Turning the Ship Around
Cory Dobbs, Ed.D.

A maxim of team building is that the biggest wins start small.  This too is true of the biggest losses.  Recently, I was called in by a successful coach to help him save his season from becoming a complete disaster.  At the time of the call the team was five and fifteen.  And four of the five wins came from beating perennial losers. Essentially this team won only one competitive match.

No matter how hard you try it takes the greater part of a season to pull together a group of young student-athletes. Cohesion is never a given.  Unfortunately for the distressed coach who called me for help, the pulling together had yet to take place.  Rather, bit-by-bit the players built relationships that pushed them apart, a gap emerged from player to player.  Conflict avoidance and superficial harmony were the unwritten rules of relationship building.  The result was a downward relational spiral in which morale deteriorated gradually at first, then a tsunami of ill-will permeated interpersonal interactions.

Finally, the team woke up and realized that there was no sense of unity or authentic camaraderie on the team, which translated into a team of selfish and uncommitted players.  Luckily for the coach, most of the players admitted fault (as did the coach) and willingly accepted working side-by-side with the coach to create an engaging and inspiring environment.

Over the years I’ve come face-to-face with the reality that something big always comes from something small.  Small causes are so often the start of something big—both on the positive and negative side of the ledger.  Yet too often we only attend to something after it has already become a hefty problem requiring a massive undertaking.

For the coach and the player to recover the season they realized change was necessary for survival.  The time had come for all team members, coaches included, to shed the illusion that they were building right relationships that would take them where they wanted to go.

COURSE CORRECTION

To inspire the team to quickly adopt changes—those the players proposed and others put forward by the coaching staff—they decided to look to Hollywood.  Yes, tinsel town!

Screen writers tell us that there is really only seven or so master plots from which all stories are developed.  These story structures are called archetypes.  An archetype offers the audience a relatable back-story with a familiar pattern that taps into the mental models of the viewer.  The classic archetypes include: rags to riches, overcoming adversity, the quest, comedy, tragedy, voyage and return, and rebirth.

The idea was for the team’s members to create a story that they wanted to “write.”  All participants agreed that to transform the team required a story that would fit the team today and acknowledge its current realities.  The goal was for the team to agree to adopt, enact, and live the story daily.  The team agreed to undertake the challenge of change by employing the archetype of Disastrous Voyage and Fortunate Return.  This was fitting because this archetype is about progression from naivete to wisdom, from disparity to triumph.  In typical Hollywood movies the protagonist stumbles across obstacles and challenges with the mistaken notion that they know where they are going.  In this real-life voyage the players sadly were heading in the wrong direction to creating a competitive team with a sense of well-being for its participants.

Beginning with the team’s current realities it seemed fitting to “title” the change story Turning the Ship Around.  The student-athletes discussed together their story with candor and enthusiasm—how they got to where they were and how they wanted to go about changing their course.  By agreeing to the archetype they went about living a shape-shifting story of resurgence and resurrection based on building durable and enduring relationships.

Fortunately, the path to turning the season (the ship if you will) around began with small victories.  Not victories on the playing field, rather small wins in building right relationships.  Day-by-day living the narrative of Turning the Ship Around the team did come to experience a successful change of course.  After one more loss the dedicated team lived to tell the tale of a seven-game win streak to finish out the season. By righting the course the team is now ready to set sail for an exceptional season next year.

To find out more about and order Sport Leadership Books authored by Dr. Dobbs including Coaching for Leadership, click this link: The Academy for Sport Leadership Books

About The Academy for Sport Leadership

The Academy for Sport Leadership is a leading educational leadership training firm that uses sound educational principles, research, and learning theories to create leadership resources.  The academy has developed a coherent leadership development framework and programs covering the cognitive, psycho-motor, emotional and social dimensions of learning, thus addressing the dimensions necessary for healthy development and growth of student-athletes.

