They Call Me Coach

“Make each day your masterpiece” John Wooden

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTITIONER

Title: The Best Coach Ever

Competencies: leadership, coaching talent, achievement, teamwork, team development, team building, trustworthiness, vision/goal setting, collaboration, decision-making, judgment, managing self, self-control, self-development

Who benefits: all of us, including young children and teens

Consultant Usage: especially useful for executive coaches, team facilitators/trainers and trainers of leadership, coaching, and team skills

What’s it about? Coach passed last week.  In death, John Wooden was described by the media and those who did not know him as a legend or as an icon.  Those who knew him described him differently.  Those who knew him talked about him in terms of real values – of building character, of loyalty, of trustworthiness, of team work and team spirit.  Those who knew him talked about how he helped each of them become better leaders, better team players, better students … better people.

That’s what great managers and supervisors do.

I met Coach Wooden once.  It was in the late 70’s.  He was recently retired.  I was doing a lot of leadership and skill development training for a major US corporation.  I was flying back to Los Angeles from a week of conducting training.  I was on an aisle seat.  Two row up on the other side of the aisle was Coach Wooden.  The seat next to him was empty.  For most of the flight I wanted so much to approach him … but who among the subjects approaches the Emperor?   My bad.  After all, one of his 12 building blocks in his Pyramid of Success is Confidence.

Finally, 20 minutes before landing, I approached him and asked if I could talk with him.  His response wasn’t what I expected and I have reflected on it a number of times throughout my professional career.  He said yes as long as we did not talk about sports.  I said that was fine because my questions were about his Pyramid.

Frankly, I stuttered out some questions and listened in awe to his responses.  He was a tolerant man!  I don’t remember much about the specifics these days.  But one thing he said never left me.  Despite his request we not talk sports, he made a number of sport references.  The one that stayed with me is that he never talked about or preached “winning”.  He said he would admonish his players if he ever caught them looking at the scoreboard.

What he taught was preparation, dedication, hard work, skill building, trust.  He said that his favorite time with the players was practice.  It was there he did his teaching.  Perhaps his own personal favorite quote was the one he used at the top of the Pyramid: “Perform at your best when your best is required.  Your best is required each day.”

That’s a great business lesson too.

I was reminded this weekend of his impact on even those who did not know him.  I was watching the Women’s College World Series on television.  I found myself rooting for the team from Hawaii because they were the great underdogs.  They weren’t supposed to be there.  They were trailing in what would be their last game.  Coming back from commercial, a camera focused on the Hawaiian team gathered around their coach.  He had his arms up and his thumbs and forefingers formed a triangle.  The young players listened intently.

An inning or two later the field announcer for ESPN did one those usually annoying interviews with the coach on the sidelines.  This case proved to be an exception.  The announcer asked the coach what he was saying to his “girls” when he had them all together between innings.  He said (approximately) “I was reminding them of the top building block in the Pyramid of Success, Competitive Greatness.  I reminded them it was not about the score, but about doing all the things that got us to the tournament.  I reminded them that it was about performing at your best.  If you have given your all, you don’t have to worry about the score.”

Coach Wooden would have approved.

If you are interested in knowing more about the man they called Coach, you can go to his official website.

If you would like to read about his teachings, I recommend Coach Wooden’s Leadership Game Plan for Success: 12 Lessons for Extraordinary Performance and Personal Excellence and/or his autobiography They Call Me Coach.

If you have children … or grandchildren … of a young age, I highly recommend Inch and Miles: The Journey to Success.  He co-wrote this delightful children’s book to help parents and teachers start teaching character traits a young age.

Thank you Coach for all you have left us.

Catch you later.

[tags]wooden, john wooden, ucla,  leadership, coaching talent, achievement, teamwork, team development, team building, trustworthiness, vision/goal setting, collaboration, decision-making, judgment, managing self, self-control, self-development, bill bradley, william bradley, bradley[/tags]

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.