Thursday, May 31, 2012

Don Meyer Thoughts


It's How You Play the Game: Mental Discipline
1. Communicate with teammates vs. talk with opponent (or officials, opposing
school crowd, opposing coaches, etc... They all have the same mental effect.)
2. Taking a charge vs. backing away from a charge.
3. Calling out and communicating assignments on the freethrow lane vs. violations
at the freethrow line.
4. Take charge or block shot to a teammate vs. wild leaping or goal tending.
5. Smart foul vs. dumb foul
6. Intense position pressure defense vs. wild lunging defense.
7. Poised offense vs. anxious offense.
8. Use the glass or grab the ball vs. don't use the glass or tip.
9. Inside game vs. outside game perimeter lapse.
10. Make lay-ups vs. miss lay-up and they score.
11. Positive one; look for ways to win vs. negative one.
12. Great effort each possession vs. great play syndrome.
Don't let weak people bring out the weakness in you.
Intensity and technique lead to hustle plays.
Play against the game.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Lawrence Frank Defensive Concepts


Your every day habits will determine your execution."
To play on a good defensive team you must:
a. be a good individual defender.
b. be a good team defender.
c. be both a & b.
** If neither, you won't play! **
Defensive non-negotiables:
1. Sprinting back on defense.
2. Protecting our paint.
3. Closing out hard and contesting the shot.
4. Playing aggressively without unnecessary fouls.
5. All five players blocking out and rebounding.
** No Layups
** No Freethrows
** No corner 3's
If the ball gets into the paint, what are the consequences for the offense?
1. Charge
2. Steal
3. Deflection
4. Blocked shot
5. Hard "NBA" foul
** Never mention anything about scoring!
Transition Defense:
1 back = Dunk
2 back = Layup
3 back = Jumper
4 back = Got a chance
5 back = GAME ON!
- Win the first 3 steps!
- Stop the ball above the 3-point line
- Get the ball out of the middle 1/3
- Think "help"
- Open shots beat you in transition, but mismatches rarely will.] accept who
they are. You job is to make them better than they were."

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Thoughts from John Maxwell

Doc Rivers on using a coaching staff

Build your staff based on the idea of what your team should be. Ask yourself
what do you want your team to stand for? Hire accordingly. Things Doc looks for
is loyalty, talent, and team players

 Engaging Assistants. Don't hire "yes men". Look for people that will provide
insight into what will make you better. Debate, explore, decide, and implement.

Pat Riley "Beginners are open. Experts are closed. The challenge is to stay
open."

Take a page from the football coaching mentality. Find staff members that have
strengths that compliment each other. Much like football coaches being position
specific and/or offensively or defensively specific, find coaches that fill voids.
Doc says, "Give them room to be great!"

If you tell your team to play their roles, shouldn't you do the same with you and
your staff?

The X's and O's don't matter. What matters is if you and your staff can get the
players to buy in. Assistant coaches must buy in to the system and goal(s) as much
as, if not more than, the players

Monday, May 28, 2012

Nick Saban on Standards

-“I think it’s important that we’re all on the same page, in terms of what we’re doing, how we’re doing it and why it’s important to do it that way. But also the standard of what we all visualize as good, acceptable, that’s going to help us improve, *and with+ growth and development.”
-“You have to challenge people to do things a certain way and it may be more than what they expect from themselves. You have to re-enforce positive performance when they do it, but you also have to confront them to do it correctly if they don’t do it that way. And there’s a balance in there.”
-“Are you defining what you expect? If I walked up to them and asked ‘what does the coach expect you to do here?’ Would he be able to answer? Is what you expect from them defined? How they act, how they dress, the 3 technique…”
-“Everybody has to be accountable to a standard and the question is ‘what is everyone doing to impact the success? What is the standard, both individually and collectively?”

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Frank Martin thoughts

Frank Martin from his clinic talk at the Texas Association of Basketball
Coaches convention in San Antonio.
- Don't cheat your kids. It's the reason you coach. Someone kicked your ass
into doing it right. Don't allow your kids to slide.
- If you allow [your opponent] to set up, play, and establish their identity,
they'll beat you.
- Defense starts with pressure offense. Run every time. We're going to put
you on your heels
- Re: Pressure Defense, "I believe in making [our opponents] throw long
passes."
- Re: Communication, "If you care about winning, you talk to your
teammates!"
- Teams now are either going to shoot 3's. If they dribble drive, it's going to
be a dunk. There is no in-between game anymore." - Prepare accordingly.
- Re: Halfcourt Defense, Teams don't get easy baskets against set defenses
that are back and ready to guard.
- Re: Wing Denial Backdoor Cuts, On-ball defender responsible for the lob
(ball pressure will eliminate easy look as well as make the pass longer,
higher, slower). 1 pass away (deny position) is responsible for taking away
the bounce pass.
- Passes go over or under the defense; never THROUGH the defense. Create
long passes.
- Opponents never catch the ball facing the basket. Defender should apply so
much pressure that they always catch with back to the bucket.
- Teaching point: On ball defense - "Crawl up in him." [I like this
terminology. Creates an image of a low stance]
- Teaching point: On ball defense - "Crack of your ass to the glass." Nose on
top hip.

Saturday, May 26, 2012

Chuck Daly Thoughts

Never trust happiness.

Coaching isn’t about X’s and O’s, it’s about managing diversity and adversity.

The better the players are, the more coachable they become.

You’re only as good as your best players.

Your best player has to be your best listener. He has to lead by listening.

Everyone wants to be coached, you just have to find the right way to reach them.

You must be honest with your players all the time.

You can reach any player if they believe your only intent is winning.

If you have a chemistry guy on your basketball team, do not let that guy out of the building.

