Dan O’Brien: Overcoming Adversity to Become a Champion

Most sports champions and successful business leaders make it look easy…but it’s not.

Dan O’Brien is a former decathlete, 1996 Olympic gold medalist, TV personality, motivational speaker, author, and coach.

But it wasn’t always rosy for him. Dan was adopted at age 2 and was raised in a home with seven other children of racially mixed backgrounds. He struggled in school, all the way through his years in and out of college. But he kept going. He had trouble with the academics, but he learned what he was really good at: he excelled in sports.

When he concentrated on track, he found his niche. After years of training and practice, he was expected to easily be on the Olympic team in 1992. However, a bad day at the trials meant that he failed to qualify for the Olympic team that year, which was particularly embarrassing, since Reebok had run a large ad campaign, the “Dan and Dave” campaign, featuring Dan and rival Dave Johnson, debating who would take the title as “Word’s Greatest Athlete” at the ’92 Olympics.

But Dan didn’t stay down long after that very public defeat. He qualified in 1996 and took the Olympic Gold Medal for the Decathlon that year in Atlanta.

Along the way, he met and learned from coaches, mentors and a lot of other world champions. Those lessons gave him strength, determination and the will to keep going.

Accelerent—Phoenix

The Phoenix division of Accelerent is the area’s leading business development organization, and Benefit Commerce Group is proud to be the Title Sponsor of this division. At breakfast events throughout the year, guests invited by members of Accelerent hear from nationally-recognized speakers and experts like Dan O’Brien.

Lessons Learned from Dan

Focus:

At one of the athletic events he attended, Dan met Milt Campbell, American decathlete of the 1950s. Milt called Dan’s name and asked him to stand up. Milt asked, “What do you want to be?”  Dan said, “I want to be a great athlete.”  Milt said, “Then you should quit; you’re already a great athlete.  What do you want to BE?”  That made Dan really think. No one had ever asked him that question.  Dan took a moment and said, “I want to be the world’s greatest athlete.”  Milt said, “Write it down, look at it every day, never stop thinking about that.”

Effort:

After Dan’s failure to qualify for the 1992 Olympics, it took a lot of effort to keep going, but Dan did. With encouragement from coaches and others, he kept pushing, and he won competitions and broke world records. He was unbeatable for four years.

He says effort is what separates the great ones from the good ones. “More work, harder, more detail.  It’s not luck, it’s not a mistake, it’s the luck that you make for yourself with preparation and effort,” Dan said.

Carry it forward:

When he had finished his Olympic and world competition years, Dan found other ways to excel. He began helping others to achieve their own greatness. He counsels others to “take responsibility for your own successes and failures.” And for those who have achieved success, he says: “Be a coach; be a mentor. Be the person who says, ‘You can do it!’”

Dan lives in Scottsdale, where he is an assistant volunteer coach at Arizona State University. He also trains athletes of all ages in sports ranging from tennis to football.

For more information about Dan, you can go to his website: https://www.danobrien.com/

BCG’s 10th Annual Employee Benefits Benchmarking Survey

During opening remarks at the event, Chris Hogan, Executive Vice President and Principal of Benefit Commerce Group (BCG) introduced the 2023 AZ Employee Benefits Benchmarking Survey, conducted by Benefit Commerce Group. This program, in its 10th year in Arizona, is designed specifically for mid-sized employers to compare their benefits against other employers in Arizona, regionally and nationally.

The 2023 Benchmarking Survey is open now, and it is officially launching February 1st. Employers who participate in the survey will be invited to attend the Results Seminar at the AZ Biltmore on June 8th. They also will receive individual reports that will identify for them:

• Where they are ahead of the competition
• Where they need to be stronger
• And how to save money and bring benefit innovations into their program

The BCG team also can drill down to even more detailed results for employers, to get a fuller view of how their benefits stack up to their competitors here in Arizona and across the nation.

Next Accelerent Phoenix/BCG Breakfast Event – April 20th

2023 is an amazing year of quality speakers and motivating topics at the Accelerent/BCG Breakfast Events!! The next one will be April 20th.  Our guest speaker will be Ron Jaworski, ESPN analyst and former NFL quarterback. Attendance is by invitation only.