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#Leadership : What Coach K Can Teach You About Leadership and the Morning Habits of NBA Stars…The most Winningest Coach in NCAA Division I Basketball History Wants to Show you How to Be a Better Leader. He’s Qualified to Do That, Don’t you Think?

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Mike Krzyzewski, or Coach K as he’s more commonly called, is much taller in person than he looks on TV.

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I guess that’s because the coach of Duke’s multiple champion men’s basketball team and Team USA’s gold medal men’s basketball team wasn’t surrounded by 6-foot-11-inch super athletes at the time I met him in a midtown New York office. Instead, Coach K was sitting with his business partner Chrissie Gorman, CEO of PowerForward, a new startup digital subscription service that will deliver interactive leadership and team-building videos to users.

He’s got trophies, medals and the respect and admiration of millions, so why start a business? “I don’t know how many more years I will continue to coach, but I wanted to be able to teach for the rest of my life,” Coach K told me. “And this platform will allow me to do so.”

I had the pleasure of speaking with Gorman and Coach K about their venture and the parallels between leading on the court and in business. I walked out of the room feeling energized, inspired and ready to throw down a vicious dunk on my opponents … if only I could figure out a way to grow a foot and a half on my way to the gym.

Last time I saw you, Coach, you had a big hunk of gold around your neck.

Coach K: I wish! They don’t give coaches the actual medals, we get replicas — but that’s OK, the main thing is we won!

How does PowerForward work?

Coach K: It is a video service a company would subscribe to. People from all walks of life — sports, business, military — tell a story about how they have adapted or how they have shown leadership. And as you watch the 20-minute video, the viewer is asked if they would have made the same decisions, if they would have done things differently and why. It is interactive. So you’re not just reading or watching — you’re able to feel it. And if you feel it, you might own it. And that’s how you get better.

 

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Related: Mark Cuban Talks Basketball, Hustle and the Wonders of Great Wealth

How did your partnership come together?

Coach K: Chrissie and CAA had the vision to put this startup together, which has been two years in the works. And they were able to help me understand the vision, because this isn’t a world that I am in. Just like she doesn’t understand the vision of attacking a zone or full-court pressing. And now it is a shared vision. I love what she and our team have be able to do.

Chrissie Gorman: We had an incredible opportunity to work with a man who has this amazing legacy of leadership. I came in to look at it and see if there was a need we could fill. I looked at the $10 billion B2B leadership market, and we saw a gap in focusing on emerging leaders. Who better to fill that role than Coach K?

Related: Leadership Lessons From Sports Legends

Your ability to lead spans between athletes fresh out of high school to athletes who are seasoned NBA All-Stars. What are the similarities and differences leading groups like that?

Coach K: It is completely different. There’s a big difference in maturity: age, physical and experience. So when I’m coaching the USA team in the Olympics, those guys are professionals, they’ve crossed bridges of experience. The quickest way of explaining it is that we adapt to each other. Then we find the best practices that that group can adapt to.

When I’m coaching the young guys in college, they pretty much have to adapt to me. The lessons I’ve learned in adapting to the pro players have been unbelievable. How you train, how they are able to be successful in certain situations — I’ve learned more in the past 10 years from these guys than I knew before.

Who surprised you most?

Coach K: Almost all of them, quite frankly. In some respect, that’s not the world I live in. In college, we have to train our guys. These professionals have their routines. What we do as a group we do as a group. But I have to allow them time to follow the routines that work for them.

Demar DeRozan is getting up at 6 a.m. to do his routine, Klay Thompson is going back to the gym and shooting at night. Kyle Lowry is one of the top scorers in the league, and he came to me and said, “What do you need coach? I don’t care how many minutes I play.” It is called selfless.

People always ask “How do you get these big egos together?” If you have a good common cause — to play for your country and win a gold medal — that’s a pretty good common cause. Like we say inPowerForward, they make a commitment to being part of something that is bigger than you.

Related: Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Quotes of All Time

Do you love to win or hate to lose?