Friday, May 25, 2012

Jeff Van Gundy clinic thoughts

Three Things To Checkout
1. Watch “A Coaches Life” on the NFL Network, a special on Bill Belichick filmed in 2009
2. Watch “Standing Tall,” a 1 hour documentary on St. Anthony's
3. Read “What If The Sectret To Success Is Failure?,” an article from the NY Times
• Need to teach
1. Grit
2. Self-Control
• Calipari was successful at UMass when he simplified everything and got great at it rather than
being able to do a lot
• You have to know who you can coach successfully
• Van Gundy can only deal with 1 of the 3
1. Soft
2. Stupid
3. Selfish
• Coaching confidence is as important as playing confidence
• You have to be confident to get your players to believe
• Pat Riley – 4 Things Players Want From a Coach
1. Confidence
2. Sincerity
3. Reliability
4. Trustworthiness
• Bill Parcells - “You have to know what loses before you know what wins.”
• If you don't beat yourself, you are going to be successful.
• He believes that balance wins
• Important to write down what you believe and get players to learn the bullet point

Van Gundy's List
1. Defend
2. Rebound – block out, gang rebound
3. Low Turnover – simple, sound, solid decisions
4. Inside-Out – ball needs to hit the paint as much as possible, either off the dribble or pass
5. Best Shot – make it part of the fabric of your team
• Every high school game I go to is decided on layups.
• What do you take personally?
• Van Gundy the following personally
1. Transition Defense
• How many guys do you send back?  You can adjust by sending more back if you are
getting beat.
• Transition defense should stop layups, free throws, and open 3's
2. Defense
• Get whole body in front of the ball
3. Screening
• Everyone can be a great screener
• Everyone should screen the same way
• Head hunt, put chest in shoulder
• If a guy always slips the screen, he is soft
4. Hitting the Open Man
5. Blocking Out
• When the ball is shot, does your team hit?
http://braydencarrfoundation.com/site/ 42

Thursday, May 24, 2012

"Lend Me your ears" William Safire

“The greatest teacher makes a few simple points.  The powerful teacher leaves one or two fundamental truths.   And the memorable makes the point not by telling, but by helping the students discover on their own.  Learning
takes place through discovery, not when you’re told something, but when you figure it out for yourself.  All a really fine teacher does is to make suggestions, point out problems, above all, ask questions, and more questions and more questions…teaching encourages not only discovery, but initiative.”

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Buzz Williams Thoughts

Nike Clinic-Maine West High School/October 2009

• “It’s all about culture-it all precedes the drills-its how you do it- not just what you do.  So many
people are reinventing the wheel.”
• “The voices you listen to determine choices that you make!”
• “Pay it forward-this is becoming lost in coaching…once guys progress, so do their egos and they
forget where they came from.”
• Somehow, what people say…that perception becomes a reality.
• Power of words-words must be the same and specific to your team!
• Buzz is constantly praising others (other coaches, his friend that is his assistant).
• Coach in sound bites and in seconds-in today’s day and age the kids need this type of teaching.
• Left first job…not right fit…people thought he was crazy and a quitter…was not right fit for him.
• He puts his practices on IPod so he can hear his words and self scout.
• He introduced the players (Drew)…they are people to him…Buzz is the most genuine coach I’ve
seen…I would love to play for him….players respect this
• In scouting-don’t explain play in report, do that in practice…in report, tell how they score.
• Close out with the top foot up…FORCE CORNER!!!
• If someone asks, what should I do, that is not working hard enough…there is always something
to do!
• At Marquette, they always guard ball with two helpers.  They do not care if ball goes towards
opposite basket…ALWAYS KEEP BALL OUT OF THE PAINT!!!
• Put tape all of the way down middle of floor…get to help line…when they are two passes away,
guys must touch help line…it is a visual and it helps.
• Butt to ball, belly to man, seeing both.
• Spring to help.
• When practice starts…it is OUR TIME…during off-season, this is YOUR TIME…maybe give YOUR
TIME workouts during season.  These are some of my thoughts that stemmed from Buzz’s
lecture.
• No negative thoughts, always giving praise, giving heart, full of gratitude.
• Shell-jump to ball (cross, down, back, fade screens)
• Top foot up, good closeouts-be skinny so you don’t get screened.
• If offensive player is “fighting for feet” or fighting for position, then defensive players are high
and loose because they don’t want to get into position.
• Post D…X out…above FT line on high side…if ball goes below then X over on low side in front…if
on low side and ball goes above FT line, then X behind above.
• Reminded me of Jimmy V- live life with enthusiasm, be genuine, have care, enjoy it, enjoy the
kids, LOVE IT!!!
• Show it, love it, don’t complain…if I complain, why do it?
• Ball screens, they give all of the coverages names.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Josh Pastner

Be prepared for every opportunity – You never know when it is going to come…
As a head coach, you are really a CEO of a company—your team and program
Always be prepared for your shot—then it’s up to you…The more you move up, the more responsibility
you are going to have.
Expect the unexpected
Nothing more important than ―LOYALTY‖
Be prepared for the responsibility/accountability of a head coach all the time
You’ve got to have good players, but you also have to motivate them, teach them, etc.
o Dealing with people (and their psychology), not robots
Hiring staff is critical!
o Stay centered
With players, better to be hard on them at the beginning of your time with them and ease up, then be easy
on them at the beginning and be forced to get tough
What you say, you HAVE TO FOLLOW THROUGH—no matter the consequences (e.g., kicking kids off
his team despite their skill level and talent for not following team rules)
Motivate through respect and hold your players accountable…I don’t want to motivate through fear…
If they don’t get the job done, make them accountable
With discipline, take each situation on its own—don’t back yourself into a corner (No 25 rules)
In a timeout, repeat yourself 3 or 4 times (especially the important things)
Do what you know and fit it to your personnel
Dealing with human beings, follow through, and follow up = MILLION BUCKS!
In our current positions as support staff, develop relationships with assistants—they’re the next ones getting
jobs
Always be positive!
You can’t run something that you don’t know
- You have to fit what you run to your personnel
On dealing with boosters:
- When they call you, call them back. When boosters and people that want you to speak somewhere get a
call back from the head coach, it makes them feel like a million bucks, even if you tell them no.
On dealing with fans:
- Always publicly say that it’s ―their‖ team, not ―my‖ team. It’s always ―our‖, ―we‖, and ―us‖ instead of
―mine‖, ―I‖, and ―me‖.
When hiring a staff:
- He did not rush on a hire. It’s better to wait longer to find the right fit than rush into a bad hire.
- The #1 quality he looked for was loyalty
- After that, they have to be able to coach and recruit - ―I want a future head coach that can deal with a
lot.‖
On disciplining players:
- Always sleep on it before you make a rash decision. Always...

