Gridiron Leadership: Winning Strategies and Breakthrough Tactics 0313378177, 9780313378171

Citation preview

Gridiron Leadership

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GRIDIRON LEADERSHIP Winning Strategies and Breakthrough Tactics

Evan H. Offstein Jason M. Morwick Scott W. Griffith

Foreword by Art Rooney II

PRAEGER

An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC

Copyright 2009 by Evan H. Offstein, Jason M. Morwick, and Scott W. Griffith All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Offstein, Evan H., 1971– Gridiron leadership / Evan H. Offstein, Jason M. Morwick, and Scott W. Griffith. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-313-37817-1 (hard copy : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-313-37818-8 (ebook) 1. Football—United States. 2. Football players—United States—Conduct of life. 3. Leadership. I. Morwick, Jason M., 1972– II. Griffith, Scott W. III. Title. GV954.O44 2009 796.332092—dc22 2009020505 13 12

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This book is also available on the World Wide Web as an eBook. Visit www.abc-clio.com for details. ABC-CLIO, LLC 130 Cremona Drive, P.O. Box 1911 Santa Barbara, California 93116-1911 This book is printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America

Among all of the tributes that can be bestowed upon a person, the lasting legacy of the printed word in the form of a dedication is probably most fitting here. In our case, it is to the brother of one of the authors who recently died of cancer. It is with great respect that this book is dedicated to Gene Griffith, who died September 20, 2008, from colorectal cancer at the age of 49. He was a great friend, a great brother, and a great son. He was also a great competitor in the game of life and, of course, in the game of football. A person that didn’t know the word “quit.” A person whose deeds personified the words “courage, conviction, strength, and honor.” A person that is not remembered for how he died but how he lived. And although you are gone, my warrior brother, you will never be forgotten.

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CONTENTS

Foreword Art Rooney II Preface Acknowledgments Introduction: Learning from the Gridiron

xi xv xix xxiii

Chapter 1

Inspiration of the Individual The Habit of Losing Aim High! Everyone Is a Guardian Four Downs Contract Negotiations Play It Safe or Go for Two? Protecting the Quarterback Put the Team First Goal Line Stand?

1 2 3 5 7 8 10 12 13 15

Chapter 2

Power Rankings Old School Mix It Up Bottom of the Power Rankings Press Power Surge at the Line On the Shoulders of Greatness

19 19 20 22 23 25 27

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The Power of the Network Staying Power

30 32

Chapter 3

Franchise Players Skilled Position? Quick Reads Line Judge Winning Desire Commit to Stopping the Run Score a Lott Game Face Final Roster Cuts

35 35 37 38 39 41 43 44 49

Chapter 4

Big Upset Off the Roster Fantasy Football Under Review Postgame Interview Cleared to Play Beaten Deep Keeping It Simple

53 54 56 58 60 61 64 66

Chapter 5

Finalize the Roster Culture Clash Ready . . . Set . . . No! Identifying the Starting Lineup Ready and Willing? Flex That Muscle Putting It All Together

73 76 79 81 83 84 87

Chapter 6

The Call on the Field Stands After Further Review . . . Workout Warrior Second Guess the Coach Gridiron Commitment to the Extreme Comeback

91 92 93 96 99 102

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Spurred to Victory First Play of the Game Kneel Coach’s Call

103 107 108 110

Chapter 7

A Winning Strategy Running the Reverse Look for a Mismatch Game Changer Buddy Ball Halftime Adjustments Use Your Timeout Deep Threat No Huddle Offense Unanswered Points Closing Speed Option Attack

113 116 119 121 122 124 126 127 129 131 131 132

Chapter 8

Becoming a Playoff Team A True Patriot T.O. Locker Room Influence Blocking Assignment Signal Caller Special Teams T.O. Revisited Halfback or Fullback? Wildcard No Mistaken Identity Flying High

137 138 139 140 141 143 144 145 147 150 151 153

Chapter 9

A Culture of Winning Outside the Lines Buddy Ball Redux Game of Inches Offensive . . . Language

157 158 159 160 163

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Helmet Decals Tailgate Gone—But Not Forgotten Out of Bounds Start with the End in Mind Afterword: Postgame Analysis Index

164 167 169 170 171 175 181

FOREWORD

Gridiron Leadership strikes a chord with me. Hard to tease apart, this book hits home both personally and organizationally. In many ways, it reads like a recipe book. A recipe book that my grandfather started, that my dad followed, and that I now work on. It is a recipe book on how to dream, design, and build great organizations. And in many ways, the themes spelled out in this book are timeless. In fact, I’d argue that they’ll forever stand the test of time. Some leadership activities never go out of style—like building a great roster, setting the example, demonstrating character and integrity, knowing the competition, or communicating and caring for your teammates or employees or soldiers. It’s like Steel. It lasts. And it makes things strong. Gridiron Leadership also spoke to me regionally. At times, I wasn’t sure if it was calling me to think more deeply about the Steelers or more deeply about the region that the Rooney family has embraced and held dear for about a century. In that vein, this book reflects not just the very best of the Pittsburgh Steelers, it also calls attention to the special attributes of the region of western Pennsylvania. Evan, Jay, and Scott make a compelling case that the same characteristics that make an organization effective also make a community successful. Indeed, words like grit, toughness, tenacity, perseverance, teamwork, and caring have all been used to describe Pittsburgh and the surrounding area of Western Pennsylvania. As I turn the pages and reflect on the attributes of great leadership, I think about the importance of education and role modeling. The very essence of Gridiron Leadership I’ve heard before at places like Duquesne University, which champions a mission that challenges all students to learn with mind, heart, and spirit, and to build all goals on a strong moral foundation. As I said, this book speaks to me. And it will speak to you. xi

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Every now and then a book comes along that grounds us. That reminds us. Gridiron Leadership is unique because it reminded and reinforced for me what true leadership is all about. Evan, Jay, and Scott also remind us that while football may be entertainment to some, it is so much more about leadership, discipline, management, and execution. There’s a great chance that after reading this, you’ll never approach leadership in the same way. But I’d also argue that you’ll never see or watch the game of football the same way either. What most see on Saturday or Sunday afternoons is really the proverbial tip of the iceberg. The management skills and leadership talent that is required in the off-season and during the week to achieve a victory on Sunday is often ignored and sometimes forgotten. Gridiron Leadership never lets you forget that the victory on Sunday is gained only through tremendous and exacting leadership skills. And it would be folly to think otherwise. Great management, great coaches, skilled and talented players—all working together—produce victories. Much of that game planning, the strategy, the tactics, and the long-term planning occur where the media cannot see. Evan, Jay, and Scott offer a credible and compelling glimpse of how to produce victories. After reading Gridiron Leadership, you’ll know that football (or any organizational activity) is much ado about human resource management. Recruiting. Hiring. Promoting. Firing. Training. Performance evaluation. Great organizations can do all of those things better than their rivals. The things that I liked best about this book were the chapters on innovation, strategy, decision-making, and culture building—the building blocks of a sustainable competitive advantage. Any owner, any group of fans, any coach wants to win consistently over time. The true hallmark of a legacy is a body of work in which there are more wins than losses. We live in a world of short attention spans and of immediate gratification. Predictably, neither of those attributes will ever amount to a sustainable competitive advantage. Instead, you need what Evan, Jay, and Scott prescribe: a spirit of innovation, creativity, and continual improvement. Strong, consistent, and sophisticated decisionmaking. A good strategy, and an even better game plan. More than anything, though, you need a culture of winning. Better than about any other book I’ve read, Gridiron Leadership spells out the importance of creating and fostering high-performance cultures. Even more, the authors tell you step-by-step how to do it. This book will not surprise you. And in fact, the lessons that flow from the text are all lessons that many of us learned directly or indirectly on the football field, baseball diamond, or hard court. What

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makes it a great read and an effective tool is that it is a testament to how inextricably linked sports, in general, and football, in particular, are to leadership. They made the case. And it cannot be argued against. Sports matter. They develop us. Lastly, Evan and Jay are both West Point graduates and veterans. Scott is a decorated law enforcement officer. As I read through Gridiron Leadership, I got the sense that these men can walk the talk. They’ve been through the crucible and know how to roll up their sleeves to lead out front. Endorsing this book with me are also General Raymond Odierno and Sergeant Major of the Army Kenneth Preston. Like great football coaches, but much more so, these two men know a thing or two about leading under and during difficult and dangerous situations and circumstances. Their selfless spirit and thirst to lead is an example for us all to follow. So, do as I did and enjoy Gridiron Leadership. You’ll be a better leader for doing so. Art Rooney II President, Pittsburgh Steelers

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PREFACE

Every year around the same time, a serious pall sets in. A stupor like no other. A state of depression so severe that no medication, social support, or medical intervention can make a dent in our sadness. As is often the case, misery loves company, so we began to ask around to see whether other people suffered the same malady that we did at about the same time every year. We wish we could say that we’re surprised at what we found, but we weren’t. Using the best scientific and statistical tools available, we believe that approximately 59 million adults suffer our melancholy. We’ve heard people take off work, stay indoors, resort to drink at 8:00 a.m., and refuse correspondence with friends and family. All because the Super Bowl has ended, which means the end of the football season has arrived. With many, a state of severe and solid denial sets in. It means watching Steve Sabol and NFL Films on a continuous loop. It means trying to get excited by Arena football. It means trying to get motivated for baseball. If it weren’t for March Madness and the NCAA basketball tournament, people would do harm to themselves. Sure, football is tough and vicious. But it’s also uniquely American. It’s about the underdog, the upset, the dynasties, the tradition, and the theatre of top-shelf competition. It bonds people together and creates a community even in our iPod-toting era of quiet independence. Football is a game of execution, of hope, and of luck. For that reason and many more, millions upon millions celebrate what could happen and what does happen on any given Sunday. We feel, however, that the playing and watching of football is more than entertainment. It offers us lessons. Deep lessons. Strong lessons. Lasting lessons. All three of us benefited from playing and watching xv

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football from an early age. For such a brutal and vicious and violent game, it sure seems to give quite a bit. From football, we learned teamwork. We learned camaraderie. We learned performing our assignment with a sense of duty that speaks to benefiting the team over the individual. We learned about discipline. We learned about coping with pain. We learned about getting up, dusting ourselves off. We learned to play hurt. We learned how to lose and to get better from losing. We learned to depend on others. We learned how to learn so we weren’t fooled twice. We learned to anticipate. We learned how to marry instinct and analysis to improve execution. We learned to follow. We learned how to motivate. We learned how to respond to an attack. We learned that sometimes in life you had to go on the offense. At other times, defense. We learned what it meant to play by the rules. We learned how to compete under the honorable umbrella of sportsmanship. We learned to have fun—even while enduring the pain that accompanies top performance. We learned, above all else, how to compete and contribute in the great field other than sports—how to work within and make better our team, our organization, and our society. Meet any leader in any community and we bet that sports, in general, and football, in particular, helped shaped their personal leader development.* The idea for Gridiron Leadership, as crazy and corny as this sounds, came from a bout of this depression after the 2007 season ended with the New York Giants winning the Super Bowl over the heavily favored New England Patriots. After this most memorable of Super Bowls, we all got together and commiserated over the oncoming dead space that is known to many as the off-season. It was during this time that we realized how much the game of football really gave to us, what it meant to us, and how it literally offered a textbook education on how to live and on how to compete. That is what this book is. It is a how-to leadership book wrapped in a zone blitz, disguised as a Hail Mary pass, or concealed in a Bubble Screen. That’s precisely what made this book so enjoyable to write (and hopefully so enjoyable to read); it’s like football in that we learned so many lessons almost through osmosis. We learned but never *For the personal examples used throughout this book, and the stories you would not be able to find in the headlines or by watching ESPN, we took the liberty of altering and adjusting the times, names, places, and contexts in which the stories take place or when the principles were originally revealed. All of the stories are grounded in truth, but some literary license is used to either protect reputations or more strongly and readily convey a point.

