Encouragement: A gift to be given

Written and contributed by Dr. Chris Hobbs (Follow him on Twitter @Dr_ChrisHobbs)

Scott Drew is the head men’s basketball coach at Baylor University. Over the past 16 seasons, he’s won nearly 20 games per season. It’s an impressive stretch for a program that has a mediocre history and when Coach Drew arrived, was almost completely dead. If you want to read a story of persistence and comeback, read “The Leftovers” which is the story of massive scandal and homicide that rocked Baylor basketball. That is the program that Scott Drew took over. The author of the book, Matt Sayman, was one of only two players that remained in the program after the scandal and during Coach Drew’s arrival. The program was absolutely decimated with NCAA sanctions and terrible support from the local community. It was a very dark time in the life of Baylor basketball. Sayman says, ‘Coach Drew was always positive and always believed we could do the impossible.’ Those first Baylor teams under Coach Drew never actually accomplished the impossible in the win/loss column, but Coach Drew did something important. He provided the players on those teams the gift of encouragement that lasts to this day.

If you understand the intention of the word encouragement, maybe you’ll want to give the gift a little more as well.

Encouragement is to give strength or courage to another. It is the kind of expression that makes someone want to go on.

Here are a couple of ways a leader can give the gift of strength and courage to someone to the people in their care…

Call when things go wrong – Over the last year or so, I’ve really tried to embrace the mantra of ‘being the kind of leader that people want around when everything is going wrong.’ An important way to do this is make sure you are actually present when things are going wrong. Often, the best way to do this is to call and talk voice to voice to someone when their world is falling apart. Pick up the phone and show up for your people when things are not going well.

Confirm why things went well – Notice the wording of this suggestion. Expressing appreciation when things go well is nice. Expressing appreciation to someone for what they did (the why) to make things go well is next level encouragement. As a leader, it is important that you give people the freedom to make good things happen and then take the time to tell them what you observed as the ‘why’ behind those good things. A team member knows why things went well but to know that it was observed and confirmed by the leader is very encouraging.

Compliment by name and task – No matter what your opinion of the Bible might be there are some excellent accounts of incredible things that we can learn a lot from. One of those accounts is of Nehemiah who returned to Israel and returned it’s economic and military stability after the Babylonians had conquered it. Nehemiah rallied a diverse and unskilled group of laborers to accomplish the incredible engineering feat of rebuilding the walls around Jerusalem resurrected in only 52 days. The historical account includes an entire chapter of Nehemiah recognizing every group of laborers by their name and the task that they completed. This is simple and powerful encouragement that I have tried to implement anytime I address a group publicly. I compliment someone on my team by their name and by the task that they have performed well for our group.

There are a lot of different ways to give the gift of encouragement. I have only listed a few of the ways that this can be accomplished. I want to encourage you to be the type of person that gives the gift of encouragement to as many people as you can.

Keep on, keepin on, friend!

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‘Bite Down and Don’t Let Go’ is a collection of writings on being intentional about life in a way that produces great persistence. Read about it more here.

Dr. Chris Hobbs is an educational leader and Director of Athletics at The King’s Academy in West Palm Beach, Florida. He’s earned a few degrees and won some awards. He’s happily married to his high school sweetheart and they have three teen age children. Life is messy and complicated most of the time. You can follow him on Twitter for all sorts of inspirational thoughts and good laughs.

Dr. Cory Dobbs
The Academy for Sport Leadership

How Coaches Turn Students into Smart Leaders

Looking back on 2019 we’re going to refer to it as the year of Player-Led Leadership. Go ahead, Google it. Many major universities

Click here to see:
UCLA

UTSA

Nebraska

have begun to identify the need to involve the student-athlete in a more holistic manner. To compete in today’s athletic arena, high performance is built around player-led leadership.

As a field researcher and facilitator of player-led leadership I am rooting for more coaches to open up to the process and practice of player-led team building.

However, often times it’s the case that player-led leadership is undermined because coaches are lacking a growth mindset in this area and lacking the skills and abilities to transform their operating system.

The driving assumptions are that a player-led process will lead to a (1) collectively, (2) reflectively, and (3)relationally smarter team; that all student-athletes are capable of learning to lead; and that team leadership is grounded in a team learning together.

For the serious coach, it takes commitment to really create a dynamic player-led team. Many coaches mistakenly assume they’re new role will be taking a back seat to student-athlete leadership.

