STUDIES IN PHYSICAL CULTURE AND TOURISM

Vol. 12, No. 2, 2005

The English language utilizes a wide variety of sports words and expressions. We use them because they offer that extra perspective and color to our everyday exchanges. Applied in business by way of metaphor, the language of sports becomes a powerful tool. When functioning outside of a descriptive context, the language of sports can now influence business conduct and shape the perception of a business as a whole (operations, goals setting, negotiating, competing, winning for profit). It can also influence relations within a company (management, leadership, team-building and teamwork, communication) and help develop ways of handling adversity and focusing on success (motivation, coaching, performance). Culture specific for the most part, the sports metaphor has become a cognitive tool by which the business community lives.

In the not so distant past, the worlds of homo faber and homo ludens rarely overlapped. When not at play, homo faber worked to produce goods and services, accumulated material and nonmaterial artifacts, and sought to satisfy his existential needs. Homo ludens, when not at work, involved himself in leisurely activities including sports. In time, homo faber noticed that he could use play as a tool to better his work and to increase its productivity. As a result, he reached for sports and the language of sports and utilized both in his business endeavors. Why, how, and to what extent sports and sports language influences business, and what implications develop from the relationship, will be at the center of this article.

For centuries metaphor was treated, for the most part, as a figure of speech used to enhance expression or to obstruct clear expression of ideas. For instance, Aristotle viewed metaphor was a mere rhetorical device which enabled him to say one thing in terms of another. John Lock disregarded it altogether as, in his view, it was a defect in reasoning. In a similar vain, Thomas Hobbes perceived metaphor in all its fuzziness and ambiguity as an impediment to the unequivocal conveyance of meaning (so important in the times of the Enlightenment) and thus a phenomenon unworthy of consideration. Over two hundred years later, most structuralists also treated metaphor as a marginal issue.

There were philosophers, however few, who well ahead of their times saw in metaphor a cognition tool. Danesi mentions two, St. Thomas Aquinas and Giambattista Vico. St. Thomas writes in his works that the Holy Scriptures were written in metaphors so that people could comprehend spiritual truths which were impossible to convey in literal terms. Vico believed that understanding metaphor was proof of our minds having ‘sense-making faculties’ [6]. For Kant, metaphor had a cognitive role as it helped us to comprehend those concepts which were impossible to understand with our senses alone.

With time and the emergence of cognitive sciences, the use of metaphor has become central to the understanding of the workings of the human mind. It is believed that the human conceptual system which serves as a point of reference according to which we think and act is ‘fundamentally metaphorical in nature’ and that metaphor as such has ‘power to create a reality rather than simply to give us a way of conceptualizing a preexisting reality’ [14]. We talk about conventionalized metaphors as elements in one’s general linguistic competence. We can determine the image of the world of a given language community using so-called idealized cognitive models which we obtain by way of a cognitive-linguistic analysis. We also talk about metaphor’s creative function when commonly used concepts take upon a new meaning in a new context, such as when the metaphor focuses our attention on one particular aspect while dissuading us from another. It assumes the status of a ‘basic mechanism governing the processes of our understanding life experiences’ and the ’most fundamental way of imagining what is complex and abstract through the reference to simple things, more basic and concrete’ [17]. This is just a step from the belief that metaphor assumes power to ‘transform our experience’ and ‘restructure common patterns of thought with a new, metaphorical description’ [14], thus revealing what has so far been hidden and activating its creative potential of thought and, therefore, behavior.

In this context, the sports metaphor functions no differently. Now viewed as complex, multifaceted, and recognized to be of paramount importance, the sports metaphor “marched” into the business world together with the industrial revolution at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the United States, for example, sports analogies have found everyday English a fertile ground in which to grow. Different sports, from highly individual ones, like chess or horse races, to all-American team sports, like football or baseball, attract participants and spectators in the millions. With either active or passive participation, sports remain deeply embedded in the nation’s culture, history, and education. Sports teams, products, and endorsements have become industry players in their own right. Such shared experience bestows both the author and the reader of a metaphor with a common cognitive area of reference in which the metaphor becomes a vehicle of communication.

Conversely, if used in an unfamiliar context or if the connotations it evokes fail to fit its author’s intention, then the metaphor may hinder rather than help communication. Thus, in order to communicate effectively, one has to consider the social and cultural factors of a metaphorical exchange. That is when an image metaphor appears, i.e. one which came into being in one culture and which is historically and socially conditioned. Let’s consider the situation of a company business meeting in Poland between American and Polish businessmen, with English serving as the lingua franca at the meeting. An American businessman suggests that, instead of being “all over the ballpark,” the company should “cover all bases,” throw their competition “a curve ball and swing for the fences,” with the goal of “getting out from the bush leagues and aiming for the world series.” In all likelihood, for a Polish businessman uninitiated in the game of baseball, such an argument makes no sense. In this case, the culturally distant or even separate cultural sport experience fails to create a cognitive common ground from which an effective understanding of the metaphor can spring, and the expected action follow. What this exchange lacks is the ‘intimacy,’ i.e. ‘the acknowledgement of a community’ between the participants in the metaphor [4], what we can call a special sociolinguistic dimension of the metaphor, enrooted in one’s sensory experience and a culture’s system of values. A metaphor has to be culturally conditioned to be comprehended.

