A team that's unafraid

UConn's women's coach Geno Auriemma, whose team is 33-0 and favored to win another NCAA title, says this year's team has something in common with great UConn teams of the past:

“We’re not afraid to lose. That’s the biggest thing. We might play bad. We might get beat. But, generally, the years we’ve had great teams, we’ve been unafraid.”

Confidence is as significant as anything in performance

A person's confidence, while making a presentation in front of a group of businesspeople or playing basketball, has a clear influence on how he performs, regardless of the situation.

"Confidence, I think, is as significant as anything in performance," said UNLV coach Lon Kruger recently. "People who play with confidence, who perform with confidence, feel good about what they’re doing. It’s hard for people to be confident if you’re tearing them down all the time. So we’re just trying to build them up to promote confidence, to promote enthusiasm. It all ties together."

According to Coach Kruger, whose Rebels are 20-8 with two regular season games left, building confidence doesn't necessarily mean going soft.

"Some individuals may need to get after it a little harder, in a constructive way,” Kruger said. "Even when you’re getting after people, that’s not a negative. That can be constructive when it’s intended the right way."

The only thing that's going to define individuals is how the team does

Great quote from Ron Artest the other day in the Houston paper:

"That’s the only thing that’s going to define individuals: how the team does."

When Tom Crean coached at Marquette, there was a banner that hung in the practice gym with a quote from John Wooden that read, "The star of the team is the team."

Back in my CBA days, that was a frequent message. As a coaching staff, we'd work to convince players to worry less about their stats and focus on helping the team win. That's something coaches at all levels talk about, but in the minor leagues, where players use big numbers as a way to catch the eye of NBA teams, it can be difficult to get guys to buy in to that.

We'd explain that NBA coaches and scouts recognize that it's one thing to put up big numbers on a losing team. Making a contribution (and sacrifice) to a winning team is more significant.

As Joe Paterno once said, a team only reaches true greatness when its members aren't concerned with their stats.

"When a team outgrows individual performance and learns team confidence, excellence becomes a reality."

Your best players need to be your decision-makers

John Tortorella, who led the Tampa Bay Lightning to the 2004 Stanley Cup, is the opposite of the coach he just replaced with the NY Rangers, Tom Renney, who was let go after a rough 12-game stretch in which the team came away with just two wins.

According to this article, "In terms of on-ice, Renney was safe-safe-safe, whereas Tortorella is a 'safe-is-death' guy."

Says Rangers veteran Scott Gomez, a former NHL All-Star, "That's normal. You're going to hire the opposite."

An article in the Minneapolis paper from May 2004 said that when Coach Tortorella was in Tampa Bay, he had three signs posted in the locker room, "each intended to remind players of [his] philosophy."

One reads: Safe is death. Another: Good is the enemy of great. The other: Don't think ... do.

In his first day on the job, Coach Tortorella, who as a minor league coach in the mid-1980s "spent a summer hammering nails and painting walls so his guys would have a better locker room," had some interesting thoughts regarding coaching and the role of the coach.

~~~~~~~~~~

On his coaching style: "I'm not going to stand behind the bench and just calmly go about it. I'm just not built that way. I think honesty is what players want. They're going to get pushed, they're going to be held accountable, and there are going to be some bumps in the road. There may be some conflict, but I don't think we should be afraid of conflict. This reputation that I just kick the hell out of people, it takes on a life of its own. As a coach you'd better understand what your team is right now as far as how they feel."

On the coach's role: "I think the coach is the guidance counselor. That's an important aspect of a head coach, getting the most out of your top people."

On regaining confidence after a losing streak: "Losing knocks you down. I'm gonna push them, but as a coach, you have to understand when you need to be with them. This is a time to get them to feel decent about themselves. They need to get a little self confidence. We're going to allow them to try to work through that and try to find a way to get a win."

On his predecessors who were fired: "There's going to be a philosophical change here, but there's a couple of good guys who are out and I just don't want them blamed."

On team leadership: "Your best players need to be your decision-makers. They're going to get every opportunity to win hockey games for us. If they're playing hard, I'm going to send them right back out there."

The secret to survival is how a team handles success and failure

Came across two good quotes in a story yesterday in the South Bend paper: One from Michigan coach John Beilein; one from Michigan State coach Tom Izzo (pictured here).

Coach Beilein, whose team lost to the Spartans last night to fall to 15-10 on the season, on the role confidence plays in preparing younger players to play:

"Part of getting these guys ready is getting the swagger back. You've gotta try and guess from what experience tells you; what you see with their body language."

From MSU coach Tom Izzo, whose team is 20-4 on the season, comes this quote:

"The secret to survival is how a team handles success and failure. It's about leadership and maturity."

The more you come through, the more you're apt to keep coming through

A couple of excerpts from Jerry West's book "Mr. Clutch" (with Bill Libby), which was published 30 years ago this year (and is now a collectible).

West, who averaged 27 ppg over 14 seasons with the Lakers, coached the Lakers for three seasons in the mid-1970s and later served as GM for the Lakers and Grizzlies (where I worked with him when I was on Mike Fratello's staff in Memphis and consider him a real mentor).