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really realized it until it was over. Unlike many classrooms and lectures, where the learning is in your face or pedantic, football is anything but. It is learning by doing and in a way that seems to be so much more enjoyable than opening up a textbook on leadership. After all, it is this game that has provided some of the greatest and worst leadership lessons that we’ve ever encountered. Although all three of us have been on the receiving end of millions of dollars of leadership development and hours upon hours of leadership training, the most meaningful training that seemed to really embed was the training found between the hash marks. So, celebrate with us. And as any good fan would do, we ask you to root for our message or root against it. Send your applause and boos to us at the Web site www.gridironleaders.com. And don’t despair; the off-season seems to go by fast. There’s always next year.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

First down always begins with families. With that, we’d like to offer cheers from the crowd for our families. For Evan that includes Laura, Madison, and Molly. For Jason that includes Christa, Ainslee, and Maston. For Scott, that includes Jennifer, Patrick, Taylor, and Wyatt. Thinking through and then writing a book requires so much fan support. We’re lucky since our greatest fans appear to be the ones closest to us. Second, third, and fourth downs don’t go well if you can’t get some good gains on the first. Thankfully, our families made sure that our first down started strong. For their support, we offer both our thanks and love. The three of us always wanted to be good players, and, even better, coaches. For that miracle to occur, a roster of supremely talented individuals had to join our roster in one way or the other. Below are just some of the leaders and coaches that have impacted how we thought, saw, or practiced leadership. Later in the book, we argue that a great player is supported by a tremendous roster. Below, you’ll find a listing of All-Pro and Pro-Bowlers that we are truly humbled to play with and for. We’d be remiss to say that most, if not all, of the leaders mentioned below made the serious game of leadership fun. In short, we are indebted to those below who continue to shape how we study, see, and practice leadership. There is no better first string anywhere. So, we offer thanks to the following: Alan Offstein, Patti Offstein, Jody Offstein, Al and Bernice Offstein, Sean Mikula, Brett Sciotto, Jeff Golan, Ed Sudzina, Mike Dugan, Art Callaham, Barb Buehl, Lee Fiedler, Danny Arnold, Mike Monahan, Del Pedew, Colleen Peterson, Pat Mifsud, Tony Wright, Rick Stafford, Bob Maricich, General Jerrold Allen, John Gould, Tom Arnold, Ryan Janovic, Todd Uterstaedt, Doug Savage, Ahmad Tootoonchi, Michael Monahan, Kevin Govern, John xix

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Rhodes, Arthur Jones, Chris Harmon, Lowell Yarusso, John Spears, Kevin Shuba, Blair Tiger, Sara Gaba, Kerri Adams, Jonathan Gibralter, Tom Hawk, Quincy Crawford, Ralph Jordan, Mike Condrey, Jeffrey Blavatt, Tom Mastaglio, Bob Millward, Jack Hansen, Jason Schroeder, Teddy Williams, Toshi Desaki, Jeff Beamon, TJ Morrelli, Brian Joy, Larry McGhee, Steve Paulin, Jeanie Seifarth, Mark Sullivan, Bill Forster, Tom Grubbe, Tom Lamb, Eric Hutchings, Gary Levenson, Tom Ryan, John Van Alstyne, Dick Cummins, Devi Gnyawali, Terry Cobb, Donald Hatfield, John Winn, Kevin Carlson, Jeffrey Arthur, Steve Childers, Bill Stringer, “Rock” Roszak, Mike Garner, Gloria HarrellCook, Bill Younger, Ron Dufresne, David Harney, Claudia Ferrante, Barry Ronan, Debra Orner, Don Battista, Cynthia Cycyota, Russ Haynie, John Hodson, David Jones, Ray Kniphuisen, Jeff Snyder, Sue Head, Mike Min, Tom Dowdell, Al Moore, Lisa Cesnick, Bill and Robin Seddon, Alan and Carol Heft, John Walsh, Vic Martina, Brian Cameron, Nancy Rice, Tim Anderson, Chris Whitehurst, Gil Valadez, Jill Fox, Joe Litley, Ed Deutschlander, Robert Vedra, Susan Bogan, Liza Dorsey, Shaun Bradley, Sean Carroll, Connie Kallback, Mike Yankovich, Chris Crane, Jeff Leischner, Catherine Conley, Pauli Overdorff and Allen Silverstein, Rick and Linda Morwick, Keri Smith, Wayne Smith, Robert Nelson, Peter Stelling, John Griffith, Donna Griffith, Chris and Deane LaDelfa, Nick Canada, Doug Deleaver, Tim Day, Dave Heffermon, Mike Crews, Dr. Nancy Wyant, Bob Burandt, Bill Westfall, Eric Chudziak, Paul Christman, Evan Berry, The Men and Women of Law Enforcement, The Men and Women of The Cape Coral Fire Department, Hope Hospice, Dr. Alex Rodi, Jim Bloom, Grant Alley, James Riggs, Jim Tyree, John Makholm, Mike Brave, Mike Stuff, Steve Tuttle, and Dr. Charlie Meslo. Jeff Olson’s title at Praeger reads Senior Acquisitions Editor. To us, he was that and much more. In short, Jeff was our Assistant Coach. He was the Offensive, Defensive, and Special Teams Coordinator. A Johnny-on-the-spot persona, Jeff was always available for any reason. His cool, Landry-like demeanor provided us with both technical and emotional support as we worked on this book. Book writing is and never will be easy. Few people do it. With that said, it would be a ton more enjoyable and easier if every senior editor was like Jeff Olson. We don’t have a game ball to offer. But if we did, we’d offer it to Jeff Olson. He’s incredibly deserving. Between the three of us, we’ve got three books, about 30 journal publications, and somewhere upwards of 100 leadership presentations behind us. Of all the leadership projects that we’ve worked on, this one may just have been the most enjoyable. It gave us the opportunity to

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think and reflect on a game that we truly love and believe is impactful of our professional development. More important, it gave us the opportunity to reflect back on all of our personal and professional coaches who’ve shaped our lives to such a degree that it would be impossible to document. More than anything, football is about a game of people working together. When we think back to those that we’ve worked with and for and who also developed us, we are in awe. If we could, we’d shine the Friday Night football lights on each and every one of you and all of your achievements since your achievements and learning became our learning and achievements. We can’t do that. Instead, we can only say thank you. Thank you.

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INTRODUCTION: LEARNING FROM THE GRIDIRON

Upon the fields of friendly strife are sown the seeds that, upon other fields, on other days, will bear the fruits of victory. —General Douglas MacArthur As a second-year doctoral student down at Virginia Tech, one of the authors had the good pleasure, or terrible misfortune, to take some newly admitted doctoral candidates on a tour of the Virginia Tech library. As they were nearing the end of the orientation, one of the new doctoral students, only weeks separated from his native India, remarked, “Americans are deeply religious people.” Unsure what to say, the author mustered a thank you. “You all worship an animal!” he shot back, a sly smirk emerging. A couple of the other international students stopped, unaware of this young man’s intention or direction. Not everyone sensed the joke coming from this young, brilliant, and highly observant, man. “Sorry, but I’m not quite following you. In America, Sunday tends to be a day of worship for many people. But, no animals.” “You worship skinpig!” he laughed. Over the course of several years, one of the authors grew very close with this brilliant mind from outside of Calcutta, Manish Srivastava, as the two navigated their business strategy studies together. But on that Sunday in the library, he made an observation that really doubled as a truth. In the United States, we may not worship skinpig, but we do hold dear the pigskin and all things football. It never ceased to amaze Manish that in the fall, Sundays were a day of anticipation and celebration made whole by the National Football League. Millions would tune in, and thousands upon thousands would enter enormous stadiums and coliseums to watch and live the game of football. Indeed, even many baseball purists acknowledge that the great American pastime is xxiii

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no longer baseball. It is football. And the fabric of sports, in general, and football, in particular, is woven into every facet of our lives to include business and organizational life. During recent speaking and consulting engagements, more and more people have asked us to speculate or comment on how leadership training and strategy development could be improved. Their concern is well founded. With so many leadership and strategy books out there all seemingly saying the same or similar thing, we need a new, fresh approach to capture and understand the concepts and practice of leadership, strategy, and execution. More often than not, we’ve relied on sports and the sports metaphor to communicate or drive home a point during coaching sessions. Metaphors are powerful learning devices that accelerate learning and understanding. The sports metaphor is particularly potent since it is a common thread that, taken together, forms the fabric of American culture and shared experiences. It’s a common platform for so many of today’s leaders and managers. This book is our attempt to bridge the gap and link the lessons people already know from growing up in and around sports so that they can better apply these lessons to their own organization and specific situation. One of the surefire ways to enhance learning is to pair a concept with a related concept that we love. And there are few things we love as much as football. For example, one senior HR manager had difficulty understanding Human Capital recruiting strategy. In the course of the discussion, the inevitable point of recruiting for need versus “best available” arose. To cement his understanding, we used a sports metaphor, and turned to the New Orleans Saints and Houston Texans. In the 2006 NFL Draft, Reggie Bush, a widely known and critically acclaimed Heisman Trophy Winner from the University of Southern California, was touted as the best available player in the draft. The Houston Texans, who picked first in that draft, drafted for organizational need and chose not to recruit and select the best player available. Instead, they chose the much less-regarded and heralded Mario Williams, a defensive end out of North Carolina State. The New Orleans Saints, who picked second, quickly snagged Reggie Bush despite having at least four running backs on their roster. Two of those running backs were well regarded and consistent performers, Deuce McAllister (four 1,000-yard rushing seasons out of a possible seven) and Fred McAfee. The two strategies are markedly different. The Saints drafted “best available” and the Texans drafted for organizational need. The personal and organizational consequences are real; time has lent some support to the Texans’ strategy of recruiting and selecting for organizational need. Williams started almost immediately, played extensively, and has seen his performance dramatically improve

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over his first couple of seasons. Williams had 14 sacks in 2007 and ended the 2008 season with 12 sacks.1 Small sports story but large learning lesson. THE GRIDIRON LEADER Many skeptics may question the validity of comparing football to other aspects of life. Is it really that similar? More specifically, is leadership on a football field really the same as in the corporate boardroom, in an inner-city nonprofit organization, or on a faraway battlefield? In many cases, the answer is a simple, yes. The fundamentals of leadership don’t change, regardless of the landscape. We opened with a quote not from a famous coach or player, but from a historical figure that also believed in the relevance of learning leadership on the athletic field. Shortly after World War I, Douglas MacArthur was appointed as Superintendent of the United States Military Academy at West Point. MacArthur was charged with revitalizing West Point and ensuring its graduates were better prepared for future challenges. In addition to changes in academics and military training, MacArthur instituted an “every cadet, an athlete” policy.2 He expanded the intercollegiate athletic program and mandated intramural sports for all cadets, a requirement that exists to this day. To understand more how Gridiron Leadership parallels leadership in real life, we need to have a basic understanding of the definition of leadership. Almost any textbook nowadays will provide a simplified definition of leadership, defining it as the ability to influence others toward a common goal. However, we would argue that this common definition doesn’t capture the essence of leadership. Leaders don’t just influence others, they build teams. Leaders create a culture of achievement. They remove barriers to success and develop the members of their organization to reach new heights. Leaders influence others toward a common goal not only through motivation, incentives, or force, but by creating a vision and strategy. This type of leadership is seen every day on the gridiron. We’ll prove it to you. When thinking about past leaders of the game, you may think of great quarterbacks such as Joe Montana, John Elway, Dan Marino, or Johnny Unitas. How many leaders would want to be able to perform in clutch situations, like Elway did in the 98-yard game-tying drive of the 1987 AFC Championship game?3 Who wouldn’t appreciate the calmness of “Joe Cool” Montana as he led his team to 31 fourth quarter come-from-behind wins?4 And who wouldn’t want Joe Namath-like self-confidence, such as when Namath guaranteed a victory over the

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heavily favored Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III? However, leaders, like athletes, come in all forms. Just remember Sonny Jurgensen. You may be asking yourself, Sonny who? You wouldn’t be alone. Many fans have forgotten about one of the greatest passers of all time. Drafted in 1957, Jurgensen spent his first four years as a backup quarterback with the Philadelphia Eagles. During his first starting season in 1961, Jurgensen set two NFL records, passing for 3,723 yards and 32 touchdowns. Six years later, he shattered his own passing record with a total of 3,747 yards while playing for the Washington Redskins. He would later go on to lead the league in passing yards five times (tying Dan Marino), be selected for the Pro Bowl five times, and would win three NFL individual passing titles.5 Remarkably, Jurgensen was only 5foot-11 and played in an era when the defense had fewer restrictions than a modern day cage match. Yet, Jurgensen’s professionalism stands out as much as his individual achievements. When Redskins coach George Allen decided to start the younger Billy Kilmer in the early 1970s, preferring Kilmer’s conservative style of play versus Jurgensen’s more risky approach, fans and spectators became deeply divided. However, Jurgensen never publicly displayed any signs of discontent and openly helped Kilmer. The history of football is full of heroes like Sonny Jurgensen. We tend to remember the flashy players or coaches, or those that can generate the best sound bite. But it’s not always the coach on the sideline yelling and screaming that has the biggest impact on the players or the outcome of the game. Game-winning plays are not usually done in dramatic fashion despite what we may believe by watching the highlight reel on ESPN SportsCenter. Although we will touch on many known and relatively obscure athletes, the game of football provides countless examples to learn from. The Gridiron Leader is also a coach. Coaching has been in the management lexicon of late. Nowhere can we learn more about leadership and management than by looking at some of the greatest coaches in football. Who would deny the oft-quoted Lombardi a space with other great leaders, regardless of profession? There is much to be learned from winning coaches such as Bear Bryant, Don Shula, Bill Parcells, and Joe Paterno. Coaches deal with and manage a variety of stakeholders. Whether it’s the players, agents, owners, NFL rules committee, or the media, these stakeholders are complex, vocal, and powerful. To coach, lead, and execute with all of these stakeholders breathing down your neck is difficult. This is true for managers in almost any organization. Today’s managers don’t just deal with supervisors, subordinates, and peers. They

