Some books demand reading, like Bill Walsh's The Score Takes Care of Itself. Walsh was an NFL head coach who turned the 49ers into a champion in three years.
He was also a great thinker who taught at Stanford Business School.
Apply some of his key principles to your process:
1. Set high standards for everyone in the organization. Walsh expected top performance from everyone from the receptionist and field stripers to the players and coaches.
2. Have complete attention to detail.
3. "The quality of your efforts becomes the quality of your work."
4. Learn every day.
5. "The road to victory goes through a place called failure."
6. After victory or defeat, look forward not backward.
7. Be accountable. Own your actions.
Read this carefully:
Philosophy is mandatory.
It evolves from a deep understanding of a domain.
It requires careful evaluation about issues and choices.
This implies the availability of alternatives and a willingness to change positions when the facts change
Results reward process.
Lagniappe. Rules.
Lagniappe 2. It's not too late to work on your jump and explosiveness. Consider dialing back the number of reps and sets early on.
Imagine your assignment is giving 'success' instructions to your classmates or teammates. Where would you start?
You might start with success stories that began with failure. Here's an illustrative post from my basketball blog.
Here are additional ideas:
1) Surround yourself with great people (teammates/coworkers). If you had a school project, would you team up with a worker or a slacker?
2) Find a mentor. Get a coach. Mr. Rogers said, "look for the helpers." Melrose is lucky to have a great 'coaching team' in Coach Celli and Coach Schmitt. "Mentoring is the only shortcut to excellence."
3) Be positive. A negative attitude never leads to a positive life. There's an old joke about a child who goes into the yard on Christmas looking for a present. There's a big pile of horse manure. The child excitedly grabs a shovel and says, "I know there's a pony in there somewhere." Look for the positive.
4) Do the work. Yes, I am a broken record on unrequired work, "champions do extra," and "do five more." Why is that? As a coach, I know that the players that worked the hardest, like Samantha Dewey and Cecilia Kay, shined the brightest.
5) Persevere. You lose a point, a set, a match. Fight on in the face of adversity. You know the quote about having the 'will to win'. Have the will to do the preparation and the work needed to win.
Lagniappe. You're T minus fourteen days on the Countdown.
Lagniappe 2. Power and placement, big and loose hand.
Lagniappe 3. Hit better, hit a dynamic ball. Track the ball, prep and snap, contact the ball high. Be aware that Japanese volleyball has less power than US volleyball. Always get input from your coaches. Their word is law.
All opinions expressed on the blog are solely my own.
Exhausting. Needy. Demanding. Don't be that 'guy'. UCONN women's basketball Coach Geno Auriemma talks to his team, "Guys, if we want to be successful, we can't do that." Even a team whose roster fills with high school All-Americans must do winning things and avoid losing choices.
The Boston Herald named former Braintree coach Kristen McDonnell their 'Coach of the Decade'. She led a powerhouse Braintree team to four state championships and produced numerous college players.
She left to coach boys in Norwood, where she is in the guidance department. Why? Because she wouldn't endure the harassment from parents unhappy with their daughters' minutes, roles, and recognition. An Internet site revealed the conflict.
Sports isn't always sunshine and roses. In a Sports Illustrated article, college women hoopsters described their situation as 'crabs in a bucket', trying to climb over each other. Fewer than half felt they could trust their coaches.
Years ago a Middlesex League team (not Melrose) was a favorite in the postseason tournament. Shortly before their game, a girl "stole" a teammate's boyfriend. The team fractured and lost. Choices have consequences.
A women's college basketball team split in a 'culture war'. The team fell apart, unable to trust and play with each other. Players transferred.
Culture matters. Collaboration matters. Commitment matters. Don't be exhausting.
Coaches and players assemble a complex assortment of puzzle pieces.
Dawn Staley, South Carolina and USWNT basketball coach, has an affinity for solving puzzles. Puzzles represent a metaphor for life. "Building from the ground up. It’s, uh, frustrating and gratifying, ‘cause puzzles can really overwhelm you. But the moment you put one piece into another, it makes you keep coming back to complete the puzzle."
