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Practice Doesn't Matter As Much As You Think
Very interesting article from a few years back on the value of practice versus talent.
https://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/practice-doesnt-make-perfect
The Culture Has To Be Theirs
Culture has been a hot buzzword in team sports for a while now, so there is plenty to read on the topic. I'm a big believer in culture and the impact the every day environment can have on individual and team behavior. When I became a head coach at Rhode Island College in 2005 I went about establishing a culture, as most first-year head coaches do, and we had a lot of success.
It probably took a full year to establish our culture, but our culture was really what allowed us to sustain success. It was a great combination of talent, mentality and fit between myself, the school and the players who were already in the program. There was alignment on what the program should look like and how we should go about our business every day, and our players completely bought in. I said it at the time and I still say it today - I don't think I'll ever be a part of a culture as tight as the one we had at Rhode Island College again. It was something special.
The most important thing about that championship culture, however, is something I think we often forget about as coaches. The culture we build wasn't my culture, it was my players' culture. Leadership can be very tricky, because ultimately we are responsible for what happens, yet we to get the most out of our people we have to give control to them. As the leader it's easy to think of the culture as something that is yours, not theirs. The most important aspect of our championship culture at Rhode Island College was that it became theirs, it wasn't mine.
What I did was help the players establish some standards and set some guidelines for our behavior. And certainly in the beginning, mine was the dominant voice as we were trying to get things established. But as you evolve, and as your players truly buy-in, they are the ones who carry the culture every day. It doesn't have to come from your mouth. They know what is expected of them, they believe in it, and they carry it out. The culture grows under their watch, not yours. They set the standards and they handle the accountability when those standards aren't met.
You hear it said often that the best teams are led by the players, not the coaches. I'm not sure I completely agree with that. We often use leadership conveniently, saying we have great leadership when things are going well and blaming our lack of leadership when they aren't. The leadership comes from you as the head coach and goes through your players, and hopefully over time you have to be less and less active in that regard. But culture and leadership are two different things. Certainly you need leadership on your team for your kids to carry the culture, but culture is more about behavior and less about what is said. The leadership you provide helps establish the culture in the minds of the players, but then they carry it out without thinking about it. It becomes who they are and what they are about.
When I became the head coach at Maine, I went about establishing our culture the same way. I knew it would take longer given the lack of talent in the program at the time. We had good kids, but most of them weren't used to the work ethic or commitment necessary to be great. As I look back, I realize our culture was mine for way too long. I was the one carrying it for the first 3 years, trying to get our guys to understand what it took to be successful. It's certainly not easy when you aren't having success to get the belief you need, but I could have done a better job. I had too much control of the culture from the beginning, and I didn't give the players enough room to take a hold of it. It wasn't until our fourth year when I started to give up control that we really started to establish and believe in our culture.
To make the culture theirs you have to be confident enough to step out of the way. You can't control everything or make every decision. You have to trust the guidelines you put in place, and let the players carry out the behavior. Sure, you'll have to step in at times to make a point or to change behavior. But over time your players will take on that responsibility and those who don't fit will find their way out of the program.
Culture is crucial, and establishing a great culture can lead to sustained success. But don't just create a culture and ask your guys to fall in line. If you really want to achieve at a high level, make the culture theirs. Give the control and let them hold each other accountable to standards they believe in. The most effective culture you can have is one owned by your players.
Reality
My first year as a head coach we started out 8-7 in our first 15 games. I took over a very talented team, as it turns out one that I think was likely the best team in the league. But we didn't get off to a good start. We'd play very well for a week and then we'd just no-show for a game or two, losing to teams that should never beat us. By mid-January we were barely over .500 and we should have been much better.
In my mind we were practicing well, our guys were bought in and they were competing very hard. We just couldn't seem to put it together. I was a new coach that took over in September and didn't recruit any of the current players, so we were still getting comfortable with each other. It was going to take time to pull it together, people told me. You have to get some of your own players in there. It'll click, just give it time. It's not going to happen overnight. We could attribute our difficulties to it being my first year as a head coach and the players still trying to get comfortable with a new system.
I knew something wasn't right, but I really couldn't figure it out. One of my assistants at the time, Bill Black, used to say "I just think we need to be more consistent." He used the word consistent over and over. I was convinced our guys were playing hard every day and committed to what we were doing, it was just taking time for it to click. Something wasn't right, but it was easy to attribute it to everything being new.
Coach Black kept using the word consistent, and I realized eventually he meant we weren't being consistent in some way. As we talked it out it became clear that I was sending mixed messages. We talked about how hard we wanted them to compete every day, but some days I was on them about it and some days I was letting them off the hook. I was a first-year head coach, and I was unknowingly concerned what my guys thought about me - not holding them accountable.
