Why You Need To Thank Your Competitors; Competition Is Good

My very first class at the University of AZ was a Flag Football class that also happened to be a “fluff” class that the University’s basketball team was taking. For me, it was a 1 unit PE class; for the basketball team I think it was a 9 Unit Graduate Level Course in “Physiology ” :).

In any case, I was not only the shortest guy in the class, I was also the worst athlete in the class, with one exception. There was a kid from a small town in AZ who made two big mistakes: he showed up wearing his high school division IV football champions t-shirt, and he acted like he was the best athlete in the class.

The basketball players immediately picked up on his cockiness and started to pick on him. It was soon apparent that the small town kid was only a “good” athlete in the very small town where he grew up, with limited competition. He could not begin to compete in even a PE class at a huge university. He soon dropped the class and I never saw him again.

Even though the small town kid was able to be a “star” in high school, the limited competition did him no service when he grew up. I think about this often as we face extremely fierce competition in the mortgage industry.

We have some exceptionally sharp competitors who only make us better every day. We are thriving and enduring in the industry now solely because our competitors are so sharp. And we could not appreciate them more.