Distance to the Green: A Caddy's Lessons in Life, Business and Golf - Softcover

Abram, Gary

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1886816069 ISBN 13: 9781886816060

Publisher: Plan II Pubns Ltd, 1996

Synopsis

Subtitled "A Caddy's Lessons in Life, Business, and Golf," Distance to the Green defies rigid classification. Book stores shelve it on their business/motivation stacks. Golf stores carry it because of its vivid golfing stories and tips. Even non-golfers enjoy its humorous and real characters and the true-to-life instruction it provides.

The book follows Scotty, a hardheaded and egotistical college golfer who is forced to spend the summer caddying at National, the most prestigious golf course in the country. While caddying for some of the most significant and wealthy men and women in the country, he learns important life lessons from its members. He learns how to set and attain goals for both personal and business success. He learns how to "wire the deal" -- a five step process for extracting the greatness within all of us. He learns the real steps of problem solving, how mentoring helps increase intellectual capital, what team building can mean, what is truly significant in communication -- and still more, all of it vital in achieving success as an effective human being and leader.

Woven into these significant life lessons are great golfing stories, humor, hints, tips, and pure, colorful descriptions of the "best golf course in America." You'll enjoy meeting Scotty and who he becomes, his mentors, and you'll like the fact that you can share in his excitement and growth as he learns some valuable lessons . . . and you won't even have to carry the bags.

About this title

About the Author

Gary Abram is president of Partners Group, an international executive search company located in Kansas City specializing in the insurance industry. He is also the president of Scott O'Brien, Inc., an innovative consulting and training firm. Scott O'Brien specializes in books, keynotes and seminars generally using a golf motif or metaphor to express key business and personal growth concepts. He taught and coached at the high school and college level, worked in the insurance industry, and in the days before free agents, was a professional baseball player.

Bob O'Byrne was the Chairman of Robert O'Byrne and Associates, an employee benefits company. Founded in 1962, the company had grown to over 150 employees in 14 offices across the country and was named the 1995 Small Business of the Year by the Kansas City Chamber of Commerce. Bob has been recognized as one of the Outstanding Alumni of the Bloch School of Business at the University of Missouri, Kansas City.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

"'On your deathbed you will have total consciousness. I got that goin' for me.' -- Carl, the Greenskeeper, from Caddyshack.

That summer before my senior year in college, I was Scotty, the looper, the caddie. Most people would say I grew up in a suburb outside of Chicago. That's only partly true. I was raised there. I really grew up at National Golf Club. This is a diary of that summer."

"...Coach Robbie proceeded to inform me that he had arranged my summer and that I was to report to an old college bud of his, Richard Nelson, at the "caddyshack" of the National Golf Club.

National and Rich Nelson turned out to be two of the grandest institutions in the world, but at that particular moment I was truly angry. I had planned a summer of girls, rock'n'roll, and hustling some gandies on some of the local courses for $25 Nassaus. Robbie had other plans for me. "Report the day after Memorial Day to National, or it's been nice knowing you."

It was painfully obvious from Robbie's tone that if I had any thought of playing for him on the golf team, then I was going to National and I'd better return with an adjusted attitude. You see, I fancied myself as a player, but that summer I learned that I wasn't even close. I sure as hell didn't see myself as a caddie, but on June 1, I began the greatest education of my life while a novice caddie at National.

National is 178 of the most beautiful acres on this planet. For a golfer, it is heaven. Everything about your golf experience at National is stellar. From the moment you pull through the gates, the treatment you receive is the essence of class. As a caddie, however, my position on the food chain did not allow me the same deferential treatment. In fact, caddies were only allowed to play on Mondays when the course was closed and after we had finished our other chores. Robbie had indeed sentenced me to purgatory: He had sent a golfaholic to one of golf's hallowed grounds and made him carry the bags of the rich and famous, whose golf swings were generally brutal, while limiting my play to once a week -- maybe.

You can imagine my attitude when I reported for my first loop at the caddyshack. Oh, yeah, "caddyshack" is a tad off-base. Nothing at National resembles a shack. The trash receptacles at national are made of marble and brass. And my boss, the caddy-master, Rich Nelson, was one of the world's classiest guys. He was silver-haired senatorial, with all the aura that came with it: bushy eyebrows, impeccable dress, the slight corpulence of a man of success and the worldliness to make him comfortable amongst kings and titans of industry. Everyone at National had a nickname except Rich. It just wouldn't have been right to call him anything else. He had been a super successful insurance executive, a yachtsman and bon vivant. I asked him once why was hanging out with a bunch of reprobates like us. He merely winked and said, "Hey, it's a good summer job."

Well, I thought it was anything but a good summer job and he knew it, so he sent me off with a foursome that included a big Irishman named Bob O'Brien.

That day O'Brien changed my life so profoundly that to this day, I am astounded by how he was able to do it in four hours on the golf course. It wasn't one of the lightening bolt kind of deals, but he got into my head that day and by the end of the summer, you wouldn't have recognized me."

Edition details

• Publisher: Plan II Pubns Ltd
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1886816069
• ISBN 13: 9781886816060
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 169