For about 6 weeks we were trying to figure out how to get better, attributing our problems to the fact that things were just new and we needed to get used to each other. The reality was much different. We were inconsistent because of my approach with the team. It really had nothing to do with us getting comfortable with each other. I made some changes in my approach, earned the trust of my players and we started to play to our potential, going 11-3 in our final 14 games. The following year we won 27 games and went to the Elite 8.
We spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to solve our problems. I'm not sure we spend enough time understanding what the actual problem is in the first place. I have a great friend, Phil O'Brien, who runs the York Consulting group, and he always says when it comes to problem solving "See reality for what it is, and act accordingly."
I think the first issue we have with problem solving is we often don't know what the problem actually is. I thought the problem with my first team was just that everything was new and it would take a little time to gel. The problem was my approach. If we don't get to the reality of the situation we are going to waste a lot of time trying to solve the wrong problems.
A lot of this when it comes to coaching is self-serving. Have you ever been in a locker room at halftime or after a game and heard "We got the shots we want... we just have to make more shots?" That's a pretty common coaching attribution after a loss. We played well, we got the shots we want, we just couldn't make any. Not much else we can do. That usually makes the coaching staff feel better, but it also avoids reality. Do you really think the reason we lost is because we just couldn't make enough shots? Sure, that may happen occasionally, but most of the time when I hear that it's not reality. Usually if we weren't making shots it's because we weren't getting the shots we wanted.
In evaluating your team, especially when you aren't playing well, it's very easy to go to what's comfortable. You find a common narrative where you can tell yourself you know the problem and you can go about fixing it. My first team was on their 3rd coach in 3 years, so of course we were going to be inconsistent. That was the coach-speak, and it fit because it made me comfortable. That must be the issue, not much I can do about it, it's going to take time. It just wasn't reality, so there was no way to fix it.
I think about this a lot with the current global pandemic going on. We are in an unprecedented situation with devastating consequences. We've been sidelined for 5 months and no one knows when we can start getting back to normal. But there is such an urgency to get back to normal, that I'm not sure we are starting from reality. We see what we want to see, a narrative that allows us to get back to school and get back to playing sports. We have to get back to normal in the fall, right? There's no way the virus can keep us shut down that long. There are so many anecdotes and different angles out there that we can find whatever information we want to support the most comfortable narrative. Just like I did with my first team.
As a coach, before you try and start solving your teams problems, make sure you know exactly what those problems are and the root cause behind them. Ask people you trust what they are seeing from the outside. Analyze the data so you are dealing with facts. Tell your staff they have to come up with a different angle, to disagree with something that you guys have been talking about. Talk to your players and get to know what is going on from their perspective.
We often don't spend enough time dealing with reality. Before you can solve your teams problems you'd better know exactly what they are. Make sure you start with reality first. See it for what it is, and then act accordingly.
Low Hand To The Ball
I was very lucky to be a part of the staff for the USA Pan American Team playing in the Pan Am Games in Lima, Peru last summer. It was great to be involved with international competition in the summer, but maybe the best part of it was being in a basketball lab every day with Ed Cooley, Mike Martin and Kevin Willard.
One concept I loved from Kevin Willard was the aggressive way he defends the ball screens. He teaches his guys to put their "low hand to the ball" when hedging the screen. As you show or even switch out onto the screen, your job is to swipe at the basketball with your low (outside) hand.
Normally I don't like teaching to reach or playing with your hands, especially with a guard trying to turn the corner on a ball screen. But what happens is the guard with the ball has to take a split second to read the ball screen coverage - is it going to be a trap, a switch, a soft hedge, etc. With an aggressive swipe at the ball, you almost always catch the ball-handler a little off guard and force him to take a step away from the hoop. He gets a little startled and backs up instinctively, giving your defense a little bit more time to adjust and slowing the ball down.
Your defender doesn't have to get a piece of the ball or aggressively go for a steal. It's just a simple swipe with his outside hand, forcing the ball-handler to protect it for a half-second. That small amount of time gives you defense a better chance at staying connected and keeping the ball out of the paint.
Adversity Action Steps: Actively Seek Positivity
When things start to go South, it's easy to tell everyone to stay positive. But to actually do so takes a more intentional approach. When things aren't going well you are surrounded by frustration and negativity. It's the nature of adversity. You have to aggressively seek out positivity.
