Years ago, my kids were attending a summer hockey camp being put on by the college hockey team in our city.

It was an outstanding program having been built into a perennial contender and multiple national champion.

The coach was revered across the country (think men’s college basketball’s Coach K, but in a Canadian hockey context).

He knew that he was coaching young kids with big dreams to reach the highest levels — Olympics, NHL, even next year’s local AAA team.

And he fed into those dreams to inspire confidence and hard work. I remember the first time he looked at the group of kids on check-in day and said “who wants to play in the NHL?”

Every hand went up. Even the young girls who at that time didn’t have a professional league to aspire to.

Then he looked at the parents and said “moms and dads?” as he raised his hand “why not?” with a wink. The adults in the room had an awareness of the odds of making it to that level.

But that didn’t stop him from inspiring dreams.

He took his responsibility as a leader seriously. It was never lost on him that the kids in his charge were his to care for.

He had an expression that was more important than all of his hockey dream-inspired motivational talks.

“You’re going to be a person a lot longer than you’ll be a hockey player.”

He saw his job as a leader as twofold – creating better hockey players and creating better people.

This applies to you if you’re leading anywhere today.

In business. Government. Non profit. A teacher. A coach. A therapist. A parent.

You’re going to be a person longer than you’ll be anything else.

Try hard to do well at being a person.

It’ll matter. For everyone you touch.

Especially today.