Monday, May 21, 2012

Nick Saban-Four Components of Leadership


Engage: You HAVE to make it about them because they don’t see it like we do. Get over it, youth have changed.

 Inspire: Why does every coach think that everyone wants to be great? Human condition is to survive, to be average. IT IS SPECIAL TO WANT TO BE GREAT. You cannot expect your kids to want to be great. We’ve had success here at Alabama because we don’t assume people want to be great and we’ve put a system in place that makes it uncomfortable unless they’re choosing the path that will make them great. We don’t assume they will do it on their own. It’s up to us to inspire/put a system in place to make people want it.

Influence: Thoughts, Habits, Priorities. Influence these 3 (IN THAT ORDER!)

Impact: How do we impact them? How do they impact each other? Peer intervention + peer pressure.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Ryan Marks thoughts

Build relationships!  ―This is a great thing for guys to get together and talk basketball.‖
Always look for ways to get better… GM’s using the lockout for self-improvement
Consider a ―Coaches Retreat‖
You are going to do these four thing’s FOR SURE as a basketball coach:
o You are going to finish last.
o You are going to finish first.
o You’re going to do a good job, and get a better one.
o You’re going to do a good job, and get fired anyway.
Coaching needs to be a fraternity—more than just a competition with each other!
We need to look at each other as colleagues
If you have the chance to be a head coach, go be one!  You learn so much as a head coach.
―If I was an athletic director, I would hire a lower level head coach that has been successful over an
assistant from a bigger school. His chances of succeeding are far greater.‖
Don’t be afraid to take a lower level job and hone your skills
―No more grinding‖ - That’s for Starbucks…  Everyone works hard.  The reality is basketball is a fun job
that is time consuming.   
You’re in the business of helping others!
Work hard. Work diligently. Remember why you are in this profession. You are giving kids a chance to
earn an education and to become better people.
Go and be a coach!
o Start your program and start impacting lives
―Best way to get to the next job is to do a great job at the one you have!‖
Recruiting
o With coaches, develop sincere relationships—guys you call when you don’t need anything
Have to be yourself in coaching and recruiting
Anytime you have an opportunity to do more things and have more responsibility than your previous job,
it’s a good move.
Any style of coaching is fine, as long as your honest and loyal… Be you!
When you are a head coach and have open staff positions, start keeping a running list NOW of who
impresses you.
Communication all about relationships!

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Notes From Dale Brown’s Readings On Leadership


1.      No leader is exempt from criticism, and his humility will nowhere be seen more clearly than in the
manner in which he accepts and reacts to it.
2.      Anyone who steps into the arena of leadership must be prepared to pay a price.  True leadership
exacts a heavy toll on the whole person and the more effective the leadership, the higher the price!  The
leader must soon face the fact that he will be the target of critical darts.  Unpleasant though it may
sound, you haven’t really led until you have become familiar with the stinging barbs of the critic.  Good
leaders must have the thick skin.
3.      Every leader must develop the ability to measure the value or worth of criticism.  He has to
determine the source and the motive, and he has to listen with discernment.  Sometimes the best
course of action is to respond to criticism and learn from it.  Other times, he must be completely
ignored.
4.      It is impossible to lead anyone without facing opposition.
5.      It is essential to face opposition in prayer.
6.      Few people can live in the lap of luxury and maintain their spiritual, emotional, and moral
equilibrium.  Sudden elevation often disturbs balance, which leads to pride and a sense of selfsufficiency and then, a fall.  It’s ironic, but more of us can hang tough through a demotion than through
a promotion.
7.      The man who is impatient with weakness will be defective in his leadership.  The evidence of our
strength lies not in streaking ahead but in a willingness to adapt our stride to the slower pace of our
weaker brethren, while not forfeiting our lead.  If we run too far ahead, we lose our power to influence.
8.      No matter how strong a leader you are, you will experience times when the cutting remarks really
hurt.
9.      You must be determined to apply massive common sense in solving complex problems.
10.     You must be willing to accept the simple fact that you have flaws and will need to work every day
to become a better leader than you were yesterday.
11.     We must never build pyramids in our own honor.  We must not fall victim to pompous, self-serving
practices.
12.     Beware of the treacherous person who pledges loyalty in public then spreads discontent in
private. Make every effort to identify and remove them.  Leaders are often betrayed by those they trust
most.

Friday, May 18, 2012

Ettore Messina on Teaching


Philosophy:‐
Teaching is more important that coaching. 

We cannot teach all of our players everything we know

We must be selective in our teaching and teach only that which we know, understand
and think will help

Develop a clear mind / system for teaching eg A‐>B‐>C‐>D not A‐>C‐>B‐>D

Each step in our teaching should be challenging but achievable ‐ not so many easy steps
that it will be too easy so we do not create superficial players. 