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also have to balance external stakeholders, whether it’s customers, partners, government agencies, the media, or the public. Coaches learn to lead under the greatest of microscopes. Fans, pundits, players, owners—all question their moves, their strategies. The spotlight is bright and the criticism is clear and always forthcoming. Their decisions can be second guessed by Monday morning quarterbacks and can be replayed incessantly. With the rise of technology, today’s organizational leader is equally under the microscope via bloggers on the Internet or 24/7 news services. To lead and manage under these circumstances is quite difficult. We can show you how the best coaches manage these stakeholders under challenging circumstances and how you can too. In short, football is akin to a classroom on the field that will help you improve your leadership skills and abilities. At the NFL level and among the collegiate ranks, the competition is fierce. It is ultra competitive. Every week, every season, rivals are trying to get better, to improve. There’s no such thing as the status quo. There’s no such thing as an off-season. Competition can (and does) come from many angles and directions. Ever hear about closing speed? Did you know that the NFL quarterback must make approximately four “reads” within a single second and then make and execute that decision? Football in the NFL and college is a game of seconds. It is fast paced. Things can change with a tick of the clock. In organizational life, regardless if it’s the military, business, or nonprofit, the same can be said. Today’s world offers a global marketplace with competition that comes 24/7 from across continents. Leaders must make quick reads. Evaluate, assess, decide, and execute. How coaches prepare and handle competition can teach us a great deal about how to deal with rivals here and abroad. Make no mistake, the rewards and stakes are high. Losers get fired. Winners get to stay for now. In this faced-paced, ultra-competitive environment, there are lessons that we learn about survival and success. Like business or the military or government, it is a what-have-youdone-for-me-lately environment. Just ask Mike Shanahan. Shanahan coached the Denver Broncos to two back-to-back Super Bowl victories in 1997 and 1998 but was fired in 2008 for failing to make the playoffs for the third consecutive year. In both college and the NFL, records are fleeting and high levels of performance are necessary week-in, weekout, and season-in, season-out. Does this context of high expectations and immediate gratification sound familiar to you? The cases we will examine will help you learn to deal with it and thrive in these circumstances.

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TALENT IS NOT ENOUGH If you are like us and believe in what Howard Cosell once said, “Sports is human life in microcosm,” then you may begin to believe that football provides an excellent platform to study leadership. But you may be asking yourself a much broader question: Can leadership even be taught? Is leadership like athletic ability, a genetic gift that some have and others don’t? Watching college and professional football on any given weekend would lead one to believe that the talent that propels one to the top is something one is born with. However, the history of the NFL is full of talented athletes that never achieved their full potential. In the early 1990s, no one considered the New England Patriots a serious threat. The team’s only trip to the Super Bowl in 1986 was a dismal loss against the Chicago Bears, 46-10. For the next seven seasons the Patriots spiraled down, amassing a record of 42-69, and only winning nine total games from 1990 to 1992.6 In 1993, newly hired head coach Bill Parcells and quarterback Drew Bledsoe were the answer the franchise was looking for. Bledsoe, an All-American for the Washington State Cougars, was the number-one overall draft pick in the 1993 NFL Draft. At 6-foot-5 and over 230 pounds, Bledsoe was an impressive individual. He was known for his powerful arm, throwing 4,555 yards in his second season; he would go on to average 3,701 per season for the next six years.7 After his second season with the Pats, he was the youngest quarterback ever to play in the Pro Bowl. Despite these stats, a Super Bowl victory eluded Bledsoe. Although he was on the roster for Super Bowl XXXVI, Bledsoe was relegated to the sidelines after missing most of the regular season due to an injury received in the second game of the season. Even after being traded to the Buffalo Bills and later to the Dallas Cowboys, Bledsoe had difficulty in the postseason. After an inconsistent beginning to the 2006 season, he was moved to the backup quarterback position and replaced by Tony Romo. Simply stated, talent may help an individual or a team, but it’s not enough. Great football players, like great leaders, continually practice, prepare, and learn to improve through their experiences. It’s the countless repetitions on the field, the time spent sweating in the gym, the numerous hours studying the films, and the never-ending lessons learned on game day that make players truly great. This is not to say that Bledsoe didn’t possess a strong work ethic and commitment. He did. There is no doubt that Drew Bledsoe was a good quarterback. However, the sheer volume of his numbers in terms of passing

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completion, attempts, and yards just wasn’t enough to guarantee a team championship. Individual stats and numbers will always be part of the game and, to some degree, a measuring stick when it comes to individual and team success, but it isn’t winning. They are not the same and should never be confused. Contrast the start of Drew Bledsoe’s career with his replacement, Tom Brady. Brady was a sixth-round draft pick in the 2000 NFL draft and was a fourth-string QB behind Bledsoe and backups John Friesz and Michael Bishop. When Brady started at the University of Michigan, he was seventh on the depth chart and had to struggle to move up to become the backup to Brian Griese. Brady became so frustrated at one point that he considered transferring.8 A few years later, Brady would find himself starting after Bledsoe was injured during the second game of the 2001 season from a hit delivered by Jets linebacker Mo Lewis. Brady would lead the team to the Super Bowl and return three more times over the next few years. Brady is now regarded as one of the best quarterbacks of all time with three Super Bowl championships, one NFL MVP, two Super Bowl MVPs, four invitations to the Pro Bowl, the NFL record for most touchdown passes in a single regular season, and the fourth highest career passing rating of all time.9 Without a doubt, Brady may be one of the most talented ball players to walk the gridiron. However, it was more than simple genetics that propelled Brady to the top spots at Michigan and New England. Brady may have fit better with Coach Bill Belichick’s strategy or matched up better with the strengths and weaknesses of the offensive line. Or, Brady may have been a better decision-maker or executed plays better. As we will discuss throughout this book, there are numerous variables to success. If Brady’s path to greatness doesn’t make you believe that it takes more than just talent to make it to the top, then think of New York Jets receiver, Wayne Chrebet. Growing up in New Jersey, Chrebet’s high school coach nicknamed him “Mush” because of Chrebet’s habit of talking fast, a result of his low self-confidence.10 Chrebet went on to play at Hofstra University, but was not drafted by any team in the NFL after graduation. When he finally did earn a walk-on opportunity with the Jets, he barely made it past the front gate. A security guard didn’t believe the 5-foot-10, 185-pound Chrebet was an actual football player and almost refused to let him into training camp.11 This was nothing new to Chrebet, who had been stopped many times in life by people telling him he was too small or too slow to play professional football. By the time Chrebet retired 11 seasons later, he had amassed 580 receptions and 7,365 yards from scrimmage, ranking him 2nd and 5th respectively in the Jets record books. Chrebet’s story is the proverbial

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underdog story, but the history of football is filled with similar cases. The message for all leaders is that we all can improve; we can all reach goals beyond expectations through dedication, determination, and constant effort. This book offers insight to put it all together—how leaders can refine their skills, learn from the experiences of others, and continually improve to ultimately become better leaders. CREATING YOUR PERSONAL LEGACY Ultimately, the greatest legacy a leader can create is a dynasty. A string of good or great seasons. A reputation that endures through time. The benchmark for high performance. The hard-to-beat team that is emulated by everyone else. In business jargon, it is called a sustainable competitive advantage. A textbook would likely define sustainable competitive advantage as getting better-than-average returns over time or consistently beating rivals over the years. A dynasty is really the organizational or team manifestation of the concept of competitive advantage. Football is filled with great dynasties. Paul Brown’s Cleveland Browns from 1946 to 1955, the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1974 to 1979, or the popular Dallas Cowboys from 1992 to 1995, to name just a few. In all of these examples, the coaches did not build a sustainable competitive advantage based on one player or one innovative play. Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers, a great dynasty from 1961 to 1967, did not achieve greatness due to quarterback Bart Starr or because Lombardi introduced zone blocking. It was due to a combination of success factors including the selection of key players such as Starr and running backs Jim Taylor, Carroll Dale, and Paul Hornung. It was also a result of Lombardi’s rigorous training regimen that demanded absolute perfection. It was Lombardi’s ability to motivate his players, such as when the Packers defeated the Cowboys in –13 degree weather during the infamous Ice Bowl of 1967. We could go on. A sustainable competitive advantage stems from the leader’s ability to combine strategy and execution. Game plans are not and never will be enough. Plenty of people have great ideas, but few can actually execute. In Gridiron Leadership, we learn to marry the two—strategy and execution. If learning both sides of the equation is important to you, your team, or your organization, then the game of football will provide the perfect laboratory to study where this comes together to create success. The organizational world, like football, is loaded with examples of leaders that successfully created a sustainable competitive advantage.

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At General Electric during the Jack Welch era, no one could dispute GE’s corporate dynasty. From 1981 to 1998, GE’s market value increased from $12 billion to $280 billion.12 Welch instituted numerous changes at the conglomerate, and it was no surprise that executives initially pushed back. They struggled with trying to manage for the long-term while being forced to meet short-term results. To Welch, it would be easy to focus on strategy or execution alone, but he expected his leaders to do both. He jettisoned businesses that could not meet his mantra of being number one or two in their respective markets. He continually purged the company of bottom performers. However, he spent the majority of his time coaching the next generation of leaders, building a stronger team. He was not content to stay in the executive offices in Fairfield, Connecticut, and instead chose to remain actively engaged on the sidelines, coaching and cheerleading for the business. The dismissal of complacency and the refusal to be content with the status quo are two powerful drivers of sustainable competitive advantage. How do you get there? How do you become a Gridiron Leader and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage for you, your team or organization and, eventually, earn the moniker—dynasty? You will do this by mastering the concepts that we will discuss in detail: motivating individuals, developing people, building a competitive team, understanding rivals, vigilance, discipline, honing decisionmaking skills, crafting a winning strategy, and more. You must do it all—not just focusing on some aspects to reach the end zone. A ROADMAP—WHAT’S IN THIS BOOK Gridiron Leadership is exclusively an application book that will improve a leader’s strategy development and ability to drive execution with proven techniques you may already know from football but may not have yet applied to your own work/life situation. Football, like organizational life, is sequentially interdependent. That is, it marries basic concepts with the more complex. Before you can get into complex offensive or defensive schemes, you must master the basics, such as blocking and tackling. We will start off the discussion by touching on the fundamentals of leadership, such as motivation and understanding the leader’s basis of influence. From the basics, we will charge ahead into building a strong roster of team members and the importance of character. You will then be ready for more advanced concepts of selecting the right talent, decision-making, strategy development, and creating and sustaining a high performance organizational culture.

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Here is an overview of what lies ahead: • Chapter 1: Inspiration of the Individual. Winning starts with the individual. To build winning teams and long-lasting, high-performing organizations, leaders must first start with building high-performing individuals. The charge, then, for leaders is to get the most out of their teams through inspiration and motivation. This chapter highlights some classic and more progressive tactics and strategies to motivate all kinds of people who serve in all kinds of positions. • Chapter 2: Power Rankings. All leaders wield power in one form or another. Power is the atomic unit of leadership that allows leaders to influence others and exert control over behavior. Without power, leaders can’t get things done. However, power comes from many sources. In this chapter, we explore the various sources of power and how leaders can create, build, and foster their power base. • Chapter 3: Franchise Players. Leadership, like the game of football, is not an individual activity. To accomplish the goal, leaders rely on the collective strength of the group or team. Winning will always begin and end with people. Leaders must first identify skilled, intelligent, responsible players who have the desire and commitment to achieve objectives. Identifying, selecting, and developing the best individuals are the building blocks for high-performing teams. • Chapter 4: Big Upset. We cannot discuss leadership without mentioning the importance of character. A leader must ensure that character, honor, and integrity exist throughout the organization. There is no such thing as an off-season when it comes to character. Leaders and their teams must exercise sound judgment on and off the field. Leaders must also protect their group’s reputation—a valuable, hard, and real asset. • Chapter 5: Finalize the Roster. Building off the previous two chapters, we discuss the final elements to putting together an all-star roster. Moving beyond individual abilities and character, we highlight the importance of selecting individuals that fit into specific jobs, who are aligned to the organization’s values and strategy. We’ll also probe topics around a team player’s readiness, willingness, and adaptability to fill different roles in the organization. • Chapter 6: The Call on the Field Stands. Up to this point, we’ve talked about motivating the individual, power, and the importance of building a high-performing team. These incredibly important themes serve as the last line of defense before execution—decision-making.