You have to do more than just "stay positive." Surround yourself with positive people. Shut down any negative talk or feeling sorry for yourself immediately. Perhaps you can give your team a little time to mourn, to feel bad, to flush out the bad feelings. But in a short period when it's time to get back to work, the negativity has to be gone.
Celebrate small victories every day. Little things that people in your organization are doing to make you better - even some things that are common and expected. Make sure everybody knows about them and celebrates them. Here is what we are doing to get better, and we should be proud of it. Go out of your way to celebrate small, daily wins when the chips are down.
When people ask how they can help, the first thing you can say to anyone is "Only speak in positive tones about our organization." That's how people can help. Speak positively about the team, the mission, the people, regardless of the tough times that are in front of you.
Train your people to talk about what you are going to do moving forward, not about what happened to you. Once you've analyzed what went wrong, get over it. Talking about what happened and continuing to dissect it only keeps you in a negative frame of mind.
There is a lot of research done on what is called the "Illusory Truth" effect, which essentially says that if you hear something stated to you consistently you start to believe it - EVEN if you know it's not true. Think about that for a second. If you know it isn't true, but people keep telling you something, you start to believe it. That should tell you a lot about the power of your mind.
Have you ever heard anyone say "It's hard to beat a team three times," in the same year? You hear it in basketball and football all the time. You beat a team twice, and now you have to face them in a conference tournament. The prevailing mentality is it's a tough challenge, beating the same team three times.
Except that it isn't true. Over a 10-year period in college basketball, when teams played three times, the team that won the first two games also won the third game 73% of the time. It actually isn't that hard to beat a team three times. The same goes for NFL football. But, we hear it so often we think it is true.
If you continue to have dialogue around "We stink, we just aren't very good right now," or "We just can't get out of our own way," you will start to believe it. And so will everyone around you. It's a difficult challenge, because when you are struggling you also have to be realistic about your situation to get better. But constantly repeating negative messages is only going to make you worse.
When adversity strikes, aggressively seek positivity. It's more than just staying positive. Put a plan in place, surround yourself with positive people, celebrate small successes, and stamp out negativity. Actively seek positivity to give your team the best chance to turn things around.
HoopHeads Podcast
Had a long conversation on a number of coaching and leadership topics with Mike Klinzig of HoopHeads Podcast. The interview takes about 1:40, so save it for a long car ride.
Patience
We should all read anything Ibram X. Kendi writes. This is powerful.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/john-lewis-and-danger-gradualism/614512/
But the gradualists of today admonish the gradualism of yesterday, condemning all those who opposed immediate emancipation, all those who told Lewis to tone down his speech in 1963. Reformists don’t age as well as revolutionaries. How could anyone say in 1829 that slavery should live another hour? How could anyone not have demanded a “scorched-earth policy” that burned “Jim Crow to the ground—nonviolently,” as Lewis was prevented from saying at the March on Washington?
A century from now, when almost all of us are dead, if we don’t act with urgency and boldness, I can only imagine what our descendants will be saying about us. How could we allow the evil of racial inequity to live another hour? How could we not support a scorched-earth policy to eliminate racial injustice? The revolutionaries of today will age well, as those revolutionaries of yesterday aged well.
Adversity Action Steps: Trust And Delegate
One of the most difficult challenges when your team or organization faces adversity is to trust the people around you. It's natural when things aren't going well to want control, yet control isn't the best way to get the most out of your team. And when you are struggling, that's exactly what you need.
The military uses a phrase that I use with my teams a lot - "In command, without control." I want to train my teams to handle everything that is going to come their way on the court, but when it's time to make key decisions I don't want control over them. They are empowered to make the right decisions based on the way we've prepared.
I've found that when adversity hits I often find my own confidence in the group. Granted, the players are looking for direction, but given a voice and some shared responsibility they will feel a responsibility to find success. Let your entire team gain confidence from the people around them by asking questions, sharing the responsibility and empowering everyone to play to their strengths.
Avoid going into a shell as the leader when things get tough. Your team will sense your uneasiness and lack of confidence in them, and that is not a game plan for improvement.
As you take a collective approach, make sure you share and delegate responsibility. Assign specific tasks to team members, and include detail about the approach and expectations. "Tim, I'm putting you in the starting line-up. I need you to be the best defender on the team, and take on the opponents best player every night. This team needs you to shut him down. Can you do that for me?" Be very specific about what you expect out of everyone, and assign the tasks directly. Any meeting you have with your organization should end with a plan of action. "We've had a great discussion about how we are going to get better moving forward. Now let's talk about the actions-steps. Here is what we are going to do when we leave this room." Specific, detailed action-steps are an essential part of any plan to overcome adversity.
