In a collaborative effort between Jon Gordon and former Atlanta Falcons Head Coach, Mike Smith, the two co-authored book about building winning teams.
Sports are not about the x's and o's and competitive strategies on the playing surface. It's much more than that. The most successful teams are not only one's that have the best players; the teams that find success are the ones that win inside the locker room. The entire team has to buy into the message the coach is putting out there.
While reading this book, it reminded me of the past semester and working with the Harvard women's swimming and diving program. From the outside looking in you can identify their philosophy is built around being a team and it trickles down from the coaches to the captains to the rest of the squad. As a coach, you may be recruiting the top athletes, but more-so you want to recruit good people.
Throughout the course of a long season you're going to be around your teammates a lot, which makes chemistry paramount. If you recruit a superstar but "their personality doesn't mesh with the team culture, then they beat you ever day; whereas if you let that person go on to another program then maybe they beat you once a year." It's building a team that you can win with every day and recruit people who fit the culture you want to set.
It’s all about people.
— Imry Halevi (@imryh) May 29, 2020
Hire good people.
Trust good people.
Follow good people.
Play with good people.
Chat with good people.
Work with good people.
Argue with good people.
The rest will figure itself out.
Many teams have achieved success using this model. Professionally, one can look at the New England Patriots. For two decades, it's always been the "Patriot Way" of operating and if a superstar player didn't quite fit the mold they were quickly pulled aside and mentored by a veteran (i.e. Randy Moss) or they were shown the door (i.e. Antonio Brown).
I can point to a few college programs who have achieved team success using this model and I look towards three high-caliber Division III softball programs in the Boston-Providence area - Simmons University, Emmanuel College and Johnson & Wales University. While only one program has won a conference title in the last few years, success is far from just winning championships and receiving accolades.
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"Success is defined by setting goals and feeling satisfied those goals were achieved."
Every team at the beginning of the year - no matter the sport - sets out to win a championship. That's everyone's big goal, so you as the leader of the team need to create smaller incremental goals that will lead to the big goal. If you do all the little things right, they will eventually lead to bigger and better things - hence the term "Little Drops Make Big Drops" and you will success will be achieved.
Bonus points that don't quite fit with the rest of the post:
- Guarding against complacency - making sure everyone is still hungry and willing to constantly improve and innovate. Nothing kills a team more than getting complacent.
- Past failure does not determine future failure - reminds me of what longtime Harvard women's basketball coach Kathy Delaney Smith said that the HBS "Sports as a Classroom" panel last fall with "failure being the fuel to success."
- The purpose of sports is to develop better human beings and who have the ability to change the world.
- Everyone wants to feel cared for, so get to know your team as people and see them more than just a number.
- Care about the work you do and the services you provide. The top organizations care deeply about their work.
- Commitment starts at the top and get out and walk around to meet your employees in their environment. No job is beneath you.
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