What if you were given such an Award?

The week had gone by pretty swiftly with the heatwave grabbing the headlines in this part of the world and how Liverpool magnificently held on win in the return leg of the UEFA Europa League which blew the whistle at 3-1 in aggregate for the Anfield boys. It’s not one that most football fans will come to forget.

Credit for the win – Jurgen Klopp, a coach who has only held this position for six months and chalking up such resounding faith in the stands and across to even this long lost fan and author himself. I believe he got it made, he knew what he was doing as soon as well, boots hit the pitch. He got the boys going when for the most of the last two decades they were more liverfools than anything. But the tide has changed and this is reason enough for a celebration…although methodically, it ain’t over until the final whistle and you certainly can’t crown a winner until the game is done. That to me is the right way to enthrone a champion.

A star when you've won the "award"?
A star when you’ve won the “award”?

Things however can be a little creative over on this side of the world. Just this past week, I have seen a major media corporation dishing out the first of its awards to those seemingly deserving “winners”. There were so many categories and even more winners for every batch of them. Some were old hats deserving of praise, others were new kids on the block that have not even seen their products consumed for more than one legitimate day. The puzzling question, the latter were given honours as award winners and rightful award recipients of their assigned categories. It baffles me how this is possible.

This preposterous award milestone also brings to mind some similar awards given out by yet another big and foreign media player with as little as RM20,000 or so I was told. Soon as you agree on the price, they would then give you a certificate and permission to use their labels, logos and the likes for “a job well done”. It got me thinking then and I’m still thinking now, is there no longer merit for accrediting awards? Is there no longer priorities and orders to rank winners from losers? Are the consumers out there so gullible that they would believe everything corporations feed them?

Truthfully I think not and I simply think this should not even be the case. Just because it is trending doesn’t make it the right thing to do, especially when it involves Awards that has no merit, no audit and for incomplete products.

If Awards can be conferred even before a product or service is completed and tested by its intended audience, then the Champions League and World Cups of the world would’ve been crowned even before the very first whistle. You could literally vote your champs for their good looks, the hi-tech gears, dashing outfits and their mighty muscles in the gym. Why bother battling in out on the field, on court and on the tracks? Wouldn’t blueprint and the sleek posters convince enough to wrestle the prize over? Wouldn’t the test results alone be sufficient to win over the trophy? The simple answer is it shouldn’t but…

In the matured parts of the world, an award is only legitimately conferred when the winner is real, authentic and superior. Think Nobel Prize.

In this part of the world however, you could just employ the best graphic artists and visualisers to doll up your marketing collateral. You’ll then be on your way to be the champion of all champions.

In the altruistic society that we live in today, it beckons for us to think again if what we’re doing is right. Conferring awards should not be a feather in the cap when it is not and neither should they be given in exchange for potential future revenues. Awards must be the elusive medal that one can only win through sheer diligence, patience, dedication and priority for the vocation. It is the very fabric and definition of why an Award is even created in the first place.

We must not cheapen our soul for a trophy and neither should we compromise our God-given intelligence just because of the glitters of the prize; our name is at stake, so is our brain and our future.

Think!

 

Image courtesy of pixtawan at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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