 We should coach where possible the Whole ‐ Part ‐ Whole method.
  ‐ Find the Balance
  ‐ Allow players to make mistakes
  ‐ Develop a relationship with the mistakes
  ‐ Learn to accept the mistakes
  ‐ Feedback determines if players will listen

 The 'Why' should always come before the "What"

3 Levels of Growth:‐
1. Mentally
2. Physically
3. Technically

 It is the coaches responsibility to check constantly that all three areas are showing
growth

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Anson Dorrance thoughts

“After a while, your coaching development ceases to be about finding newer ways to organize
practice.  In other words, you soon stop collecting drills.  Your development as a coach shifts to
observing how great coaches teach, motivate, lead, and drive players to performances at higher
and higher levels.  I think what happens to great coaches who are not effective at the end of
their career is they lose their willingness to take the required stress and emotional confrontation
that they did when they were younger.  Some leaders no longer have the energy or willingness
to make the emotional commitment to motivate people to attain the standard required of them to
compete successfully at the highest level.  Coaches sometimes are not willing to make that
commitment because it is so exhausting.  They are not willing to confront players when they are
not exerting maximum effort and achieving maximum performance because it’s a stressful,
uncomfortable situation.  To constantly motivate players, you have to be a driving force and
make personal investments for which you can pay dearly.  There are times when it might not be
an easy or popular environment for you to challenge them, but there are times when they are
just going to have to suck it up and deal with it.  And, trust me, the standards most players set
for themselves will usually be in a comfort zone that is well below their potential.”
-Anson Dorrance – Training Soccer Champions pg.29

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Tom Izzo on timeouts and Special teams

Izzo is one of the best in the business.  I love his approach to the game and how he uses assistants. 

-Players in tough situations don’t respond how you wished they would. Use timeouts to
rectify this.
-Save your timeouts in the 1st half, utilize them in the 2nd
.
-Utilize your timeouts: how are they playing us? At times it’s something we need to adjust to,
but at others, it’s simply putting it down on the board and explaining it to our players.

-Izzo refers to dead ball situations as basketball version of football’s special teams.(blobs,slobs, free throws, jump balls, and after time outs)

-Why the importance on “Special Teams”? Lost 14 games by 1-4 points in his first 2 seasons
and thought, “how could we steal a couple of points a game?” The important part was
selling the emphasis to his players. “The main point of all this isn’t necessarily the plays we
run, but the commitment we make to it. You can substitute any of our x’s and o’s for your
own, but the important piece is that it needs to become incredibly important to you and your
players. Convince them that those extra points will separate you”

-We see these situations as times where we can’t let up. While the other team is relaxing,
we’re going 100 miles an hour with total concentration.

-If we get one basket every 2 games in each one of those 5 situations, we’ve gained 5 points
a game.


Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Ken Blanchard on How Great Leaders Grow


This is from Dan schawbel's blog.  ALways a great Read




Ken Blanchard
I recently caught up with Ken Blanchard, who is the Chief Spiritual Officer of The Ken Blanchard Companies. He is the author or coauthor of 50 books that have sold more than 20 million copies, including the iconic One Minute Manager®. His latest book is called Great Leaders Grow: Becoming a Leader for Life. In addition to being a renowned speaker and consultant, Ken also spends time as a visiting lecturer at his alma mater, Cornell University, where he is a trustee. In this interview, Ken talks about obstacles that slow a leaders growth, what some of his biggest challenges used to be, some tips for young leaders and more.
When it comes to leaders, what obstacles stall their growth?
The biggest obstacle that stalls leaders’ growth is the human ego. When leaders start to think they know it all, they stop growing. Growing for leaders is like oxygen to a deep sea diver. Without learning and growing, leaders die in terms of their effectiveness.
Over your career in the management field, what were some of your greatest challenges and how did you overcome them?
In the late 1970s my wife Margie and I were on sabbatical leave from the University of Massachusetts, where I was teaching and Margie had finished her PhD. We were encouraged to start our own company by a group of presidents who were members of the Young Presidents Organization (YPO). We were flattered by their encouragement, but talk about challenges—we couldn’t even balance our own checkbook! We were fortunate that five of those presidents offered to help us and became our advisory board. Our biggest challenge was our ignorance about how to set up or run a business.
In the book I just wrote with Mark Miller, Great Leaders Grow, we suggest a way to overcome challenges like these. We call it Walking toward Wisdom. That means being willing to receive feedback, seek counsel, and grow as leaders. It’s been an interesting journey. Today Margie and I have more than 300 people working with us, with offices in Toronto, London, and Singapore, and partners in 30 nations. We never would have gotten here if we hadn’t been open to learning and seeking counsel.
What are your top 3 tips for maturing as a young leader?
First, you need to Gain Knowledge. That means learning about your strengths and weakness and the strengths and weaknesses of the people you work with. You need to continue to learn about your industry and constantly read and study about leadership.
Second, you need to Reach Out to Others. That means looking for mentoring relationships and sharing what you’re learning with others. Leadership is not about you; it’s about investing in the growth of others.
Third, you need to Open Your World. That means seeking new experiences outside the workplace to broaden your understanding of reality. Within the workplace, it means venturing outside your own department and understanding the company as a whole. Look for opportunities to lead—work groups, fund-raising teams, social event committees. You’ll learn more by hands-on leading than anything else.
How do you differentiate between managers and leaders? Can you be both?