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Throughout this chapter, we discuss some decision-making tools and landmines to be aware of. • Chapter 7: A Winning Strategy. This chapter examines what happens when organizations develop and execute a coherent strategy versus those that don’t. Leaders are ultimately responsible for developing strategy. And a good strategy can be a game changer. We will discuss several examples from a variety of organizations and how you can apply these concepts to your own strategy development. • Chapter 8: Becoming a Playoff Team. Most winning organizations make the leap from a collection of individual efforts to a team that can execute perfectly together. The very best teams are able to create a collective mind where team members know their own role but, more importantly, know the role of the team members to the left, right, upstream, and downstream and how their performance affects the greater whole. We’ll detail in this chapter on how to improve team decision-making and execution along with improving team creativity and innovation. • Chapter 9: A Culture of Winning. We conclude with a discussion on how leaders can create a winning dynasty. Behind each dynasty and central to its continuation is the force and power of organizational culture. In this chapter, we highlight how great coaches, players, and owners develop, maintain, and, even change their culture. More important, through the use of football cases both recent and past, we build a link between culture and performance. NOTES 1. NFL Web site, http://www.nfl.com/players/mariowilliams/profile?id=WIL431243 (accessed March 13, 2009). 2. Theodore J. Crackel, West Point: A Bicentennial History (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003). 3. ESPN Web site, http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/classic/bio/news/story?page=Elway_ John (accessed March 13, 2009). 4. All Sports Web site, http://www.allsports.com/players/joe-montana/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 5. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/J/JurgSo00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 6. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ teams/nwe/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 7. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/B/BledDr00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009).

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8. Sports Illustrated Web site, Lee Jenkins, http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/ 2008/writers/lee_jenkins/01/30/tombrady/index.html (accessed March 14, 2009). Please also see: Nick Cafardo, The Impossible Team: The Worst to First Patriot’s Super Bowl Season (New York: Triumph Books, 2002), and Charles P. Pierce, Moving the Chains: Tom Brady and the Pursuit of Everything (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007). 9. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/B/BradTo00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 10. Rafael Hermoso, “Garfield’s Chrebet Hopes to Impress Jets,” The Record, May 4, 1995, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-22475068.html (accessed February 13, 2009). 11. Wayne Chrebet and Vic Carucci, Every Down, Every Distance: My Journey to the NFL (New York: Doubleday, 1999). 12. John A. Byren, “How Jack Welch Runs GE.” BusinessWeek, June 8, 1998, http://www.businessweek.com/1998/23/b3581001.htm (accessed February 13, 2009).

1 INSPIRATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL

She’s coming along. —Bill Parcells With the seventh pick in the 1996 National Football League (NFL) draft, the New England Patriots selected Ohio State speedster, Terry Glenn. Then-coach Bill Parcells probably wasn’t enthused about spending a high pick like that on a wide receiver, which Parcells thought could be snagged in a later round for a cheaper price. Almost at the end of training camp, a reporter asked Coach Parcells how the rookie receiver was doing. Without missing a beat and without a second passing, Parcells smiled and said, “She’s coming along.”1 The room full of sports reporters broke out laughing. The joke was on Terry Glenn, or so we thought. Terry Glenn would use his coach’s comment as a motivational factor for the remainder of the season. Some in the sports arena credit this one remark for motivating Terry Glenn to shed his previous reputation as an injury prone, prima donna. Glenn finished a remarkable rookie season recording 90 receptions for 1,132 yards and six touchdowns. Maybe more important, he helped his team reach Super Bowl XXXI. At the time, his 90 receptions were the most ever for a rookie in a single season. He finished second in Rookie of the Year voting behind his former Ohio State teammate, running back Eddie George.2 Clearly, though, Parcells touched a nerve that caused Glenn to perform and to play tough, even hurt. In the final game of the regular season in which the Patriots had to win to earn a playoff bye, they were down to Parcells’s former team, the New York Giants, 22-0. And then Glenn got hurt and suffered a hip pointer. The trainers and coaching staff offered to sit him the rest of the game. He refused. Eight catches 1

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and 124 yards later, the Patriots won an improbable 23-22 victory. Several years later, Parcells would ask Glenn to join the Dallas Cowboys. With Parcells again as his coach, Glenn led the Cowboys receiving corps in touchdowns for 2003 and 2005. The lesson of this story is one that is often told, but seldom executed. Not everyone is motivated by the same factors, and the best leaders know the triggers, needs, and sparks that motivate some but not others. Clearly, Parcells knew what would move Glenn in the right direction and then provided the spark to light his fire. The approach Parcells used would obviously not work for all players or in all situations, but it was effective for Glenn.

Moving the Chains

Great leaders know what motivates their players. It isn’t always the same triggers, and the very best leaders know what buttons to push and which ones to avoid.

Although we will discuss some common principles that should apply across situations and across individuals, the beginning lesson is not one of commonness. Rather, it is a lesson of uniqueness and uncommonness. Leaders know and come to understand the different motivations behind people’s performance. THE HABIT OF LOSING Do you remember Rich Kotite? If you live in Philly or New York, you probably need life-saving medical intervention after reading his name. Kotite was the former head football coach of the Philadelphia Eagles and the New York Jets. Kotite was remembered for many things. Unfortunately, winning wasn’t one of them. He is infamous for going for a two-point conversion against the Dallas Cowboys when down 24-13. Even after the objections of his coaching staff to settle for an extra point, Kotite refused. Randall Cunningham was caught just short of the end zone and the two-point conversion would fail. Asked later why he did it, he told reporters that the chart he used to determine whether to go for one or two points was rain soaked and he couldn’t read the chart. Sadly, Kotite would go on to lose 31 of his last 35 NFL games as a head coach. A major hypothesis was that his players stopped playing

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for him. In essence, they “quit” winning and, sadly, the habit of losing became a common trait. And this is of major concern to all leaders and managers everywhere. It isn’t enough to recruit and select talent. Or even to train people. To leverage the talent, knowledge, and abilities of people and of teams requires a willingness to spend it. In other words, above all else, people must be motivated. If they aren’t, their human resource, their human capital is wasted. Production plants, assembly lines, and computers can’t quit or become unmotivated. But people can and sometimes do. That is where great leadership and management come into play. An essential duty of any coach, leader, or manager is to inspire and motivate people to perform their best. It isn’t clear what exactly Terry Glenn’s performance would’ve been without Parcells pushing those buttons. We do know, however, that when Parcells was there, Glenn performed. Moving the Chains

Great leaders ensure there is no quit at the individual and team level. Instead, they inspire individuals to consistently do great things.

AIM HIGH! If you don’t remember Rich Kotite, there’s little chance that you remember Curvin Richards. People in Pittsburgh and in Dallas remember Richards, though. The University of Pittsburgh has had some great running backs in its day. They include Craig “Ironhead” Heyward, Curtis Martin, Kevan Barlow, and, of course, Tony Dorsett. But the second-best running back at Pitt may just have been Curvin “Swervin” Richards, who was selected in the fourth round (97th overall) of the 1991 NFL draft by the Dallas Cowboys.3 Jimmy Johnson, the Hall of Fame former coach of the Dallas Cowboys, probably used Curvin “Swervin” Richards to motivate an entire football team. As the story goes, Johnson warned Richards that he needed to work on his ball protection and demanded that he and the Cowboys protect the ball better and reduce turnovers. But Richards kept fumbling. So, Jimmy Johnson cut Richards when he fumbled the ball in the final game of the 1992 regular season at Chicago. Cutting a player during the season is almost unheard of, let alone the last game of the season. In this particular case, the NFL advised Johnson that he could not replace Richards on the roster—essentially meaning that the Cowboys

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would be down a man on the overall roster when the playoffs began. Johnson, after sleeping on it, stuck with his decision and cut Richards anyway.4 Why, then, did Johnson cut the backup to Emmit Smith knowing that no replacement would be readily available? Johnson was tough and wanted a championship team. He recognized early that there’s one surefire way to do that and that was to have high standards. Those high standards weren’t just meant for game time. He famously cut John Roper, a promising linebacker from Texas A&M, for falling asleep during a team meeting. Clearly, Johnson sent a signal loud and clear that standards mattered and that there were consequences for not meeting those high standards. Jim Jeffcoat, a Cowboys defensive end from 1983 to 1994, would later tell Maxim magazine that “some guys see kindness as a weakness” and that’s what made Johnson so successful. Although fear and meanness may temporarily motivate people, we don’t think that’s what was at work here. Instead, it was the high standards demanded on the field. The reason why Jimmy Johnson, and by association the Dallas Cowboys, were so successful was because Jimmy Johnson communicated, valued, and enforced high performance standards. And, herein, lies a lesson for all leaders and managers. Leaders are the guardians of standards. Leaders decide, set, and enforce standards. When a leader doesn’t do that, standards fall and become meaningless. Standards have to be meaningful. They can never be empty words or hollow voices. Rather, a foolproof way to motivate people is to set standards and attach positive consequences for meeting or exceeding them and, on the flip side, negative consequences for not meeting them. Yes, it was sad to see Curvin Richards’s career cut short. But Jimmy Johnson knew that high standards motivate all to action—but only when they’re enforced. Leaders must enforce and attach consequences to the standards they set and communicate. There’s no real compromise here. Very simply, it must be done. By the way, the corollary to this is equally true. When leaders fail to set and enforce standards, they de-motivate others and create a feeling of apathy since people realize no action or lack thereof is met with a consequence. When leaders fail to act as the guardian of standards, by circumstance, they are also becoming a guardian of something entirely different—losing. Moving the Chains

The first step to motivating and inspiring is to communicate, maintain, and enforce high performance standards.

Inspiration of the Individual

5

EVERYONE IS A GUARDIAN Maintaining high standards is true for any profession. As an example, a friend of ours was asked to come and speak to a police department regarding ethics, professionalism, and leadership after one of the officers was arrested for criminal activity. The department chief was well liked and devoted much of his time to developing a positive working environment for the members of his agency and the community. Although he was confident that this was an isolated incident, the chief wanted to ensure the resulting fallout didn’t have a negative impact on the rest of the department. He felt that bringing in a highly regarded speaker would be a valuable tool to reinforce the department standards with all the members. When our friend arrived and gathered the officers, he listened before he spoke. He listened to the language they used as they filed into the room. He listened to how they described what they believed happened in their own words. He watched their posture and body language for clues as to what they were truly feeling. “I could tell,” he later told us, “that some of them didn’t know how they felt for [the arrested officer] or to what degree he had impacted the agency or the community. He seemed like a good guy. Everyone liked him. They didn’t seem angry over the incident. They didn’t like the fact that it happened, and they wanted to know how he got mixed up in it, but they didn’t seem ticked off or mad.” Our friend then spent the next several hours talking to the officers about setting and maintaining high standards. “At first, they just didn’t get it,” he surmised for us. “My perception was that they weren’t seeing and feeling the impact of this officer’s criminal actions. They were sympathetic when they should’ve been angry. This guy was on their team, a member of a noble profession that only a chosen few have had that entrusted privilege. How dare this guy violate that privilege, their oath to each other, their agency, and the community they have sworn to protect and serve. What was going on here?” “So, what happened?” we asked. “As the conversation progressed, I felt that my initial perception was misplaced. I could see that the officers in the room saw and felt that their honor code was seriously violated. I heard them speak about the importance of creating a relationship of trust with each other and the citizens of their community. That their profession and their agency demanded its members embody character, and to do anything else was unacceptable.”

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Our friend told us that before he left for the day, a group of officers and administrative personnel came up to him to exchange pleasantries. An administrative officer who had not said much extended his arm to shake hands and said, “We know that none of us is as strong as all of us, and we all have a great responsibility. Our officers are committed to doing the right things and want accountability when someone isn’t. [The arrested officer] violated the highest standards of the department and we’re glad we found out, and he’s out—period!” When teams adopt and internalize a set of standards, individuals will act in the best interest of the group. In high-performing organizations, the leader is not the sole and exclusive guardian of the organization’s standards. Everyone has a shared responsibility to maintain the integrity of the core values and standards of the team. This applies to many different environments and situations. We met a mid-level manager of a large Fortune 500 company who explained how he once handled a low-performing employee. The story reminded us that setting and maintaining standards applies to any level of organization, from executives down to junior leaders. “He just couldn’t perform,” the manager started. “Our team was a group of highly skilled project managers. We were tasked with a variety of projects. We were responsible for delivering results on time and on budget. We prided ourselves on the ability to work in a fast paced environment and to find a way to work through obstacles to complete the job.” “What happened?” we asked. “He just couldn’t meet a deadline. Every assignment was the same. There was always an excuse, always a reason as to why it couldn’t be done. I knew he had the ability. I mean, he was intelligent, had a background from the same industry, and had been properly trained in project management. I ensured that he had frequent, consistent feedback, and when I noticed he was slipping, I tried to provide a lot of personal coaching. I also ensured that the projects he was working on were no more difficult than what others had and were inside the scope of what his ability should’ve been. I even paired him up with the more successful members of the team to help him out. Still, nothing seemed to work.” “So, what did you do?” “I finally had to let him go. I didn’t feel good about it, but I exhausted every opportunity to try to develop him. He was very likeable, but at the end of the day we are all paid to deliver results on time and he couldn’t meet that standard.” We were curious. “How did the rest of the team react?”

