Earlier this week, the WNBA announced that the league and the New York Liberty agreed to suspend consideration of Isiah Thomas’ application for an ownership interest in the team.
It is unclear if this move was indeed a mutual decision by both parties or if the WNBA Board of Governors was prepared to deny the application (thus the halt mostly allowed Thomas, James Dolan and the Liberty to temporarily save face).
But one thing we do know is that Ginny Gilder – co-owner of the Seattle Storm and Olympic silver medalist in rowing – was a member of the Board of Governors’ vetting committee. She is an outspoken proponent of equal opportunities and treatment of women in sports and believes both male and female athletes “deserve the same chance to reach for greatness.”
Standing up for what she believes in did not come naturally to Gilder. Rather, it was the experience of joining her Yale University women’s crew teammates in a Title IX protest that opened Gilder’s eyes to blatant gender discrimination in sports.
Recently, she chronicled her journey of overcoming odds to compete as a collegiate and Olympic rower in her memoir Course Correction: A Story of Rowing Resilience in the Wake of Title IX. Gilder also shares how her years of competing as an elite athlete led her to the WNBA, where she co-owns a professional sports franchise because it “offers the best female basketball players to do what they love as a career.”
Seattle, WA -- Ginny Gilder, Olympic Silver medalist in rowing, the founder and CEO of an investment... [+]
I caught up with Gilder to learn more about her transformational athletic experiences, her take on leadership in sports, and her expectations for the 2015 WNBA season. Here are excerpts of our conversation.
Alana Glass: How did your collegiate rowing participation at Yale University shape you as a leader? What did it teach you about leadership and teamwork?
Ginny Gilder: I believe that leadership is a consequence of how you behave in life as opposed to something to aspire to. I've never aspired to be a leader. I have only focused on doing things that I felt were important. I am sure there are a lot of leaders, people who are hired in executive leadership positions who don't necessarily corral a following. Followership is something that’s gifted.
AG: Form what I can see, it seems like your take on leadership circles back to rowing where – everyone’s moving in a direction together but each person has to put forth their individual effort. Would you say that's correct?
GG: Rowing epitomizes that because you're only as strong as your weakest link. If you have somebody in a boat who is dying in the last quarter of the race it's going to disproportionately hurt the boat. What I love is being a part of a small group of people trying to make something happen.
My relationship with my partners in the Storm is the best and most vivid example of that. Not one person is in charge and I love that. It's pretty much a consensus, which does not mean that we all totally agree 100 percent by any means. But we get to a place where we're comfortable and we're all willing to go forward.
AG: This year is the 43rd anniversary of Title IX, what do you see are the current issues surrounding the legislation?
GG: Title IX has not done all it needs to do, it is still a serious matter. Way beyond just the importance of sports, but also to education. The way that Title IX has been portrayed by a lot of people is that because of women's sports deserves to grow; men’s sports need to be diminished. I'm always surprised about that.
You think they've forgotten that in an educational environment, sports are a part of an education. Currently, with men's football and men's basketball it's a huge distortion of the university experience. The idea that if a sport earns more money than another sport in a college environment justifies it being included, I find amazing.
For all of the people out there who are inspired by Title IX as a concept or want to figure out how they support girls and women in sports, I'd say two things. One is go to women's sporting events at all levels - elementary schools, middle school, high school, college, and professional women's sports. Become a fan, it makes a difference.
AG: In your book, you mentioned someone telling you that you were too small to become an Olympian but you continued to persevere and medaled at the '84 Olympics and qualified for the ‘80 Olympics. Discuss your journey to becoming an Olympian and what that means to you.
GG: There's a part of my book that's hard for me to read because every time I do, it makes me cry. It's the part when I found out I made the 1980 Olympic team. I think the reason that it still moves me to this day, is that I see how much I needed a win. How much I had invested in what it meant to become an Olympian. I just believed that I had something to offer. When I saw my name on the list, it was like crossing into a new world.
AG: It is the 19th WNBA season, what are you looking forward to and what is the Seattle Storm focused on?
GG: I'm focused on what our players are going to learn; how they're going to develop as a unit; and how are they going to develop as the role models and representatives of the Seattle Storm and the WNBA.
We created Force 10 Enterprises just two years ago and Force 10 Enterprises owns Force 10 Hoops, which is the Seattle Storm. Then we created Force 10 Sports Marketing, which is focused on extending opportunities for women's sports. We just opened Force 10 Performance, which is a training center for athletes of all ages and abilities. Force 10 Performance is all about providing access to sports. I'm a huge believer that sports can transform your life in a positive way.
AG: What do you want readers to learn from your Course Correction journey?
GG: Telling my story might seem extraordinary, I am an ordinary person who has taken advantage of some of the gifts I was given and developed them further. We're all given different amounts of confidence or height or maybe even raw intelligence. We get to choose how we're going to live our lives. Ordinary people can do extraordinary things all the time. It's a matter of choosing and then doing the work, and not letting anyone tell you, you can't be who you want to be and do what you see and think is important.