I don’t get involved in trying to differentiate between managers and leaders, because when people talk about the difference between the two, managers always get second fiddle. Warren Bennis, one of the great thought leaders in our field, said that “leaders do the right thing and managers do things right.” I think both doing the right thing and doing things right are part of leadership.
There are two primary aspects of leadership. The first aspect is vision/direction, because leadership is about going somewhere. If people don’t know where you’re going, your chances of getting there are very slim. The vision/direction part of leadership is the leadership part of servant leadership.
When I talk about servant leadership, people think I’m talking about the inmates running prison and trying to please everybody. They just don’t understand these two aspects of leadership.
The next part of servant leadership is implementation—how do you live according to the vision and direction and attain the established goals? When you’re implementing the vision/direction, you turn the hierarchical pyramid upside-down and work for your people, doing everything you can to help them implement the vision. This is the servant part of servant leadership. So to me, leadership is about both setting a vision/direction—the traditional leader role—and implementation—the traditional manager role.
Can people do both roles? Some people can. Some people are really good at the visionary role. They’re like third grade teachers who tell people the vision and values over and over and over until they get it right, right, right. But they’re not implementers. If they’re good leaders, they gather people around them who can take the implementation role and move it forward. Some people are good implementers. These people to make sure they have someone who can play the visionary role role. Both roles have to be applied if you’re going to be an effective leader.
Can you name a few people who have grown their leadership ability over time?
Two people come to mind: Garry Ridge, President/CEO of WD-40 Company, and Colleen Barrett, President Emeritus of Southwest Airlines. Fortunately, I’ve had the chance to write books with both of them.
I got to know Garry after he enrolled in our Master of Science in Executive Leadership program at University of San Diego. I shared with Garry that back when I was a college professor, I was always in trouble because I gave the final exam out the first day of class. When the faculty questioned me about that, I told them that not only would I share the final exam at the beginning of the semester, but I would also teach them the answers, so that when my students got to the final exam, they’d get As. Life is all about getting As, not some normal distribution curve! Garry was fascinated by my story and said, “Why don’t we do that in industry?” He took off on a journey to change the culture at WD-40 Company and to implement a business philosophy called “Don’t Mark My Paper, Help Me Get an A.” In 2010 WD-40 Company had the greatest financial year in the history of the company. At the same time, they handed out an internal employee satisfaction survey, which 98 percent of their people filled out—and they’re in over 60 nations! The results were overwhelmingly positive. One survey statement said: “At WD-40 Company, I am treated with respect and dignity.” Over 98.7 percent said “true” to that statement. What a great learner Garry is!
Colleen Barrett took over the presidency of Southwest Airlines from cofounder Herb Kelleher. Her main experience before taking that job was being Herb’s executive secretary for over 20 years. Herb understood the two aspects of leadership. He felt the vision and direction of Southwest Airlines was clear and he didn’t want a Jack Welch lookalike to come in and turn the company in a different direction. He wanted somebody who knew the implementation or servant aspect of leadership; someone who could cheerlead and keep everybody going in the direction they had set. Colleen was the perfect choice. It’s amazing how she grew as a leader. I got so excited about her leadership that I wrote a book with her called Lead with LUV: A Different Way to Create Real Success. In her 18-year tenure as president, Colleen played a major leadership role in the airline industry and was the first woman ever to achieve some groundbreaking goals.
Dan Schawbel is the managing partner of Millennial Branding, a Gen Y research and management consulting firm. He speaks on the topic of personal branding, social media and Gen Y workforce management for companies such as Google, Time Warner, Symantec, CitiGroup and IBM. Subscribe to his updates at Facebook.com/DanSchawbel.

Monday, May 14, 2012

Nick Saban on coaching

“In college, I coached everyone the same way. When I got to the pros and Art Modell would come check out my DB drills to make sure his bonus babies were playing I realized that if I couldn’t reach
Everson Wells the way I coached, it was me that needed to change because he was playing regardless-whether I was the DB coach or it was the guy they brought in after I was fired for not playing Art Modell’s bonus babies. Whether he back-pedaled the way I wanted or not, he’s going to play. You can’t coach everyone the same way. Ask yourself: ‘How can I reach him?”

Sunday, May 13, 2012

#NikeClinicVegas

The power of twitter...  Eventhough I am currently in Wisconsin, I have been following along the clinic in vegas.  Here are some of the things that have been tweeted with the hashtag #nikeclinicvegas

 Josh Pastner
  • You can win on energy and emotion alone sometimes in college and high school basketball. 
  • If you have talent, you have to let them be able to create on offense.  
  • Everything we do in practice is simple, competitive and about getting to the paint.
Don Meyer
  • Talk doesn't cook rice. You have to be a living example for your kids to follow
  • 2 things you never talk about as a coach: 1. Being satisfied 2. Retirement  
  • Adapt do not adopt everything at a clinic
Shaka Smart
  • 1 of 5 reasons behind 
  • setting ball screens - "Create a role for unskilled bigs."  
  • Smart: 99% of ballscreens run by VCU stolen from Billy Donovan, who he says is the nation's best at it. 
  • Smart: keys to ballscreens include exploiting guards who "melt" and immobile bigs. Attack the poor defenders.  
  • if VCU beat Indiana and faced UK in tourney, I would have brought Anthony Davis out and made him defend ballscreens.
  • make ballscreens tougher by forcing defensive movement and getting them out of position.  
  • Anytime we pick and pop our other big ducks in hard and posts the defender low on his body. 
Tony Barone
  • "you have to find the roles for your team and get your players to be comfortable in that role."  
  • Your team won't buy in to your system if they don't buy in to YOU!
  • Barone uses Zach Randolph as example of good "role" player. One of 11 players to avg. 20 pts 10 reb la
  •  st year.  
  • "in order to show your team how to play hard, you have to put them in drills that challenge them." 
  • You develop mental toughness through repetition.
  • when you defend the pick and roll, the first rule is the player with the ball cannot get the shot. 
  • when you defend the pick and roll, the second rule is that the first pass out cannot get the shot. 
  • "The best defenses are noise. A team that TALKS well on defense is intimidating."
  • Barone talks about the importance of having a glossary of terms and making sure your players understand each of them.
  • "be a coach who wants to learn. You have a license to plagiarize. If you see something you like, use it."  
  • "instead of getting a player to be who he is not, get him to be who he is."
Frank Allocco (De La Salle HS)
  • too many coaches don't focus enough on bball IQ. They get great athletes and let them go. Help them understand.
  • it's important when running drills to involve a lot of different skills, not just the ones you're working on. 
  • Says he tries to get his team to have that same constant communication on the floor
  • Allocco's pet peeve is players who stop when a shot is taken. Teach your players action continues until the ball is secured
  • Allocco: teach your players when rebounding to always "chin" the basketball, elbows out. It's the strongest position.
  • going through drills on using screens. "if you're not good enough to get open, get somebody else open." 
Jay Wright
  •  zone defenders are taught to play with their hands up, so we always bounce pass into the zone. 
Bob Knight
  • just getting kids to concentrate is one of the toughest things to do in coaching these days  
  • anything you do on O or D requires great concentration. So do anything you can to help them do that
  • "do something in your drill that makes kids think during every practice." says he's done it since days at West Point
  • start every practice with something that makes your team have to concentrate intensely.  
  • "we as coaches overlook the value of a free throw and players overlook the value of a free throw." 
  • the baseline is the best defender in the game. With exception of the post, I tried to keep my O 8 ft above baseline
  •  when coaching I learned there were 3 major things: offense, defense and conversion. Conv. Is the most important.
  • "Every time the ball hits the floor, somebody has to move to help.
  • it's important for your practices to make kids think and react. Change things up and keep them on their toes.  
  • "we try to make our practices tougher not b/c they're longer or harder but because they make you think more." 
  • Q about length of Knight's practices: Christmas break 2hr 15min, but never more than 90 min otherwise.  
  • the biggest weapon vs. zone D is the dribble. Penetrate gaps and draw 2 defenders to exploit weaknesses
Mike Anderson
  • The goal is to disrupt with traps, switches and doubles. No easy buckets
  • playing intense D means you must have conditioned players. He spends time at each practice on drills to help that
  • conditioning drills include full court sprints a defensive slides. Then zig zag dribbling with defender.  
  • with these drills "we're creating a monster on D. We wanna be tough and be tough on other people." 
  • when D overmatched, put a player in the lane to buy time and prevent layups. Allow trailing defender to recover
  •  "defense is about trust. You have to be one heartbeat."
  • it's not Run and Gun its Run and Execute!
Kevin O'Neill
  • post player very important to beat zone D. They should be moving, flashing, and not posting, standing.  
  • attacking match-up zone is one of the most difficult tasks as coach. Don't be afraid to run man offense against it.
  • up 6 and less than 2 min left always have 5 back on D. "if you lose, it's because you (messed) up."  
  • sell your team on your D and stick with it. Your job is to get them to believe, and once u do u got something good.
  • O'Neill on playing tough, physical: the first ballscreen the opponent sets, run right through it. Set the tone.  

