Post-Career Lessons From Michael Jordan.

It is now 23 years since Michael Jordan retired from the Chicago Bulls. Basketball fans know the importance of number 23: it is the one that was worn by Michael Jordan during his career and also the one which was initially chosen by Lebron James, the current reigning star of the National Basketball Association. Most readers will immediately conclude that this is how I got the idea for this article. Well, no actually. As improbable as it might seem, it happened when I was talking to a friend who owns her own theatre company. It very likely had to do with the fact that we were discussing about brand development and, for some reason, Michael Jordan crossed my mind. Ten minutes later, after saying goodbye to the said friend, I was sitting in a coffee shop and determining the key points of the present article.

You will quickly understand why I associated brand development to Michael Jordan. His career as an athlete is long gone, but his career as a businessman is still ongoing. It can in fact be argued that he has been more successful in business than in sports. This might sound like a bold statement considering the incredible list of honours that Jordan has won as the greatest basketball player of all time: Six NBA championships, Ten Scoring Titles, Five MVP Awards, Two Olympic Gold Medals...the list is just too long to include everything here. The reality is that very few top-level athletes, past and present, have the business acumen of Michael Jordan. We often hear about these former professional sportsmen and sportswomen who go broke soon after they stop playing. Michael Jordan is the polar opposite: his business and brand just got bigger and better. So, after all that has been said and written about this legend, what can he still teach us now that he is close to his sixtieth birthday? Quite a few things actually. Below are my top three lessons from Michael Jordan in 2022.

1. Timeless values create lasting brands.

In his book "Driven From Within", Michael Jordan mentions the following: "You have to be uncompromised in your level of commitment to whatever you are doing, or it can disappear as fast as it appeared." Jordan talking about commitment is like Steve Jobs talking about iphones: he takes it to a completely different level. This is what enabled him to dominate the NBA and develop the hyper successful "Air Jordan" brand. Michael Jordan often pointed out that his work ethic and unflinching dedication to excellence played a greater part in his success than talent. He never looked for shortcuts when it came to reaching his goals. For the foundations that he was building to remain rock solid, he could not afford to look for an easy path. This attitude is what separated him from most of the other players of his generation. The quality of everything that Michael Jordan created was a direct consequence of his attitude. Nothing more, nothing less. His reasoning was quite simple: the right values create the right results. These values (hard work, integrity, leading by example...) are often viewed as old-fashioned and boring but they are at the core of every worthy achievement in the history of mankind. When Michael Jordan abruptly retired in 1993 before coming back in 1995, there was talk that the Air Jordan brand would fail without his presence. The opposite happened: the brand kept thriving. This was mostly because of the values which Jordan applied to it and these same values explain why Air Jordan is still successful to this day. Key lesson: Every product or service is, first and foremost, the result of a set of values before being the result of an expertise or technical ability. The most successful brands are those which apply values that produce the best results over the long-term.

2. The end of a career does not mean the end of competition.

During his time at the Chicago Bulls, Michael Jordan was arguably one of the most competitive athletes in the history of sports. Even when the odds were heavily stacked against him, he would turn things around and produce plays that often resulted in last-second winning shots. It was not just about winning the game for him and his team: Michael Jordan was aware that many people who came to watch a game at the United Center, the home of the Chicago Bulls, might have had a unique chance in their lifetimes to see him play and he did not want to disappoint them. This says a lot about Michael Jordan and his determination to give his absolute best every night he played. In his own words: "I played in front of 8000 people at the beginning, and that never determined how hard I played. It's easy when 18000 show up, and every game is sold out. It's not hard to find your motivation in that environment. I was playing when the stadium was half empty, and my effort was exactly the same. If you can't play in front of a full house, then you have to get the hell off the floor. I don't know what motivates you if that doesn't do it." This principle of not waiting for an audience to turn up before he strived for excellence was evident in other areas of Jordan's life. When his career ended, he went into several ventures that ranged from motorcycle racing to the management of the Charlotte Hornets, a team which also competes in the NBA. He could have simply enjoyed his retirement and played golf all day but, judging how busy he is, Michael Jordan wants his legacy to extend far beyond his exploits on the basketball court. Everything that he achieves in these other ventures is part of Brand Jordan. Key lesson: Even if circumstances weigh heavily on you and progress is slow, keep working on your ability to compete. The end of a phase at a specific point in time does not mean the end of a mindset.

3. Always give credit to those who helped you win.

As talented and determined as Michael Jordan was, he readily admitted that his career, as an athlete and as a businessman, would not have reached its full potential if he had not been surrounded by the right people. When it comes to Jordan, the right people in question were those who shared his values and vision. They were willing to go all the way just like he did. This did not always equate to being a teammate on the Chicago Bulls. When he was growing up, he was lucky to have a very strong and supportive family. Jordan often mentioned this and we get a glimpse of the critical importance this part played in the book Driven from within. Michael Jordan's mother, Deloris Jordan, said the following: "It could have gone either way with different parents who weren't there all the time. We were providing strong values to Michael. Would he fight you? Yes. Even though sometimes he didn't understand what we were saying, we wanted him to know that what we were teaching him was designed to make him strong once he left our door." At the Chicago Bulls, the presence of people like Doug Collins, Phil Jackson, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman among many others helped Michael Jordan forge himself into the iconic athlete that defined what many consider to be the golden era of basketball. This was an era that produced the original 1992 USA Dream Team and which led the Chicago Bulls to become one of the greatest NBA dynasties of all time. On the business front, the fateful moment came when Michael Jordan met Phil Knight, the man who founded Nike. Knight introduced Jordan to Tinker Hatfield, the genius who designed many of the great Air Jordan shoes. The rest is history. No other athlete has since been able to produce a similar line of sports shoes which became style icons in their own right. Key lesson: Associating with the right people will nearly always help exceed expectations. The reverse is true: the wrong people, in both personal and professional settings, will slow everything down.

Conclusion: Will Michael Jordan still be relevant 23 years now? Yes, he will. He set a standard that modern players are still trying to exceed. No one has quite managed to do it. Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, Stephen Curry...many have tried and some came close, but their results were not as good as what Michael Jordan achieved. Perhaps it's better that way.

Good luck,

Ashley Boolell | www.ashleyboolell.com

My latest novel is called Market Dystopia. It is available on Amazon.

Chicago Bulls Introduction - 1997 NBA Finals Game 6