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“Interestingly, when I briefed the rest of the team, no one seemed surprised. Everyone simply nodded their head as if they knew this was coming, and I also sensed some relief among some of the team members.” Like Jimmy Johnson, this young manager made a clear decision to maintain the standards of the team. Severing the tie with the employee wasn’t a callous act, nor did the manager ignore opportunities to correct the behavior. Ultimately, it was a simple call based on the known and adopted standards of the group. The junior leader not only preserved the meaning of the standard but also preserved the performance of the team.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders set high standards and create an environment where all organizational members maintain the standards.

FOUR DOWNS What we are about to say now may seem counterintuitive or, even conflicting, with our previous argument regarding high standards. As we’ll explain, what we are about to say can coexist with enforcing high standards. In football, we’re lucky. We don’t just get one chance; we have four chances to get a first down. It is a game of multiple chances, with associated risks and rewards. The same can be said for extending second chances to those we lead—some people deserve and demand more than just one down. In the case of Curvin “Swervin” Richards, he was warned on several occasions. He got more than one chance, but if you need any more evidence regarding the power of second downs and second chances, then look no further than Barry Word. Barry Word was a flat out, world-class running back coming out of Virginia. In 1985, Word rushed for 1,224 yards for the Virginia Cavaliers, which at the time of publication, ranks fifth best in Atlantic Coast Conference history. In 1985, Word was selected as the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) player of the year and was drafted in the third round, 62nd overall, by the New Orleans Saints in the 1986 NFL draft. But things didn’t go well during his first couple of years in the league. In 1987, Word along with two other Virginia athletes were indicted on cocaine distribution charges, and Word would spend five

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months in prison. Predictably, the New Orleans Saints gave up on Word and the potential that he possessed. It looked like Word would be another poster child of wasted youth after sitting out the entire 1989 NFL season. But the Kansas City Chiefs, led by the disciplinarian and old-school persona of Marty Schottenheimer, took a chance on Barry Word and offered something that motivates all people—the chance for redemption. And Word would deliver. In 1990, Word won the NFL Comeback Player of the Year, an award aimed at emphasizing redemption and second chances, after rushing for 1,015 years on 204 carries, all while sharing the load with perennial Pro-Bowler Christian Okoye.5 So, you can have both. Schottenheimer was known for many things. No doubt, he held high standards. But when high standards are coupled with the possible opportunity for redemption, a culture of inspiration follows. When people and players see that they can take chances and, occasionally, miss perfection and still be welcome on the team, people become more committed—not less. We are aware of an old Army officer who used to say that the unit standard was not, and never would be, perfection, but it would always be excellence. This statement reflects that mistakes will be made, people will learn, and, occasionally, second chances will be given. This isn’t being soft. Rather, it sends a signal that we can all overcome obstacles. The other learning point, though, is that some people deserve second and, maybe even third, chances, while some only require one. To answer exactly how many downs or chances one should get, you need to return to the opening quote of the chapter. To make that assessment, you must do what Parcells did and does—you must really know your people to make that call. We just want you to know, however, that it’s okay to give second chances and, if you do, it holds the opportunity to motivate and inspire.

Moving the Chains

The opportunity for redemption is motivating in and by itself.

CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS Great leaders, coaches, and owners motivate people by creating a meritocracy. Put differently, they reward those who outperform others

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9

within and outside the organization. Frankly, almost three centuries of economic thinking and one century of psychological research support what we are about to say—a merit- or reward-based mentality drives effort and increases motivation in ways both easy and complex to understand. In the late summer of 2008, Steven Jackson signed a five-year contract extension valued at $49.3 million and included an $11 million signing bonus with the St. Louis Rams.6 At the time of the deal, the new contract made Jackson the fifth highest-paid running back in the league. Of course, his new, huge contract is rewarding and motivating to him. But, more importantly, it motivates others within the Rams franchise, as well as running backs throughout the league. If the Rams seem down since the heady, Super Bowl days of Kurt Warner, Marshall Faulk, and the “Greatest Show on Turf,” it isn’t because of Steven Jackson. History will judge Steven Jackson as a great running back for the Rams. He can do it all. He can run, block, and catch the ball out of the backfield. A large, fast, and bruising running back, he can run through or around the opposition. His performance is highly correlated with the performance of the St. Louis Rams. When human capital means that much to an organization, it must be compensated with some type of resource, which doesn’t always have to be money. But money is a reward and, of course, money can motivate. The inspiring statement that this contract says to other players is that if you outperform others and reach levels considerably higher than the already high performance standards, you will be rewarded. It is really a function of expectancy. If people expect to get rewarded for high effort and even higher performance, they’ll exert themselves tremendously. And an old economic concept entitled Tournament Theory suggests that the higher the prize for winning the Tournament or being the best, the greater the effort. In other words, the higher the potential rewards, the higher the effort. So, Jackson’s huge contract was a direct signal to others on the team that the potential was there for rich payouts if they could deliver Jacksonian performance levels. Also, it probably motivated other running backs in the league who can now use Jackson and his contract as a benchmark for their own performance, and their own contract. On the opposite end of the spectrum is what we call leader-induced socialism. In leader-induced socialism, the leader believes that everyone should be treated equally (which means not fairly) and be paid the same, given the same or similar resources, and given the same amount of time off. Of course, this never works, does it? When there is no

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consequence for performing high or low and rewards will be administered the same across the board, the incentive to try or to exert effort disappears. In general, organizations that adopt a socialist mentality underperform those that are merit based. And it doesn’t always have to do with money. Leaders control or have access to all kinds of resources to include promotions, time off, scheduling, public recognition, and special assignments to name just a few. Leaders can juggle and dole out these resources to create a meritocracy that celebrates top performance while marginalizing average performance. So what are you—a socialist or a capitalist? If you are a great Gridiron Leader, you, in essence, are a capitalist.

Moving the Chains

Create a meritocracy. Attach a positive consequence to top-shelf performance. Others will take notice and try to follow suit.

PLAY IT SAFE OR GO FOR TWO? Players look to coaches, to their Gridiron Leaders. Shortly after looking, something special occurs. Looking turns into acting. One of the wiser senior Army officers that we came across once remarked that platoons inevitably morph, over time, to mirror their platoon leader. In other words, followers look to their leaders for cues on how to think, act, and behave. Leaders set the tone, and they model desirable behaviors. Of all lines in this book, the one following may just be the blocking and tackling of all leadership, on and off the playing field. Truly great leaders set the example. There are precious few leadership acts that motivate as strongly, as passionately, as setting the example. The reverse is true as well. Few leadership activities kill the spirit as quickly as leaders who, for whatever reason, fail to set the example. Hypocrisy is the silver bullet that kills many a leader, and you’ll find it when leaders don’t set the example for others to follow. Gridiron Leaders seem to recognize the inherently motivating influence of setting the example. And setting the example can come in many forms, shapes, and sizes—all of which are quite powerful. Football, sports, business, military operations, or just success, in general, often require heavy doses of courage. Tom Osborne knows a thing or two about courage and setting the example. In 1984, the Nebraska Cornhuskers were supposed to have a banner season. Some believe that the Cornhuskers ultimately disappointed

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that year. We disagree. Instead, we contend that the 1984 season cemented the legend of Nebraska football and the legacy of coach Tom Osborne more than any other season—including their National Championship years of 1994, 1995, and 1997. The Cornhuskers were picked early in 1984 to win it all. They were one of the few college teams to be ranked number one the entire season. Indeed, they were 12-0 and ranked number one in the country as they entered the Orange Bowl to face the fifth-ranked and home favorite, Miami Hurricanes. Down most of the game, the Cornhuskers fought back to score a touchdown on a fourth-and-eight option-play from quarterback Turner Gill to Mike Rozier’s backup, Jeff Smith. Smith scampered 24 yards for a touchdown that narrowed the lead to 31-30. Rather than go for the easy route and kick the extra point to tie the game, Osborne opted for courage over safety. He went for two.7 The pass from Turner Gill was incomplete, and the Miami faithful stormed the field. Contrary to what the scoreboard read, however, there were two winning teams that evening. Osborne did two good things that evening in the Orange Bowl. First, he set the example. All year, Osborne and coaches like him preach winning. And when the pressure was on, Osborne backed up his rhetoric with actions and decisions. If you watch the video clip on YouTube, you hear one announcer remark that Osborne “made this decision a long time ago.” When what a leader says (talk about winning) closely approximates what a leader does (going for the win), you’ve got a person that sets the example. Second, it was the gutsiest of calls—a decision colored more by courage than anything else. Although Osborne had built a strong career up to that point, few would argue that it was bulletproof. Osborne knew that he would be second guessed locally in fan-crazed Nebraska, but also nationally. It would’ve been far easier, and safer, to go for the tie. But courageous leaders don’t go for the tie when it’s all on the line. And especially when they’ve talked about winning—not tying—all season. Invariably, they go for the win. Followers are motivated by this approach and will stand behind leaders like that.

Moving the Chains

Set the example. If you talk about winning, then go for the win—don’t try not to lose.

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PROTECTING THE QUARTERBACK On September 23, 2007, Mike Gundy, the Oklahoma State football coach, came completely and utterly unglued. In one of the more spectacular postgame tirades in all of football history, Gundy literally screamed at Jenni Carlson, a sports reporter for the Oklahoman, for a negative commentary that she had written on one time starter and star, quarterback Bobby Reid. A true YouTube sensation, Gundy screamed at Carlson to come after him in her columns. After all, he screamed, “I’m a man! I’m forty!” To many, Gundy’s outburst may have appeared over the edge. But to others, and probably to scholars like Kathy Kram, Gundy’s tirade deserved something a bit more. It deserved praise. Kathy Kram is a researcher and scholar at Boston University and is considered an international authority on the topic of mentoring. In her seminal book, Mentoring at Work, Kram suggested that one potent, but often overlooked, way for mentors to develop, encourage, and motivate their prot
eg
es is to shield and protect them from outside forces and external threats.8 We couldn’t agree more. And while this may seem like it involves mentoring, we think it touches on something a bit bigger—leadership. We don’t know much about Mike Gundy. We do, however, know that he got Oklahoma State back on the football map, a feat not done since the Thurman Thomas and Barry Sanders days. But we can say that his defense of one of his players on that September evening typified the leadership characteristics of mentoring and Gridiron Leadership. It is important to note, though, that shielding is not coddling, nor is it babying. Rather, it is standing up for your players, your employees, or your people when you believe in them. We’ve all seen or experienced the opposite scenario—when leaders throw their staff, their players, their team, or their employees, right under the proverbial bus. If protecting your team members from outsiders that want to do harm is motivating, creating scapegoats and throwing personnel under the bus or to the wolves kills motivation, destroys morale, and is just plain wrong. A case in point may just be Stan Brock, the former coach who replaced Bobby Ross as Army’s football coach in 2007. Shortly after losing their second consecutive game to start the 2008 season to 1-AA New Hampshire, he told the press, “I think some guys quit.”9 To young men who play Army football voluntarily without scholarship or traditional National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) luxuries, this comment attacked the very heart and character of players who are sent to the true playing fields of Afghanistan and Iraq. Given the choice, who would you rather play

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for—a leader that publicly blames their subordinates or one that goes the extra distance to protect them? That’s not to say that it’s easy to protect and shield your team. Because it’s not. Leaders are under tremendous pressure to perform. Ultimately, it is the leader that is responsible and accountable for getting the job done. When that doesn’t occur, some leaders look for excuses or ways to shift blame, thinking that it will protect their job and their reputation. Ironically and almost without exception, it does the exact opposite. It makes the leader appear weak and incapable of handling the responsibility and accountability that goes hand-in-hand with leading. Finally, we want to highlight that we aren’t, and never will be, advocates of babying or coddling followers whether they be players, employees, or personnel. There is a time and place, however, where the pressure, the accusations, and the glare get too fierce, too hot to be put on the followers. Leaders need big shoulders, like Mike Gundy, to bear this weight themselves. We don’t know about you, but we’ve found that one of the most effective leadership activities and motivating tactics involves sticking up and standing behind followers when they’re unjustly or unfairly signaled out. And, by all means, leaders should never create scapegoats to save their own skin. That’s not leading; that’s cowardice. Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders will stick up for and stand behind their players and personnel when they’re unfairly targeted or criticized. How motivating is it to know that a leader has your back?

PUT THE TEAM FIRST There is a leadership principle taught to Army leaders that states “know your subordinates and look out for their well-being.” Coach Gundy’s outburst demonstrated this principle, but perhaps no other coach embodied this concept more than Coach Eddie G. Robinson of Grambling State University. Coach Robinson coached for 56 years from 1941 to 1997, becoming the winningest coach in college football history at the time he retired with over 400 wins. He compiled 45 winning seasons with 17 Southwestern Athletic Conference championships. Over 200 of his players went on to play professional football, and he set a pro football record in 1971, that still stands today, when 43 of his former players were in training camps. However, it wasn’t his winning stats that made Robinson a great coach.