Another factor which makes the sports metaphor so attractive to the business community are the various attributes which the two share. ‘Business is the greatest game in the world,’ said Andrew Carnegie, undoubtedly one of the greatest businessmen of all times [18]. Although not a man of sports himself, Carnegie enjoyed the thrill of being engaged in all aspects of running a business, including the setting of goals, facing the difficulties, relishing its unpredictability, encouraging cooperation, leadership, and competition, and dealing with similar issues of winning and losing. In all aspects, business reminded Carnegie of the titillation of people involved in sports.

Both sports and business have a system of values which serves as a foundation for any activity. In sports, the system is referred to as fair play and means an honorable approach, based on rules, in which loyalties and honesty determine play between opponents. The rules are important and consequential for they define a contest, set limitations on the players, and determine how a winner can be named. In business, the value system is based on a collective sense of right and wrong and is defined as the code of ethics. These laws, internal for each kind of business (similarly to rules in different sports disciplines), are based on being fair, honest, considerate, self restraint, and polite to others. They, too, take on the role of establishing principles of fair business conduct [5].

Secondly, both sport and business draw from the idea of competition. In sports, competition is play, carried on ‘within itself and its result does not have part in the life process of a given group’ [11]. In other words, competition stems from pure enjoyment of play and the results no longer bear any consequences. In business, however, competition is there to ensure progress towards a goal of outdoing and outrunning the opponent and to ensure profit. It is worth nothing, however, that business tends to equate competition in terms of a war parallel more readily than one of sports perhaps because it is still considered a “boys’ game.”

Furthermore, as a direct result of competition, sports and businesses share the element of winning. In sports one wins more than just the game itself; one wins recognition and honor and additionally transfers victory upon the entire group to which he belongs. In business, to triumph over one's competition is an ultimate reward as it more often than not translates into greater financial gains. In both winning and competition, other factors are involved including the price (the effort put in a game or venture); the stake (whether it is honor or a title in sports), and – in the case of business – a sum of money invested and risked on the unknown result of an endeavor. The latter factor is closely related to the unpredictability of the outcome of both sports and business undertakings, regardless of the effort ahead. It is also important to remember that goal-oriented activities can be still affected by such factors such as luck. As a result, correct anticipation of the opponent's behavior can at times resolve a result of the contest.

The ever-pervasive feeling of challenge is another catalyst for both the worlds of sport and business. ‘A game (like business venture – LJK) holds our interest only if it presents an intellectual challenge, is played against an opponent of near equal skills, or requires somewhat difficult physical exertions’ [3]. The urge to surpass a sports opponent and beat the competitor in the marketplace is another fundamental element to the sports and business parallel. Along with challenge comes a feeling of fun, which accompanies both sports and business experience. People involve themselves for the similar passion for adventure, enjoyment, and a prospect of success.

And finally, both sports and business share the phenomenon of synergy, a togetherness, a sharing or union, in an effort to win. The term is especially germane when referring to team sports and large business organizations. In essence, it means that a collective effort and cooperation of individuals in a group brings about better results.

Interestingly enough, with such a wide variety of sports disciplines available, business language tends to utilize analogies which stem form team sports rather than from sports which stress individuality. And so, it is sports like baseball, football, basketball (also the most popular sports in the U.S.A.) where we find the largest sources of metaphors. This is due to the fact that the words used to describe these sports seem to express best the fundamental business notions of cooperation, leadership, role assignment, and strategy.

Consider the example of cooperation. Working or acting together for a common purpose is a basic goal for any business. Whenever two or more people join to apply for corporate charter to form a corporation they agree to cooperate, to work their individual talents into an effective whole, and to lead their organization toward recognition and financial success. To be successful, they must devote time and expertise to their undertaking, all the time recognizing their dependence on each other, just as in the case of team sports. Sociologists of sport came to a similar conclusion when investigating sports groups: ‘When one member progresses toward the goal, all members are facilitated. Conversely, if a member fails at his task or is hindered in his goal-seeking efforts, then the team itself is affected negatively’ [1].

