When we measure collaboration instead of individual wins, teams shift from rivalry to shared success.
I didn’t grow up playing sports. At 5 feet tall, I wasn’t a natural athlete. But I did grow up in a fiercely competitive household. The competition wasn’t confined to school; it was a marathon against anyone we knew, across every imaginable category. My parents are immigrants, and like many others, we lived with a deep sense of scarcity. Resources felt limited, and inequity seemed inevitable unless we outpaced everyone else by being “the best.”
This mindset showed up in ungracious ways. It wasn’t enough to get As; you had to set the curve. I avoided studying with friends because I didn’t want them to gain an advantage. The more I poured myself into academics, the more I heard about the areas I lacked: language skills, looks, tidiness (I’m still messy). I cringed whenever a family friend succeeded because somehow, their success meant I had failed.
Turns out, this mindset isn’t unique. Scarcity thinking isn’t limited to immigrants. Many of us feel like we’re in an undocumented contest against everyone around us. Moving away from this is hard because so many signals reinforce the idea that success is a zero-sum game.
Despite my lack of athleticism, I’m a huge basketball fan (go Warriors). It’s a love language for me and my son, especially how teamwork on the court mirrors teamwork in life. Some teams are known for “unselfish play,” and I wanted to understand how that works and how coaches create the psychological safety that allows players to embrace abundance.
Unselfish play means no single player dominates the game. But how does that work in a sport literally won by points? A friend who attended the University of North Carolina told me about their legendary coach, Dean Smith, who championed unselfish play. Smith even wrote a book, The Carolina Way, documenting how these principles apply beyond sports.
Smith’s mantra was simple: play hard, play smart, play together. He urged players to focus only on what they could control: their effort and execution. Practices emphasized defense and assists, rebounds, screens, and other team-oriented tactics. The KPIs measured controllable actions that helped the team succeed.
One of Smith’s most famous traditions was his “point to the passer” rule. Every time a player scored, he pointed to the teammate who passed the ball. This small gesture reinforced a big truth: no one scores alone. Players even pointed after missed shots because the attempt was only possible thanks to someone else’s help.
What would happen if we stopped competing? At first glance, it seems impossible, especially in business. If a client chooses us, they’re saying no to someone else. There’s a limited amount of work to win. Right?
Or is there? In Uncompete, Ruchika Malhotra argues that scarcity thinking drives most competition. In the short-term, this mindset can produce results. For example, if a team competes to make the most sales calls, sales might spike. But Malhotra warns of long-term costs: when people compete, they stop seeing each other as collaborative resources even when collaboration could make the company more successful.
Imagine I have a prospect who would benefit from my colleague’s expertise. If I’m competing for sales credit, I might hesitate to make that introduction because the sale wouldn’t count for me. That’s a missed opportunity for the client and the company.
Smith shares a similar cautionary tale. He recalls an NBA player whose contract included a bonus for hitting a rebound quota. Late in the season, the player asked teammates not to go after rebounds so he could “get credit.” It sounds minor, but it reveals a deeper issue: it’s hard to stay unselfish if you’re measured for individual work only.
I saw this play out in real life. A friend works at a recruiting firm that hired a new senior leader. Immediately, tension arose over “prospects.” If the new hire contacted someone already in the database, who got credit and commission? The default answer was whoever “knew them first.” That system disadvantaged the new hire and burdened existing staff to hoard relationships.
An “uncompete” approach would examine the structure itself. Is the commission model encouraging unselfish play? What if, instead of individual commissions, the team shared profits? Or, like Coach Smith, what if we added KPIs for collaborative behaviors?
Removing competition from a team takes more than clichés like “There’s no ‘I’ in team.” Competition taps into a primal fear of scarcity. Think back to early hunters: resources were limited, and survival depended on winning. But humans are also wired for connection. Agrarian tribes thrived because they worked together. One person can’t plant and harvest alone.
So how do we shift into an uncompete mode? Like any adaptive challenge, it starts with small experiments that adjust over time. Here are three ideas:
- Copy Coach Smith’s “point to the passer.” In AEC firms, imagine leaders publicly acknowledging not just the project team but marketing, BD, and accounting teams for enabling wins.
- Reevaluate what’s measured. Hit rate matters, but it shouldn’t be the only KPI. Track controllable actions: client meetings, follow-ups, debriefs, targeted campaigns, social media engagement. Like Smith’s focus on assists and screens, measure what drives success, not just the final score.
- Create abundance. Internal competition fades when people believe there’s room for everyone to be rewarded. Start by examining how recognition works. Are visible tasks overvalued while consistent, high-quality work goes unnoticed? Equity in recognition builds trust, and trust acts like a lubricant to get things moving.
Realizing that competition doesn’t have to be the default has been a game changer. Scarcity pushes us to make short-term decisions instead of long-term investments in ourselves, our teams, and even our industry. But like all deeply held ideas, change is hard and needs to start on a micro level.
The next time you get that twinge when you hear someone’s good news, stop and ask yourself why. Does their win take anything away from your success? Next time you’re praised, pause and point to your passer. Odds are they helped more than others realize. If you’re a manager, start looking at what unselfish play means for your team, what KPIs could tell the full story, and how to create a feeling of abundance. I’m working on something new for myself, a phrase coined by Malhotra called “freude-freude,” which translates to the joy of someone else’s joy. It’s the antonym of the German word schadenfreude, the joy from others’ despair. We may not always remove competition, but we can reframe how we see it.
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Janki DePalma, LEED AP, CPSM is director of business development at W.E. O’Neil. Contact her at jdepalma@weoneil.com. |