Coach K: Both! I would say for me, the thought of losing is a bigger motivator than the thought of winning. But the hatred of losing causes you to prepare to win. Everybody wants to win, not everybody wants to prepare to win. You have to love the process of preparing to achieve that goal of winning. People who are less talented can beat you if they are more together, tougher and more unselfish.

My kids play little league, and there is a mercy rule that stops better teams from running up the score too high. Are you able to take your foot off the gas during a game?

Coach K: I would hope that I am faced with the opportunity in every game that I coach! A lot of people ask if I prefer a close exciting game or a blowout — as long as we’re the ones blowing out the other team, the sooner the better.

Does that competitiveness carry through in business? Do you look to crush your competition?

Gorman: In business, you have to be agile. You have to be open to someone coming in and disrupting you. You can’t rest on your laurels. It is always competitive, but in the end, it is all about your investors and your customers. You are working to make their investment of time and money worthwhile, that’s where your focus needs to be.

Coach K: I think your focus should always be on yourself, being the best that you can be. Your competition shows your flaws, your weakness. I’m into beating my opponents, not crushing them. Without competition, you don’t know how people are looking to beat you. So you welcome that. To “crush” someone means that you feel like you won. But if you’re committed to excellence, it’s not about one game, you have to be there all the time. You’re never at the end, you’re always “becoming.”

Related: 10 Most Successful Entrepreneur Athletes (Slideshow)

When you are recruiting new players for Duke, you have statistics that show how talented a player is, but are there any tells that you look for to see if you want them on your team?

Coach K: We look for three things: talent, academic ability and character. Are they easy to coach? Is it all about them or is it all about us? We give those equal weight, and if one is missing, we won’t try to recruit that player.

Do those three pillars line up with recruiting employees in business?

Gorman: Yes, particularly when it come to character. I look for people who say “we” more than “I.” When someone says “we” that means that they feel a part of something being built.

Coach K: I ask every kid I’m visiting, “What are your goals?” I visited two this weekend who said, “I want to be part of a national championship team.” And you love to hear an answer like that. If they start asking how many shots they’ll take or minutes they’ll play, that’ll all shake itself out — most likely as you are playing for another team. The “we” concept is huge for us.

Gorman: It’s funny, as I’m building this team for PowerForward, if someone’s first question is “what will the salary be?” it’s not the right fit. This is a startup, this is about building something together and about the experience. You can go somewhere else if all you’re looking for is a comfortable salary.

Part of being a leader is dealing with the good and the bad. The NCAA just announced that they are pulling all championship games from North Carolina due to its controversial transgender bathroom law. How do you feel about that?

Coach K: I was asked about this law when we were preparing for theOlympics in Las Vegas. It was a very short answer: It’s embarrassing. And I still feel it is embarrassing because it is discriminatory. I’m all in on what the NCAA has done and I am proud that Duke AD Kevin White has stepped forward on behalf of our university to say that we are against discrimination, and to express our sorrow that it has hurt our great state.

Related: The Most Inspiring Moments from the 2016 Olympics

You coached all of these guys on Team USA, and now they’re all back in the NBA. So going into this season, who do you want to win?

Coach K: First off, I want them all to be healthy. I want them to be taken care of contractually. In 11 years, in the last five competitions we’ve won, we’ve coached 39 NBA players and they’ve all won gold medals. Some multiple times. I have anywhere from 16 to 20 former Duke players in the NBA. I want good things to happen for them all.

On Christmas, I’ll be watching the NBA games with my grandsons and I’ll be able to say, “On the court right now, there are six guys I’ve coached.” Then the next game will have four or seven. I just want them to do well. And I keep in contact with a lot of them. Relationships are another keyword that we teach in PowerForward. We want people to take these words, make them their own and be better for it.

 

Entrepreneur.com | September 15, 2016 | Dan Bova

 

#Leadership : 7 Telltale Signs That You Have a Leader’s Mindset…Being a Great Leader is about Setting your Ego Aside and Putting your Team First. It’s About being Present in your Interactions. Most of All, It’s about Looking for Ways to Help your Employees Become the Best Versions of Themselves they can Possibly Be.