There was a great study done by researchers at MIT on high-performing teams, and they found that the best teams showed 3 things - they were empathetic, everyone was willing to help, and the responsibility was shared amongst the group. Everyone on the team played an equal role in the success of the group. The teams that had one or two alpha-dogs leading the way, telling everyone what was going to happen and taking on most of the responsibility, weren't as successful. The best way to get the most out of your team is to collaborate, even when the chips are down.
Resist the urge to take complete control when things aren't going your way. Trust the people around you and empower them to help with specific, detailed action-steps. Taking the solo route is only going to make things more difficult and likely alienate members of your team. Collaborate with them and count on them to get your team back on the right path.
Resistance Vs. Muse
Pat Scanlon is the head coach at Greenwich Country Day School. He has some great thoughts on his blog. Always worth checking out.
Hard Work
"The greatest who ever do it are always the hardest workers."
- Rich Gannon
I'm not sure we are being honest with the way we talk about work. You hear and see quotes like the above one from Rich Gannon (who was talking about Tom Brady) all the time. We don't really ever seem to question whether or not they are actually true when we are talking about hard work.
Babe Ruth wasn't exactly known for his work ethic, but he's on Mount Rushmore of the greatest baseball players of all-time. Shaquille O'Neal didn't really blow people away with how hard he worked either. But he's one of the top 50 basketball players ever to play. It's just interesting to me the way we glorify hard work, and we immediately associate the best players with having this incredible work ethic. I just don't think that's accurate.
"Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard"
I'm sure you've seen that one on a high school wall somewhere or at least on instagram or twitter. That flows nicely and fits well on a poster of some track athlete dripping with sweat. But is it true?
I coached some great teams at Rhode Island College that won championships that were really talented but didn't necessarily work that hard. They relied a lot on their talent and suffered some bad losses along the way because of their lack of a consistent work ethic. In the end, however, they were talented enough to pull it together and win a championship. I also coached some teams at the University of Maine that worked extremely hard and were fully committed, yet only won a handful of games. Ultimately due to transfers and injuries, we just didn't have good enough talent on the floor to win games.
If I gave you a choice to coach the hardest working team in the league or the most talented team in the league, which one are you choosing? I'm taking the most talented team, and I suspect most coaches who are interested in winning, would do the same.
Look, I'm not saying work ethic isn't important. It absolutely is, and it's generally something within your control. I've made a career in college athletics out of work ethic, because I knew as a junior in high school I wasn't good enough. So this isn't to crush work ethic as a non-factor. It's extremely important. But I'm not sure we need to glorify it the way we do.
You don't (or at least you shouldn't) tell your team that the five hardest-workers are going to start. That's because they won't. I've coached some incredible kids who worked their asses off every day who just weren't talented enough to play very much. A great work ethic alone isn't enough, and I'm not sure we should glorify it like it's the most important thing.
We tell kids at a young age all the time that if they are willing to work hard they can be whatever they want in life. Well that isn't really true. With all due respect to Malcolm Gladwell (and I'm a big Gladwell fan), I could have taken ground balls for 10,000 hours when I was in Little League but I still don't think I was ever playing shortstop for the Yankees.
When I go recruiting, the first thing I am looking for in a player is natural ability. Do I want him to have a great work ethic? Of course I do. But the natural ability to play at this level and help us win is what's most important. We all want our best players to be our hardest workers. But that isn't always the case.
Talent matters. That's okay. It's important to recognize that. We always want to instill the value of a great work ethic as well, but there's no need to misrepresent it. We run the risk of being disingenuous if we do.
Ask Questions
When in doubt, ask questions.
We all think of leadership as standing up in front of a room and delivering an inspiring message to a group. Give them the game plan, tell them what to and how you are going to succeed. In difficult times, it's letting them know everything will be alright. Make them feel better, and lay out the game plan to get things back on track. The leader is supposed to stand in front of the group, show strength, and make statements.
But that's not what leadership is really all about. That looks great in sports movies, but it doesn't usually work out that way. Leadership is hard and often uncomfortable. While you feel like you are supposed to have the answers, often you don't.
I've stood in front of my team many times and told them I didn't know. I wish I had the answer, I wish I knew the right thing to say right now, but I just don't. Transparency is critical for effective leadership. And if I didn't know, I told my players I didn't know.
We are facing incredibly challenging times right now, with a lot of emotion and uncertainty. The George Floyd murder has impacted everyone and the fact that we are all pretty much separated from our everyday lives has made it harder to process. We don't get to see many of the people we are closest with on a daily basis. We don't get to see our workmates, our friends or our teams. So with everything going on in the country we are left on our own to make sense of it all.