~~~~~~~~~~

I've seen too many players who never improve because they think they've got it made. What they do well, they enjoy doing, naturally, so that's what they practice, sort of showing off, like a great hook-shooter who spends all day shooting hooks. I've seen too many players who won't practice what they don't do well, because they're afraid of showing these faults up, of being embarrassed by them. I always practiced ballhandling rather than shooting because I needed ballhandling practice more than I needed shooting practice.

~~~~~~~~~~

I'd like to say I'm "up" for every game, but I'm not. No one is. I try. Most of us try. But it's just not in us. We're sick or we're hurting or we're tired or we've played too many games in a row or something off the court is bothering us and we're just not sharp mentally and physically for every game. In high school and college ball, I'd say most players are up for every game. In pro ball, where the schedule is long, you're up for maybe two-thirds of the games. In high school and college ball, you have maybe five or six big games a season. In pro ball, you can't even begin to count the games that count as big.

~~~~~~~~~~

The more you come through, the more you're apt to keep coming through. Confidence is a lot of this game or any game. If you don't think you can, you won't. The teams that strung together championships like the Yankees in baseball..., the Celtics in basketball -- they had this confidence. They came through and kept coming through.

~~~~~~~~~~

There's only so much any coach can bring to a team and a game. No coach is a miracle man. None I ever saw, anyway. He either has a superstar or two or he doesn't. One or two men make the difference. With Bill Russell, Red Auerbach always finished first. Without him, he doesn't.

~~~~~~~~~~

[If you've never seen him play, here are some YouTube highlights of Jerry West.]

The importance of an identity and style of play

Wolves GM Jim Stack on what Kevin McHale has brought to the bench:

"He has been able to show guys how we are going to play, getting guys to feel a little bit better about themselves -- I think that has been one of his big strengths. Getting guys confident with themselves and getting them to be relaxed and playing within a system. Just having an indentity and a system of play. Hopefully it will continue to be more cohesive and we will see the identity take place enough where we can say, 'okay, this is more of a long-term guy and we need more of this and more of that.' When you can't establish an identity and style of play, it is very hard to pin those things down."

Zero tolerance for negativity

Good story on ESPN about the progress coach John Beilein has made at Michigan, which has been ranked in the top 25 this season (with wins over Duke and UCLA) after going 10-22 in '07-'08.

In his second year at UM, Coach Beilein isn't buying into the hype, saying, "We haven't turned the corner yet. We can see the corner up there, but we haven't turned it."

One key to the turnaround is the coach's attitude. As one player put it, "There is zero tolerance for negativity with him. Zero. There's a standard for everything you do, and you gain so much confidence through him. You feel like you can do anything."

The writer contends that Coach Beilein "teaches players things high school coaches don't have the time to teach. Things like transition defense. Whatever he wants to call it, the way he coaches involves a learning curve. Players aren't used to reading defenses as he demands they do, nor frankly are they used to the steady green light he offers. The Wolverines take around 26 3-pointers per game, despite making only 8.8 of them on average."

"It's almost like a football playbook, there are so many plays," [sophomore guard Manny] Harris said. "He has his own vocabulary and it's hard to get down. The other thing is, it's not that you step outside of the system, but you have to be able to create. The system puts you in the position to be open. It's up to you to create and finish."

Gleaning confidence from a coach

I'll be at the Cal-Arizona game at Haas Pavilion tomorrow night, but read this article about Cal's 1959 NCAA title today.

