When I was a kid my dad used to play basketball in a local amateur league. Every Saturday during the season we went somewhere and he spent a couple of hours playing, while I was playing with a ball on the side. I was very lucky if they had an extra hoop nearby and even better if there were people to play basketball with. I started playing more seriously, with older kids, when I was 9 years old, and I played at a highly competitive level until I was around 20. I kept playing throughout my adulthood in less competitive more amateurial leagues.

Basketball is a great sport for many reasons:

1. It’s a team sport

2. All players can score

3. All players can defend

4. Role players play a great role in certain circumstances

5. We win or lose together

6. There are better and worse players but the less good players are incredibly important through training and preparation.

Fast-forward more than 20 years and I see several similarities with business in general and startups in particular.

Wearing more than 1 hat

Often startups require the personnel to be flexible and do more than one thing. This is similar to the players who didn’t normally score having an advantage they could take in some games and becoming the biggest scorers.

Conversely, it’s also similar to the player who didn’t defend that hard, having to step up their game to cover a very skilled player from the other team.

Develop team skills

Invariably during the training people learn new skills or adapt their game to internal and external competition. Often a player who wasn’t able to shoot the ball from three-point had to improve their shooting skill. Also, players often improve their tactical skills.

In tech startups, shooting would be like learning a new technology stack, while improving their tactical skills would be like learning to focus more on the business outcome rather than on the technology itself.

Leadership can be shared

In basketball, leadership can be shared depending on the moment. In business, it’s great to have several players ready to step up as they are needed to be able to win a game. This leadership can be trained, through playing with different combinations of players.

Specialised roles are important

A player that can make any three, a player that can defend anyone, and a player that can make their teammates play better are all important. In startups, growth hackers, specific skills for the stack the company is using, etc. are very important too.

Conclusion

Team skills are often overlooked and it’s relatively hard to train. The learnings from playing a team sport are incredible, and one like basketball where the roles and responsibilities can be fluid would be my best recommendation.