A lot of people are struggling with how they feel, and what do do about it. I know I am.
Whenever I wasn't sure what to say, I wouldn't make any statements. I'd ask questions. One of the best things you can do as a leader is to know what you don't know. If you aren't sure what to say, or how to process what you are feeling, don't say anything. Ask questions. You'll learn a lot about your team.
I would always start with two basic questions. 1) How are you feeling? 2) What can we do about it? I think that's a great way to start, especially with the challenges we are facing now. Many people aren't really sure how they are supposed to feel. And not a lot of people know what to do next. We all feel awful, we all want to do something to help, but there really aren't any easy answers. Being confused and unsure is natural right now. Just because you are the leader, doesn't mean you should feel differently.
I'm sure there's a lot of pressure because your group is looking to you for leadership. So give it to them. Ask them how they feel. Explain to them how you feel. Let them know you are unsure. Be transparent, and show them some vulnerability. That will make them feel comfortable. Get them talking. Learn what they might need from you. Let them know it's okay to be confused, to be uncertain. That will make them feel more reassured than any statements you can make that don't ring true. Have a conversation, get them to share their emotions, and then start to work on how you can help.
"People will forgive you for not being the leader you want to be, but they will never forgive you for not being the leader you claim to be." - Diane Sawyer.
Authenticity is leadership. If you aren't completely genuine, especially during tough times, your credibility is shattered. Leadership is situational. Context matters. And we are in an unprecedented situation right now in our country. There is no playbook, because this combination of global pandemic and national outrage has never been seen before.
You aren't supposed to have all of the answers. But you can ask the right questions. Get to know how your team is feeling, and let the dialogue happen from there. Then start to ask about solutions. Be honest about how you are feeling, even if you are unsure. There are no easy answers here, and it's okay to say that. Sometimes leadership is being honest about what you don't know.
Adversity Action Steps: Win Anyway
The core mentality of your organization is crucial when it comes to handling adversity. Although by definition you don't really know when adversity is going to hit, you can be prepared for it. The mentality within your team is a big part of that preparation.
At RIC we started using the term "Win Anyway" to establish our "no excuses" mentality. Tough road trip - Win Anyway. Bad officiating - Win Anyway. The heat doesn't work in the gym - Win Anyway. The phrase created a mindset that expected bad stuff to happen, but we were always prepared for it.
There are no accommodations in the standings or on the bottom line for misfortune. Every team suffers through struggles and bad breaks. When the final standings are set, however, no one cares. At all. One team is in first place cutting down the nets, and everyone else is watching them. Nobody asks in that moment how they got there.
It's important to look forward and stop talking about how you got there. You may have gotten a bad break, but dissecting that in the moment doesn't help you move forward. Stop talking about what happened and start focusing on what you are going to do about it.
Jack Clark, the great Rugby coach at Cal, defines mental toughness as "the ability to move on to the next most important thing." That approach should be intentional in your organization. Your team should always be looking forward to what is next, not what just happened. And it's a mentality you can create before adversity hits, through your daily approach.
Built-in disadvantages, obstacles and adversity can become launching pads for your success. They can create a toughness and a resilience that runs through your organization at all times, not just when things get tough. Embrace that level of toughness with a "Win Anyway" mentality, and when adversity hits it will be just another chance to prove yourself as a team.
Color Blind
I've had numerous conversations with white people late me who tell me they are "color blind" or they were "raised not to see color." This excerpt from Michael Eric Dyson's book "Tears We Cannot Stop" makes a great point regarding that approach.
"The civil rights movement that inspired King, that he inspired in turn, has been appropriated too, and often in troubling ways. We end up with a greatly compromised view of the black freedom struggle. In the narrative of American history, especially the kind told in our nation's textbooks, the movement didn't seek racial justices as much as it sought a race-neutral society. American history hugs color blindness. If you can't see race, you certainly can't see racial responsibility. You can simply remain blind to your own advantages. When some of you say "I don't see color," you are either well-intending naifs or willful race evaders. In either case, you don't help the cause. The failure to see color only benefits white America. A world without color is a world without racial debt.
One of the greatest privileges of whiteness is not to see color, not to see race, and not to pay a price for ignoring it, except, of course, when you are called on it. But even then, that price pales, quite literally, in comparison to the high price black folk pay for being black."
Pick up the book. Dyson's approach will make you better, because it will make you think.