As the story describes, "Cal entered the NCAA Tournament ranked 11th in the country and was the lowest-scoring of the four teams that qualified for what was not yet known as the Final Four, being played that year in Louisville, Ky."

Standing in Cal's path were two All-Americans and future Hall of Famers. First Cincinnati's Oscar Robertson, who led the nation in scoring at 32.6 points per game. Looming the next night was West Virginia's Jerry West, who averaged 26.6 points.

According to the article, Cal had one thing their opponents didn't: Coach Pete Newell.

His teams were well-conditioned, disciplined and defensive-minded. The players revere him still, but as college kids they gleaned great confidence from their coach.

Said one former Cal player: "His intensity level during the game was quite something, when he'd be chomping on that towel. He never really yelled at us. I just remember you didn't want to get that look. We didn't ever want to displease him."

Coach Newell's team -- known for "defense and teamwork" -- was also well prepared, thanks in great part to assistant coach Rene Herrerias, "who provided detailed scouting reports on each opponent." [Coach Herrerias took over for Coach Newell at Cal after Coach Newell retired.]

Some 25 years ago, Jerry West, a member of the West Virginia team that Cal defeated in the final game, was quoted as saying, "Teams today have great individuals, but Cal had a great team."

It comes down to chemistry and heart

There's a consistent theme in articles about NY Knicks coach Mike D'Antoni: Fun.

It's a word you don't hear enough these days.

According to Raja Bell, who played for Coach D in PHX, his former coach's influence extends beyond the basketball floor:

"The work environment he creates has a real family-type feel. With him basketball is fun, and he really helps you believe in yourself."

Lakers coach Phil Jackson, who played for the Knicks from 1967-78, says he's hearing good things about what Coach D'Antoni is creating in NYC:

"The friends that I have that are still alive (in New York) that haven't passed away from old age are really saying, 'This is kinda fun to watch.' They play freely and they have a certain sense of teamwork. They are sharing the basketball. They like what they're seeing."

Says Knicks PG Chris Duhon: ''We play a fun system. It's very exciting basketball to watch and to play.''

As for Coach D'Antoni, he puts it in perspective.

"This is basketball. This is fun. It comes down to guys having chemistry and heart, and things will come together. I think that the best way to get things out of players is trusting them and their instincts. It doesn’t come down to X’s and O’s or something you can put down on paper. It comes down to heart and brains. To me it’s all focus. You can do it if you have the will to do it."

The essence of "team"

No Umenyiora (injured). No Strahan (retired). No Shockey (traded). No Burress. Five new defensive starters. No players rank at the top of major stat categories.

And somehow the NY Giants aren't just better that last season when they won the Super Bowl (without a single Pro Bowl player), they're 10-1.

As the NY Times puts it: "The more anonymous they become, the better they get. The deeper they dig into their roster, the more they win. The Giants, despite their success, shine without much individual wattage."

Coach Tom Coughlin contends that it comes down to one thing: Team.

“That’s really what the essence of it is. That’s what this thing is all about for me: team."

Based on their comments, Giants players have bought in.

According to LB Antonio Pierce (shown here with Coach Coughlin and assistant Steve Spagnuolo):

“Once you have guys here complaining or being bitter about not getting the ball enough or not making enough plays, that’s what causes the problems. We’ve had that here. We don’t have that here now. That’s why we’re 10-1. I’d rather have 53 guys who play like Pro Bowlers, regardless of whether they get into the Pro Bowl or not. That’s what our team is.

We have 53 stars. Instead of having that one star-power guy, that guy that gets all the attention, all the love, every week reporters have somebody else to talk to, something else to write about. That’s good. That’s good for our whole team, because that means everybody’s shining. And if you’ve got your whole team shining, you can’t have nothing but a good team.”

Says Giants center Shaun O'Hara in this article:

“The one thing I can say about our team right now is whether we’re up 3 or down 3, up 7 or down 7, we have the confidence that we’re going to come back and win the game. A lot of us feel like that because we have done it before.

“[After winning a championship] you raise your own standards as well as your team’s standards. You carry yourself differently because you do not allow yourself or your teammates to settle for mediocrity. You expect greatness from everybody. You’re no longer saying: ‘Oh, man, we didn’t get it done. Well, what are you going to do? We’re not perfect.’

Now it’s like, ‘That’s unacceptable.’ We know how good we can be when we play the way we’re supposed to play.”

