Management As A Coaching Job
I'm Australian so please forgive me. Years ago, the first I heard of Joe Paterno was in a book about managers who inspire, lauding Paterno as a great model of corporate leadership. It is hardly surprising that the metaphor "manager as coach" has endured. Here are some business observations from a couple of seasons watching Paterno coach at Penn State.
Judy Olian
(Judy Olian is Dean of Penn State's Smeal College of Business and a leading expert in strategic human resources management.)
I'm Australian so please forgive me. Years ago, the first I heard of Joe Paterno was in a book about managers who inspire, lauding Paterno as a great model of corporate leadership. It is hardly surprising that the metaphor "manager as coach" has endured. Here are some business observations from a couple of seasons watching Paterno coach at Penn State.
1. Recruit and woo the best talent, don't hope to create it from scratch . Coaches spend years observing high school teams for good reason. The best route to a great team is to bring them in as a great team. Recruits may be raw, in need of significant development, but they must have natural talent because you can't teach an old dog to dance.
2. It's all about the team . Build a team that's much more than the sum of the parts. Spend time developing respect and appreciation for member strengths and differences. To quote Paterno*, "for a team to become excellent it has to overcome individual preferences and individual performances". The team has to believe that they are better because of each other.
3. Diversity of the team is an asset —every team has various positions and roles that are one-of-a-kind, making an essential contribution to the overall performance of the team. Diversity of talents is a major source of team excellence.
4. Managers (and coaches) must adapt their styles to fit each player , adjusting their teaching and motivating approaches to idiosyncrasies and dispositions of those they manage. One style does not fit all.
5. The best managers (coaches) segment responsibilities by skill and expertise , and help individual members of the team excel in their particular role. The cumulative result is a winning team. Another coach, Andy Reed of the Eagles, says the following, "What you do is you take that little 3x3 box that you're in and you master that box, so each guy doesn't have to be an All Star, they just have to be able to master their little box on the field. Then you can master that big box which is the actual football field" (St. Petersburg Times, December 31, 2000).
6. Morale of the team is the manager's (coach's) responsibility . Better morale means better team performance. Again Paterno, "You don't have to concern yourself with how a first stringer feels. The real test is whether the last substitute has good morale. If he has it, it means everybody has."
7. Prepare strategically and specifically for each competitor . No coach walks onto the field without understanding and anticipating the offensive, defensive, and special team plays of next week's opponent, which are different from the plays of last week's team. They target their plays to the particulars of the competitive situation, much like in business.
8. Don't dwell on the past, focus on the future . Or, using one of Paterno's most famous quotes, "the last play isn't important. It's the next play that's important." Constant criticism and recrimination about failures and losses are not going to inspire your team.
9. However, do review the last loss for improvement opportunities . Failures and losses are an important source of learning. Examining what went wrong and how to correct it—which is not the same as wallowing in failure—will be a valuable learning opportunity.
10. When the team is down at half, it's not necessarily out . It's a call to the manager (coach) to rise to the challenge and to inspire. That's where contagious enthusiasm and optimism come in, to re-ignite the team toward the shared goal and lift its vision from failure to success.
11. Managers must be willing to take risks —they can't lead their team into a project or assignment with fear of losing. However, risks taken must be informed, calculated, and practiced. Again, quoting Paterno, "If you are in this game and you are going to go out there and are afraid to get licked, then you are in the wrong business."
12. Manage relationships for the long haul . There is a tomorrow, and your team's competitor today may be your ally tomorrow. "I think you go out there to play to win and respect your opponent... You try to beat him and appreciate the fact that he has given his best to try and beat you. ...I don't think there is any need to embarrass anybody," says Paterno. Shifting business alliances that alternate between companies that compete against, and then partner with each other, call for healthy respect even in the heat of the game.
Yes, I am partial toward JoePa for more than football. There's a lot to be learned about managing and inspiring from those coaching teams from the sidelines. In business, as on the field, it's the team that plays the game.
*Paterno quotes from "Quotable Joe" by L. Budd Thalman, Towle House, 2000.