Everyone wants to be a contributor on the court. Find a "varsity skill" that gets and keeps you on the court. Rachel Johnson's career arc informs that process. As a young player, she blocked at a high level. In one sectional final, she made a key pass to set up the match winning point for Athena Ziavras. And in the State Title run, she averaged about nine kills/match over the final three contests to become that key third hitter.
Your skill could be setting, "keeping the ball up" in the back row, or efficient attacking.
Become a piece of the puzzle...and always be a great teammate.
Kevin Durant wakes asking, "How can I get better today?" Everyone has that challenge and opportunity.
"What if" an external you counseled you, "do this and don't do that?" Consider the possibilities.
1. Invest more time; spend less. Reduce time wasting. That includes less television, less texting, less screen time. We have a family saying about food, "Don't waste it." Widen the application.
2. Become more efficient. A ten minute shower could become five. '86' useless drills. Have a sense of urgency.
3. "Do five more." - Dan Pink I share James Kerr's Legacy advice plenty ("Champions do extra."), but have I made the five more calls, read five more pages, walked five more minutes?
4. Get adequate sleep. Improve sleep hygiene by avoiding caffeine (five hour half-life) after noon. Consider a warm bath before sleep.
5. Build better habits. Pick, stick, check. Every day is resolution fulfillment day.
6. "Look for the helpers." - Mr. Rogers Find a mentor and be one. The same principles for athletes - skill, strategy, physicality, and psychology apply to our parenting, business, and hobbies. I've said, "make friends with the dead." What would Lincoln say? What would Dean Smith do?
7. Share more of yourself. Sharing includes time, ideas, and quality.
Give more credit. Without my wife, I am nowhere.
8. "Read. Read. Read. Read. Read." Ideas emerge out of nowhere, but more often others trigger them.
9. Be more grateful. Choose gratitude over grievance. And say thanks.
10.THINK - As communicators, spread:
T - tell the truth
H -be helpful
I - inspire
N -be necessary (shave syllables, be concise, consider others' feelings)
K -be kind
Model excellence.
Suggestions for readers:
Legacy by James Kerr
The Positive Dog by Jon Gordon
The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy
Atomic Habits by James Clear
The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz
Lagniappe.
"You can't become a great team until you realize that it's not all about you.
It's the commitment that you make to your teammates, the hard work that you put in, the trust that you earn, the love that you have.
Life is about making choices. Choose leaders, assistants, teammates, style of play, locations, and more.
Variability results from both "bias" and "noise." Bias is systematic. Bias affects choices based on specific characteristics - age, gender, ethnicity, experience, education, religion, and so forth. If we've decided, "we need a woman" or "we need a Harvard Law grad" for this job that's bias. In 1985, UCONN wanted the best woman as basketball coach. The players pushed for the 'best' coach. Geno Auriemma was the pick.
NOISE is unwanted variability. Noise impacts ‘fairness’ in employee evaluation, grading, sentencing, medical diagnosis and treatment, coaching, college admissions and more. When I coached with Ralph Labella, he picked the first eleven and I got the final choice. That "noisy" choice selected Sydney Doherty who became one of our top two players. Noise can work against or for you.
Rigid guidelines reduce noise and discretion. Reducing noise led to ‘sentencing guidelines’ and ‘standardized testing’. Three strikes and you’re out gave life sentences for three felonies. But all felonies are not alike. I don’t know whether a three time car thief merits ‘life’.
Coaches evaluate players for selection, minutes, roles, and recognition. Can we separate signal from noise in a 90 minute audition? If we see 20 players, probably a quarter emerge at the top, a quarter at the bottom and half are in the middle. The middle becomes a crapshoot. For fairness's sake, I devote more time to evaluating that middle.
We reduce variability with small-sided games, usually 3 v 3 rotating players for the last half hour. Multiple 'graders' also dampen the noise. Fair? I don’t know.
