Personal Relationships Are at the Heart of All Success: Interview with Christy Keswick, Co-Founder of Good Sports
I recently went one-on-one with Christy Keswick, co-founder and president of Good Sports.
Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here? What experiences, failures, setbacks, or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?
Christy: I started my career in management consulting right out of college. It turned out to be a great place for me as I learned so much about how to think critically and strategically. It is also where I met my friend and future co-founder of Good Sports, Melissa Harper.
In 2003, we launched Good Sports, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to break down barriers and provide access and opportunity to sports and physical activity for kids. The barrier we focused on was the high cost of equipping kids for so many of these activities.
What started as an initial donation of 500 basketballs from Spalding has turned into a national nonprofit that just hit a milestone of donating $100 million in sports equipment to programs serving high-need communities around the country.
Throughout this 20-year journey, there have been countless experiences, successes, and setbacks. I think one of the most important moments for us was building out the funding to transition Good Sports from a local to a national organization. I think sometimes you must set yourself forward before you are ready and learn along the way. We learned so much as we grew nationally that led to our significant growth.
One of the biggest challenges for us recently, like so many others, was navigating the early days of COVID. As we all know, youth sports were halted like everything else during that time. Trying to figure out how to have an impact and raise funds during that period of time was a challenge no one expected. However, our team knew these programs would need our support as soon as sports started again, so we remained focused. We launched a “Restore Play” campaign to keep funders engaged and we stayed in touch with all our programs to let them know we would be there when they were ready.
Adam: What are the best leadership lessons you have learned from leading a non-profit organization?
Christy: While I don’t think this is specific to non-profit leadership, I think leaders need to get comfortable with “just-in-time learning”. When things hit our desks there is usually no easy answer, but I have learned that it is not about knowing the answer, but rather having a process to figure it out. If you can instill that approach with your team, you will end up with a team of problem solvers. As you grow, the challenges become more and more complex, you will have built a system for you and your team that will help you arrive at the answer.
I think leaders must embrace failures because they help build your business too. Being faced with complex and constantly changing circumstances comes with a lot of uncertainty and you aren’t always going to get it right. However, both the wins and the losses are beneficial to business and to leadership training so don’t fear them. Additionally, if you are too afraid to fail you won’t take enough risks to move the business forward.
Adam: What are your best tips for fellow leaders of non-profit organizations?
Christy:
Work with people, not companies. I truly believe that personal relationships are at the heart of all success.
Be wary of overnight success stories. Building a solid foundation for a business takes time.
It’s hard to outwork someone who is driven by passion because they are thinking about and building their business in so many of their quiet moments. So, find something that is going to get you excited most days to tackle it.
Adam: In your experience, what are the defining qualities of an effective leader? How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?
Christy: Effective leaders are really good at bringing others along in the journey. They envision and articulate the North Star, something you are aiming and striving for which motivates you and your team to do the weekly, monthly, and yearly work needed to get you there. If you believe in that work and you can excite your team to go there with you, there is almost nothing you can’t accomplish.
Adam: What are your three best tips applicable to entrepreneurs, executives, and civic leaders?
Christy:
If at all possible, choose something that you are passionate about building because it will help you break through the challenges.
Be open to continuous learning. If you are lucky, you will be doing this work for a long time and during that time the world changes. Keep educating yourself.
Create a work environment that allows for flexibility.
Adam: What is your best advice on building, leading, and managing teams?
Christy: Managing teams is hard and complicated so boiling it down to one piece of advice is hard. I would say the most important thing is to treat people with respect. If you can’t be a good human to other humans, you don’t have a shot at building anything meaningful with your team.
Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?
Christy: The best advice I have ever received is that listening is a competitive advantage. If we truly listen to what people are saying, then we have the ability to make a compelling response. It helps us avoid generic responses and allows others to feel seen and heard.
Adam: What can anyone do to pay it forward?
Christy: I am often approached by people who want to change their career path and “do something good”. I don’t believe we have to all quit our jobs and found non-profits to do something good and often good is done in small doses. We all have unique gifts to share.
For me, I always find time to speak with women in the sports community and social entrepreneurs because I feel like I have a unique perspective to share. I know I didn’t get here without some help, so I try to pay that forward. Start with something small and just commit to doing it.
Something we can all do is use our purchasing power. It can have a huge impact and the more you do it, the more brands will want to partner up with charities.
Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally-recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one on one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.
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