Do you want to inspire people to be kind, thoughtful, and generous to one another? Apparently the NCAA doesn’t.

Josiah Q. Roe’s article at Irresponsible Journalism points to a story of the NCAA’s inability to recognize what is actually right in college athletics today.

UGA is playing Boise State opening day. Some UGA fans hear about the father of a Boise State player who is currently serving in Iraq. These Georgia fans decide to raise the couple thousand dollars to fly the father home from Iraq so he can see his son play D-1 football ‘gainst Georgia.

The NCAA finds out about it, and check this, put a stop to it because it would be violating the NCAA’s bylaws. In effect, these Bulldog fans would be functioning as boosters for Boise State, so its a no-go. Amazing.

Sometimes rules are meant to be broken.

I agree with Josiah. Do you? Sure you do.

Now:

Do you commendate employees for “breaking the rules” in order to service customers?

Do you hire employees that are willing to “break the rules” if needed?

Or are you more interested in having yes-men working with you and for you?

Do you communicate rules to your employees or do you communicate the heart of your company?

Bottom line: If your employees are unwilling to break the rules of your company when necessary to serve customers, then they’ll break the heart of your company and lose customers instead.