Style of play. Seek solutions to put players in the best position to succeed. Maybe we believe Wooden, "Basketball is a game meant to be played fast." With superior talent, I agree. Multiply advantage by more possessions and the edge expands. But as an underdog with less talent and experience, playing faster and extending the defense will probably get you croaked.
Reducing Noise:
Sport decisions may be reproducible but imprecise. Both bias and noise will always enter into the mix. Most of us will feel more comfortable with our judgment than hard rules.
Develop a collection of leadership stories that have meaning to you. Keep your eyes open to leadership around you - family, teachers, coaches, and friends. Look for chances to lead. And learn what others consider leadership exemplars.
Note how Churchill uses the rhetorical technique of anaphora in his call to arms to defend Britain and ultimately Western civilization.
Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin abbreviates her master works on the Roosevelts, Lincoln, and Lyndon Johnson in Leadership in Turbulent Times. Each of us benefits from knowing how former presidents led through crisis.
UNC soccer coach Anson Dorrance has his team read a lengthy book, The Leadership Moment, exploring leadership stories. I'm partial to the story of Arlene Blum leading an all-women's ascent on Annapurna, one of fourteen Himalayan peaks over 8,000 meters. That story shows how bold women accept the glory and consequences of extreme risk.
Examine the leadership process in your family. Your family is your first and most important team.
Consider how local politics intersects with the school system. Read great books like Yuval Harari's Sapiens, which explains how policy in human history emerges from economics, politics, and religion.
Study how authors describe who leaders are and how they operate. There's no 'unitary' approach to leadership, so learn as you go. Know the diversity of leaders, young (Malala or Greta Thunberg) or old (Gandhi), women (Taylor Swift) or men (your coaches) with a range of values, styles, and experience.
Consider keeping a 'leadership notebook' to refine your leadership skills.
Lagniappe. Be intentional. "Break the ball" in practice.
You're procrastinating, from the Latin (pro - for and cras - tomorrow). You face the dreaded summer reading.
Director Werner Herzog summarizes, "Read. Read. Read. Read. Read." Readers are leaders. Readers achieve more.
I recently finished Making Decisions by Cambridge alum, former British cricket selector Ed Smith. Currently, I'm nearing the end of The Contact, book seven of the spy thriller series from Saul Herzog. And I'm a big fan of Dan Coyle (The Talent Code), although I wish his blog had more posts.
If you read two hours a day, in 90 days you have 180 more hours of knowledge and nuance than the non-reader (25 percent of Americans). Billionaire Steve Forbes reads 50 pages a day. Influencer and Author Dan Pink (Drive) suggests "do five more." Five more reps, five more pages, five more minutes help separate you from the crowd.
Lagniappe. Trust the process.
The number one key to performing well under pressure is keeping your focus on the process instead of the outcome.
Seek balance. Life rewards balance. Courage balances recklessness and fear. Confidence balances arrogance and doubt.
Legend says that John Lennon said this,
"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down 'happy'. They told me I didn't understand the assignment, and I told them they didn't understand life." It's not confirmed but still good.
An elite girls' coach told me, "Girls tend to have more of an "imposter syndrome" where they don't know how good they are." You can only play as well as your self-belief.
UNC women's soccer coach Anson Dorrance believes in only showing positive video clips to support players' self-belief.
Trader Todd Harrison reminds us, "Never confuse self-worth with net worth." More resources don't make one a better person.
People may adopt teachings about their value. Every player on the team has value.
Parents can inflict withering disapproval. Sherri Coale discussed the player whom the team thought was selfish. "You're not happy unless you're scoring." In a team meeting, the young woman cried, "my father won't talk to me if I'm not scoring."
Award yourself value for what you can control - honesty, effort, teamwork. Never allow anyone to dismiss your self-respect.
Coaches can support or damage a player's self-worth. Nothing beats "I believe in you" and nothing beats down more than abusive coaches telling players they're worthless.
