Executive Summary
Throughout my life I have played many sports such as baseball, basketball, football in the backyard, and even ping-pong and tennis occasionally for fun.? No matter what sport it was or the importance of the game I was always the type of person that gave it 100 percent and never quit.? Of all the sports that I have competed in throughout my life baseball was the one that had my interest the most; I loved it so much that after I graduated high school I continued to play baseball at the junior college level at Baton Rouge Community College.?
The preface of this book starts off in the life of Venus Williams who is a talented tennis player as well as a successful business woman.? She starts the book with a quote about how ?Just when other young professionals are peaking, hitting their stride, and consolidating their skills, we?re starting, if we?re smart, to think of our future, one that doesn?t depend on our athleticism and our injury prone bodies to pay the rent.?? I believe this is true and what most young athletes should be doing, whether are not your in high school planning to play at the college level or in college planning to play at the professional level you should always have a backup plan or a plan to do both at one time such as Venus.? Venus also speaks about the role her mother Oracene and her father Richard played in her becoming the successful woman she is today.? Her father always preached to her and her siblings to ?Think entrepreneurially?, and I believe this is very important for any young kid to think, it?s never too early for someone to start thinking about their future because before you know it the future is the present.?
Before reading this book I never really thought my love for the game of baseball or other sports in that matter would mean much to me after they were finished.? What I mean by this is that all my life my coaches have preached to me about how important the games we play are, and that what we do in the gym or on the field will better us in our everyday walk, but most of those speeches went in one ear and out of the other.? But this book ?Come to Win?, by Venus Williams changed the way I look at my situation.? This book is compiled of 46 business executives, political leaders, professional athletes, doctors, actors and actresses? vision of how sports laid the foundation to the stardom, credibility, and success they have accomplished so far in their lives.? This book contains quotes and stories about the lives of famous athletes such as Roger Staubach and Earvin ?Magic? Johnson.? As well as locals such as Dr. James Andrews who was a graduate from Louisiana State University, and Robin Roberts who played basketball and graduated from our very own Southeastern Louisiana University.? This book is great for the reader because it not only gives you an insight of what these famous men and women?s contributions were on the playing field, but it gives you a detailed description of what their lives were like before they became famous, it shows us as everyday people the type of attitudes it takes to become successful in the business world.? It showed me the work ethic and drive that Earvin Johnson had and what we had to overcome in order to become who we all know now as ?Magic? Johnson.? This book is full of stories about what hard work can do for a person.
This book is a genius piece of work put together by Venus Williams and Kelly E. Carter, which was created from a compiled list of former athletes (not all of whom played professionally) made by Venus, but these athletes and well known people are not in this book because of their successes on the playing field they are in this book because they are now at the top of their professions.? This book is not a book to inform you on how many career points ?Magic? had or the amount of Super bowl rings Roger Staubach has, it is to inform you on the hard work and effort they put in to get to those points in their careers and how that same hard work and effort led them to be successful in the business realm as well.
The Ten Things Managers Need to Know fromCome to Win
1.??????????? ?Never be afraid to put extreme effort in.? If you don?t do your absolute best, then you can?t expect to achieve anything different from what anybody else has done.? ? Sarina Bratton- Founder and Managing Director of Orion Expedition Cruises
2.??????????? ?I really feel that sports gave me an incredible advantage.? I had the tools.? I had what it takes to work with people, to solve problems.- Robin Roberts- Good Morning America
3.??????????? ?Share the Credit and Take the Blame?- The credit should go to the team, and the blame for failure should be on you.
4.??????????? ?Pushing Through Comfort Barriers?, is important when working internationally or in places where you aren?t comfortable.
5.??????????? Bring lessons learned on the court into the meetings whether they are with potential clients, your team, or suppliers.
6.??????????? ?Don?t Make the Same Mistake Twice?- If you make a mistake one time, be sure that you don?t let it happen again.
7.??????????? ?Unspectacular Preparation Yields Spectacular Results?- The more you prepare the better your end results will be.