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Great performers don’t always make great leaders. Need proof? Just look to the sports world. Wayne Gretzky, Isaiah Thomas and Kevin McHale — all legendary athletes whose on-the-field success didn’t translate to storied coaching careers.

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Leadership, it turns out, is its own distinct set of skills — skills that can be cultivated and developed, just like any other. To paraphrase the great Vince Lombardi, leaders aren’t born, they’re made. And it all starts with the right mindset.

More than anything, leadership is just that — a state of mind. It’s the lens through which you see the world and the beliefs you bring to all your interactions with your team.

So how do you know if you have the leader’s mindset? Here are the seven telltale signs that you have the right frame of mind to be the leader your team needs.

1. You stop craving credit.
I’m not saying you defer it. I’m saying you literally stop craving it altogether. For leaders, credit becomes increasingly unimportant over time. In its stead, a desire to do the work you were meant to do, to the very best of your ability.

To a large degree, great leaders separate outcomes from their activity entirely and derive satisfaction from the work itself.

 

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2. You become more cheerleader/coach than player.
You realize it’s not about the work you do, but rather it’s about the quality of the work that others around you do.

This means you’re not focused on building presentations, creating systems documentation or making sales calls. Instead, you’re focused on creating the best culture and environment for your people to thrive. You’re inspiring and setting a vision that rallies people to become the best version of themselves. You’re removing obstacles from your team so they can do in the most unobstructed manner possible.

Great leaders focus less on doing and more on getting others to do their best.

3. You care about how you make others feel.
You understand that people like you primarily as a result of how you make them feel, and not how you look or how smart or cool you appear to be. It’s fine to have an edge, and it’s good to be bold, but good leaders are keenly aware of how people feel in their presence.

4. You begin to crave criticism.
Leaders are curious about criticism rather than defensive towards it. In fact, the best leaders actively seek it out because they know that criticism means there is likely an opportunity for growth and improvement. Remember, in every critical interaction, there is the potential for growth by the critic, the person being critiqued (aka, you) — or both!

The common thread….By now you’ve probably noticed a through line — it’s not about you.

5. You lead with curiosity.
This is especially relevant when dealing with people. Good leaders always give people the unreasonable benefit of the doubt. You should never lead with assumptions, unless they are positive ones.

Curiosity is a state of mind that not only makes you playful and interested, it ensures you’re always present. Many leaders feel a certain pressure to be perfect. They feel the company looking up to them and like they have to be on their A-game all the time.

But as my recent podcast guest Marcia Reynolds says in her latest book The Discomfort Zone, your team wants you to be present more than they need you to be perfect. Approaching everything with curiosity ensures that this is always the case.

6. Helping your team find their unique abilities is a top priority.
You realize one of your most important objectives is to help people find what energizes them the most, and then effectively aligning resources so they can spend most of their time doing those things (or more likely, that one thing).

This will not only give your team the greatest gift you can give them — the opportunity to do what they were put on Earth to do — it will also have wide ranging impact on your organization. When people are focused on their unique abilities, and not wasting their precious energy on things they don’t like or aren’t good at, magic happens.

7. You think about the long-term significance of your actions.
Good leaders are obsessed with timescale and the significance of their activities in the long run. If you’re keenly aware of the impact your actions of today will have on the future, you’re on the right track. You don’t sweat those actions that don’t create any future impact — like most emails.

You understand that as a leader, it’s most important for you to spend the majority of your time on what will matter three, six and twelve months from now. You hire people to worry about the hours, days, weeks and months. The significance and timescale of your activities will define your impact as a leader.

Extra credit –– You understand that your people want to see you live a rich life.
That is, they want to see that you’re not just a great professional, but someone who lives a full, rich life — someone who has a great and loving marriage/relationship, someone who is peaceful and tranquil throughout the day (showing mental and emotional health), and someone who takes care of themselves by eating properly and working out.

Why is this important? Because consciously or not, your employees follow your example, and focusing on having a well-rounded life gives them permission to have a well-rounded life as well.