Lagniappe. Acceleration footwork/arm position.
Lagniappe 2. Repost. You know this. You can watch the steps in slow motion using the YouTube "gear" function.
Regular readers know the lesson, "how you play reflects how you live." Team players live teamwork. Selfish players see the world through self-indulgent lenses.
Reflect on Clark's principles:
LOVE CONDITIONALLY. “On the other hand, if you get the wrong guy on your team, he’ll beat you every day.”
BE THOROUGHLY ACCOUNTABLE. We open every meeting with what we did well. Spend so much more time on your strengths."
SHARED VOCABULARY. Have a common language.
PRACTICE RESILIENCY. In other words, culture, to be successful must be intentionally thought out, planned and executed by all those involved.
EXPECT EVERYONE TO LEAD. This is a form of shared ownership where everyone is contributing to successful elements of a culture. Successful people work at making the right decisions within their priorities and strive to properly manage those decisions daily. The first and most important person that you lead is yourself.
IMPROVE RELENTLESSLY. "We believe in constant performance improvement. We say it’s not just enough to win."
GET A GREAT COACH teaching must be a key ingredient in successful/teams and organizations.
VALUE TEAM. "We celebrate team, talk about it and build on it."
What are your "volleyball values?" Distill them to one word to reflect your ethos, your volleyball character.
You want to succeed, to contribute, to have a meaningful role and be recognized. Understood.
Integrity. Means being 'professional' - on time, ready to go physically and mentally, playing hard on every drill, every play.
Teamwork. Put the team first. Put leadership ahead of being the team MVP.
Improvement. "Every day is player development day." Wake up asking yourself, "how can I be a better person, a better student, a better player?"
Sharing. Be a sharer. Share vision, experience, knowledge. "Mentoring is the only shortcut to excellence."
Inspiration. Energize yourself and your teammates. Do you know the Ration sisters. There are the little sisters, Aspi and Inspi Ration. And there are the big sisters, Prepa and Perspi Ration.
Humility. "Thinking about yourself less doesn't mean thinking less of yourself."
Lagniappe. From my basketball blog, study great leaders. Maybe you don't agree with their policies. Fine. Learn from their processes.
Lagniappe 2. Defense and setting exercise, attacking from a box.
Adam Grant's book Give and Takeshares that people have 'styles' of interaction - givers, matchers, and takers.
The most and least successful are givers, the most are 'ambitious givers' and the least are givers who give too much time and energy away.
Here's your assignment - 'gift' appreciation to a former teammate. Thank her for making you a better person, better student or better volleyball player.
While you're at it, think about gifting a teammate the same. It doesn't have to cost anything. Praise them for their consistent work, positive attitude, or for sharing an idea with you.
Learn to use analogies. Clouds don't always mean rain any more than you should believe everything you hear. "Lightning never strikes twice in the same place." That's wrong as the Empire State Building gets hit 25 to 100 times annually.
Toughness and effort are skills. Listening is a skill. Failure to listen helped lose a championship game. It happened. Don't suffer regret.
"Paying attention pays for excellence." Concentration leads to anticipation, reaction, and execution. CARE.
Listening involves eye contact. Doug Lemov, teacher extraordinaire reminds students, "eyes on me." Even a computer, so-called multitasking, does so only by focusing on each task and by executing faster.
Bobby Knight called a timeout in practice and diagrammed a play. Then he handed out paper and pencils and asked players to reproduce the play. Pay attention or else.
Be fully engaged. Talking, we only speak what we know. Listeners process and absorb new information.
Coach Kiraly shares tips for better listening.
To be a good learner be a good listener.
A good listener makes a better teammate.
Give full attention to the speaker. Turn off distractions.
Ask questions. "Tell me more."
Avoid interruptions.
Why is listening important in the team setting?
How can you tell when someone isn't listening?
Catch yourself not listening.
Catch yourself thinking of what you plan to say instead of listening.