8.??????????? ?Never give up. Work harder.? Whatever you think your limit is, you can go further.? You can push it.- Denzel Washington
9.??????????? Making Assists- Helping people on the court is the same as helping people in the business world or in life in general, you can always benefit from this.
10.??????????? Discipline-? Being discipline will help you to face obstacles that will encounter in business.
Full Summary of Come to Win
??Come to Win?
Imagine that there is 10 seconds left in game 7 of the NBA finals, and the ball is in your hands.? Everyone in the arena knows that you?re going to take the final shot.? Down by two points you know the pressure is all on you to make this shot, but because of the obstacles you have faced prior to this opportunity you know that you have what it takes to make your dreams and the dreams of your fans come true.? You dribble down and shoot the three point shot, as the shot goes in every ounce of blood, sweat, and tears flash before your eyes.? Every moment that accounted for you to be right here right now has come back to you in an instant.? Then as your feet hit the floor you feel an awkward twist in your knee, and hear it pop.? This twist and pop has just led to your final game as an NBA player, before you can ever celebrate the championship you just brought to your team your career is over.? What happens next?? In this book ?Come to Win?, by Venus Williams and Kelly E. Carter she writes about what should come next.? The next step of this athlete?s career should be just as successful as the picture I just painted.? Because you have worked so hard to be successful in a given sport these same traits and qualities that brought success to you should bring you success in the business world as well.
Preface
She starts the book with a quote about how ?Just when other young professionals are peaking, hitting their stride, and consolidating their skills, we?re starting, if we?re smart, to think of our future, one that doesn?t depend on our athleticism and our injury prone bodies to pay the rent.?? I believe this is true and what most young athletes should be doing, whether are not your in high school planning to play at the college level or in college planning to play at the professional level you should always have a backup plan or a plan to do both at one time such as Venus.? Venus also speaks about the role her mother Oracene and her father Richard played in her becoming the successful woman she is today.? Her father always preached to her and her siblings to ?Think entrepreneurially?, and I believe this is very important for any young kid to think, it?s never too early for someone to start thinking about their future because before you know it the future is the present.?
Venus Williams is a successful tennis player she has won many matches and tournaments in her career, but her proudest works may be the two companies that she currently owns.? In this book Venus depicts that hard work, sacrifice, effort, the ability to win, and also the ability to lose are just as important in business as they are on the playing field.? This book contains excerpt from 46 different people most of which are well- known.? These people are actors, athletes, designers, political leaders, doctors and many other highly qualified business men and women.? In this summary I will explain what these people went through in order to be where they are today.? Venus believes that sports gives you a foundation that is transferrable, and how if you?ve played (at any level, professional or amateur), you are carrying around knowledge that you can use effectively in other fields, and after reading the book ?Come to Win?, I have a much clearer image of what she is saying here.? Venus also says that some of the benefits she has received due to sports are character, strength of body and mind, confidence, and a sense of value and validation, which are all things that managers of businesses should acquire if they plan to be successful. This book contains quotes and stories about the lives of famous athletes such as Roger Staubach and Earvin ?Magic? Johnson.? As well as locals such as Dr. James Andrews who was a graduate from Louisiana State University, and Robin Roberts who played basketball and graduated from our very own Southeastern Louisiana University.? This book is great for the reader because it not only gives you an insight of what these famous men and women?s contributions were on the playing field, but it gives you a detailed description of what their lives were like before they became famous, it shows us as everyday people the type of attitudes it takes to become successful in the business world.? It showed me the work ethic and drive that Earvin Johnson had and what we had to overcome in order to become who we all know now as ?Magic? Johnson.? This book is full of stories about what hard work can do for a person.