Adversity Action Steps: Separate From The Results
Continuing with a plan for handling adversity
4. Separate From The Results
Does your team understand and believe in your why? Simon Sinek wrote a book ("It Starts With Why") based on the premise that people "don't believe in what you do, they believe in why you do it." The book is just okay, but the premise is a strong one. People buy-in to why you are doing things.
It's a popular narrative today to "explain the why" because of the digital age we live in. Everyone has quicker and better access to information than they ever have, so they want to know why you are doing what you are doing. As a leader, you have to assess how this works in your organization. In a team sport the "why" isn't always at the forefront. You are here to help the team and we are trying to win games, that's why. But even for the most committed athletes, buying in to positive results likely isn't enough.
Jim Steen, the longtime legendary swimming coach at Kenyon University (he's won more national titles in any sport than anyone in the history of the NCAA) used a great quote with his teams:
"Find a place within yourself where success and failure do not matter, a place where you can compete without compromise."
Compete without compromise. That always resonated with me. Getting to a place where nothing gets in the way of how you compete. That's a pretty special place for a team or an individual. But it's a hard place to get to, especially when you factor in the results.
When adversity hits it's crucial to be able to separate from the results. Negative results can have a powerful impact on the way we operate every day, and that is a place where mediocre to bad teams remain. It's really hard to focus simply on what you are doing every day and finding a way to evaluate your approach without thinking about - or achieving - the desired results. You have to understand the why, and that why needs to be something more than a win or a trophy.
If your team really believes in what you are doing every day - the way you operate, and the impact it will have - you'll be able to stick together through adversity. When I took over at the University of Maine we had the worst team in the league by far, and we knew it would be at least two years before we started seeing results. After our second year, when most of our young talent transferred to higher levels, we continued to struggle to win. It was essential that we showed our kids why we were doing things the way we were, and the impact it would have on them moving forward if they bought into it. It was about character development and a winning approach - things that would translate to success for the rest of their lives. We dealt with adversity just about every day in the form of consistent, negative results. It wasn't easy, but I was very proud of the culture we built and the way we operated despite our lack of success on the scoreboard.
A long-term commitment to the process over results will help your group overcome challenges. Get your team to understand that the journey is the reward. The time spent investing in doing something great is extremely valuable, regardless of whether they win or lose. And it will lead to great success moving forward.
Compete without compromise. Results are just the product of your process. That type of approach will help a great deal when adversity hits.
Adversity Action Steps: Count On Your Culture
Step 3 of my adversity action plan:
3. Count On Your Culture
Your long-term culture is the backbone of your organization. Whether you pay attention to it or not, your team has a culture. How much you do to define it and cultivate it is up to you, but your approach will have a significant impact on your long-term success.
When adversity hits, the culture of your team will be your strength. It is what you can count on. If you have a group that believes in your day-to-day approach, they will stick together and seek out ways to get better. They won't let the negative take over their mentality if your organizational ethos is something worth fighting for.
Having a defined set of values and a mission that everyone is connected to is important. I did some leadership development seminars with a military supply company this spring, and part of their mission was too "better the lives of military families around the world." I thought that was a really powerful mission. We talked about the adversity that hit this spring with the pandemic and how it impacted their organization. Their sales team still had to work and find a way to provide for military families. But helping out military families through difficult times was an impactful way to keep their team together and fight through the challenges. That mission statement made a difference.
If your team really believes in a defined mission it will really help you when things don't go their way. When JFK went to visit NASA as the President in the '60s after charging NASA with putting a man on the moon, he introduced himself to a janitor he met. He asked the janitor what he did at NASA and his response was "I'm helping put a man on the moon sir." Everyone in the organization believed in the same mission. When you face tough times, that can be really helpful.
It's important that your team knows you are playing an infinite game. What you are doing doesn't end with wins and losses. There is tremendous character development in your approach that goes beyond the results. When your team realizes the impact what you do is going to have on them long-term, the belief is that much stronger. And when the team starts to struggle they will stick together.
Handling adversity doesn't start the moment adversity hits. Check your program every day, and don't make any short-cuts when it comes to your culture. Is your group prepared to handle a tough situation? Prepare yourself every day with clear, concise values and a mission that everyone believes in. That belief will keep you in the right place when tough times hit.
Adversity Action Steps: Have A Plan
Continuing with my action plan for handling adversity:
2. Have A Plan
When things don't go your way or adversity strikes, it's usually going to be emotional. It's not going to feel good. You have to start by handling the emotions. As we talked about in step 1, evaluate the situation honestly and see reality for what it is. Give yourself a chance to let the emotion go, and wherever possible try not to make emotional decisions. You can easily end up making a bad situation worse. Take your time to address the emotion of the situation, and then very it so you can make a plan.
