Process over Outcome: Has America Forgotten?

over making consistent money over time. It is not to say that those types of vehicles should not have been offered, there was and is a limited need; however, it is difficult to argue with the idea that our countries automakers had their eyes on the immediate $$$$$ that could be made.

At least much more so than on a “process” that would guarantee future success and longevity.

b. Enron Scandal—A situation where a company’s (and/or executives within that company) greed and focus on making money: the outcome, came before anything else. And at a big cost to many.

c. Other Big Business Scandals—If you Google “scandals in big business,” the list that comes up is wide and varied. Most  causes eventually boil down to finding ways to circumvent the “process” in order to quickly get to an “outcome,” or $$$$$.

d. NCLB & Schools—As partially inferred in my last blog, Things Your Kids Didn’t Learn in School and the Youth Sports Environment, our schools are heavily focused on the end result. Emphasis is moving away from counting efforts put forth for practice and homework—“process,” and being placed only on test scores, especially standardized test scores—“outcome.”

e. PED & Steroid Scandals —Even though Major League Baseball is currently getting the brunt of publicity regarding their use, I can assure you that these illegal substances are used as a means to gain access to success for too many in professional, Olympic, and elite level sports. The outcome-based focus here? Fame, fortune, glitzy lifestyles, winning at all costs, and (false) achievement.

f. U.S. Government—Oftentimes uses a “Band-Aid” approach to addressing financial issues, borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. How long can we actually borrow from funds saved for other means and from other countries to build roads, pay bills, or any number of other things and not dig a hole so deep that we cannot ever recover?

Making things better for the short-term without truly considering the long-term risk is central to an outcome-weighted approach, at least as to how I have defined it here.

g. Youth Sports—The emphasis in youth sports today that places winning as the No. 1 priority and/or the scholarship as the reason for sports participation, both of which lend themselves toward the less rewarding aspects of an outcome-based foundation.


I am sure there are other aspects I am not aware of that many could add to this list; however, the items above help to prove my point inferred in the title of this blog. That we, as a society, may truly have forgotten an important foundational principle, one that was part of an internal strength that Americans and America had at its core.

So even though this blog, and my general focus, centers on youth sports and positively impacting its participants, this issue of placing more emphasis on outcomes rather than the process seems to be symptomatic of a bigger problem affecting our society as a whole.

From my vantage point, when our approach to gaining success and achieving goals becomes so heavily weighted toward the “end result,” or outcome, with little consideration for the consequences of that approach, or process used, then trouble usually follows.

Looking at the list I provided certainly helps to justify that conclusion.

Whether in work, sports, or life in general, focusing in on the process with the understanding that the outcome is a by-product of this process, gives advantages not easily seen from the outside.

It is central to the intrinsic value one receives and pride one feels when true and real accomplishment is achieved, creating the type of success that lasts from generation to generation.

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