Lagniappe. Challenge players to raise performance.
HC assignment. Before season begins, write down your vision for each player by end of year. Now hand it to player, he/she gets to be your editor, adding or subtracting. HC rewrites, role declaration included, meet again before season, discuss, go forward.
All stars are different and the same. The largest known star, UY Scuti has a radius about 1700 times of ours!
Know your Melrose volleyball history. Jennifer Cain. Great teams have three dynamic hitters. On the 2012 State Championship team, they were Sarah McGowan, Cain, and Rachel Johnson. Exceptional teams have defenders who 'keep the ball up' and passers who put the ball in the right place. Cain did all that.
She wasn't the 'third wheel' of a champion, she was the transmission, a part without whom the team could never have achieved what they did.
Observers of Melrose volleyball over the past twenty plus years know that she was one of the best all-around volleyball players ever to come out of Melrose. She played college ball at Merrimack.
Communication drives relationships. Communication includes both verbal and nonverbal communication.
Great nonverbal communication includes eye contact and a firm handshake. Smiling communicates. Don't roll your eyes or scowl at the game officials. That won't get you more calls.
In his MasterClass, media personality George Stephanopoulos stresses "the Four C's" of communication. Work on them.
Clarity. Say what you mean and mean what you say. Master teacher Richard Feynman preached NAME, EXPLAIN, RESEARCH, and RESTATE. Be specific. If I say, "fully engage," it's not the same as "during a timeout, sprint to the bench, eyes on Coach, stand up straight, and lean in to the conversation."
Concision. "Brevity is the soul of wit." Your coaches put you in the best position to win. "Be professional." Show up on time, mentally and physically ready to go.
Curiosity. Identity. Who are we? Performance. How do we operate? Are we executing at the highest level or can we improve defending the outside hitter, winning serve receive with first attacks, and getting more aces without major risk of service errors?
Candor. Be honest. Coach Lane, after wins would often say, "I'm pleased but I'm not satisfied." Exceptional teams have, in the words of UNC Soccer Coach Anson Dorrance, "continual ascension." They improve during the season. Consider last season. Was the team that beat Dartmouth the same team that lost to Peabody? Of course not. When Coach says, "we must improve _______," he's not communicating to hear his voice.
Think for yourself and communicate better using higher order tools.
Use analogies, challenge ourselves to think more clearly, more broadly, with more imagination.
Imagine sitting in your dining room after dinner. Look around. Generate ideas. Go.
1. The chandelier overhead goes on. "The light goes on." We have an idea or a series of them, the brain magically activated.
2. A place setting decorates the table. "You have a lot on your plate," maybe a job, offseason volleyball, summer reading.
3. A knife sits to the right of your plate. A knife might symbolize potential for violence, slicing a task into more digestible pieces, or friendship? Oscar Wilde said, "your friends stab you in the front."
4. A glass of water is half consumed. "Is the glass half full or half empty?" Do we see the world through rose-colored glasses or jaded eyes?
5. There's garlic bread on the table. Garlic wards off vampires. Battle metaphorical energy vampires and opponents to be vanquished. Where is your garlic?
6. Most chairs around the table are empty. Influence expert Dan Pink says to remember the 'empty chair' at a meeting. If you don't have one, get one.
The chair represents someone with a vested interest in the meeting, but not physically present. That could include a customer or consumer, the fans, or a parent. Just because someone isn't present doesn't mean they don't care.
7. Cannolis for desert. Think about the backstory.
Cannolis conjure the spirit of The Godfather. There's no mystery as to the identity of the Godfather of Melrose volleyball.
8. Dark night cloaks the windows. What mysteries will evolve this season? "It's always darkest before the dawn." Visualize the role you want to fill and how to make that happen.
Lagniappe. A legendary coach talks relaxes position, platform, and adjusting to the ball.
Lagniappe 2. "Cornhole" profits by scoring on your first attack off serve receive.