The rich business literature, especially the one on helping businesspeople grow professionally, approaches the issue in a similar way. As an example, Clifford and Cavanagh present it as follows: ‘As in team sports (…) a superstar sometimes makes the difference between success and failure but never can do it entirely alone. It’s the whole team (…) that scores on the field (…) and in the winning company’ [8]. Aware of the importance of such a group effort to the success of his whole company, Lee Iacocca resorted to sports and team metaphors to help his employees change their perception of their role and performance in the company [13]. At first he described the company, which then was on the verge of bankruptcy, in the following way: ‘There (at Chrysler) was no team, only a collection of independent players.’ Then, as Iacocca writes, he consulted Vince Lombardi, a highly successful baseball coach. Lombardi advised to Iacocca to change his perception of the car building business, saying ‘The difference between mediocrity and greatness is (…) team spirit. When the players are imbued with that special feeling, you know you’ve got yourself a winning team. (…) It’s the same thing, whether you’re running a ball club or a corporation. After all, does one man build a car all by himself?’

And so, at one of many ‘game plan’ sessions addressing his managers, Iacocca resorted to the same metaphor: ‘If you want to succeed in this business, you all have to operate as a team.’ He knew that referring to the familiar concept of a sports team he could provide his people with a new understanding of business by describing one kind of experience in terms of another. Here, the sports metaphor was no longer just a rhetorical device. It involved a preexisting experience to create a new conceptual system upon which to act.

Today, business well recognizes the correlation between team success and cohesiveness. Research on sports group cohesiveness found that teams which are more cohesive are, indeed, more successful. This success brings about greater satisfaction from being part of the group, which then leads to higher levels of group’s cohesiveness. Consequently, this natural circular relationship is maintained. Therefore, many companies require their individual employees to have the ability to effectively interact with co-workers in obtaining the organization's goals. So, using appropriate metaphors, Iacocca expected what in sports is so prevalent, i.e., team loyalty, pride, and a sense of belonging, the willingness of an individual to set aside his personal gains for the good of the group, as well as expressing his belonging to a group in terms of 'we', 'us' or 'ours'. He also expected the individual to remember that ‘when people win together, the joy is more intense than when any of us wins alone, because part of any true pleasure is sharing that pleasure’ [10]. And what pleasure it was when the Chrysler empire, like Lombardi’s teams, had defeated the competition and again became the leader in the industry.

Research has also showed that there is a correlation between team success and the quality of coaching it receives. This concept is well known in business circles and has been additionally noted in business literature. Clifford and Cavanagh present it as follows: ‘As in team sports (...) a superstar sometimes makes the difference between success and failure but never can do it entirely alone. It's the whole team (...) that scores on the field (...) and in the winning company’ [8]. In this situation, too, sports imagery can prove useful. The science now known as sports psychology helps business players excel in their endeavors. When coaching, instructors use the same techniques they apply when coaching sportsmen. They help the business people to get into the frame of mind of professional athletes and approach their tasks, e.g. difficult negotiations, like the athletes would approach an imminent competition. Visualizations or neurolinguistic programming are used, which in turn utilize metaphors of different kind, inclusive of sports [16].

Issues of leadership are also extremely important in a successful business/sports model. Like a captain leading his team (usually a highly skilled and knowledgeable active player who carries the on-field responsibility of coordination, e.g. a catcher in baseball or quarterback in football), a business leader must posses the same basic qualities. So, to use Iacocca’s example, the business leader perceives his role in a company as one who inspires confidence and trust in his people and who is competent to direct his team. A detailed knowledge of all aspects of the business adds credibility to his leadership. Iacocca viewed himself as a team leader and he acted like one. He compared his role as president of a company to a track leader – the one that is in front of the group (like bicyclists or jockeys) – always imposing the tempo of the race. ‘I expected no less of the people who worked for me: I’ve always found that the speed of the boss is the speed of the team’ [13].

The concept of coaching and role assignment has also entered the world of business. Managers, like coaches in sports, run ‘pre game sessions’ to introduce their workers to the company’s goals. They delegate responsibilities to their assistants, check on the subordinates’ progress, and make them accountable for completion of the assignment. Hoping to inspire confidence among their subordinates, he or she will teach them the trade and skills necessary, often referring to elements of sports. By using the metaphor of a chief coach or coach assistants to focus their attention on one aspect of their job, they can hide another in order to make the task differentiation clear. This is similar to the function of base-line or pitching coaches in baseball or kicking coaches in football. So the manager, like a chief coach, sets goals and establishes a strategy (a game plane), delegates to his assistant a portion of his own responsibilities, checks on the subordinate’s progress, and makes him accountable for completion of the assignment. The manager may also set up a contest for the ‘most valuable player’ or, with the end of the year, give the ‘rookie of the year’ award. Again, if an employee is not familiar with the game of baseball (the MVP metaphor) or the game of chess (the rookie metaphor), he may not know what these expressions entail.

