, and I cannot help but see some correlations to how we advisors build teams and lead.

TALENT ALONE IS NOT ENOUGH

​Matthew Stafford, the winning quarterback, spent a decade in Detroit before being traded to the Rams and winning a Super Bowl in his first year here.

For context, he departed as the Detroit Lions’ all-time leader in completions (3,898) passing yards (45,109), passing touchdowns (282), and quarterback wins (74) — took the franchise to three playoff appearances in his tenure, but the team failed to win a playoff game, going 0-3.​​​​​

Now, this is not going to be a Detroit Lions smear campaign, but you can look up a decades worth of decision making and not working to keep or get the best talent to surround Stafford. Two Hall of Famers​ (Barry Sanders and Calvin Johnson) in Detroit basically decided to retire than to keep putting their bodies through a rigorous season knowing they didn’t have what it took to win.

So how was Stafford able to win in his first year as a Los Angeles Ram?

Surrounding Talent​

It’s rare you see a super star in any league carry a team to a championship with average talent around him/her. 

Was this Super Bowl win always there for Stafford all those years in Detroit? Probably.

The fact that the Rams put players around him that are just as talented, or even more talented than him was crucial. 

Why is this point important for us financial advisors building our own practice?

​Let’s say you’re a newer advisor, but a high performer and can produce, on your own, $300,000 a year, comfortably.

You’re great at selling. That’s what you do! Now how do you get from $300,00 a year to $600,00? We all know you can’t just put in double the time, because you will eventually run out of time. And you cannot trade time for dollars. That is a recipe for failure.