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Coach Robinson saw his teams as more than just a collection of athletes, and he didn’t just care for his players while they were on the football field. He once stated, “You have to coach ’em as though he were the boy who was going to marry your daughter.”10 During team meetings, Robinson didn’t just talk about football. He talked to his players about drugs, class attendance, and the importance of studying. He would often go to the dorms in the early morning to wake his players for breakfast. He sought to use the game of football to better those who participated on his teams. It must also be noted that Robinson, an African American, began his career at the historically black college well prior to the civil rights movement. Not only did Robinson have to battle against the institutional racism of the time, but he also struggled with little funding to get the small school’s football program off the ground. He initially had no paid groundskeepers and would line the field himself.11 He also had no paid assistants, no trainers, and little equipment. Robinson would make lunches for his players prior to road trips since his players would not be able to eat in the segregated restaurants of the South. Yet, these obstacles did not prevent Robinson from producing winning teams, nor did it make him resentful against a system that seemed to be against him. Robinson showed, through his own example, that success was possible through hard work and perseverance. Much can be learned from Coach Eddie Robinson. He was an inspiration to many of the athletes that played for him, as well as many others familiar with his legacy. He was a great leader, not only because of his ability to develop high-performing teams but his personal commitment to his players. For over five decades, Robinson put his players first. Improving the character of his players was more important to him than his winning stats, and he couldn’t seem to understand why some coaches wanted to put themselves in the limelight. His lesson for all leaders seems simple: get to know and care for your people. Realize that they are more than just workers on a production line or cubicle occupiers. The impact of a leader that shows genuine compassion and takes the effort to understand their people can have far reaching effects and motivate people to reach new heights. As Coach Robinson once explained, “You can’t coach ’em if you don’t love ’em.”12 Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders take the time to get to know and look out for the well-being of their people. Taking interest and showing compassion can motivate people to higher performance.

Inspiration of the Individual

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GOAL LINE STAND? Do your players know where the goal line is? And, more important, are they willing to either take the ball into the end zone or, in other situations, defend their goal line? Both are equally important as we attempt to better understand motivation and inspiration. Over the last several decades of organizational and individual performance research, we’ve reached a rather solid conclusion. Namely, goals—in and by themselves—are extremely powerful motivators. Bill Cowher is revered and loved in Pittsburgh. In 15 seasons as the Pittsburgh Steelers head coach, he led the Steelers to six AFC Championship games and two Super Bowl appearances, and one Super Bowl victory. But even the most ardent Cowher supporters would argue that Cowher’s value as a coach rested in his motivational abilities as opposed to his tactical and strategic prowess. Not to say he was weak in those areas, but his core competency was getting his players to perform consistently to a very high level. What few realize is that behind the yelling, screaming, jut-jawed competitiveness of Cowher was his ability to rationally and logically use goals and goal theory to inspire the individual and advance the team. Internally, Cowher was known to break a 16-game season into four, four-game mini-seasons. He correctly thought that winning a championship involving 16 regular season games and three or four playoff games was too difficult and too large for a typical player to comprehend or grasp. So, he broke the larger goal of making the playoffs into winning a series of four games at a time. This way the players could see the goal clearly, and it was never too distant or too much of an abstraction for players. The fact that Cowher broke down goals into manageable parts is really just one part of effectively using goal theory. In general, we know from years of research largely driven by the research tandem of scholars Ed Locke and Gary Latham that goals guide and direct behavior. Without goals, we wander aimlessly and waste a ton of mental and physical energy. The Gridiron imperative then is to communicate what the goal is. Not once, but twice and three times. Write it down. Talk about it. Modern management also supports Cowher’s approach. Management guru John P. Kotter advocated the creation of short-term wins to create momentum. “Most people won’t go on a long march,” Kotter wrote, “unless they see compelling evidence . . . that the journey is producing expected results.”13 Kotter warned that without these short-term goals, employees would give up trying to meet the long-term goals of the organization.

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Additionally, goals are important because they provide the specific challenge against which all performance is benchmarked and judged. The Gridiron imperative then is to create attainable but challenging goals. These are the types of goals that marshal creativity, innovation, and effort. If the goals aren’t attainable, people, players, and employees are less likely to exert effort judging it as just a waste of time. Conversely, if the goals are too easy, then people aren’t pushed and become lazy and distracted. The best goals are really on the edge of the goal line—on the brink between the doable and impossible. Where Cowher really tapped into the power of goal theory was his ability to provide clarity and understanding to the goal itself. Take a minute and assess whether all of your followers, your team, and your personnel know exactly what the short- and long-term goals are. With Cowher, it seemed as if everyone on the team knew exactly what the goals were all of the time. We also know from Locke and Latham’s research and from watching the Pittsburgh Steelers with Big Ben Rothlisberger, Jerome Bettis, and Hines Ward that goals work best when they are set, agreed upon, and accepted by all members of the organization. Here, too, it seems like Cowher was particularly gifted at getting everybody on board to see the goals not as “his” but as “theirs.” There are several key takeaways here. The most important lesson is to recognize the sheer power and the allure of the goal line. Like gravity, the goal line itself pulls the ball downfield. The challenge for the Gridiron Leader is to add the push to the pull and really drive the ball downfield. That power will always be amplified when there is goal clarity, when the goals are attainable but still difficult and challenging, and when everybody on the team accepts the goals as their own. Remember, too, as a leader that you must provide feedback to ensure players know how close or how far they are from achieving the goal. Obviously, the farther away, the harder they must drive the ball. What are you waiting for? Dive for the end zone and cross that goal line.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Understand what makes each one of your people tick. Not everyone is motivated by the same drivers. To improve performance from your team or organization, do not attempt to motivate everyone in the same manner. Find the unique drivers that motivate people and learn the ones to stay away from.

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2. Become a guardian of standards. Establish, communicate, and enforce high standards for everyone on the team. Ensure that there are rewards for meeting the standards and consequences for those that don’t. Don’t compromise. Standards that are adopted and valued by the group can become motivators in and of themselves. 3. Don’t be afraid to offer a second chance. Inevitably, mistakes will happen. Maintaining high standards doesn’t imply that leaders have to be completely rigid. Accept the reality that some mistakes will be made and use this as an opportunity to allow people a chance to grow and improve. Leaders that demand high performance but also allow group members to learn from their mistakes will create a culture of inspiration. 4. Create a meritocracy. Create a reward-based system that compensates individuals based on their performance. Not everyone deserves to be compensated equally, and rewards can take many forms. If people expect to be rewarded according to their performance, the higher they will perform. 5. Set the example and protect your people. People will naturally look to their leaders to determine the “right” way to act. Always lead by example and don’t expect others to do what you will not do. Protect your people from internal and external forces. Do not coddle the members of your team, but take accountability for their actions and never shift blame. 6. Create and communicate short-term and long-term goals. People will naturally gravitate toward a clear goal or objective set in front of them. Develop short-term, or interim goals and celebrate small victories to build momentum toward long-term goals.

NOTES 1. Gerry Callahan, “A True Survival Test,” Sports Illustrated, January 27, 1997, http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG11 42708/2/index.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 2. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/G/GlenTe00.htm?redir (accessed March 14, 2009). 3. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/R/RichCu00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009).

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4. ESPN Web site, http://m.espn.go.com/general/page2/story?storyId= 3593759&pg=2 (accessed March 14, 2009). 5. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/W/WordBa00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 6. ESPN Web site, http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/trainingcamp08/news/story? id=3546615 (accessed March 14, 2009). 7. Charles Nobles, “Tennessee Braces Itself as Osborne Prepares for Final Bowl,” New York Times, January 2, 1998. For a complete account of Nebraska football history, please see Steve Richardson, Then Osborne Said to Rozier (Chicago: Triumph Books, 2008). 8. For more research on mentoring, see Kathy E. Kram, Mentoring at Work: Developmental Relationships in Organizational Life (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1988). 9. ESPN Web site, http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/recap?gameId=282500349. 10. Roscoe Nance, “Legendary Grambling Coach Eddie Robinson Dies,” USA Today, April 4, 2007, http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/ 2007-04-04-eddie-robinson-obit_N.htm (accessed January 28, 2009). 11. “Ex-Grambling Coach Robinson Dead at 88,” Associated Press, April 4, 2007, http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=2825016. (accessed January 28, 2009). 12. Roscoe Nance, “Legendary Grambling Coach Eddie Robinson Dies,” USA Today, April 4, 2007, http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/ 2007-04-04-eddie-robinson-obit_N.htm (accessed January 28, 2009). For a complete account of Coach Eddie Robinson’s life and career, please see Eddie Robinson, Never Before, Never Again: The Autobiography of Eddie Robinson (New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 1999). 13. John P. Kotter, What Leaders Really Do (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999), 87.

2 POWER RANKINGS

I will pound you and pound you until you quit. —Woody Hayes What makes football great is also what separates it from other sports and pastimes. The truth is that if we were to bottle up football and send it to the Los Alamos labs for scientific study, we would only get scientific evidence confirming what we already know. The atomic unit, the DNA, of football (and maybe life) is power. Football, in many ways, is about accumulating and spending power. Power is used in so many overt and subtle ways within the locker room, in the front office, and, ultimately, on the gridiron. Coaches exercise power over their players. And, in turn, these players try to exert their will, their power, over their competition. Without question, champions tend to have more power and are able to use that power better than rivals. In this chapter, we closely examine this notion of power and how to get it and how to spend it to cross the goal line and guarantee victory. OLD SCHOOL The opening quote comes from one of the true, bona fide coaching legends in all of sports, Woody Hayes. In the same spirit of basketball coach Bobby Knight, field General George S. Patton, football peer Paul “Bear” Bryant, and capitalist Andrew Carnegie, Woody Hayes was, if nothing else, old school. Especially when it came to this leadership tool we call power. Hayes racked up a 205-68-10 career while at Ohio State. Two times he earned College Football Coach of the Year honors. During his 28-year career, he directed and led the Buckeyes to five national titles cementing Ohio State as one of the most storied football programs in 19

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all NCAA history. Along the way, he coached and mentored the likes of Bo Schembechler, who would later serve as a chief rival while coaching at Michigan.1 Woody Hayes was a tough coach and an even tougher man. In midsummer 1974, Woody suffered a severe heart attack. Not serious enough to stop him from coaching the home opener, though. It was this toughness that helped build a power base that would carry Woody Hayes, and by extension the Ohio State football team, far. As the Web site www.buckeyesfansoly.com reports, Woody’s style was strength-on-strength, will-on-will, toughness-on-toughness, and Woody’s philosophy mirrors the opening quote—“I will pound you and pound you until you quit.” It shouldn’t be surprising then that Woody, in classic old-style fashion, was a yeller and screamer. With a legendary temper, Woody bent and, literally, forced people to his will. His verbal explosions were known throughout the sports world. When these outbursts occurred, it was not uncommon for Coach Hayes to destroy a few things along the way. Whether it was a film projector, his glasses, water jugs, or his watch, his emotions were certainly displayed in overwhelming fashion. His old-school way of doing things, however, would ultimately cost Woody Hayes his job and a bit of his legendary reputation as a winner. Trailing by two to the Clemson Tigers in the 1978 Gator Bowl, freshman Ohio State quarterback Art Schlichter tossed a short pass that was intercepted as Ohio State was driving for the win late in the fourth quarter. The ball fell into the hands of Clemson noseguard, Charlie Bauman. Racing up the sideline for a possible Clemson score, Woody Hayes apparently had enough. After being tackled and forced out of bounds, Bauman was punched in the throat by a furious Woody Hayes. Of course, Ohio State lost 17-15. But this incident brought an immediate end to the career of one of the most successful and storied coaches of all time. He would never coach again, and in true Woody Hayes style, he never apologized for taking Bauman out. MIX IT UP Wrapped up in the life and the story of Woody Hayes are many lessons about power and the sources, uses, advantages, and disadvantages associated with being a power broker. And as the heading above suggests, best results almost always occur when we have the insight and opportunity to build and use a variety of different sources of power. Let’s begin with the core definition of power. At its center, power is about the ability, capability, or potential to control and influence the

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behavior of others. In gridiron terms, it is about controlling the man lined up in front of you and, subsequently, the line of scrimmage. It is about subjecting and projecting your will unto another. Much like a law of Newtonian physics, power is absolutely essential to get things done. A car without power does not go. A drill without torque, without power, has no function. This same principle applies to leadership— without power, leaders cannot get things done. As a result, the elemental leadership lesson is rather straightforward—leaders must create, build, and foster their own power and build power pockets or power stores within their team to beat rivals and surpass the competition. The creation and use of power may include motivation, but it doesn’t necessarily have to. And, herein, rests the true value of power. Power can get people to exert effort and act in accordance even if they don’t want to. Surely, the players at Ohio State didn’t always want to do extra practice drills. But they did so anyway. How do you explain this? The bottom line is that power gets action when action seems untenable, impossible. This principle is not foreign; ultimately, leaders cannot control follower beliefs, attitudes, personalities, or, even opinions. Sure, they can influence and shape them. But not control them. A leader almost always, however, can exert some control and direct influence on behavior. And they do this through power. What gives power its juice or kick is the concept of reciprocity and dependence. A leader or coach can either give or withhold something that a follower wants in the shape of rewards that include money, information, prestige, pride, praise, and/or time. For instance, a coach controls playing time and scheduling and can use that to reward or punish followers, but only to the degree that followers want, desire, or are dependent on what the coach has or controls. Using the scheduling example, a coach or manager can give time off for great performance to include scheduling shorter practice sessions or, in the case of the manager, give free paid time off. In this example, both reciprocity and dependence are at work. The coach can reciprocate good performance with time off and the teammates or employees likely desire, value, and may even depend, on that reward. It can be argued that Woody Hayes relied on a single source of power—a mistake that is very difficult to pull off today. Conversely, coaches that have continued success like Virginia Tech’s Frank Beamer, Florida’s Urban Meyer, Chicago’s Lovie Smith, and former Indianapolis coach Tony Dungy all “mix it up” when it comes to their sources and uses of power. Make no mistake, though. While football (and life) is much ado about power, it is not about being old school. The days of relying on the brute force of yelling and screaming are long

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over. Indeed, there is some finesse and artistry to building and using power, and we’ll explore and explain more below.

