Winning isn't everything

When a culture becomes too concerned with winning it can do some self destructive things and the damage is most often done by the middle managers or indiscipline amongst the staff.

Here are two examples from the last two weeks:-

* Maclaren Mercedes team telling lies to get an extra point in Formula 1.

* The Labour party apparatchiks cooking up a scheme to smear Conservative politicians in order to weaken their opponents.

The people who set the cultural tone, Ron Dennis at Maclaren for all those years and Gordon Brown, may claim that it was nothing to do with them - but they do not convince.