I was recently asked to document how I came about to writing my book, How to Play Business Golf. Following is part of the series: My History of Business Golf
Part 1
Many years ago…around 1990, way before the Tiger Wood era… I started playing in annual golf outings sponsored either by my company or organized separately by several of the top executives of my company. I’ll leave the company unnamed for obvious reasons, but I’m sure many of you who know me personally will make assumptions that could or could not be accurate.
Some of these golf outings were well known and played as part of business conferences and others were not public but known internally by nearly every employee who played golf.
These events were scheduled throughout the year. Some were held at the same location while others purposely were moved around. Some were one round of 18 holes while a few were five days of multiple rounds of golf each day.
Where We Played Was More Important
All of them were played at private golf clubs or country clubs.
Most of these outings were well known to the thousands of golfers within the corporation, however, there were a few that were very private. Some of which I never got to play in because of what probably were political reasons related to who I worked for and the level of management status I had…I’ll probably never know.
What I do know is those who got to play usually moved up the corporate ladder rapidly or got to retire early. Nobody I knew, who got to play in those “ClamBakes”, ever complained of having attended.
When I first started playing in these outings I took it as them being casual gathers of peers and bosses to kick out the jams on company time. Most of us rookies to these events looked at these functions as extended benefits of our position in the company or an official day off. It took awhile for me to finally find out there was much, much more to these gathers than golf.
Change in Golf Economy Began
It was around 2000, the year the massive changes started in the US economy, these outings started to be more of what they had always been, but never designated as…Business Golf.
Over the years I never paid attention to there also being key customers and vendors always scattered throughout the groups of golfers. I just figured it was some sort of ‘appreciation day’ of which some of the outings covertly were called. What was really being played was more than a regular round of golf. The golf that was played was not as serious as the round of Business Golf.
Not All Fun With Games
Of course, after me telling you all this you are going to assume these were clandestine drunks ending up in smoke-filled conferences rooms where deals were strong-armed. Your assumption would not be too far off for a few of these gathers that went on in the early years, but starting in the early 2000’s, these rounds of Business Golf were artfully executed by well-trained business people like me.
My eyes were really opened to what these golf outings were all about when I was chosen to be one of a dozen operations managers to formally organize the golf outings that were part of the corporation’s quarterly Management Conferences. It was here where I saw Business Golf played in it’s purest form and where I learned the art of How to Play Business Golf.
I’ll be back with more on My History of Business Golf.