Work Ethic Article


Learning About Work Ethic From My High School Driving Instructor

NOV 15 2011, 10:01 AM ET20
Bob of the Easy Method Driving School has spent his entire life teaching his students how to drive -- and there's nothing he loves to do more
EasyMethod-Post.jpg
The car horn is like a lovely word defiled. It was never meant to be profane. It was never meant to be deployed only in a rage or in a hurry by our dumb and vulgar selves. It's just a signal. A safe driver, if she were driving safely, would honk her horn -- quick taps -- maybe once an hour: when a schoolchild or squirrel threatened to enter the road; when she approached a man pulling out of his driveway but couldn't make eye contact; when lingering for too long, perhaps because of traffic, in another car's blind spot.
I know this because Bob told me eight years ago. Bob taught me how to drive: Before I could get my license I was required by law to enroll in a behind-the-wheel driver training program and people said his was the best.
At an appointed time he picked me up in a modest sedan with one of those giant pizza-delivery prisms on the roof that broadcast both the name of his driving school and my dangerous incompetence. We had three sessions of two hours each. I drove around the suburbs and Bob talked nonstop the whole time about the micromechanics of driving and traffic accidents and the role of body language at intersections and the true purpose of the highway shoulder and the way you're supposed to ease the wheel back, after a sharp turn, with a "controlled slip." Then he took me to the DMV for the practical test and I passed.
All of Bob's students passed. For the hardest part, the parallel parking, he had a trick. On his car's back right window he stuck a New Jersey Devils decal. When it came time to parallel park, you were to pull up until the back of the decal was aligned with the parking spot's front left cone. You turned the wheel clockwise as far as it could go, looked out the back windshield, and stopped exactly when another sticker -- I forget what that one was -- was aligned with the back right cone. Finally you spun the wheel fully counterclockwise, eased back, and straightened out.
When they gave me my license I left in a hurry, eager as I was to join the legions of bad New Jersey drivers. I thanked Bob. Then I did what everybody who's ever had a driving instructor has done: I forgot about him.
* * *
There is a guy who works the register at the pharmacy across the street who regularly makes my day. He doesn't do anything spectacular -- he's just good at his job. He fluently handles cards and cash; he offers you the pen ready to sign, and makes sure your receipt doesn't curl up; he has memorized the prices of things so that you don't have to wait when a barcode is missing. And he's pleasant in a real way, not like a waitress paid to be bubbly, but like a friend in high spirits. When he says "take care" the words are inflected with humanity.
It reminds me of a flight attendant I once saw and this maneuver he had developed, where right before he scooped ice into a passenger's cup, he'd tilt his hand just so, steep enough that the liquid condensation would roll back into the ice box, but not so steep for the cubes themselves to fall. That way there wouldn't be any extra water along with the ice, and the passenger could enjoy her cold soda at full strength.
Why are these little moments of care so delightful? Because they stand out against a backdrop of listless dissatisfaction. Take the staff at my local grocery store. In a typical visit someone will fumble your credit card; forget what's in stock or where it goes; enter the wrong price; or ignore the basics of bagging. When they say "good night" it's on behalf of the store, not themselves, and they clearly don't give a damn.
On the one hand you sympathize. Bagging groceries is boring; it doesn't pay well; the customers are unpleasantly demanding. That's a brutal trio. It's also fairly common. If bitter torpor seems like the default human operating mode out there in the workaday world, may it not just be that a lot of people have jobs they don't like, jobs they can't like? Who can blame them for that?
Then I think of the flight attendant and the pharmacy, and a small handful of my friends and colleagues, and I remember that there is such a thing as a work ethic and that the people who have it seem to have it all the time.
It's hard to say "work ethic" without sounding like an asshole. But I think it's worth getting a grip on what it means. It seems to me a bit opaque, perhaps like one of those words -- "skyscraper" or "doughnut," say -- which we are so used to seeing as compound wholes that we forget the components. The cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter would call them "tightly bonded semantic chunks," like "pieces of wax that have melted together in the bright sunlight."
"Work ethic" seems like one of those chunks. It elicits a halo of simple images: a man hunched over a desk, staying late, furrowing his brow. The "work" part dominates. One forgets the word "ethic" is in there.
But as Thomas Crocker, an associate professor of constitutional law at the University of South Carolina, reminds us, doing a good job, or not doing it, is very much a moral question. Here he quotes Matthew Crawford on Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance:
Here is the paradox. On the one hand, to be a good mechanic seems to require personal commitment: I am a mechanic. On the other hand, what it means to be a good mechanic is that you have a keen sense that you answer to something that is the opposite of personal or idiosyncratic; something universal. ...
Pirsig's mechanic is, in the original sense of the term, an idiot. Indeed, he exemplifies the truth about idiocy, which is that it is at once an ethical and a cognitive failure. The Greek idios means "private," and an idiotes means a private person, as opposed to a person in their public role -- for example, that of a motorcycle mechanic. Pirsig's mechanic is idiotic because he fails to grasp his public role, which entails, or should, a relation of active concern to others, and to the machine. He is not involved. It is not his problem. Because he is an idiot.
Of course most people are not car mechanics or airline pilots. Most people have jobs where being a "moral idiot," as Crocker puts it, won't kill anyone. Should we really demand that the guy who checks ticket stubs at the movie theater hones his craft?
Well, yes. No job is too low to not warrant care, because no job exists in isolation. Carelessness ripples. It adds friction to the working of the world. To phone it in or run out the clock, regardless of how alone and impotent you might feel in your work, is to commit an especially tragic -- for being so preventable -- brand of public sin.