The Academy for Sport Leadership’s underlying convictions are as follows: 1) the most important lessons of leadership are learned in real-life situations, 2) team leaders develop best through active practice, structured reflection, and feedback, 3) learning to lead is an on-going process in which guidance from a mentor coach helps facilitate learning and growth, and 4) leadership lessons learned in sport should transcend the game and assist student-athletes in developing the capacity to lead in today’s changing environment.

Editor’s Note from Brian: I have had this in my files for around 20 years and feel that it is definitely worth sharing.  I think it is good advice for all of us, regardless of our age!

Written by Beverly Heirich.

We all have the same questions: Why is life so tough? Well, there’s an answer to that:

When my husband and I were raising our five children, we taught them everything we knew. Now we know that was not much

If we could do it over, here are some critical facts about human nature that I would start teaching them before they were old enough to brush their teeth without help.

Bad is easy. Good is hard.
Losing is easy. Winning is hard.
Talking is easy. Listening is hard.
Watching TV is easy. Reading is hard.
Giving advice is easy. Taking advice is hard.
Flab is easy. Muscle is hard.
Stop is easy. Go is hard.
Dirty is easy. Clean is hard.
Take is easy. Give is hard.
Dream is easy. Think is hard.
Lying is easy. Truth is hard.
Sleeping is easy. Waking is hard.
Holding a grudge is easy. Forgiving is hard.
Telling a secret is easy. Keeping a secret is hard.
Play is easy. Work is hard.
Falling is easy. Getting up is hard.
Spending is easy. Saving is hard.
Doubt is easy. Faith is hard.
Laughter is easy. Tears are hard.
Criticizing is easy. Taking criticism is hard.
Letting go is easy. Hanging on is hard.
Secret sin is easy. Confession is hard.
Pride is easy. Humility is hard.
Excusing oneself is easy. Excusing others is hard.
Borrowing is easy. Paying back is hard.
Sex is easy. Love is hard.
Argument is easy. Negotiation is hard.
Naughty is easy. Nice is hard.
Going alone is easy. Walking alone is hard.
Dumb is easy. Smart is hard.
Messy is easy. Neat is hard.
Cowardice is easy. Bravery is hard.
War is easy. Peace is hard.
Poor is easy. Rich is hard.
Sarcasm is easy. Sincerity is hard.
An F is easy. An A is hard.
Growing weeds is easy. Growing flowers is hard.
Reaction is easy. Action is hard.
Can’t do is easy. Can do is hard.
Feasting is easy. Fasting is hard.
Following is easy. Leading is hard.
Having friends is easy. Being a friend is hard.
Dying is easy. Living is hard.

If you ask why all this is so, why is life so hard, I’ll tell you, “It just is. Nothing in life that is good and worthwhile comes without effort.

We are born, all of us, with a nature that is drawn to the easy rather than the hard.
Knowing this about one self and others softens the heart and builds iron into the will, keeps us going when all around is crumbling, when friends forsake, when the heart breaks, and the courage and confidence shatter.

Knowing that such experiences are part of the deal gives us opportunities to choose to do hard things. Constant challenges make our journery exhilarating, wonderfully fulfilling, never, never boring. As the Arabs put it, “All sunshine makes a desert.”

And here’s a small secret that most sad and lonely people never learn: Deep down inside we are all asking the question. No matter who you are, life is hard, and we all ask why it should be so.

But there is comfort in knowing we’re not alone. So maybe your child – or the person sitting over there – needs to hear from you right this minute that sometimes you question too.

Easy is its own reward. Hard is much finer!

These notes are from the Don Meyer Leadership seminar and were sent to me by Steve Smiley.

-You can do anything you want, just not everything you want.
-Learn who you are and what your game is.  Biggest turnoff is being fake.
-Effective better than Efficient.
-Your example isn’t the main way in leading others, it is the only way.
-Your example screams so loudly that they can’t hear what you are saying.

