 One of my good friends and mentors is Jay Billis of ESPN and Jay's been a great friend for over a decade now And Jay told me that part of his job with ESPN game day is he needs to go watch each team practice The day before he covers their game so he can get some intel and some insight on what the team's going to do and really get to Know each of the players and coaches well back in 2010 in early December was going to be a rematch of The previous spring's national championship game where Duke barely escaped beating the Butler Bulldogs One of the best NCAA finals that we've seen and this was a very highly anticipated rematch because it's not very often that the two teams That met in the championship played each other in an early season match up, you know a mere six months later Well Jay is Duke alum, so he decided that he would go watch Duke's practice first And he goes over to coach K and coach K is talking to the Duke team and coach K says We're going to beat Butler tomorrow because we have a distinct advantage. We are bigger We are stronger And we are more powerful than they are we are going to beat them because we have the advantage We are bigger stronger and more powerful. We will pound the ball down low. We'll get easy layups and dunks We'll out rebound them and we'll block every shot. We are going to win tomorrow because we have the advantage Now coach K is one of the best to ever blow a whistle Hall of Fame coach, so Jay left and thought This is going to be a bloodbath tomorrow Coach K just told them why they're going to win and why they have the advantage But he goes over to the Butler Bulldogs practice and Brad Stevens is an absolute basketball savant one of the brightest young coaches in the game absolutely brilliant and He's talking to the Butler Bulldogs and he says guys. We're going to beat Duke tomorrow Because we have the advantage We are smaller quicker and faster than they are We are going to beat Duke because we have the advantage. We are smaller. We're quicker and we're faster There's no way their big guys can keep up with us. We'll out run them in transition. We'll get easy layups We'll have wide open threes We'll get plenty of steals. We will win tomorrow because we have the advantage and Jay left that practice and thought I Don't know who in the hell is going to win the game tomorrow Because both of these teams Believe that they have the advantage Both of these teams have incredibly high self-awareness to know what it is that they do well and what can be their Separator to give them the best chance of being successful. And here's the coolest part They were both right They were both 100% right and I tell you that story because I want that to be the reason that you double down on Relationships the reason why you invest in relationships because again, they can't be copied So your relationships can be your advantage Can be your separator and can be the reason that you will win in whatever business that you're in