* * *
A month or two ago I was driving back to Manhattan with three friends in a borrowed minivan that had just over 120,000 miles on it. We were in the middle lane making a loping left turn on the highway. It was raining hard; I had the wipers at their fastest setting. A car crept up from the right to pass.
After enough uneventful driving you get the feeling that there is a protective envelope around your car. You forget that you are maneuvering a ton of steel and carbon fiber and moving faster than anything alive on Earth had moved in its first few billion years, in lanes just a few feet on either side.
It helps not to be at ease in that situation. It helps to be afraid, even -- if only so that when the car on your right makes a quick dash toward your lane your hand is already on the horn and your foot's already on the brake, and you've scanned your mirrors and know your outs. You honk and veer gently leftward. The other car retreats. You return home safely.
How often this sort of thing has happened, this thing where a tiny moment on the road has brought me to the edge of infinite doom and a dormant instinct brings me back. The difference between this last time and all the others is that for once I remembered where half those instincts came from. I remembered Bob.
Getting in touch with Bob was easier than I expected, given that I didn't remember his last name or the name of his driving school. It says something both about his stature in the state of New Jersey and the unnerving reach of Google's intelligence that I was able to type "bob new jersey driving" and see his business as the first result.
When he picked me up he was driving a different car than the one I remembered. He explained that he puts on about 60,000 miles per year and so replaces the car once every three. He has been a driving instructor for 32 years. His career began in 1979 when he turned twenty-one and started training under his father. They ran the business out of their house. Young Bob always answered his home phone the same way: "Easy Method Driving School."
If you do the math you discover that he has logged more than two million miles on the job. Along the way he's had just a handful of minor accidents. In every case he was rear-ended by someone else, and in every case the other driver was declared to be at fault, never Bob nor -- remarkably -- one of his students. I don't think it would be a stretch to say that he is one of the best drivers in New Jersey (which if you've ever been on the Garden State Parkway probably sounds like an insult, but it's not meant to be).
I came around on Bob because I want to care about something the way he cares about driver safety.
The student we were going to pick up had never driven before. First timers account for the larger part of Bob's business. For the most part they are all exactly the same age -- just turned 16 -- though he has taught adults as well. He said there was a big influx of East Germans when the Berlin Wall came down. "What's the first thing you want to do when you flee the Soviet bloc?" he asked. "Drive. Really be a free person."
I had forgotten that driving for the first time is a big deal. I was in the back seat when we pulled up to the girl's house, an Indian-American high schooler wearing a hoodie that said "Chatham Fussball" on it. She and her mother were standing on their doorstep. The girl couldn't stop smiling. Her mother's arms were folded. As Bob spoke both of them nodded, the daughter eagerly, the mother less so. Bob mimed grabbing the wheel and making a big turn, his hands at ten and two o'clock; they all laughed. A little sister poked her head out the front door.
One forgets how overwhelming the road can be. Bob was telling me before we pulled up for the lesson that "driving is about seeing." "Your eyes get there first," he said. The hardest part for a new driver is knowing where to look. I didn't believe him until we got to the student's first loop around a cul-de-sac: Instead of looking out her left window, toward where she was wheeling the car, she kept looking in the opposite direction to keep an eye on the curb, or worse, on her own hands.
It's quite jarring. You spend your entire life being driven around and it seems rather natural. But then you take the wheel and suddenly you have to pay attention -- actually pay attention -- to all the moving parts. For someone who's been at it a while it's mostly automatic. But consider: There is the problem of controlling the car, getting a feel for its weight, the sensitivity of the wheel, the brake, accelerator, and so on. There is the world inside: your adjustable seat and steering column, your posture and sightlines, all those cupholders and compartments, the radio, clock, your phone, your fellow passengers. The dashboard has its own meters and messages that must be checked every so often; so too with your mirrors. There are the other drivers on the road. There are the signs, speed limits, potholes, detours, construction sites, and other unpredictable exceptions to the regular rules of the road, and on top of that the general problem of knowing where you are, and on top of that whatever you happen to be thinking about.
The first-timer is too wrapped up in fearful tunneled focus to do much beyond the basic work of not running into stuff. "Did you see that sign?" Bob would ask. "Watch your speed." "It's probably a good idea to check your mirrors every five to eight seconds." "See that one kid? Where's his friend?"
The poor girl never had a ready answer. She admitted to missing every single sign on the road. Bob says that students frazzled and exhausted after two hours of driving will often blow right by their own houses.
* * *
The market for driving instruction is crowded with part-timers looking to make a little extra income from their car, perhaps to defray the increasing cost of gas. The business has attractively low barriers to entry: mostly just a background check and a few hundred dollars in processing fees.
Which is roughly what you'd expect, I think. Driving instruction seems more like the sort of thing a high school teacher would take on after hours to round out his day, like coaching, than a lifelong home for the dedicated specialist. It doesn't feel worthy of the time and attention. Who would want to make a career out of driving kids around?
Bob is the exception that proves the rule. As art is central to an artist's life so driving is to Bob's. What's strange is that he's not even a car guy -- he doesn't follow NASCAR, he doesn't tinker under the hood. What he's passionate about is the safe operation of motor vehicles.