Your team needs to know you have a plan to get them out of this situation, and you have to give it to them in detail. So take the time to write it out, discuss it with your staff, and run it by others that you trust. Get plenty of feedback on your plan before you present it to your team.
It could be a 3-game losing streak. It could be a season-ending injury to one of your best players. It could be self-inflicted, like significant suspensions to good players for violating your standards. Regardless of what you are dealing with, your team needs to know you have a plan to move forward, and you have to be able to explain it to them in detail. So prepare that plan before you get in front of them.
There are two essential management elements to handling adversity - task management and people management. Task management is about the goal you are trying to achieve and the organization needed to get you there. The plan and the feedback on the plan are major elements of managing the task. What are we trying to do, and how are we going to do it? You need to answer those questions for your team as their leader. When it comes to task management, it's crucial that you focus on what you can do, and what you can control.
The people management element is just as important. This is about making sure your team is okay. It's about listening and providing candor. It's about encouraging your team to open up so you can understand how they are feeling about your situation. It's about connection, motivation, and encouragement. A major part of managing your people in an adverse situation is how you communicate. And a big part of how you communicate is your willingness to listen.
Organizing your plan when adversity strikes is extremely important. As the leader you have to provide direction. By focusing in on two major areas - task management and people management - you can organize your approach in a simple manner and give your team the confidence they need to bounce back.
Adversity Action Steps: Evaluate Honestly
I've had the opportunity to work with different teams and organizations on leadership development this spring and summer, and one question seems to come up with every group. How do you handle adversity?
Handling adversity is something we talk about as coaches and leaders constantly. We know how important it is, and we know that every team is going to face challenges. And every situation is different, so there is no specific blueprint. But to handle it, you have to do more than talking about it and reacting to what happens to you. You have to have an action plan.
I'm going to share my action plan for handling adversity that I've developed over the years.
- Evaluate Honestly
The most important thing you can do is to start with the facts. A great friend and leader I know, Phil O'Brien of York Consulting, always says "See reality for what it is, and act accordingly." It sounds so simple and makes perfect sense, but it's harder to accomplish than you think. When adversity hits, it's almost always an emotional situation. There will be a lot of noise - most of it negative - and that can easily affect the way you think. You have to make a clear and intentional effort to deal with the facts.
Colin Powell used to say, "Tell me what you know, tell me what you don't know, then you can tell me what you think." Do not let opinions come into play until you are clear on the facts. Sometimes a conversation about just the facts will make your approach a little clearer.
Say a few of your kids get caught out after curfew the night before a game. You are getting ready for a big game, and now you've got to deal with a team issue. Maybe one of your assistants comes in and says "these guys clearly don't care about their teammates and winning isn't important to them. They need to be suspended." Well, while all that might be true, none of those are facts. That is emotion, and it doesn't necessarily solve the problem. The facts are that 3 of our players came in 30 minutes after curfew. The facts are where they were, and why they were late. The facts need to be compared to other curfew issues you have had in the past, and how they have been handled. You might be really angry because it's the night before a big game, but that emotion isn't helpful. Start with the facts.
It's also important to seek out people who will tell you the truth - both inside and outside your organization. Hopefully you encourage your assistants on staff to speak honestly and openly. Talk to your players, and encourage them to do the same. Speak to other coaches or administrators and get their thoughts on the issue because the lens is a little different from the outside looking in. Have conversations with people who will tell you the truth. That will help you deal in reality.
One thing to keep in mind is that the truth doesn't always feel good. You've got to get over that. If you start talking about things in a way to make you feel better, your decisions will be clouded by emotions. Somebody screwed up and it's going to have a negative impact on your program. It shouldn't feel good. That's okay. Making the right decision on how to move forward will.
When you start with a clear set of facts, it allows you to answer the most important question: What needs to be done? That is where you are trying to get to when adversity hits. What is the best thing to do to get past this as a program and get better? The only way to answer those questions properly when adversity hits is to start with the facts.
Talent And Leadership
I don't think talent has very much with anyone's ability to lead. I'm a firm believer that leadership is a skill, not a rank. But within the traditional model of leadership, talent certainly gives you the credibility to lead, a mistake we make all too often.
I've always felt that when a bad player speaks up and says something with an edge we call it an attitude problem, but when a talented player does the same thing we call it leadership. We have to be careful with how much freedom we give our most talented players to "lead" because we can lose credibility as a coach.