Moving the Chains

Effective leaders use diverse sources of power.

BOTTOM OF THE POWER RANKINGS The power rankings are used by several media sources to assess where and how NFL and collegiate teams rank. ESPN famously publishes the top 10 and the bottom 10 in power rankings every week. We use the power ranking format and formula now to better understand the sources of power available to leaders of all organizations (See Figure 2.1 on p. 32). At the bottom of the power rankings is the source of legitimacy, or legitimate power. This source of power gets its strength from such things as position, rank, or conventional authority. In the military, a colonel outranks a major. In the corporate world, a vice president outranks a manager. Because of this structure, the colonel or vice president enjoys a legitimate power advantage over the major or the manager. On the gridiron, the coach can get players to act largely on the basis of his formal position title and rank—a coach always outranks the players. In today’s world, legitimate power provides a start. But it is difficult to build a sustained competitive advantage only using legitimate power. While some coaches may rely solely on legitimate power, it is difficult to do for an extended period of time. When this occurs, especially with disciplinarians, the coach is said to have lost the team. A recent example may have been the firing of Bill Callahan, the former Raiders coach, who was relieved of his duties only one year after taking his team to the Super Bowl. Callahan was openly criticized by his players, some of them Pro Bowl regulars such as Tim Brown, Jerry Rice, and Rich Gannon. Noted in this example is that although the players may have recognized him as the coach, his ability to lead and use power, more than likely, stopped with his job title. Judging from news reports and sports affiliates, it appeared that some players had little respect for their coach. If this was the case, Callahan’s lone source of power, legitimate power, wasn’t enough to get the Raiders to perform consistently during his tenure and wasn’t enough for him to keep his job. One of the largest drawbacks of legitimate power is that the leader doesn’t own the source of power; the organization does. With legitimate power, the leader is the one that is truly dependent—dependent

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on the organization to confer rank, position, and title. As soon as those things go away, which did in coach Callahan’s case, the leader loses his or her legitimate power base. Effective leaders know that consistent performance cannot be obtained through a lone source of power. They must reach out for different, and more potent, sources of power that apply to the situation and the individual.

Moving the Chains

Legitimate power is the property of the organization—not the leader. And, therein, rests a critical drawback of over-relying on rank and position.

PRESS Similar to pressing the defense, “press” means to force and coerce others to achieve a desired outcome. This is next to the bottom on the power ranking scale, just slightly above legitimate power mentioned earlier. Pressing or coercive power refers to a leader’s ability or capacity to influence behaviors largely through punishing undesirable behavior. This moves beyond positional or legitimate power that is really a passive display of power. Rank is a passive indicator of power—not really a full-fledged source of power. But coercive power is an active source. It involves fear, some bullying, and the use of punishment. By its very nature, coercive power is an active power process—never a passive one. For instance, Eric Mangini has effectively used punishment and coercive power to change undesired behaviors. Early on in his tenure as the head coach of the New York Jets, Eric Mangini instituted a policy in which players and squads would be punished by running extra laps at practice for general mental sloppiness that lead to things like turnovers and penalties. His threats and actual use of punishment seemed to work; in Mangini’s first couple of years with the Jets, his teams were in the top five in the league for fewest penalties and fewest penalty yards.2 Of course, this also relates to our previous discussion about maintaining and enforcing high standards. But notice that Mangini did so through coercive power, through punishment. Both coercive and legitimate power sources are usually found together at the bottom of the power rankings because they naturally fit alongside each other. It is usually the leader or coach who has the authority and the legitimacy to confer and levy punishments. And as we can see from the Mangini case, there’s clearly a time and place for coercive power.

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It is, after all, an effective way to reinforce high standards. But, like legitimate power, coercive power has both limits and pitfalls. First, and similar to legitimate power, the organization confers the capacity to punish to the leader or coach. When the position or title is removed, so too is the ability to punish. Most important, though, is that the very act of punishing followers or teammates (not rivals!) can have some serious unintended consequences. Remember, the gridiron shouldn’t be that different from organizational life. Ideally, work can and should be fun. We just spend too much time doing it to be miserable. Sadly, an overreliance on coercive power and punishment breeds a culture of fear and intimidation. Work no longer is a game, nor is it fun. Instead, it’s a chore. Leading scholarly research indicates that punishment creates deep-seated emotional feelings toward the leader and breeds, among other things, sabotage, avoidance, and resentment.3 If it is hard to picture a mutiny brewing within cubicle walls, recognize that negative behavior manifests itself in many forms. Leaders in business environments are fairly restricted when it comes to the types of punishment they can administer. Business leaders, for example, can’t legally force hourly paid workers to work overtime without compensation. Many business leaders may be reluctant to give a poor performer additional responsibility to compel the worker to perform better. Therefore, some business leaders reserve the ultimate punishment to deal with bottom performers—terminating the employee. Used too often, this form of punishment creates a culture of fear leading to a variety of unwanted outcomes. Workers may lie, cover up, or blame others for mistakes. Process or product problems may go unaddressed because employees are scared to raise issues. In addition, top performers may voluntarily leave the organization. Predictably, no organization can perform to a high standard over the long haul with these types of pervasive feelings among and between followers. The truth behind coercive power then is that there’s a time and place for it, but it should never be every time and every place. We even suggest that it should probably never be the first course of action for the leader. This is easier said than done. Just ask any parent. It almost always seems easier, more expedient, to punish as opposed to taking the time to develop and mentor. Moving the Chains

Coercive power is among the easiest sources of power to tap into. But easy doesn’t equal effective. Instead of making it the first source of power, make it the source of last resort.

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POWER SURGE AT THE LINE Next on the evolutionary power scale is that of reward power. Reward power is definitely a progressive step forward from coercive power. We, personally, believe that reward power should become standard in any and all discussions of power. We argue this based on several reasons. The most notable reason is that reward power, unlike the other two, reflects the current of leadership. By current, we mean “current” as the heading above suggests—a current of electricity. The steady and onward movement that can cause a surge in momentum. At its most elemental level, power is fluid, not static, like an electrical current. It’s always moving. But also like money or currency, power is about an exchange. Above all else, it’s about reciprocity. The Gridiron Leader has something that the follower wants. It doesn’t always have to be money, but it could be. Followers, oftentimes, want more than money. They seek resources, assistance, information, cooperation and support, a chance for promotion, time off, or fame and recognition.4 Whereas coercive power really trades and markets in the currency of fear, reward power is a bit more potent because it trades and markets in the currency of wants, needs, and desires. Reward power, then, is the leader’s ability, capacity, and willingness to dangle carrots or rewards to drive performance. Interestingly, having the capability to dole out rewards isn’t quite enough. To cement the deal, a leader must also be perceptive. In other words, they must know what type of resources (i.e., money, recognition, or promotion) a follower desires. The very best Gridiron Leaders are able to fit the reward to meet the individual or team desires. If leaders can’t do that, they waste precious rewards and resources on people and followers who don’t even want or desire them. Bottom line—rewards must address a need, want, or desire to be effective. The lineage of reward power, though, is closely linked to coercive power. Without question, these two sources of power share more similarities than differences. The most striking similarity is that the leader, again, is largely handcuffed and constrained by the organization. If the organization chooses to withhold resources from the leader, the leader loses a great source of reward power. The best way to think about this is a line of dependence. The organization bestows rewards upon the leader in the form of information, scheduling discretion, or money, and leaders, in turn, dispense these rewards as they see fit. But if the

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organization is low on resources or just refuses to give leaders this source of power, the leader is descending to weakness, not rising to power. Moreover, something as simple as organizational policies may prevent the leader from exercising personal, creative, or innovative uses of rewards. In fact, we know one manager at a distribution center who couldn’t approve any free time or vacation or offer small bonuses/ financial rewards. For instance, the manager once asked for $40 to host a luncheon for his shift that broke production records. The organization refused as it wasn’t company policy. In general, you’ll find these two truths on the gridiron as it relates to reward power. First, the greater the centralization tendencies of a given organization, the less likely leaders will be able to rely on reward power. Instead, reward power is centralized in the hands of a few, much higher in the organization. Second, and as you can probably predict from our discussion, the leader never really completely owns the source of reward power. The organization does. Finally, and maybe most important, reward power is heavily context- and timedependent. Said differently, it’s easy to give rewards, particularly financial ones, when times are good. When times aren’t as good, it’s difficult or even impossible to dole out rewards. And watch out if those rewards become an expectation! To put this in perspective, consider one popular reward mechanism in many companies—stock and stock options. A CEO could decide to give stock or stock options as a reward for superior performance, but the value of those rewards would be heavily context-dependent. When the company is performing well, the CEO could give stock options and the options would have value. But what happens when the company is not performing well? The CEO can’t give those same rewards with the same frequency or with the same potency because the company no longer has the resources to do so. For these reasons, the leader is always giving up some level of leverage here to the organization. The lesson should be clear— although we encourage the use of reward power if you’ve got the liberty to do so, never rely on it exclusively. It is a fragile source of power. A student of both reward and coercive power is Lane Kiffin, the onetime coach of the Oakland Raiders. Lane Kiffin was on the receiving end of coercive power as he was fired for cause by longtime owner, Al Davis. But Lane Kiffin also understood reward power. Kiffin’s remarks to NBCSports.com demonstrate a rather sophisticated understanding of both the dynamic (as opposed to static) and currency aspects of power.

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You see a lot less old-school, hardnosed “my way or the highway” coaching because players now are just different than they were when my father started out. That’s what [Monte Kiffin] says. Coaching back then, players just wanted to play. They just loved playing football. Now so much more goes into it and they make so much money that you have to find different ways to motivate them. The two things that motivate them are playing time and money. If you can get them better they’re gonna listen because that gets them to play more so they can make more money on the next contract. . . . The love of the game . . . they’re playing as much for the money and that’s where you have to interact so much with your players and understand them and see what motivates them.5

Moving the Chains

Many think using reward power is easy. It hardly ever is. It requires perceptions of fit and tends to be a fragile source of leader power.

