Nelson Mandela's 8 Lessons of Leadership

I took this one from a 2008 Time Magazine article by Richard Stengel. These are the 8 Lessons of Leadership from Nelson Madela:

1 - Courage is not the absence of fear - it's inspiring others to move beyond it.

2 - Lead from the heart - but don't leave your base behind.

3 - Lead from the back - and let others believe they are in front.

4 - Know your enemy - and learn about his favorite sport.

5 - Keep your friends close - and your rivals even closer.

6 - Appearances matter - and remember to smile.

7 - Nothing is black or white. - Decisions are complex, and there are always competing factors.

8 - Quitting is leading, too. - Knowing how to abandon a failed idea, task, or relationship is often the most difficult kind of decision a leader has to make.

Don Shula on Reducing Practice Errors

This one is from George Selleck's book "Court Sense." Selleck references a five-step plan that Don Shula used for reducing errors in practice. This one is good for any leadership, management, teaching, or coaching position.

1) Tell people whay you want them to do.
2) Show them what good performance looks like.
3) Let them do it.
4) Observe their performance.
5) Praise progress and/or redirect.

Coach K on Motivation

Mike Krzyzewski talked about motivation in one of my all-time favorite books, "The Gold Standard: Building a World-Class Team":

Motivation can come from many different sources.

One source is reinforcing that sense of perspective that you taught your team early on.

Another source is reviewing your established standards, giving your team the chance to see how they have performed based on those standards and how they can uphold them at an even higher level.

Another element of getting your team motivated is rallying support from the outside by broadcasting your group's message...Typically a group's message is some combination of your goal and your standards: This is what we are going to do and this is how we are going to do it.

Bringing about those emotions and harnessing the energy that they create is the essence of motivation.

Roy Williams' Coaching Philosophy

Obviously, Roy Williams has had a ton of success as a head coach at both Kansas and North Carolina. In his latest book, "Hard Work: A Life On and Off the Court," Coach Williams talks about his basketball coaching philosophy.

"My philosophy is that basketball is the simplest game in the world - IF you can get five guys moving in the same direction for a common goal. Coaching is all about me getting my five guys to do what I want them to do better than you can get your five guys to do what you want them to do. If you have one guy looking out for himself, you're in big trouble. If you have more than one, you have no chance."

Leadership from Ronald Reagan

In honor of the 40th President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, and the 100th anniversary of his birth, here are some quotes from President Reagan on leadership:

- The challenge of statesmanship is to have the vision to dream of a better, safer world and the courage, persistence, and patience to turn that dream into reality.

- A leader, once convinced a particular course of action is the right one, must have the determination to stick with it and be undaunted when the going gets rough.

- We did not seek the role of leadership that has been thrust upon us. But whether we like it or not, the events of our time demand America's participation.

Thanks to leadership-skills-for-life.com for sharing.

Morgan Wootten's Big 5 in Coaching

Morgan Wootten may be the most successful high school basketball coach of all time. Wootten won nearly 1,300 games, five mythical national championships, and coached dozens of Division 1 college players at DeMatha (MD) High School. Coach Wootten's ultimate accomplishment came with his 2000 enshrinement in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. In his book, Coaching Basketball Successfully, Coach Wootten outlines his "Big 5 in Coaching".

1. Our goal must be to provide a wholesome environment in which young men or women can develop themselves spiritually, socially, and academically.

2. As coaches, we should be the kind of coach we would want our sons or daughters to play for.

3. We must never lose sight of the fact that basketball is a game and it should be fun. We should never put winning ahead of the individual.

4. Because basketball is a great teaching situation...we must prepare them for the many decisions they will be making that will have long-range effects on the quality of their lives.

5. This is the bottom line: Are we doing all we can to make our players' sport experience as rewarding as possible?

Bruce Weber's Keys to Building a Program

I've heard Illinois Head Coach Bruce Weber at clinics on a couple occasions. He always refers to his keys to building and maintaining a program when he presents. Here they are:

1) Have kids play hard. Don't give them the choice to not play hard.
2) Play as a team. Play to win.
3) Have a flexible system.
4) Lift weights and condition.
5) Defend. Spend at least one hour of practice on defense.
6) Teach your players how to play.
7) Have competitive drills. Have them love to win and hate to lose. Practice game habits at game speed. Have efficiency; drills conducive to your system.

Craig Robinson on the Princeton Offense

Some may know him as the president's brother-in-law but Craig Robinson has a pretty good career, himself, as a basketball coach. Coach Robinson played at Princeton under Pete Carill and later was an assistant at Northwestern under former Princeton assistant Bill Carmody. After leading Brown as head coach for two successful seasons, Robinson is now trying to rebuild the program at Oregon State. In his book "A Game of Character," Robinson discussed the Princeton offense:

"It is as much a mind-set as it is a set of strategies designed for winning the game of basketball."

"Others will talk about the Princeton offense as being good use of fundamentals - passing, moving without the ball, and backdoor cuts. Yes, those are some of the strategies..."

"All of that obscures what the Princeton offense is. Bottom line, it comes down to playing unselfishly, passing and cutting until you get open for a shot - as a team. It is a way of thinking. You not only need very skilled players with a level of precision required for making that perfect shot, but they also need to be patient - hence what may parade as slow isn't necessarily."

Quotes on Listening

John Maxwell is one of my favorite authors. In his latest book, "Everyone Communicates, Few Connect," Maxwell discusses many ways for people to improve their communication skills by connecting with other people. He references a few people's thoughts on listening and being inquisitive in this book...

"Listening requires giving up our favorite human pastime - involvement in ourselves and our own self-interest." - Sonya Hamlin

"My greatest strength as a consultant is to be ignorant and ask a few questions." - Peter Drucker

Larry King's favorite question to ask is "Why?"...It's the greatest question ever asked, and it always will be.

And when asking questions, remember the word "FORM," which stands for family, occupation, recreation, and message. Ask people these questions to connect!

What Jon Gruden Learned about Practice from Indiana Basketball

I'm a huge Jon Gruden fan. I liked his passion and enthusiasm as a coach. I love that same enthusiasm in his game analysis for ESPN. I recently read his book, "Do You Love Football?!" He obviously has learned from many great football coaches, with experiences at Tennessee under Johnny Major and in the NFL with the Bill Walsh 49ers and Mike Holmgren Packers, to name a few. But here are the lessons he learned from Bob Knight and the Indiana Basketball Program when he was a ball boy, during the time his father was an assistant football coach at IU:

"Teach your players how to practice. That's even more important than teaching them what to practice, because if you don't establish the pace you want and if you aren't consistent about it, they're going to work the way they want to and it's going to change with each day. You have to let them know that you want them practicing hard, with a sense of purpose, every time."