I've made the mistake plenty of times as a head coach, where I've reacted poorly to something a bad player says or does, and I realize I probably wouldn't have reacted the same way if one of my better players did the same thing. We tend to give our more talented players the benefit of the doubt. We say that they are trying to lead, they really want to win, or we call it competitiveness. We immediately go to their positive attributes and use them to rationalize whatever behavior they are displaying. It's a mistake, and one that can hurt your team in two ways - by allowing bad behavior from one of your players, and by suppressing any leadership you might get out of some of your other players.
I've thought about this a lot in response to everybody's thoughts about Michael Jordan in "The Last Dance." It's interesting to see everyone taking the best of what Michael put out there and using it as evidence of his "leadership style." The narrative comes across like this is how we should all lead.
The most important element of MJ's leadership style was his talent. Being the best player in the league and arguably the greatest to ever play provided him with a lot of cover to do or say whatever he wanted. Most "leaders" don't have that luxury. It's not as if Michael had a leadership approach that was nuanced or developed. He was the best player by far, and a ridiculous competitor, and what he said and did is really all that mattered. That allowed him to get away with whatever he did that really wasn't acceptable, simply because he was Michael. Very few of us have that luxury.
What other leader would get away with any of that behavior? He was relentless in the way he made fun of the General Manger, and he did it in front of the team. He hammered his role playing teammates in practice. He punched one of them in the face (was it Will Perdue, I though it was Steve Kerr? Or was it both?). He clearly was a prick whenever he wanted to be, or when he didn't get his way. Would we accept that type of behavior out of all our leaders? We accepted it from MJ - as a matter of fact it seems like we praise it - because of his talent.
This isn't to take anything away from MJ's ability or accomplishments. I've said he's likely the greatest competitor I have ever seen, and honestly I have no problems with some edgy behavior that takes place amidst the intensity of competition. I have a ton of respect for how much Michael cared about winning, and his relentless approach to competing. He also got a ton out of his teammates and clearly was the driving force behind their six titles. However, I'm not sure we we should be celebrating his leadership approach without taking into account his elite talent, and the amount of credibility that bought him. He could do and say things that most of us never could, with any repercussions.
Being extremely talented doesn't make you a great leader. But it can help give you the credibility you need to lead, something I think we need to get over. I think MJ made his team and his teammates a lot better, the ultimate sign to me of a great leader.
But whether or not you feel Michael Jordan was a great leader, we can't overlook the fact that his talent had a great impact on his ability to lead. His "style" had a lot to do with being the best player.
Dealing With Outside Voices
I was recently on a Zoom call with educator Jeff Duncan-Andrade, a former basketball coach and now a professor of education at San Francisco State University. He has written two books on education, and focuses on the education of underprivileged kids in disadvantaged areas. He has a great approach to teaching and education, so if you ever get the chance to connect with him take advantage of it.
One of the coaches on the call asked about dealing with outside influences in players lives, specifically how to deal with someone who was giving a message to the player that the coach disagreed with. Duncan-Andrade gave a really detailed answer with a really intelligent approach.
The first thing he said was that he always made sure to invest a lot of time in the player and learn as much as he could about the relationship. He never wanted to take it for granted. So he would ask the player what advice he was getting from the coach or family member, and why he thought they were giving that advice. He'd always ask the question, "Why do you think they are telling you that?"
He said he'd almost always get the same answer. "Because they care about me. They want was is best for me." That, according to Duncan-Andrade, was the key.
He said "I never wanted to mess with a relationship like that." Especially when dealing with kids from difficult backgrounds, he said, he always wanted to celebrate any relationship where they felt they were cared about. He talked about how so many kids don't have a lot of people who genuinely care about them, so he didn't want to minimize that. The first thing he wanted the player to know is that he appreciated the fact that someone truly cared about them. He knew how important that was.
I thought it was a really interesting and intelligent approach. So often when one of our players is getting advice we don't like from someone outside of the program, it becomes a tug of war. We try and pull them away from that person and make sure they are listening to what we are telling them. It very often becomes adversarial.
Duncan-Andrade's point was that regardless of the information you disagree about, you aren't winning the battle trying to pull them away from someone who has cared about them all of their lives. You had better learn to embrace that relationship, and find a way to get on the same page about at least one thing - we both want what is best for you. We may disagree about the best way to get you there, but we are both trying to help you. The information you may disagree about isn't nearly as important as the relationship.
It's not something I often think about as a head coach, but it's time I started to do so. Usually in those spots I think about the disagreement, and how to best resolve it. I don't think about the relationship. If you don't respect that relationship, even though you disagree with the message, it's easy to lose the player for good.