-“Leadership starts at the top.” Morgan Wooten
-Leadership: Like pornography, can’t explain it or describe it, but I know what it is when I see it.
-Pat Summitt: “Got to have guts to make the big decisions.”
-We are all free agents.
-TEAMS: Tough, Effort, Attitude, Motives, Servant Leaders

-Find the need, fill the need. (Where you want to be minus what is = need assessment)
-Positive Leadership: Pessimist: “Things can’t get any worse.”   Optimist: “Oh, yes they can.”
-2 types of people, energy givers and energy takers
-Be Sound: teach fundamentals
-Be Solid: integrity, authenticity
-Be Simple: the more you think, the slower your feet get

-Not everyone can work the cash register, somebody has to sweep out the backroom. Sam Walton Story
-Study your opposition, but don’t be obsessed about your opposition.
-Humility precedes Honor
-Make up your own mission statement.

-As a coach, you get both praised and criticized when you shouldn’t.

-Simple Truths, 212 extra degree–Here is a link to the video that Coach Meyer is referring to:
(when you click the link, make sure that your speakers are on)
212 Degrees The Extra Effort
-Got to win when the ball doesn’t bounce our way.

-Start to watch the way successful coaches deal with people.
-If the vaccine doesn’t work, quit applying the ointment to the infected area.
-You can whip a horse to run, but sometimes they will run faster if you whisper in their ear.
-Get mad, cool down, then act mad.

-“I don’t make decisions because they are convenient, easy, or popular, I make them because they are right.”
Cancer Player:       Malignant-cut it off
Benign-treat it and decide at end of season
Can’t decide-treat it as malignant (cut it off)
-Respond with wisdom, love, firmness and positive self-control when dissatisfied with the behavior, performance or response of others.

-Discipline and Demand without being Demeaning.
-an arrogant leader who never thinks they are wrong / “and let me make this clear”  / very difficult to play for
-Hurts me to leave a task undone.
-Selfishness will kill your team.
-Just because you are elected doesn’t mean you can lead.

-You can elect your team captains, but your players will pick your leaders.
-Internal Control: whoever controls the locker room, controls the team.
-Leadership: you have to let go of your ego, be a follower first, influence others
-You must meet someone in your life that expects greatness from you.
-Expect Greatness, Inspect for Greatness, Accept only Greatness.

-Your legacy: never have a legacy if you don’t give your power away
-Inspect Supervision: be there physically, be there mentally
-Internal Leadership (characteristics of Leaders)
1) Hardest Worker  2) Take of care of stuff off the floor  3) Let the coaches take care of everything else
-everyday need a soft rain (reign) of leadership, like an irrigation system, can’t be too hard, will break the corn stalks off, need a slow and steady drizzle everyday

The Head Coach needs to have a great practice every day.
-A coach needs credibility to confront.
-Building a positive culture takes a long time, doesn’t take long to lose it.
-Handle wins/loses the same way.

-Cause / Self      (must have a cause bigger than yourself)
-Process / Results   (can’t be a scoreboard watcher)
-Nothing more harmful to a team than the lack of discipline.
-Dick Bennett Badger Basketball, 1)see the picture  2)sell the picture  3)everyone has to help paint the picture
-Don’t set long term goals, we have to be the very best we can be today.

-Word of mouth – best selling practice, but the hardest to accomplish
-Read the book “Art of War” Sun Tzu
Need proper disciple, Can’t fear losing, Must face it together, Prepare for the worst, expect the best.
-The teacher always learns more than the students.

Important Situations
Good Businesses (time spent on problems) Urgent Matters 20-25%, Non Urgent Matters 65-80%
Bad Businesses Urgent Matters 25-30%, Non Urgent Matters 15%

Non-important Situations
Good Businesses Urgent Matters 15%, Non Urgent Matters 1%
Urgent Matters 50-60%, Non Urgent Matters 2-3%

*Be efficient by planning / prepare
McCormack’s Rules
1) get a system , any system
2) stick to it
3) write everything down

Meyer’s Rule’s
1) Plan the week on Sunday
2) plan the next day the night before
3) exercise
4) Say No
5) Take mini-vacations (long lunch, early leave)
6) keep a journal, not what you did, but what you learned

