When I was much younger, I sold for New York Life Insurance Company. I worked in an agency as a partner and we would frequently collaborate on larger cases with other agents (this was way before the hype on the word collaboration).

We would learn great things from each other. What we did with that learning turned out to be some fun, healthy competition – competition that only made us all better and richer. What that sounded like I learned from one of the collaborators. It goes like this – “I’m going to take what I learned from you and beat your brains out with it.”

I still use this today. To me, this is the only kind of competition that should be going on among leaders. Unhealthy competition is counterproductive to what we, as leaders, are really trying to do – or against what we ought to be doing. Unhealthy competition is simply competition that requires others to lose so we can win.