No priority is more important than building confidence

One of my former college roommates forwarded me an excellent article that has real relevance for coaches, especially those who are taking over a team or program.

As I read the article, I kept thinking about coaches at all levels who've been hired and achieved success immediately. Paul Johnson at Georgia Tech (pictured here), for example, comes to mind.

According to the authors, one "essential element that must exist before any process change can show significant results." That element is confidence.

"Leaders who inspire confidence find that [players] become partners, and invest time, energy and effort toward the desired end result."

The following is an excerpt from the article [which is here]:

Ultimately, what determines whether a new leader will be able to meet expectations is the motivation and effort of the [team]. While a great reputation may give the new leader a brief advantage, it’s the ability to inspire the willing contribution of [his players] that enable him or her to deliver results rapidly and sustain these results over time.

When people have confidence, they willingly invest their time, effort, and energy toward the end result. New leaders can get better results, and get them more quickly, by making confidence-building a central focus of their transition plan.

But this doesn’t mean they start out with a pep rally. The kind of confidence people need doesn’t come from impassioned speeches or from patting people on the back and letting them know you have faith in them, but from a carefully crafted plan that guides people toward early successes and inspires them to ever higher levels of performance.

As Rosabeth Moss Kanter found in her research for her book, CONFIDENCE, once an organization is on a “winning streak,” it takes relatively little effort to sustain performance. So it makes sense for new leaders to focus their initial efforts on early successes. These successes inspire people in the organization to have confidence in the leader, in each other and in their own ability to win.

So how do new leaders rapidly build confidence?

While every organization is different, and every new leader will face unique circumstances, the good news is that any leader in a new role can rapidly encourage confidence by implementing the five building blocks:

1. Building trust through frequent, candid, and consistent communication.
2. Getting buy-in for one overriding and inspiring objective.
3. Creating a plan with input from the organization.
4. Ensuring that people are in the right roles.
5. Achieving early successes that inspire.

COMMUNICATION: As a new leader, know that everything you do communicates something. The messages people get from your early actions impact the confidence they will have in your leadership.

A great way to build credibility and mark the beginning of your leadership is by solving simple problems that get in people’s way.

The best way to determine which small changes will have the biggest impact is to get out and talk to people. When you decide on the changes to make, make them quickly and publicly.

People need to trust your motivations and feel confident that you’ll keep your word. The more exposure they have to you and the more you show interest in their concerns, the more likely you are to build trust.

INSPIRING VISION: Far too many leaders are great at giving specific directions, but neglect to remind everyone on the team of the greater direction and vision of the company.

But offering a strategy without a meaningful goal is like providing a map, pointing out a direction and telling people to “just get started” and you’ll fill them in later on the destination. The journey quickly becomes meaningless, and if the travelers encounter any roadblocks or detours, they’re likely to just give up, since they don’t know the greater purpose.

People are goal-directed organisms. Providing a meaningful objective taps into people’s natural motivation to succeed. As a new leader, you need to rapidly identify your prime objective for the first part of your tenure and get buy-in from all stakeholders. For any goal to inspire team confidence, it must truly be shared by everyone.

When people are confident of the clear, overriding purpose for their activities, they can respond flexibly, rapidly and confidently to unanticipated obstacles, changing circumstances and new
opportunities.

As a leader, you need to take responsibility for keeping people connected to the direction and vision on a regular basis. This keeps people from getting lost in daily activities and losing momentum.

STRATEGIC PLAN: No coach who wants to inspire the confidence of the team is going to suggest they can win without a clear game plan. In the same way, you can’t expect your players to get out on the field without a strategy.

Can the plan change along the way? Of course. But it’s having a plan – a roadmap for action – that inspires players to get out on the field and get started.

It’s important to engage people in developing the strategy. Not only will you gain valuable information, but you’ll increase people’s feeling of ownership in the plan. When people participate in creating a plan, they feel more invested in bringing it to a successful outcome.

Every milestone, program, and initiative needs to move the organization in the direction you want it to go. And everyone in the organization needs to be aware of how his or her role fits into the larger objective.

CLEARLY-DEFINED ROLES: By ensuring that the right people are in the right roles, you, as a leader, can feel more confident in them. Putting people in roles that fit their competencies also increases their self-confidence and the confidence of others on the team.