If you believe, as I do, that student-athletes are capable of much more leadership than we’ve asked for in the past, you must read Coaching for Leadership. It’s about the real work of transforming your team’s culture, the work of implementation of player-led team leadership.

New to the Second Edition of Coaching for Leadership!

We are pleased to announce a new chapter to the second edition of the best-selling Coaching for Leadership. The chapter, The Big Shift: Unlock Your Team’s Potential by Creating Player-Led Teambuilding, connects the previous edition of this book to its origin, as well as to the future of team sports.

The new chapter sets forth a practical and applicable agenda for change and improvement. The reader is introduced to seven vital elements of change; seven shifts of traditional mental models that lead to the new core principles necessary for creating a player-led team culture. Click here for more information about Coaching for Leadership

About Cory Dobbs, Ed.D.

Cory Dobbs is the founder of The Academy for Sport Leadership and a nationally recognized thought leader in the areas of leadership and team building.  Cory is an accomplished researcher of human experience. Cory engages in naturalistic inquiry seeking in-depth understanding of social phenomena within their natural setting.

A college basketball coach, Cory’s coaching background includes experience at the NCAA DII, NJCAA, and high school levels of competition.  After a decade of research and development Cory unleashed the groundbreaking Teamwork Intelligence program for student-athletics. Teamwork Intelligence illuminates the process of designing an elite team by using the 20 principles and concepts along with the 8 roles of a team player he’s uncovered while performing research.

Cory has worked with professional athletes, collegiate athletic programs, and high schools teaching leadership and team building as a part of the sports experience and education process.  As a consultant and trainer Dr. Dobbs has worked with Fortune 500 organizations such as American Express, Honeywell, and Avnet, as well as medium and small businesses. Dr. Dobbs taught leadership and organizational change at Northern Arizona University, Ohio University, and Grand Canyon University.

Have you ever coached a team that was talented but something was just missing and as a result it simply underperformed?

If the answer is no

… then either you haven’t been coaching long or you are one of the all-time great coaches.

The truth is a lot of teams fall short of expectations.

But why?

According to Dr. Cory Dobbs, Founder & President of The Academy for Sport Leadership, teams often become so focused on tasks and strategies and their commitment to the “team” begins to wane.

In the video clip below Dr. Dobbs discusses a case study he conducted with a team that was underperforming.

He shares the process he used to help them develop teammate accountability and become a more successful team that was focused on transformation, relationships, and harmony.

If you are a coach that is interested in the new science of leadership, teamwork, and teambuilding then you will want to check out Dr. Dobbs’s new masterclass: Coaching for Leadership.

In this groundbreaking course he shares his 3 Big Ideas:

• A Leader in Every Locker
• Coaching for Leadership
• Teamwork Intelligence

*The Coaches Toolbox subscribers: Use coupon code “Toolbox25” to receive a 25% discount on the course at checkout here: Coaching for Leadership Masterclass*

Submitted by Dr. Cory Dobbs of The Academy for Sport Leadership. Dr. Dobbs is a regular contributor on coaching for leadership to The Coaching Toolbox.

Three Reasons Every Coach Needs a Mentor

Most coaches enter the profession with a vision on building a career.  Simply stated, anyone who is building a career will need help along the way. Experienced coaches, current and former, can serve effectively as mentors.  But a mentor needn’t be an ex-coach.  Sometimes the ex-coach as mentor can undermine growth and development by spending too much time on “this is how I handled it.”  All coaches can benefit from the wisdom and insight of others.  The energy and growth from relevant learning interactions can be a career game-changer.  Here are three important contributions that mentor relationships can provide:

REFLECTION
Learning from others further down the career road can be intimidating at first.  Yet, what feels like a big deal initially, may not be a big deal in the larger scheme of things. It’s important to know what to sweat and what to forget–when it’s okay to let something roll off your back and when you should stop and reflect more deeply. Great mentors have a better view of the broad landscape. Effective mentors excel at asking questions, specifically the types of questions that lead you to reflect on your performance, behavior, and goals as well has how to learn from your mistakes and successes.

PERSPECTIVE.
Mentors can help you make sense of your current situation; the small things as well as developing expertise from your experiences.  They don’t tell you what to do.  Instead they use questions to teach you how to think constructively on your own. In the process, they help you realign your perspective with the reality of the situation, to provide you the smoothest, most natural path forward in a way that is authentic to who you are.