Gone are the days when your employees are cool with their leader being really good at work, but terrible at everything else. That inspires very few. Great leaders take care of their people and themselves. Part of what we provide at SnackNation is the ability to demonstrate to your team that it’s not all about work; things like health, nutrition and well-being not only support performance, but are just as valuable, if not more so.

The common thread….By now you’ve probably noticed a through line — it’s not about you.

Being a great leader is about setting your ego aside and putting your team first. It’s about being present in your interactions. Most of all, it’s about looking for ways to help your employees become the best versions of themselves they can possibly be.

 

Entrepreneur.com | August 2, 2016 | Sean Kelly

#Leadership : 7 Leadership Tips When The Business Is Struggling…Working 24 Hours a Day, Losing your Cool, & Falling Back to a No-Risk Strategy are Not Conducive to Long-Term Success.

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It’s easy for an E ntrepreneur, Manager or a CEO to feel like a leader when things are going well, but the challenge is to keep that confidence and drive in the face of economic downturns, business turnarounds, and stressful personnel situations. Working twenty hours a day, losing your cool, and falling back to a no-risk strategy are not conducive to long-term success.

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Are you ready for that really tough challenge?

I saw some practical tips for business leaders under pressure a while back in the book “The Outside the Box Executive,” by Richard Lindenmuth, a seasoned interim CEO, who has stepped in and revitalized more than his share of struggling companies. I’m convinced that his advice is equally relevant to early startups, where the challenges are legion and the path is far from clear.

 

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I agree with Lindenmuth that emotional intelligence and stability is a must in these environments. He calls it strategic empathy, which is sincerely focusing on the individual, but always with the big picture of the business as top of mind:

  1. Expect anxiety on the team and deal with it directly. When things are not going well, or when the future is clouded with unknowns, expect to find people on the team who are scared and angry. You have to act quickly to communicate strategy, be the role model for calm, and stand up to outliers before the whole team becomes dysfunctional.
  2. Let them say no, and actively listen to team input. Of course, no leader wants to hear negative views, but it’s important to show empathy and reach everyone on an emotional level, while containing your own emotions. People need to know that it’s safe to express their opinions. Once you get beyond the negatives, most people have real contribution
  3. Focus on team members who will tell it like it is. In any organization you will find people who will tell you what you want to hear, or who are fighting for their own survival. Although you must listen at every level, the best leaders look carefully for that middle ground or middle manager that can see the big picture and effectively implement change.
  4. Don’t send a representative in lieu of direct contact. Lack of your physical presence is read as detachment, or lack of leadership. Direct contact, to people at every level, is the best way to generate trust, respect, support, and action. A recipe for failure is assuming that you can deliver a message once, and get it passed down by subordinates.
  5. If you see something broken, fix it now. Decisive action inspires confidence. People’s perception of your leadership and trustworthiness is directly related to your word-action alignment and behavioral integrity. Show them what you expect, and people will follow your example. If everyone is fixing problems with confidence, the business will prosper.
  6. Everyone has to pull their weight in the same boat. Create an environment that encourages and rewards participation and progress, with no penalties for missteps. Define a common goal, such as improving the customer experience, and eliminate any contention between the internal towers of development, marketing, and sales.
  7. Practice the eight out of ten rule. Generally, out of ten ideas, eight are not usable, but that’s the only way to get to those two good ones. So welcome all suggestions and praise every attempt, which will encourage more ideas. This may also be stated as the Pareto principle, where 80 percent of the results come from 20 percent of the efforts.

When the business is struggling, it also makes sense to bring in outside help for a fresh perspective. This could be a peer, or independent business advisor, ideally one who has been through a similar kind of struggle in their business. The best leaders put aside their pride and emotion, and listen carefully to guidance from outside the organization.

When real change is required in business, a unilateral top-down business leadership strategy is rarely effective. Successful CEOs and entrepreneursinstead listen, learn, empathize and include everyone in the challenge. With their leadership, and everyone invested in the company’s survival, the odds of success go up dramatically. Are you ready for that really tough challenge?

 

Forbes.com | April 21, 2016 | Martin Zwilling

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