Click here to read: Part 2

Developing Leadership Capacity

The Context and Culture Make a Difference in Developing Your Team Leaders

By Cory Dobbs, Ed.D., The Academy for Sport Leadership

It didn’t dawn on me that there might be anxieties and risk involved in team learning until I put a few work teams at a Fortune 100 company under a microscope. To say the very least, what I observed was a wide-range of defensive and protective processes which ultimately closed off the team’s members from learning and instead created a variety of dysfunctions anchoring the team’s collective efforts in the harbor of mediocrity.

As a result of this work I decided to take a closer look at how student-athletes learn in a team setting, and in particular how the context influences the perceived risk involved in learning to lead one’s teammates. Upon closer inspection it became obvious that many of the risks involved in team learning in the corporate world are mirrored in the athletic world. Likewise, learning to lead in a team environment is risky business.

So, how do you get student-athletes to learn together? There are no simple answers. However, knowing that the context greatly affects learning is a step in the right direction if you’re serious about your players learning how to lead.

Leadership Development and Psychological Safety

When a student-athlete takes on a leadership role it’s important to understand that he or she will learn primarily through trial and error (which is why I firmly believe in deliberate practice—scrimmage—as a way to reduce perceived risks). If a student is learning physical geography he or she will learn in private with no one else aware of his or her mistakes. However, learning to lead in a team setting requires learning by trial and error in interpersonal interactions. Learning this way is certainly not learning in private and the consequences of actions always involve one’s teammates. Therefore, team leaders perceive risk in appearing ignorant and or incompetent in front of their peers.

Because most student-athletes have little experience at leading, which includes making mistakes in front of teammates, such fears as embarrassment and rejection are always present. And many student-athletes are reluctant to take actions or to speak up or speak out for fear that their actions may be held against them by teammates. To neutralize such fears it’s in your best interest to create a psychologically safe environment.

Let’s start with what I mean by psychological safety. It is a shared belief by all team members that the team is an environment where everyone has a sense of confidence that others will not embarrass, disrespect, disregard, or punish someone for taking action or speaking up or speaking out. All members understand that a supportive learning environment is necessary to build a psychologically safe team context.

The central idea is that a psychologically safe team environment will produce higher performing team learning and team leadership. Expressed as a formula it looks like this:

At the heart of the growth of a team leader is the leader as a learner, the learning process, and the context which together form the cornerstone of leadership development. Always keep in mind that the team leader is engaging in learning a new mind-set as well as a new skill-set. That is, the student-athlete as a team leader is undergoing a tremendous transformation and that is why creating a psychologically safe environment is necessary.

Creating a Psychologically Safe Learning Environment

Years ago, during a seminar the late Peter Drucker asked an elite group of executives “How many of you have deadwood in your organization?” referring to those employees that had retired on the job. The hands of every one of the high-profile CEOs went skyward. He then asked “Were they that way when you brought them into your organization?” The implication was obvious, if they were then the leader was at fault for hiring them, and if they weren’t then something inside the organization “caused” the employee to basically give up on improving and become organizational deadwood. The point is that the context has a much more profound effect on how people behave than most leaders
realize.

The question, then, is what can you do to create a psychologically safe environment for team leaders learning to lead? The first step is to understand your team environment as it is and how it interacts with the internal achievement drive of your team leaders. To do this, use the model below.

Hopefully the matrix above can provide a window into your current team context and how it is affecting the development of your team leaders. Psychological safety is an important component of creating an effective learning space for you and your team. The purpose of this brief article is to provide an introduction into the practice of developing a team leader’s capacity to lead through the process of team learning. When you involve all members of the team in the learning of leadership you’re more likely to create an effective learning environment.

Let me issue a quick reminder that leadership is a social influence process in which team leaders work to motivate or persuade teammates to achieve specific individual and team goals. As such, the norms, beliefs, and values that emerge from team member interactions will create team dynamics that will influence the social structure and social processes that will either enhance or inhibit team learning. Your goal as the chief architect of the environment should be to create a psychologically safe learning zone.