In order to do this, you need to:

-- Evaluate: See that the right people are in the right jobs. Support those who are, move those who are not.

-- Coach: Guide, critique, and assist people to improve their performance.

-- Build: Encourage and recognize people regularly. Specific encouragement and reward gives your people the courage to stretch, take risks and achieve new levels of performance.

Don’t wait for scheduled meetings, reviews, or ceremonies to give people feedback and recognition. Every interaction you have with your team is an opportunity to energize people and encourage them to move them in the right direction.

EARLY VICTORIES: It’s important that people feel momentum building during the transition period. The best way to accomplish this is to focus people on achieving early wins. It’s important to avoid initial challenges that carry the risk of failure and instead identify goals that can be achieved within a short time frame.

Seeing tangible results boosts motivation and encourages further effort. Leaders need to identify milestones that lead the organization in the direction of the overriding objective. Achieving these milestones constitutes early wins and gives the organization and leadership team something to celebrate. Achieving these early victories builds the leader’s credibility, the organization’s motivation, and the team’s confidence in its own ability to win.

Not only do you need to identify milestones and create a path to achieve them, you also need to celebrate victories, even the small ones, from the very beginning. Celebrating not only creates an atmosphere of recognition and positive energy, it bonds your team members together in the spirit of shared accomplishment. This inspires further confidence in their ability to collaborate and to win.

In any transition, getting the beginning right is critical to achieving the end results you want. As you move into a new leadership position, you’ll have many things to do. You’ll find yourself pulled in multiple directions, needing to respond to multiple stakeholders and outside observers, often at the same time.

Keep in mind, however, that confidence is the driving force enabling you to deliver on expectations. No priority is more important than building that confidence. The sooner you master this, the sooner your strategic plans are likely to deliver on their promise.

Playing above your mistakes

Willis Wilson was head coach at Rice for 16 seasons. This past March, after the Owls went 3-27, Coach Wilson was let go.

Despite the challenges of coaching at Rice -- strict academic standards, a small budget, substandard facilities -- Coach Wilson won 216 games at the school.

In an article in yesterday's Houston paper, Coach Wilson shared his thoughts on coaching:

-- On how the first few games of the year can impact the season: "This is that time where a win or a loss just changes your whole persona. You lose a game or two early in the season, and all of a sudden you’re trying to fix something that maybe really never was broke. But the reality is that as a head coach, your responsibility is to put everything into trying to be successful. And you’re being judged for it. So there’s this internal pressure that you have to fix something. You try to fix things that maybe aren’t fixable."

-- On what getting fired does to a coach: "When you get terminated from a job — any job — you lose confidence in yourself. You lose confidence in your decisions, who you are, what you’ve accomplished. Jeff Van Gundy (former Rockets coach) told me that, and that was something that was really helpful for me. You hear about players losing confidence all the time.

Coaches lose confidence, too. You lose confidence when things don’t turn out the way you want them to. You lose confidence when you do all the right things for all the right reasons and still get fired. You have to come to this understanding that you just don’t have control over everything. And sometimes you don’t have control over the things that are most important to you."

-- On how coaching can become all-encompassing: "It was sobering to realize how many guys in this profession are doing things they either accept or don’t like or really have a strong disdain for. It’s a cycle you get caught up in. There’s a whole other world going on out there, and as a coach you really don’t realize how consumed you are by it until you get out of it."

-- On how being out of coaching has allowed him to learn more about himself: "I know I’m a good husband. I know I’m a good father. Call it ego or whatever you want, but I know I’m a very, very good coach. Doesn’t mean I’m going to be as successful as somebody who lands at the right program where they have the right players. And that doesn’t bother me. For a long time, that did bother me. It bothered me to not have the resources and do the best job you can and it not be enough.

I think there just comes a point where you have to do what’s right and not worry about somebody judging you. You just have to know you’re going to make some wrong decisions, and you’re going to make them right. Just like you tell your players every day: You play through it. You play above it. You play above your mistakes."

Confidence is something you can control

I'm a big fan of Baylor coach Art Briles. And though his Bears are 3-6 this season, his team has made significant progress in his first 11 months as coach at BU.

If nothing else, Coach Briles has instilled a new attitude in his players:

"Confidence is something you can control. Every time we come to the table, we will come for a full meal. We're still fighting hard for respectability and credibility. All I know is to keep fighting, keep working, and keep believing."