Such reference to the familiar when creating metaphors, as mentioned previously, is one of the fundamental principles for the use of an effective metaphor. Since most businesspeople have passively or actively participated in sports, examples from sports, either by way of a parallel or a metaphor, can serve as good examples to depict the issue in question (assuming that all parties share such experiences). Business literature is filled with examples how to use analogy to sports in negotiations [9].

In conference speaking, on the other hand, the use of a sports parallel can assume a broader role. Consequential in such circumstances, not only does it help maintain a level of interest in the audience and focus its attention on what the parties to the conference have in common, but it also presents an opportunity to steer the discussion away from issues which may cause disagreement, or even a conflict [12]. In fact, similar situations can also apply in management. A good manager needs to convey his intentions in such a manner that his associates or employees can grasp his message unambiguously. Here too, a commonality among Americans sports experience can prove itself beneficial. The sports metaphor can help prevent disagreements and negative responses, while at the same time increasing mutual understanding and cooperation [2]. When used for motivation purposes, the use of metaphor can take on a persuasive function, aiming to make the audience open to a different perception of a goal or even incline them to change their attitude and behavior, hopefully bringing the company some form of profit [7]. Therefore, a sports metaphor has to evoke in the human mind images, non-verbal representations of concepts, which can then undergo conventionalizing and become encoded in one’s conceptual system, becoming part of the shared knowledge of a group, so that the group’s members can unconsciously act on the premise implied by the metaphor [17].

While an overwhelming majority of expressions of sports origin find their use in a parallel or a metaphor, a good number have managed to enter the business register and become part of its specialist vocabulary. For example, in business some of the most commonly used words from sports came from golf. Most refer to finances, and especially to the stock market. This is evidenced by the word ‘par,’ which first established its presence on golf courses as one belonging to the golf register. This word is a good example of how metaphor is culture-conditioned, and how, from the cognitive perspective, it draws reference from the collective experience of a given community [7]. Since belonging to a golf course was fashionable during the rapid development of the American stock market at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and before the Black Monday of 1929, so stock brokers of the day would often ‘move’ their offices to golf courses and prefer to finalize their deals (by the way, a metaphor from the game of cards) on golf courses. A ‘par’ in the game of golf now means a number of strokes considered necessary for a good player to complete a hole or a course. ‘Par,’ used in business as a noun, means an average or a nominal amount, degree, or value. A nominal or face value of a share is referred to as ‘par value’. The shares or bonds can be above, below or at par, which means that they are respectively above, below or at their original price or face value. It worth noting, however, that the original meaning of the golf par has changed over time, for in golf to be ‘under par’ is advantageous, whereas in business, shares under par are losing their value.

Another example of a word no longer directly associated with sport is ‘rookie,’ now well established in the business world. ‘Rookie’ originated from the game of chess where it is called a ‘rook’. The rook is the chess piece which is located in the corner of the board and often the last one used in a game. This implies that the person called a ‘rookie’ in business (the diminutive of ‘rook’) has the least experience or skill, while others who have been ‘in the game’ longer are not.

Naturally, the business register abounds in sports references. Such words and expressions include the ‘leader’ (races), a ‘team’ (team sports), a ‘deal’ (cards), a ‘knockout’ (boxing), ‘be within ballpark’ (baseball), a ‘face-off’ (hockey), a ‘sticky wicket’ (cricket), ‘play close to the vest’ (cards), a ‘rain check’ (baseball), ‘enter the world by sliding home’ (baseball), or a ‘toss-up’ (basketball) are no longer perceived as belonging exclusively to sports. The transfer between languages of homo ludens and homo faber is an continuing process. We can only anticipate that this flow will not subside, and when, for instance, in our annual performance evaluation we read that we are “like a good point guard, exemplifying excellence and making everyone around better as a result,” we can rest assured that our performance has met the teams’ goals and management’s expectations and that we are progressing towards the major leagues in whatever line of business we are engaged.

The sports metaphor has an undeniable impact on the world of business. Used at first as a parallel, the verbiage of sport has slowly settled in the business lingo for good, permeating its thought and verbal expression and assuming the power to influence behavior. At the same time, the use of metaphor in general opens doors to a broad reflection upon the business culture and its systems of values and goals. From the behavior in and language of business, we can draw conclusions about one’s personal perceptions of his business. Whether it is sports, war, journey, or still some other metaphor the people in business choose to act by, we can conclude what they believe for them the business is all about. With an abundance of linguistic evidence one conclusion is certain: for many, business is like sports – a game with many individual players, teams, leaders, competition, and goals. Where at times, there is a lot at stake, and the race to win can be exhausting, but also where, regardless of if you are in the business for a few shots or for a long run, you still can earn marks for artistic impression. Whether you win or lose, it is still fun to play.