John Wooden led the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Bruins to 10 NCAA basketball championships in 12 years and, among other accomplishments, has been named America’s “Greatest Coach of the 20th Century” by ESPN.
He also wrote or co-wrote several books, including Coach Wooden’s Game Plan for Success: 12 Lessons for Extraordinary Performance and Personal Excellence (McGraw-Hill, 2009), with Steven Jamison. Wooden’s leadership advice provides insight for leaders in any organization.
How to Earn Respect, Trust
“If you give respect, you’ll get respect. The same goes for loyalty and trust and all the other virtues that I believe great leaders have to offer,” Wooden says.
“I also believe the leader, the person in charge, is usually the one who must initiate the process. Don’t wait for an employee to respect you before you’ll respect him or her. Hire good people, respect and trust them.
“I believe the following: ‘It is better to trust and be disappointed occasionally than to mistrust and be miserable all the time.’ I’ve been disappointed a few times along the way, but not enough to change my thinking on that subject.
“Trust is “one of the most powerful leadership tools available to a leader,” Wooden says. Why is it so important?
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“There are challenges for a leader when things are going great, but the challenges are much greater when things are going bad—whether it’s a losing streak, a competitor who seems to be taking over the market, or anything else.
“And bad times are a part of what leadership must deal with. That’s when you need the trust of those under your supervision. They have to believe in you.
“Without trust they may cut and run; with trust they will follow you into uncharted waters. They must believe in you… Good values are a fundamental element in creating trust.”
Promote ‘Greatness’
“I define greatness as making the effort to do your job for our team to the absolute maximum of your ability,” Wooden says. “You achieve greatness, in my view, when you do that. This is true whether you happen to be Bill Walton, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the sixth player on the bench, the equipment manager, or the head coach.
“Thus, greatness is available to everyone on our team, not just the super star or the high scorer in a particular game.”
As a basketball coach, “I made a very special effort to let the so-called lesser role players on a team know that I valued them and that they were pivotal in our achieving success.
“At the beginning of a press conference following a game, for example, I would intentionally mention a player or two who I knew the reporters wouldn’t ask about, just so that player got some deserved attention.
“In practice, I would acknowledge them more often than the ‘star.’ (I would generally give the ‘star’ my praise privately.)
“In my perspective, some players might be harder to replace—Bill or Kareem, for example—but that didn’t make them greater than their teammates.”
Common Leadership Mistake
What is the most common mistake that leaders make, and what should they do to avoid making that mistake? “I don’t mean this to sound glib, but the most common mistake leaders make might be fear of making a mistake,” Wooden says.
“My great coach at Purdue, Piggy Lambert, used to tell us, ‘The team that makes the most mistakes wins.’
“He meant that if you don’t make any mistakes, you aren’t doing anything; you’re static, sitting on your hands. You must initiate action to be competitive.
“…. Of course, the difficult thing is to understand what kind of mistakes are worth making. If they come from lack of preparation and solid analysis, then you’re making the wrong kind of mistakes.
“A good leader knows and teaches the difference between the good mistake and the bad mistake.”
For more on Coach Wooden, who died in 2010, visit http://www.coachwooden.com/.
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