You Win in the Locker Room First: The 7 C's to Build a Winning Team in Business, Sports, and Life

Chapter 7Care

Relationships are the foundation upon which winning teams are built, and all great relationships are based on value, respect, love, trust, and care.

Caring Is a Strategy

Jon Gordon

In Water Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs, he shared a story about Steve helping his father build a fence when he was a young boy. His father told him he must care about crafting the back of the fence as much as the front. When Steve asked why the back mattered when no one would see how it was crafted, his father said, “But you will know.” Steve's father taught him to care more, and years later he went on to create Apple products with such care that they generated feelings of awe, loyalty, and passion among the brand's millions of new customers. It wasn't an accident. Jonathan Ive, the man who designed many iconic Apple products, said, “We believe our customers can sense the care we put into our products.” Apple cared about the work they were doing and the products they were creating, and in turn their customers cared about them.

I believe caring is one of the greatest success strategies of all. The greatest organizations on the planet care about the work they do, the products they create, and the services they provide. I've been fortunate to work with many of the most successful companies in the world, and I have discovered they all have a unique way that shows they care—I call ...