I Won a Prime-Time Survival Show in My Scoutmaster Uniform. First, We Had to Fight.

A fourth-degree ninja black belt I'd seen on Naked and Afraid All-Stars. A mercenary who helped take out Saddam Hussein. A Marine Scout Sniper. Military survival instructors. Special forces guys.

And me. About 53 years old, the oldest competitor on the show, up on a hill in my Scoutmaster uniform. Neckerchief and all.

The show: Kicking & Screaming, a prime-time survival competition. My partner and I won it. But first, we had to fight, on camera.

Picture your last tense meeting. Two good people go at it, and the room stares at the table. It feels like the team is breaking.

Every team goes through a stage called storming. You are going to fight. And you want to.

Storming is a stepping stone.

The old Scoutmaster

I'd always sworn I'd never go on one of those shows. Have you seen what they make them eat?

Then a casting company emailed me out of the blue. A new survival show, pitting 10 of the country's top survival experts against each other. They wanted me in my Scoutmaster uniform, representing all of Boy Scouts of America.

Each expert got a novice who'd never even camped out in their backyard. They came in by boat and looked up at us on that hill. Rough, tough survival experts. And the old Scoutmaster.

Mine was Natalie: pink and blue hair, fully tattooed, a tongue ring, an online video gamer. You know what she was thinking. "Please, God, do not give me the old Scoutmaster."

She was an atheist. She was still thinking it.

She got the old Scoutmaster.

She's a good person. Smart, strategic, tough, and she wanted to win.

At one point, we went at it.

"We're in the middle of number two"

Why doesn't matter. We were hungry, sleep-deprived and stressed. The cameras loved it.

We separated for a little bit. I'd learned something in scouting: the four stages of team development. One, forming. Two, storming. Three, norming. Four, performing.

So I came back to Natalie and said, "Guess what? I got great news."

"What?"

"We're in the middle of number two."

"Yes, we are."

"No, that's not what I mean. We're in the storming stage."

"The storming stage is not a stumbling block. It's a stepping stone. As long as you do it with love and respect."

After that, we became the most winning team on the entire show.

Storming is a stepping stone.

"I do not have a chance"

Final three: Brady, the Marine Scout Sniper. Ben, a U.S. Air Force survival instructor. And me. When I first met those two, I called my wife and told her, "I do not have a chance."

To my amazement, and because Natalie was strong, we won that round. Final two: Brady and me.

He's one of the baddest dudes I've ever met. In camp, he'd told me, "Terry, you probably got the best attitude of anybody I've ever met in my life." Now it was him or me. It was mostly the novices, and mine came through with flying colors.

We won the entire show. I couldn't believe I won a freaking survival show.

Because I didn't. We did. Natalie and I did. Scouting and I did, because they trained me up. God and I did.

And winning wasn't the important part. Since then, I've spoken at countless scouting events and helped raise millions and millions of dollars for kids who will never know I existed.

Storming is a stepping stone.

What I took from the jungle

If a team never storms, it never gets honest. It's niceties and platitudes. On a corporate team, in a nonprofit, in a marriage.

Baden-Powell, the founder of scouting, taught that there is good in every person. I looked for it in Natalie. She found it in me.

My Advice

1. Teach the four stages at your next team meeting, before the fight. When the storm hits, say what I said to Natalie: "Guess what? I got great news."
2. When it blows up, step apart first. Let it cool.
3. When you come back together, name the goal you share. Then look for the good in the other person. Storm with love and respect.

Storming is a stepping stone.

For the sake of the other readers: what helped a team of yours come through a rough patch stronger? Tell me in the comments.

If you got something from this, share it on LinkedIn. The post is already written for you: "There's some great stuff in here I thought you'd like to see."

To your success,
Terry

P.S. Next edition: U.S. chess champion Sam Shankland, who announced he was quitting chess with three tournaments left to play. Subscribe so it lands in your inbox.

I told the full story on my solo episode of The Comeback Chronicles podcast. The four stages come from Bruce Tuckman, "Developmental sequence in small groups," Psychological Bulletin, 1965. Photos: Kicking & Screaming (2017).

My new keynote: The Down Day Decides

Natalie and I had our down day in the middle of a jungle, hungry and on camera. What we did at the bottom of it is what this edition is about. My new keynote is about that moment, for your whole team. If your team is storming right now, that's the room I want to be in.

Stop losing good people to bad days. That's the keynote. See the full keynote, or watch the trailer:

Watch the 2-minute trailer →