Ultimately, you have more to do with a team leader’s learning to lead—or not learning—than you probably thought you did. If you’re not growing team leaders, then it’s likely the problem is not the seed, it’s the soil.

To find out more about and order Sport Leadership Books authored by Dr. Dobbs including Coaching for Leadership, click this link: The Academy for Sport Leadership Books

About the Author

A former basketball coach, Cory’s coaching background includes experience at the NCAA DII, NJCAA, and high school levels of competition. While coaching, he researched and developed the transformative Becoming a Team Leader program for student-athletes. Cory has worked with professional athletes, collegiate athletic programs and high schools teaching leadership as a part of the sports experience and education process. Cory cut his teeth as a corporate leader with Fortune 500 member, The Dial Corp. As a consultant and trainer Dr. Dobbs has worked with such organizations as American Express, Honeywell, and Avnet.

Cory has taught a variety of courses on leadership and change for the following universities:

Northern Arizona University (Graduate Schools of Business and Education)

Ohio University (Graduate School of Education / Management and Leadership in Sport)

Grand Canyon University (Sports Marketing and Sports Management in the Colangelo School of Sports Business)

Visit www.corydobbs.com to read Cory’s leadership blog.

from Jim Rohn:

If  you want to be a leader who attracts quality people, the key is to become a  person of quality yourself. Leadership is the ability to attract someone to the  gifts, skills, and opportunities you offer as an owner, as a manager, as a  parent. What’s important in leadership is refining your skills. All great leaders  keep working on themselves until they become effective.

Here are some specifics:

Learn to be strong but not impolite. It is an extra step you must take to become a  powerful, capable leader with a wide range of reach. Some people mistake rudeness for strength. It’s not even a good substitute.

Next, learn to be kind but not weak. We must not mistake weakness for kindness.  Kindness isn’t weak. Kindness is a certain type of strength. We must be kind  enough to tell someone the truth. We must be kind enough and considerate enough  to lay it on the line. We must be kind enough to tell it like it is and not  deal in delusion.

Next,  learn to be bold but not a bully. It takes boldness to win the day. To build  your influence, you’ve got to walk in front of your group. You’ve got to be  willing to take the first arrow, tackle the first problem, discover the first  sign of trouble. Like the farmer, if you want any rewards at harvest time, you  have got to be bold and face the weeds and the rain and the bugs straight on.  You’ve got to seize the moment.

Here’s  the next step. You’ve got to learn to be humble but not timid. You can’t get to  the high life by being timid. Some people mistake timidity for humility. But  humility is a virtue; timidity is a disease. It’s an affliction. It can be  cured, but it is a problem.

Humility  is almost a God-like word. A sense of awe. A sense of wonder. An awareness of  the human soul and spirit. An understanding that there is something unique  about the human drama versus the rest of life. Humility is a grasp of the  distance between us and the stars, yet having the feeling that we’re part of  the stars.

Here’s  a good tip: Learn to be proud but not arrogant. It takes pride to build your  ambitions. It takes pride in your community. It takes pride in a cause, in  accomplishment. But the key to becoming a good leader is to be proud without  being arrogant.

Do  you know the worst kind of arrogance? Arrogance from ignorance. It’s  intolerable. If someone is smart and arrogant, we can tolerate that. But if  someone is ignorant and arrogant, that’s just too much to take.

The  next step is learning to develop humor without folly. In leadership, we learn  that it’s okay to be witty but not silly; fun but not foolish.

Next,  deal in realities. Deal in truth. Save yourself the agony of delusion. Just  accept life as it is. Life is unique. The whole drama of life is unique. It’s  fascinating.

Life  is unique. Leadership is unique. The skills that work well for one leader may  not work at all for another. However, the fundamental skills of leadership can  be adopted to work well for just about everyone: at work, in the community, and  at home.