I admitted to my cousin Laura the other day that I was watching the movie Jerry Maguire and loved it. Sure, I’m a sucker for a romantic comedy with a happy ending. This movie has even more appeal to me. The premise of the movie is a great leadership lesson captured by Jerry’s manifesto in the very beginning. In particular, “The answer is fewer clients.” More focus on personal relationships.

I’m not a sports agent, and this still applies to me. I think of each of my direct reports as clients. I work to get to know them and help them succeed. You may not have direct reports, and you still may have people that you feel responsible to help develop. They are your clients. And I believe in limiting the number of clients I have to allow myself to focus on them. I don’t believe you can have the same depth of relationship with twenty direct reports as you can with five.

In the movie, Jerry gets his wish as his world comes crashing down upon distributing his manifesto to everyone in his firm. He is fired, loses all but one of his clients. He is forced to survive by focusing his entire attention on just one client, American football player Rod Tidwell. I would argue this movie is both a romance AND bromance; following the evolution of the relationship between Jerry and Dorothy and also Jerry and his client, Rod.

Jerry is forced to evolve and get to know Rod and his family in a way he lost as a high-volume agent in a large agency. Jerry gets to know Rod’s wife and kids. They play together. They weather ups and down. And when Rod is injured on the field, it is Jerry that comforts Rod’s wife. Imagine having a relationship with someone you work with that would result in YOU being called on for comfort in a life or death situation.

Maybe that makes you uncomfortable. Because you see work and personal lives as separate. You feel like you’re prying when you ask about personal details, or you are shy to divulge them yourself. I certainly have not alway been comfortable sharing my love of the romantic comedy with the world. It can result in feeling vulnerable and exposed.

I’ve come to realize that trying to hold on to work separate from personal is a losing battle. We spend lots of time with people we work with. When we try and hold back pieces of ourselves we can be perceived as less than the human beings we are. When we avoid showing empathy, or compassion, or vulnerability. We can be difficult to relate to in situations where relating is our job, and our results rely on working together.

In the movie, the context is clearly the sports agent and his relationships. We all rely on others in our work, especially as leaders.

"The cause is caring about each other. The secret to this job is personal relationships.”

You had me at "hello”.