ENCOURAGEMENT
There is an old saying that “nothing succeeds like success.” This means success bread success, that you have a better chance of being successful if you’re successful.  This is only partly true. We may gain confidence from our successes, but it’s our failures that develop our leadership muscle and offer the most powerful insights.  When you are expected to learn from your mistakes, it’s important to be able to view that process in a positive light–to see how valuable and rich hard-won lessons can be.  Every coach needs positive energy to move forward in their career. An effective mentor will help you build self-confidence step-by-step, through victory and defeat, success and failure, and all the challenges that emerge along your coaching journey.

Dr. Cory Dobbs is an accomplished researcher of human performance–a relentless investigator of team building and leadership behavior.  A skilled researcher, Cory actively engages the process of naturalistic inquiry seeking in-depth understanding of social phenomena such as leadership and team building in their natural setting.  A “teamologist,” Dr. Dobbs is an author, speaker, teacher, trainer and a consultant.

Cory is the Founder & President of The Academy for Sport Leadership. A former basketball coach, Cory’s coaching background includes experience at the NCAA DII, NJCAA, and high school levels of competition. Cory has worked with collegiate athletic programs and high schools teaching leadership and team building as a part of the sports experience and education process.

“Tell me and I’ll forget. Show me and I may remember. Involve me and I will care.” -Your Student-Athlete The world of coaching is changing. In Coaching for Leadership you’ll discover the foundations for designing, building, and sustaining a leadership focused culture for building a high-performance team. 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

Dr. Cory Dobbs
The Academy for Sport Leadership

In an essay titled “Good Guys Finish First (Sometimes),” Andrew Bagnato told the following story:

Following a rags-to-riches season that led them to the Rose Bowl—their first in decades—Northwestern University’s Wildcats met with coach Gary Barnett for the opening of spring training.

As players found their seats, Barnett announced that he was going to hand out awards that many Wildcats had earned in 1995.  Some players exchanged glances.  Barnett does not normally dwell on the past.  But as the coach continued to call players forward and handed them placards proclaiming their achievements, they were cheered on by their teammates.

One of the other coaches gave Barnett a placard representing his 17 national coach of the year awards.  Then, as the applause subsided, Barnett walked to a trash can marked “1995.”  He took an admiring glance at his placard, then dumped it in the can.

In the silence that followed, one by one, the team’s stars dumped their placards on top of Barnett’s.  Barnett had shouted a message without uttering a word.  ‘What you did in 1995 was terrific, lads.  But look at the calendar: It’s 1996.’

Teachable Point of view: It’s dangerous to rest on our past successes.

New to the Second Edition of Coaching for Leadership!

We are pleased to announce a new chapter to the second edition of the best-selling Coaching for Leadership. The chapter, The Big Shift: Unlock Your Team’s Potential by Creating Player-Led Teambuilding, connects the previous edition of this book to its origin, as well as to the future of team sports.

The new chapter sets forth a practical and applicable agenda for change and improvement. The reader is introduced to seven vital elements of change; seven shifts of traditional mental models that lead to the new core principles necessary for creating a player-led team culture. Click here for more information about Coaching for Leadership

About Cory Dobbs, Ed.D.

Cory Dobbs is the founder of The Academy for Sport Leadership and a nationally recognized thought leader in the areas of leadership and team building.  Cory is an accomplished researcher of human experience. Cory engages in naturalistic inquiry seeking in-depth understanding of social phenomena within their natural setting.

A college basketball coach, Cory’s coaching background includes experience at the NCAA DII, NJCAA, and high school levels of competition.  After a decade of research and development Cory unleashed the groundbreaking Teamwork Intelligence program for student-athletics. Teamwork Intelligence illuminates the process of designing an elite team by using the 20 principles and concepts along with the 8 roles of a team player he’s uncovered while performing research.

Cory has worked with professional athletes, collegiate athletic programs, and high schools teaching leadership and team building as a part of the sports experience and education process.  As a consultant and trainer Dr. Dobbs has worked with Fortune 500 organizations such as American Express, Honeywell, and Avnet, as well as medium and small businesses. Dr. Dobbs taught leadership and organizational change at Northern Arizona University, Ohio University, and Grand Canyon University.