All opinions expressed in the blog are solely my own. They don't represent those of the City of Melrose, the School Department, Melrose High School, or the Melrose Athletic Department.
Tryouts are just around the corner. Be physically and mentally prepared.
Hit the ground running. Tryouts aren't for conditioning. Don't get ready. Be ready. Conditioning is your responsibility.
Be a great teammate. Choose collaboration.
"Leave the jersey in a better place." - James Kerr, in Legacy "Culture beats strategy for breakfast." Fight for your culture every day.
"Cross the red line." When you cross the red line onto the court, be stretched out, fired up, and ready to go.
"Keep the ball up." The ball doesn't hit the ground when defenders talk. Talk intimidates. "Silent teams lose."
Mentor younger teammates. "Mentoring is the only shortcut to excellence."
Everyone leads. Be on time. Never be a distraction. Excel in your role, regardless of the amount of playing time.
"Don't cheat the drill." Be fully engaged and go full-tilt, full time. You earn your paycheck - minutes, role, and recognition.
"Have a growth mindset." You can be as good as you work. Learn every day. Pick the brains of your coaches and experienced teammates.
Lagniappe. "Form begets function." Study the video and study video of your serve - your routine, toss, and swing.
Someone asked me last night, "how can you write over 3,500 basketball pieces?" "Be open to inspiration from the world around you."
Maybe you never see "The Bear" because you don't watch television or don't have access to the channel. The summary (spoiler alert) speaks for itself. Apply the lessons. Leave out the expletives.
1. Maintain a growth mindset. You're either staying the same or pushing forward. It's your choice.
2. Imagine the possibilities. See yourself being in the big moment.
3. Stay focused on the biggest priority - your family.
4. The greatest achievements come from being part of a team.
5. Looking at Luca's skill and Marcus's creation reminds me of a basketball truth, "great offense comes from multiple actions." That should conjure, "dig, set, spike."
Be part of 'special' as you fulfill John Wooden's father's advice, "Make every day your masterpiece."
All opinions expressed in the blog are solely my own.
"Every day here is the freaking Super Bowl." - The Bear (language)
Her former employer, Abercrombie, gave a young leader a poster showing fifty sweaters and asked her to pick the top two sellers. She picked them. They asked how she knew. "Those were the best ones." Sometimes, we know the best when we see it.
Prioritize program values. List top to bottom however you like. Get something down. Add more if you want. Some overlap in varying degrees.
Teamwork
Excellence
Growth (mindset)
Discipline
Purpose
Athleticism
Skill
Leadership
Effort
Toughness
Culture
Energy
Intensity
Communication
Accountability
Focus
Competitiveness
Inspiration
Urgency
Tradition
Legacy
Resilience
Edit your list to five. That doesn't mean the others don't count. Remember the saying, "if you're going to put all your eggs in one basket, watch the basket carefully."
My five won't always be yours.
1. Teamwork. Volleyball is a team sport. Individual actions count, but the sport rewards "dig, set, spike" collaboration with points.
2. Excellence. Remind yourself of the sign in the locker room of the greatest college women's soccer team ever, North Carolina.
Excellence Is our Only Agenda
The sign doesn't say "winning" is our only agenda, "becoming All-America" is our only agenda, "Getting NIL money" is our only agenda, or "Envy is our only agenda." Slogans only matter when embraced and lived.
3. Growth. Target improvement at every opportunity. Ask how can you impact team success and make everyone around you better.
4. Leadership. Leaders make others better. Leaders make leaders. Leaders see what needs to be done and do what it takes. Player leadership matters.
5. Resilience. Staying power. Have the will to stay in the fight even when the battle is going against you. Work to close out games when ahead. Other qualities like focus, toughness, energy, and competitiveness roll into it. Do not quit.
You might argue that one word from the list encompasses all these - culture. You are the culture. Protect your culture.
Lagniappe. Learn to read the ball quicker and more accurately. Faster recognition allows faster reaction.
Some called Seinfeld "a show about nothing." We can learn a lot from nothing.