The Power of Reinvention
??????????? In the section of the book entitled The Power of Reinvention Venus Williams writes about a woman by the name of Vera Wang.? As you may know Vera Wang is a very successful designer, but what you may or may not know is that she had some hardships along the way.? Vera?s first love was the sport of ice skating, as a young girl she thrived to be an Olympic figure skater.? Vera loved to skate, she spent numerous hours and hard work towards trying to compete professionally, one of the main reasons for this was because of her mother which was diagnosed in her 30?s with Hodgkin?s disease, which is cancer of the blood loved to watch her skate.? Vera claims that her skating is what kept her mother alive in which she lived to be 89 years old.? After Vera failed to become a professional skater she went on to new things, not leaving behind the qualities she gained from this sport.? Vera started off as an assistant for a magazine company by the name of Vogue, later she was given the opportunity to become editor and was the youngest in the history of the magazine.? At 23 years of age she became full editor of the magazine and remained there until she was 38.? After that she went on to pursue a career for the company by the name of Ralph Lauren where she became the design director for women?s accessories.? Vera quotes that, ?Were it not for what I learned through skating, I could never have reached my dream of becoming a designer.? Those principles of discipline, desire, and hard work are one hundred percent responsible for my success.?? Vera also claims that she never really go what she wanted most in life which was be on the podium collecting a medal at the Olympics.? She also said that a lot of her accomplishments in life happened by default, because she didn?t achieve what she had hoped for.? One of her most prized accomplishment was when was accepted into the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame for her costume designs for Olympic skaters Nancy Kerrigan and Michelle Kwan.
Natural Ability Will Take You Only So Far
??????????? The next section Natural Ability Will Take You Only So Far is an excerpt from Academy Award winning actor Denzel Washington.? As a kid Denzel played baseball, basketball, and football, where he went on to play college basketball at Fordham University in the Bronx, New York.? Denzel claims that when he was young he had no desire to act, and that he really didn?t even know what it was.? Denzel says that he wasn?t the biggest of kids, but he was the fastest, and to be smaller and still have success in a sport such as basketball his natural ability theory is correct, because even if your small, but have the more hard than the bigger guys you will go farther than they could ever dream.? Denzel Washington?s quote? Never give up.? Work harder.? Whatever you think your limit it is, you can go further.? You can push it.? You can push it.? Is very important when it comes to sports, but I believe that it is just important in the business aspect, because if you are willing to push harder than your competitors then you are always one step ahead.?
Discipline
??????????? Later on in the book it talks about a woman by the name of Robin Roberts who graduated and excelled in basketball at our very own Southeastern Louisiana University.? Robin Robert is currently host of the morning show Good Morning America.? Roberts claims that discipline is the key to anyone trying to succeed in anything whether it?s a sport or your profession.? Discipline made her the player she strived to be on the court, and discipline is the reason she?s able to wake up at 5:30 every morning to be on Good Morning America.? Roberts says ? The greatest thing she learned from sports is that you always get another chance to prove yourself.? There?s always another game.?? This quote is very true, and I believe she is right about this point.? Not only did sports give Robin the ability to be successful in her profession, it gave her the ability to defeat anything life threw her way, even when she was diagnosed with cancer.? At first she was upset because she thought that her athletic body had let her down, but the doctors told her that by her being fit the way she was it was one of the reasons she was able to defeat the cancer.? So sports not only helped Robin Roberts become a very successful woman it also saved her life.?
Making Assists
??????????? Making Assists is based on the Earvin ?Magic Johnson, Magic is in the NBA Basketball Hall of Fame, and is considered to be one of the greatest basketball players of all- time.? In this book Magic claims that making assists in the world is far more important to him than making assists on the court ever was, but by learning to be discipline on the court helped him to carry that over to his two successful businesses and his efforts to make the lives of? people with? lower privileges happy.? Throughout live Johnson was faced with doubt from critics many times.? The first time came when he entered the draft after his sophomore season at Michigan State University, yet he went on to be a very successful NBA player.? People also began to doubt him when he claimed that he wanted to start up his own business, but nobody really thought that his success on the court would lead to success in business, but as you see throughout this book this is not true.? Being successful in sports can lead a person to have more success in the business world.? Magic Johnson faced even more doubt when he was diagnosed as being HIV- positive, then again his critics didn?t think he would be able to survive this disease, but he is still alive and well today and able to give the testimony of his life as an athlete and businessman, and his ability to defeat the odds no matter the circumstance he is given.
