elitefts™ Sunday Edition
I’m getting older. This is a factual statement and, personally, I love this statement. Each year, we all take one step closer to the abyss. One day, we'll all cease to be part of this earth. I'm absolutely enamored with history. It's one of the things that I love to study and try to understand. I also watch public television quite often. This week, the local PBS station ran a special on Lewis and Clark. Here are two guys who go only by their last names (similar to me), so they must be better than famous—they must be infamous (if you get that movie reference, you're OK with me).
As I was watching the show and learning about these two men, who I'm far from an expert on, I realized that they were much younger than I am now when they had their adventure traveling across this continent. How did they do it? Only one man died during their entire trip. It brought to my mind thoughts of Ernest Shackleton and his amazing leadership. But back to Lewis and Clark...they showed amazing leadership and work ethic in accomplishing what they did. I'm now 37 years old and they accomplished all of this while being younger than I currently am. Could I still do at 37 what I had done when I was in my mid-twenties?
Sharpen your saw
I'm sure many people out there have read the book Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey. In my opinion, this is a very good (but not great) book about leadership and lifestyle. About five years ago, I had the opportunity to listen to Covey speak (the talk was a little cultish for my tastes but had some good information). The number one thing I took away from the book and the talk was that I need to sharpen my saw more often. In other words, take a break, read a book, drink a beer, connect with others, and do something that you enjoy outside of work. This is a hard lesson for many in our profession because we often want to be the hardest working and we're very passionate about what we do. I applaud this, but it shouldn't be a zero sum game taken at all times and at all costs.
In my current position, I don't have much staff under me because we're a small university. We can't afford to pay the staff we do have what they're truly worth. This is a double-edged sword. While I'm able to find people who are young and eager and want experience (which is great because they're always ready to work long days, sweat, and come back for more the next day), the downside is that I generally lose them to full-time or graduate assistant positions within one or two years of their initial start date. I'm very happy to have such hardworking staff, but I know that I'll have turnover year after year. In addition, while I grow older, my staff always remain young! This is great for keeping me young and honest about how hard I'm working.
Now here comes the very hard part of tying it all together. I have a group of young, eager professionals who want to come in and do a great job for me while pushing me to new heights, but I need to temper what they're bringing to me. The reason I have to do this is twofold. I need them to know that whatever they commit to doing here at work, they must do as long as they're here. Do they want to travel with a team? That's fine, but now they must do that continuously. Do they want to warm a team up before games? Again, that's fine, but they can never miss a game. Do they want to warm a team up before practice? That's fine, but they can never miss a practice.
As you can see, this could become a problem when other responsibilities come up. In addition, once they commit to doing these things, they have set a precedent, and when they leave, I must now find someone else who can do the same things with that team. In other words, if a new strength staff member wants to do twenty minutes of “footwork” (I don’t like that word, but that’s another story), the coach will want every person who I hire after him or her to do the same. I'm not in any way saying that I don’t want staff who are out there trying to make our athletes better in different ways and make our coaches happy. But we must think about what we can do, how our time can best be spent, and how we can still have time to sharpen our own saws.
The umbrella
Due to these factors, I work with my staff as an umbrella, and my job is to empower them to be great while giving them what they need to be great. My expectations for my strength staff are to be great, know our overlying philosophy, think about their decisions, and find the best way to get things done. Within these parameters, I want them to train the heck out of their teams (except don’t use that stupid speed ladder in the weight room). My job is to set the overall umbrella philosophy of what we're doing and then let my staff do it, but they need to think about their decisions and determine the best way to get things done.
Sometimes in our profession, young strength professionals are so eager to please a head coach that they offer to do meals on road trips or be at every practice. These things can be good if you have enough staff and you can do them. However, when you have a limited staff, you must figure out ways to most effectively spend your time.
Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m 64?
Great song, right? Back to the point of all this. Whether you're a young, 'up and coming' strength professional or a seasoned vet, think about your decisions. Where will all of this leave you when you're 64? I know that when I’m 64, I’ll be tanning on a beach while reading and drinking coffee until noon and then I'll start with wine right after I train. This profession can chew people up and spit them out. I don't want to see the strength coaches who are 40 years old get chased out because they can't be at every team meal anymore due to family responsibilities like raising a child. I also don't want to see us not do a great job with the athletes we have the opportunity to work with on a daily basis.
So this leads me to an analogy I use to describe everyone and how he or she relates to his or her community. Imagine that we're all boaters out on the same river. We all must pass each other, and we'll all create wake that the other boaters have to deal with. Is your wake so bad that other boats have to either slow down or change course? As a young strength coach, you may not always know what the "boss" wants or why he wants it that way, but you must trust that there is a reason and believe that he's just trying to shade you or keep you dry with his umbrella. As the "boss," remember that your staff wants to do a great job, but they aren't always privy to the same information that you are. Sometimes you have to explain why you want things done a certain way. In addition, as the "boss," choose your words carefully. I learned this from a CEO who came to speak to my athletes.
In his early 40s, this guy became CEO of a company that owns a few hundred restaurants. He said that he would be in a meeting and announce that he had an idea (he was just brainstorming). Whether the idea was good or not, someone then wanted to run with it and make it happen. As he said, sometimes we need to know how powerful our words can be when we're in a position of authority. This really hit home for me. Most of the time, I believe that my staff are honest with me, but I'm sure there have been times when people do things for me because I'm the boss. Think about that before you speak.
I hope this article got you thinking about why you do some of the things that you do every day. Our job is to service our students and coaches. It isn't to be there at 5:00 a.m. so that we can say we're hardcore. It's fine to leave the weight room and go fishing or, in my case, drinking (ha ha). Intensity is a word that people love to throw around. It's important to posses this when we're coaching, but it's just as important to let people know that we're human and we do take, and need, down time. Now go get some R&R.