1. I know a Physicians Assistant who asks people for a tip or core value. Mine was "share something great." That might include Coach Phil Jackson's quote, "Basketball is sharing" or knowing the best experiences are shared joy.
2. Starbucks has a service principle called "LATTE," an acronym.
L = listen to the customer A = acknowledge the problem T = thank the customer for bringing the problem to our attention T = take care of the problem E = explain to colleagues so they don't have the same problem This works in coaching and in playing. Every correction applies to all.
3. Get more from practice through efficiency. Watching the UCONN women's basketball team practice, we saw a model of efficiency.
Increase efficiency. - Operate at a higher tempo. - Make it competitive. - Condition within drills. - Limit lines, laps, and lectures. - Include special situations. In close games, any possession can be the answer.
4. Newer isn't necessarily better. In Jim Bouton's irreverent Ball Four, he used the line, "Consider the source." Everything we hear or read doesn't add value. "Consider the source."
5. 'Common sense' comes in limited supply, but its opposite, nonsense comes unbounded.
6. In school, we recited 'The Pledge of Allegiance' thousands of times. It ends, 'with liberty and justice for all'. Have you thought about what that means and applied it to your relationships?
7. To get respect, give respect. Respect your coaches, teammates, opponents, and officials.
8. If you read even an hour a day for the next month, you'll have thirty more hours of possible knowledge than those who don't. "Little things make big things happen."
9. Coach Billy Donovan says, "Study every guy that you may be expected to guard." Who are the players you need to contain to win? What's your plan?
10.The best players impact winning by making everyone around them better. Be that guy.
Lagniappe. Serve receive is critical. How does a system decide who covers the seams?
Always communicate and follow the system of your coach.
Mines are 'low-tech', demoralizing weapons of war. Designed as much to maim as kill, anti-personnel mines are outlawed under the Geneva Convention. They're still being used in regional war today.
Coaches have numerous minefields to navigate.
Attitude
Bias
Confidence (including overconfidence)
Conflicts
Energy
Expectations
Parents
Playing time
Politics
Scheduling
Excellent teams usually have collaborative, learning cultures with great teamwork. They don't have the dreaded S's of selfishness, sloth, and softness. "Fight for your culture every day."
I'm not talking about race or ethnicity bias. We can be biased based toward experience, youth, or balance, or toward size, athleticism, offense, or defense.
Confidence cuts both ways. Teams underachieve lacking confidence or when overconfident headed into "trap games." If a team doesn't show up physically or mentally, an inferior team can beat them.
Coaches, setters, and top players must bring energy and energize teammates every day.
Some coaches downplay expectations. The 'perennial loser' Boston Red Sox turned their franchise around in 1967 hiring Dick Williams as manager. Williams said, "we'll win more than we lose," guiding the Red Sox to the World Series where they lost in seven games to the mighty Cardinals. Lowering the bar only wins in limbo.
Parents can present challenges, judging the coach through the prism of their children's status. Chuck Daly's triad of minutes, role, and recognition (48 minutes, 48 shots, 48 million) applies the same for middle schoolers as for pros.
Playing time represents a constant issue. There's an old joke about the coach sending out ten players to start, for which the officials assess her a technical foul. She turns to parents saying, "I told you that they can't all start." Coach Sonny Lane emphasized to us, "it's not who starts, it's who finishes."
Every parent should read Carl Pierson's The Politics of Coaching. Players, coaches, administrators, and others seek to undermine the coach for their own ends.
Scheduling can work for or against coaches. Schedule some 'cupcakes' to pick up cheap wins? Your team won't be prepared to face quality teams or to win in the postseason. In Massachusetts, a power rating formula rewards teams for playing better schedules.
Nothing could be more wrong than "any idiot with a whistle can coach." Negotiating the pitfalls above is a constant. No matter your effort, you will never make everyone happy.
Lagniappe. Defensively, "keep the ball in the air." Always follow the system of Coach Celli or your coach of the moment.