??????????? In conclusion, I believe that the book ?Come to Win? is a very inspiring story.? To be able to read about the lives of all these famous people is a great thing.? It has definitely inspired me.? Throughout my life I have always enjoyed playing sports, whether it was baseball, basketball or just out in the backyard playing football I have always thrived to be the best at what I played.? The love of my life is baseball, as long as I can remember I have loved to play baseball.? I played varsity baseball in high school claiming All-District and All-State honors, and after graduation I went on to play at Baton Rouge Community College.? I can?t really envision a life without sports because I love it so much.? I always thought that after I was done playing organized sports that would be the end of it.? But after reading this book I realize that entering into the world of business is the same as playing sports, and through my successes in sports I have the characteristics to make a great leader as well.? Leadership is a very important quality to have as a manager of a business.? The ability to lead people from the bottom to the top is an important factor in a successful business.? After reading this story I have more appreciation for the sports I played that I ever had before, because I know that they have shaped me to become successful in the real world as well.? All my life my coaches have preached to me about how important the games we play are, and that what we do in the gym or on the field will better us in our everyday walk, but most of those speeches went in one ear and out of the other.? But this book ?Come to Win?, by Venus Williams changed the way I look at my situation.? ?This book is a genius piece of work put together by Venus Williams and Kelly E. Carter, which was created from a compiled list of former athletes (not all of whom played professionally) made by Venus, but these athletes and well known people are not in this book because of their successes on the playing field they are in this book because they are now at the top of their professions.? This book is not a book to inform you on how many career points ?Magic? had or the amount of Super bowl rings Roger Staubach has, it is to inform you on the hard work and effort they put in to get to those points in their careers and how that same hard work and effort led them to be successful in the business realm as well.? I plan to use what I have learned from this inspirational book, and from theses very successful to better prepare me for what?s to come next for me in my efforts to become a successful businessman.
The Video Lounge
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgZVKTyocc8
In this video,? Venus Williams explains what her new book ?Come to Win? is all about.
Personal Insights
Why I think:
The author is one of the most brilliant people around because:? She takes the time to interview theses people, and find out the many obstacles they faced on their road to success.? This book is great for the reader because it shows them that even these very famous people are human, and had to travel the same exact paths that any normal man or woman will have to travel in order to find success.
If I were the author of the book, I would have done these three things differently:
1.??????????? Went into a little more detail about the lives of these people she?s chosen.
2.??????????? Tried to interview bigger named business people such as Bill Gates or Donald Trump.
3.??????????? Tried to interview more athletes.
Reading this book made me think differently about the topic in these ways:
1.??????????? I gained more respect for the sports I played.
2.??????????? I gained more respect for the lessons I learned through sports.
3.??????????? I gained more respect for the coaches and leaders that have taught me these important qualities.
I?ll apply what I?ve learned in this book in my career by:
1.??????????? Being Discipline
2.??????????? Becoming a Leader
3.??????????? Being Ethical
Here is a sampling of what others have said about the book and its author:
Venus Williams has become a household name after her book ?Come to Win?.? This book is just another success by Venus Williams to go along with her success in the sports world, and also her success in business.? It is a very inspiring book to young people entering into the business world.
Bibliography
Venus Williams. Kelly E. Carter. Come to win business leaders, artists, doctors, and other visionaries on how sports can help you top your profession
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Contact Info: To contact the author of this ?Summary and Review of Come to Win,? please email daniel.berthelot@selu.edu.
Biography
David C. Wyld (dwyld.kwu@gmail.com) is the Robert Maurin Professor of Management at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana. He is a management consultant, researcher/writer, and executive educator. His blog, Wyld About Business, can be viewed at http://wyld-business.blogspot.com/. He also serves as the Director of the Reverse Auction Research Center (http://reverseauctionresearch.blogspot.com/), a hub of research and news in the expanding world of competitive bidding. Dr. Wyld also maintains compilations of works he has helped his students to turn into editorially-reviewed publications at the following sites:
Management Concepts (http://toptenmanagement.blogspot.com/)
Book Reviews (http://wyld-about-books.blogspot.com/) and
Travel and International Foods (http://wyld-about-food.blogspot.com/).????????????????
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Written by David Wyld
Professor of Management, Southeastern Louisiana University
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