Winning beyond the game: A playbook for your next career

Elite athletes master the art of winning through discipline, strategic thinking, and relentless execution – qualities that translate powerfully to business success with the right guidance. Thunderbird School of Global Management's "Winning Beyond the Game" program provides professional athletes with a comprehensive playbook for transforming athletic excellence into business leadership. This immersive experience helps athletes reframe their competitive mindset into business strategy, translating team dynamics into organizational leadership, and converting game-day focus into executive decision-making. Participants develop a personalized career strategy that leverages their unique strengths and experiences, building a professional identity that extends far beyond their athletic accomplishments.

Through frameworks tailored to the athlete's experience, storytelling techniques that highlight transferable skills, and strategic networking approaches, participants create a clear pathway to their next victory in the business world. The program directly addresses both the practical challenges and psychological adjustments that athletes face during career transitions, providing them with concrete tools, actionable plans, and the confidence to excel in their next chapter. Whether pursuing corporate leadership, entrepreneurship, or other professional endeavors, athletes leave with their personalized playbook for continued success.

Doug Guthrie is an expert in international business and trade, technology and society, entrepreneurship and technology transfer, and organizational development. Guthrie uses his past experience in his teaching at ASU since he was a senior director at Apple in Shanghai, China, where he led Apple University efforts on leadership and organizational development in China. Guthrie is a professor and the director of China Initiatives at the Thunderbird School of Global Management. He has spent his career researching, writing, teaching, and advising companies about organizational development and Chinese economic reforms.

Dr. David Slocum is a Professor of Practice at the Thunderbird School of Global Management. David teaches high-impact leadership, strategic management, and the management of the creative industries in global management degree and Executive Education programs.​ In addition to his appointment at Thunderbird, David is Professor of Creative Leadership at the Berlin School of Creative Leadership (Steinbeis University, Germany), where he was previously the Academic Director and oversaw for a decade the Global Executive MBA in Creative Leadership and the school’s non-degree corporate, agency, and partner programs. David also served for five years as the Academic Director and Program Adviser at RARE with Google, where he provided thought leadership and academic support to improve Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in the creative, marketing, media, and technology industries. He recently co-founded On Global Leadership, an international leadership education, research, and advisory firm. 

Sunil (Sonny) Garg is an expert in organizational transformation, leadership development, and strategic innovation across private, public, and non-profit sectors. Garg uses his extensive C-Suite experience in his current role as CEO of the Center for Expanding Leadership & Opportunity, a nonprofit social enterprise he spun out from the Aspen Institute that leverages proprietary research to improve development in young people. Garg is Distinguished Executive-In-Residence at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, where he mentors Executive MBA students and co-teaches a workshop on Designing Your Impact Journey.

Sudhir Venkatesh is the William B. Ransford Professor of Sociology at Columbia University and Founding Director of SIGNAL: The Technology and Leadership Lab at Columbia University. He is also the co-founder of Beyond the Game, a leadership initiative that has worked with pro athletes, and the NFLPA and NBA’s G League, to support athletes in career transition. His previous work included the Head of Integrity Product Research at Facebook and building Twitter’s first Social Behavioral Innovation team. He is a New York Times bestselling author, and his stories have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Slate.com, This American Life, and NPR.

Transform personal challenges into compelling professional assets that differentiate you in the marketplace

Walk away with a comprehensive Career Playbook containing your 12-month implementation plan

Accelerate your career trajectory through strategic relationship-building and network leveraging

Gain confidence in articulating your unique value proposition across multiple professional contexts

Create your custom career blueprint that aligns your passions and beliefs with market opportunities

Framework of Everyday Leadership

Person-Behavior-Environment Framework

Reflective practices to guide personal & professional growth

Personal Storytelling as a tool for professional self-presentation

Network mapping & leveraging relationships

Strategic Alignment

Creating actionable 3-6-12 month personal business plans

Self-presentation and influence

Thunderbird is a world leader in global business and management education for a new era of technological transformation. Guided by a global mindset and a deep commitment to advancing inclusive and sustainable prosperity worldwide, Thunderbird integrates original, multidisciplinary management and business research with emerging technology trends to empower leaders of transnational organizations to adapt and thrive in a rapidly changing and increasingly complex world. Blending global business, public policy, and international affairs, Thunderbird specializes in providing hands-on, real-world learning experiences to develop leaders and managers across sectors and disciplines, thereby enhancing performance in public and private organizations globally.

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