Like many long-time residents of a niche, Bob sees the world in a peculiar way. After a digression into the state's turn-on-red laws, for instance, he continued: "But then again, I've driven around here enough times to know every light, to know when you're allowed to turn on red and when you're not allowed to turn on red. I'll tell you, when I go someplace, like Boston -- you can turn on red there. I've been to Boston. I've turned on red." That was all he had to say about the trip.
Bob notices things that I suppose only a long-time driving instructor could notice, like how you could tell that a driver was from Hoboken by the way the screws framing their license plates are scratched and worn from having parked so many times in the city's tight, unmarked spaces. He has an uncanny memory for driving situations. He is constantly telling these insanely detailed and tedious stories, like the one about a student who back in 2006 took the curve too fast on Summit Avenue just north of Hillcrest -- Bob said the student had a tendency to accelerate into turns -- and nearly skidded off the road, but managed to stick it out because the town council had recently repaved the street with an expensive grippy top-coating. There are no climaxes in these stories. In fact they're not so much stories as nerdy shoptalk, the thinking-out-loud of an intensely interested man.
I'm reminded of how chess grandmasters can recall legal board positions with far greater fidelity than people who don't play, but perform about equally when the pieces are arranged in ways they'd never see in a real game. The difference is that a legal board position means something to the GM -- it's laced with strategic features like "pawn strength" and "control of the center," and composed of familiar scenarios like "the Sicilian opening" or "Queen's gambit" -- where to a layman it's still just a jumble of pieces.
Traffic is Bob's chess board. Where we see a mess of metal and nitwit drivers, he sees the interplay of tiny narratives: turns attempted and aborted, inelegant merges, a canny lane-switch in a roundabout. Three decades of this work have rejiggered his perceptual apparatus.
One incident stands out in particular. We were about an hour into the lesson and had just graduated from the backroads of the student's hometown to a two-lane street with steady traffic. The car in front of us had slowed down, signaled, pulled over toward the shoulder, and made a smooth right turn into a shopping complex. Bob was impressed. "See how nicely he positioned that car?" He explained to the girl that that was exactly how it was done. And then a while later, long after the moment had passed, he said quietly, more to himself than to either of us, "I really liked the way he did that." It had the ring of nostalgia to it.
* * *
There is no zealot like a convert. These days I am obviously in Bob's corner, but my impression as a 16-year-old was quite a bit different. He wore the same thing then that he was wearing when I saw him a few weeks ago: a short-sleeved button-down shirt, khakis, and a tan adjustable baseball cap with his business's name and phone number. He looked young for his age but not in a particularly good way. Maybe he still lived at home? He seemed to ramble, wrapped up in weird minutiae. He emanated George Costanza. I kept thinking of how Jerry would on occasion tease George by calling him "Biff," a reference to the son of the failed salesman Willy Loman. I imagined that Bob would fit in with the Lomans.
What changed is simple: At some point in the last eight years I realized that I'm an idiot, a moral idiot, and the chief symptom of my festering insecurity about work is a visceral contempt for indifference and a deep admiration of its opposite.
Ever since I graduated from college in 2009 I have been lucky enough to have a good job. I work as a computer programmer. My skills are in high demand. The trouble is, programming is a craft and I am not a craftsman. I sincerely believe that close enough is good enough. I do not live in the details. I'm not sure what the hell is wrong with me but I'm happy with code that mostly works. If I were to build a bridge that bridge would eventually collapse.
This didn't so much matter when I started, because when I started my projects were small and unambitious. But I am moving up in the world. I'm on applications now with lots of users, people who will depend on the stuff I build to do important work. When I do a half-assed job -- which is the same thing, I am now realizing, as not going out of my way to do an excellent job -- I am making their actual lives more difficult. I have seen this happen. Just last week my minor crimes of indolence cost two companies about eighty man-hours. People were on edge because of me; they were tired and unpleasant because of me.
This brand of occupational atrophy is no better for happening inside an office than its equivalent out there in restaurants and retail stores. In fact it's probably a lot worse. After all, one reason the guys on the 50th floor are paid more than the guys on the first is that their work, on the balance, is thought to have more impact -- a double-edged sword if there ever was one. How many unscrupulous investment bankers does it take to fuck up a global economy?
I came around on Bob because that's the road I'm on and it scares the crap out of me. I want to care about something the way he cares about driver safety. I want to be the opposite of a moral idiot, but I don't know how, and I'm fascinated by people who do. Bob oozes concern; he wants to infect the state of New Jersey with good driving habits. He respects his public role, the fact that the minute he's done with these kids they head straight for their parents' car keys and out onto the roads we share. When I asked him what he likes to do outside of work, he laughed: "This is my life."
His reward is the pleasure of depth itself. He's an expert; his brain has been reshaped, perhaps literally, by decades of close attention. The fact that he dove deep into K-turns and lane changes seems infinitely less important than that he dove deep at all. It's at once devastating and inspiring, devastating because I expect I'll never get there, and inspiring in the way that the old Calvin and Hobbes strip is inspiring, the one where Calvin, knee-deep in the dirt, shovel in hand, is approached by Hobbes: "Why are you digging a hole?"
"I'm looking for buried treasure!"
"What have you found?"
"A few dirty rocks, a weird root, and some disgusting grubs."
"On your first try?"
"There's treasure everywhere!"