Transcriber: Sarah Alonso Reviewer: Denise RQ
Pick him up!
Time out.
Get over here.
If any man on this team falls down,
you just sprint, and you pick him up!
The great coach Jason Gillespie.
So let me give you a bit of background
before you think that I'm crazy.
My entire life, I've been playing basketball.
Little league,
middle school,
high school,
college,
even some international.
But the most influential coach I've ever had throughout the years
was coach Jason Gillespie.
See, I played at a school called Bluefield College,
a little small school about 45 minutes outside of Virginia Tech.
But even though we were a small school,
we had a lot of nationally recognized accolades.
We led the nation in scoring,
we beat three Division I teams my senior year,
went to Auburn [University], almost beat Auburn
- and if anybody follows basketball,
they know that big teams like Auburn call little teams like Bluefield,
drag them up there so they can beat them by 40 points.
But there was a problem with this team.
We were more concerned about our individual success
than the success of the team as a whole,
so we started off losing,
and losing pretty bad.
So coach said this: "Here's what I'll do:
I will create a culture of selflessness.
I'll make them play for each other.
So if any man falls down from a screen,
any man lays the ball but it falls out of bounce,
any man hits the deck for any reason,
no matter where you are, you run, and you pick him up."
Like that (snaps), we got it.
We realized that if we were going to maximize our potential,
if we were going to win, which was the most important thing,
we had to be selfless.
We had to put the man next to us
ahead of us.
So it got me thinking;
Chattanooga's like that Bluefield College team in a lot of ways.
One way in particular,
because any time I tell somebody I played at Bluefield College,
they say the same thing as when I say I'm from Chattanooga,
"Where's that?"
(Laughter)
But in other ways as well,
because even though Chattanooga is a small city,
we've received a lot of nationally recognized accolades.
Fastest internet in the world
- nation, world, I don't know, it's fast!
It went from being named the dirtiest city in America in the 1960s
to a complete transformation,
now being called The Scenic City for how beautiful the city is,
and the restoration that we've done to our downtown and riverfront areas.
It's huge.
So, I'm like, what if we created a culture of selflessness?
What if the city did that?
How big would that be, right? Think about it.
Anybody has ever seen that movie Talladega Nights?
Raise your hand if you've ever seen it.
Ricky Bobby, "Shake and bake, wow!"
I loved that movie. Right? Love it.
Ricky Bobby had one main concept: if you're not the first...
(Audience) ...you're the last.
Exactly. If you're not the first, you're the last.
But, I believe when it comes to the city, it's the complete opposite.
I think in order to be the first, you [should] be the last.
You put the people who you work with,
the people who you mentor, the people who are your friends,
put them ahead of you.
It's like that old saying goes:
If you want to go fast, go alone.
But if you want to go far, you take others with you.
So what?
What if we create a culture of selflessness?
"OK, fine. James, I'll buy in. Chattanooga. Culture of selflessness."
How do we do it, right?
Well, first, it starts with leadership.
Because if coach Gillespie weren't the most selfless person
on the team and the organization,
the players would have never bought in.
It didn't work like that.
He first had to be selfless.
And I'm going to tell you something about our coach:
he treated all of us equal.
He treated the "star players" the same way
he treated the guy sitting at the end of the bench who never got much playing time.
All equal.
So when a city also starts with leadership,
it starts at our executive directors, it starts with our bosses,
it starts with our elected officials
implementing programs like the small business incentive.
And, yeah, we have Volkswagen, and that's great
- and it's always great to bring in large corporations
and bring in tons of jobs
and give them tax breaks and incentives for that -
but what about the little guy sitting at the end of the bench?
What about our small businesses?
It's also great to give them an incentive to hire.
The Small Business Administration reported that since the 1970s,
55% of the old jobs and 66% of the new jobs
have been created by small businesses.
So why would we not give them incentives for hiring as well?
Also, what if you were at work,
and you didn't just get bonuses or incentives for your own performance,
but you got a bonus or incentive every time you helped out your co-worker?
You were responsible for their individual performance as well.
What kind of culture would that create?
What kind of changes would we see happening?
But it takes a leadership to implement those things.
What else?
See, I told you guys that we led the nation in scoring.
And we also led the nation in points, rebounds, and steals,
but I am not trying to brag.
But what I didn't tell you guys is that we led the nation in assists.
Nobody was ball-hogging.
We shared the ball.
We put each other in positions to score and to be successful,
and everybody had that mindset, right?
It has to work the same way for the city.
We have to pass it on.
Big deal if we have entrepreneurs or a single entrepreneur
who's doing awesome things in this city,
but if he holds on to that knowledge and never shares those things
with the up-and-coming entrepreneurs,
then what difference does it make?
We got to lead the nation in assists.
We have to pass it on.
See, I was very fortunate to be in a program here
where they hand-selected the top executive directors,
and CEOs, and decision-makers,
and then by application process,
they selected up-and-coming emerging leaders in the city
and they paired us together.
Once a month, they took one mentor
with eight different protégés,
and sat them around a table.
And that mentor just poured knowledge into us.
He told us how late we had to stay up,
how early we had to get up,
how much hard work it takes,
what kind of connections you need to make.
He gave us this information
and by far, it was the best class that I've ever sat in.
They didn't teach that at Bluefield College.
So what if we continue to pass it on?
Because since they passed it on to us,
now it's our responsibility to pass it on
to the next upcoming emerging leaders.
So what else?
You have to pick them up!
That's the whole point of this thing, right?
Yeah, it starts with leadership and we put great programs into place;
yeah, we start passing it on,
and we're sharing knowledge and resources and we're coming together as a community,
but what about those underprivileged neighborhoods?
What about the homeless? What about the at-risk youth?
See, it's real easy for us
to just sweep them into little corners and pockets of the city,
and hope the tourists don't see them when they come into town.
It can be easy to do that.
It's hard to pick them up,
to uplift them out of those situations that they're in,
so when the tourists come into town,
we don't have to sweep them into little pockets of the city.
You have to pick them up.
See, one example of that is an initiative that a non-profit here is leading.
And I'm grateful to be a part of it.
We recognized that there is an issue downtown;
on Martin Luther King Boulevard,
on one side of MLK, there's Miller Plaza.
Business people go there,
they eat, they talk, they network.
Directly on the other side of MLK is Miller Park
where there's homeless and disadvantaged people.
They're not eating.
So we say: "Here's what we'll do:
we'll close off that block of MLK,
we're going to line up a table right down the middle,
we're going to sponsor some food,
and we're going to open it up to the community
to bring in food as well, just like a potluck.
And we're going to invite both sides to the table,
so we can let them know: "Hey, we want to hear your story.
You matter as well.
You may not get to have Thanksgiving meal with your family,
so break bread with us."
We want to pick you up
because if any man on this team falls down,
you run, and you pick him up.
Thank you.
(Applause)