ON THE SHOULDERS OF GREATNESS One of the great moments of the NFL was when Bill Walsh won his first Super Bowl as the leader and coach of the San Francisco 49ers. At the end of the game, the players hoisted Walsh onto their shoulders and paraded him around the stadium. What kind of leader gets hoisted onto the shoulders of great individuals and even greater teams? A special leader. A powerful leader. The use of legitimate, coercive, and reward power is enough to get you to midfield. In today’s world, that’s about all the farther you’ll get. To get into the Red Zone, a leader must develop and tap into the most potent sources of power—expert and referent power. We discuss these two sources of power because they’re so damn hard to tease apart. Expert power is a power source that is derived from the real and perceived knowledge, expertise, talents, skills, abilities, and talents of the leader. A major critique of expert power is that it’s a narrow source of power. We’re not sure we agree; expertise and “genius” status often bleeds into other areas. There are no shortage of examples, past and present, which bear witness to the value and efficacy of expert power. Historians tend to agree that General Robert E. Lee derived much of his power and influence not from legitimacy, coercion, or reward sources of power. Rather, he was viewed by his followers (and enemies!) as one of the greatest strategists and tacticians of all times. People followed Robert E. Lee

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because they knew that he knew what he was doing. Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and Steve Jobs all wield tremendous power. Some may say that their power comes from their position. We believe otherwise. Their expertise, knowledge, imagination, talents, and competencies are their true sources of power, and it is those attributes that cause so many people to stop and listen when they talk. Bill Walsh, the founder and father of the West Coast Offense, and Dick LeBeau, one of the innovators of the zone blitz scheme and one of the NFL’s all-time best defensive coordinators, are powerful because of their minds. Because of their genius. Unlike the previously discussed sources of power, expert power is an especially attractive source of power because the individual owns it— not the organization. Since it’s your property, you take it with you, wherever you go. Here, the tables are turned. Instead of relying on the organization for power, the organization is in debt and is dependent on the leader to share and use their expertise and knowledge. If the lesson doesn’t jump right out, it should. Educate yourself. Get smarter. Develop a unique skill set and learn it better than anyone else. Sharpen a skill into a competency that few have. Grow your talents! The one drawback, if any, of investing in expert power is just that—it’s an investment and usually takes some time to develop a specialized and deep knowledge base, skill set, or competency. Some people think that you have to be old to accumulate expert power. But this is hardly the case. The founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, were young guns when they started Google. Jon Gruden was in his 30s when he won the Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, while Mike Tomlin, the head coach of the 2009 Super Bowl Champion Pittsburgh Steelers, was only 36 at the time. As good as expert power is, it’s amplified when it’s partnered with referent power. Together, victory is all but guaranteed. Referent power is a source of power that influences others’ behavior and decisions as a result of the respect, admiration, or popularity directed at the leader. A correlate to referent power is reputation. Those with sterling reputations tend to have large stores of referent power to draw on and from. Referent power is notable because it’s not unidirectional, meaning that it doesn’t just flow from the leader to the follower. Instead, referent power is multidirectional. Referent power is felt by followers, peers, and even superiors. Sometimes, simultaneously. A hallmark or strong sign of referent power is the concurrent rise in role modeling behaviors. Subordinates and followers like to role model those that they respect. The genius status of Bill Walsh probably led to his source of referent power. Regardless, Bill Walsh launched a literal field army of role

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models who respected him so much they tried to model their behavior and career after Walsh. Mike Holmgren, Jim Fassel, and Mike Shanahan are just a few that modeled their career after Walsh and all have either participated in or won a Super Bowl. Referent power is also rooted in a leader’s personality and interpersonal skills. People will follow these types of leaders because they can communicate attractive visions of the future, demonstrate desirable personal traits, take personal risks, energize others, use unconventional tactics, or can effectively engage members of the organization. Pete Carroll, head coach of the University of Southern California (USC) Trojans football team, effectively uses referent power to build a winning team. Since taking over the program in 2001, Carroll has propelled the Trojans to two national championships and five Pac-10 conference titles. Carroll took over a program that was in a 20-year slump and now he has the highest winning percentage among active coaches in Division I football.6 Many credit Carroll’s leadership style for reviving the USC football program. Although rivals may know Carroll for his team’s aggressive style of play, many more at USC know Carroll for his gregarious personality, his youthful enthusiasm, and his willingness to try non-traditional approaches. During practice, Carroll can be found running sprints or participating in drills with the team. Also, unlike traditional practices, Carroll has opened practices to the public to help motivate players. He spends time explaining the team’s legacy and past playing greats so the current team members feel a connection and a sense of history or tradition.7 Once regarded as too soft on NFL players when he coached the New England Patriots, Carroll’s style has resonated with younger players. No question, Carroll’s charisma is embedded in his strongest source of power. On the power genome, expert and referent power are more alike than different. Referent power shares the same benefits as expertise power. Actually, referent power may be longer lasting as the knowledge and skills associated with expert power may become more obsolete at a quicker pace in our fast changing, technology rich world. Make no mistake; referent power lasts a long time. And like expert power, the individual owns it, builds, and guards it. It is the property of the individual, not the organization. Although this is a gridiron book, the best illustration of the characteristics of referent power may just be in baseball with Joe Torre. Hank Steinbrenner took away Torre’s legitimate, coercive, and reward power when he essentially dismissed and disrespected the former Yankee skipper. But Torre had both expert and referent power and he took that with him to the Dodgers where he immediately leveraged both to get Los Angeles to the playoffs.

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An example of a leader outside of the sports world who has mixed it up and used all sources of power would be General (retired) Jack Keane. In over 30 years of public service, General Jack Keane amassed all sources of power during a career that included service in Vietnam, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, and Kosovo. On his way to four stars and the post of Vice Chief of Staff, Keane would command the tradition-rich 101st Airborne Division and the XVIII Airborne Corps. Interestingly, the nation needed and called upon him the most not during his career, but in his retirement. And this call reflects the true and exceptional value of the last two sources of power—expert and referent power. Matthew Kaminski describes and chronicles the leadership abilities of Jack Keane in an exceptional article in the Wall Street Journal entitled “Why the Surge Worked.” Keane was one of the leading advocates of the surge strategy in Iraq, and one of the first voices in the woods to call for it. His international relations expertise was so strong and his reputation so well regarded that many, including President Bush, turned to and listened to Keane. President Bush took Keane’s counsel over Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield. Rumsfield’s power base, rooted in legitimate, coercive, and reward power, was not enough to win the president over to Rumsfield’s viewpoint. This is a classic case where referent power followed and accompanied Jack Keane out of his Army career. The staying and potency of that referent and expert power was strong enough to push through the objections of both houses of Congress, the Iraq study commission, and the very opinions of the Secretary of Defense.8 Moving the Chains

When combined, expert and referent power offer two of the strongest sources of power for Gridiron Leaders.

THE POWER OF THE NETWORK What do Dennis Green, Mike Holmgren, Norv Turner, Dick Jauron, Steve Mariucci, Marty Schottenheimer, and Dennis Erickson all have in common? Just like the famous Verizon commercial, it appears that all have the power of the network behind them. And this is important. Up to this point, we’ve described power going primarily from leader to subordinate in a traditional, vertical relationship. Harking back to our Woody Hayes example, though, vertical relationships are more old school than they are about the future.

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Network power is a rising, fast-growing source of power, and it affords those that invest in this source of power many advantages. The coaches above are all coaches who’ve either resigned or been fired only to coach again, sometimes multiple times. Sure, their rehiring, no doubt, is directly related to their reputation and previous track record of winning. A more nuanced understanding, however, would likely show that these people were well connected and enjoyed some degree of network power. Invest in network power. It affords several leadership and organizational benefits. Globally, networks of peers and superiors provide both personal and professional support. On a more micro level, network position and network power increase information and knowledge transfer. Think about it. Those within the network often get the best information sooner. In a knowledge-based environment, the importance of information speed and quality cannot be overstated. Those left out of the network are often left guessing and without a clue. A strong, diverse, and growing network can provide high-quality advice when you need it most. It can also provide social support as a leader approaches a difficult decision. Lastly, and maybe with a touch of self-interest, a network that is alive can protect a leader and offer them early insight to network opportunities like job openings or coaching vacancies. We offer one particular piece of advice in regard to network power. There are two kinds of networks—internal and external. Internal network power is within the organization. As long as you are part of the organization, internal network power has benefits. External network power reaches beyond the confines of the organization to other companies, industries, units, or locales. A competitive advantage will go to the leader who invests in both. Interestingly, of all the coaches on the list above, Dennis Erickson may just be the network master. Unlike the other coaches mentioned, Erickson seemed to have strong support networks both in the collegiate and professional ranks. After all, he’s coached six different college football programs (Idaho, Wyoming, Washington State, Miami, Oregon State, Arizona State) and two NFL franchises (Seattle and San Francisco). The case of Dennis Erickson illustrates several key points relating to network power. First, and similar to referent and expert power, the leader—not the organization—owns this source of power. Second, investing and tapping into this source of power provides the leader some mobility. In today’s world, leaders need to be mobile, not confined to a singular organization. That’s why conference and industry event participation is so important; it allows and encourages the very practice of networking. Internal to an organization, leaders need to cross department and functional boundaries to establish new relationships. Having

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Gridiron Leadership Legitimacy Source

Reward

Coercion

Referent Expert

Network

Effectiveness Least Effective Ownership

Figure 2.1

Most Effective Organization

Individual

Sources of Power and Their Effectiveness

relationships and networks that span beyond the leader’s immediate team may provide additional access to resources as well as information. Finally, this source of power is special because it transcends the individual. Referent and expert power lie in the knowledge, skills, abilities, competencies, popularity, and reputation of a single leader. Not so with network power. This source of power offers more talents, more knowledge, more skills, and more competencies just by the very fact that a network is plural—it involves many leaders, not a singular one. Do yourself a favor, then, and invest in the power of the network.

Moving the Chains

Invest and tap into network power. Network power is fueled by the talents of many as opposed to one. For that reason alone, it is a special source of leader power.

STAYING POWER Remember, the entire premise and objective of this book is that great leaders leave legacies and special organizations create dynasties. It is impossible to achieve either without fuel, without power. One of the major strategic objectives that we’ll touch upon later is the kinetic and real energy associated with momentum. At its most simplistic level, leaders and organizations in motion tend to stay in motion. Hopefully, we are focused on the motion and momentum of winning. Don’t ever forget, though, that all momentum begins with a push and that push is only possible through a power boost. A steady and constant application of power helps momentum continue.

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To reach legendary status as a leader or to achieve dynastic characteristics for the organization requires staying power. Staying power is nothing more than a commitment to constant improvement and steady and high performance. Staying power is never a luxury of circumstance. Instead, it demands planning and preparation and commitment. No single leader can build referent or expert or network power overnight. It is the long war—not the short battle—that separates Gridiron Champions from all others. The best way to achieve this staying power is to reflect upon and evaluate the sources of power that we mentioned earlier. While tempting, try not to overinvest in any one power source. Instead, try to mix it up and diversify your sources of power. When this is done, one source can compensate for another if it is running low. Given the level of competition, it always amazed us how good the 49ers, the Steelers, the Cowboys, the Packers, and the Patriots were for so long. Equally amazing is how long-tenured coaches such as Tom Landry, Bill Cowher, Joe Paterno, Frank Beamer, and Jeff Fisher stayed good for so long. Sure, there were ups and downs. But all had something special that enabled them to survive and thrive while others didn’t—they had staying power.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Recognize and use a variety of power. All leaders exercise some form of power to get things done. Power, the ability to influence the behavior of others, can come from many sources. Use a variety of methods, techniques, or strategies to influence others. Never rely on a single source of power or any one approach. 2. Leverage what comes from the organization, but not too much. Legitimate power is derived from the leader’s position in the organization. Coercive power stems from punishing undesired behavior. Reward power draws from the leader’s ability to provide something followers want. All three of these power sources are owned by the organization but can be used as effective tools by the leader to influence behavior. Recognize that this power is on loan from the organization. Exceptional leaders will not rely on these sources alone. 3. Build your power. Expert and referent power are key sources of power for the leader. Build your base in these areas by seeking self-development. Invest in new skills, education, or sharpen

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your talents. Protect and manage your reputation as a leader to build referent power. Be a role model for others to follow. 4. Get connected. Create a network of professionals, peers, superiors, and subject matter experts to provide personal and professional support. Increase your access to knowledge and information. Invest time and effort to create a network both internally and externally to the organization. 5. Create staying power. Have a commitment to constant improvement and high performance. Conduct frequent self-evaluations to understand your strengths and development needs as a leader. Learn what’s making you an effective (or ineffective) leader. Plan and prepare to strengthen your sources of expert, referent, and network power.

NOTES 1. ESPN Web site, http://espn.go.com/classic/biography/s/Hayes_Woody.html (accessed March 14, 2009). 2. Karen Crouse, “Punishment Laps Help Jets Kick Penalty Habit,” New York Times, January 5, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/05/sports/football/ 05jets.html?fta=y (accessed February 13, 2009). 3. K. D. Butterfield, L. K. Trevion, and G. A. Ball, “Punishment from the Manager’s Perspective: A Grounded Investigation and Inductive Model,” Academy of Management Journal 39 (1996), 479–512; K. J. Dunegan, “Fines, Frames, and Images: Examining Formulation Effects on Punishment Decisions,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 68 (1996), 58–68; D. Grote, Discipline Without Punishment (New York: Amacom, 1995). 4. K. D. Butterfield, L. K. Trevion, and G. A. Ball, “Punishment from the Manager’s Perspective: A Grounded Investigation and Inductive Model,” Academy of Management Journal 39 (1996), 479–512; K. J. Dunegan, “Fines, Frames, and Images: Examining Formulation Effects on Punishment Decisions,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 68 (1996), 58–68. 5. NBC Sports Web site, http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/26365992/wid/ 11915829/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 6. USC football Web site, http://www.trojanfootballanalysis.com/top_10_active_ 2006.html and http://usctrojans.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/carroll_pete00 .html (accessed March 14, 2009). 7. Michael Sokolove, “Happiness Is a Warm Football Coach,” New York Times, November 2, 2008. 8. Matthew Kaminski, “Why the Surge Worked.” Wall Street Journal, September 20, 2008.

3 FRANCHISE PLAYERS

You can learn more character on the two-yard line than anywhere else in life. —Paul Dietzel, coach of the 1958 National Champion Louisiana State University Tigers How many franchise players are suited up on your team now? Do you know what makes a franchise player a franchise player (See Figure 4.1 on p. 63)? Whether in the profit or nonprofit sector, such as the military or law enforcement, these questions are important ones for leaders to ponder. The rationale is rather simple; organizations today don’t rely on machinery as the primary force to get the job done. Just like football, today’s technology-rich, complex organizations place their bets on people to get the ball moving. For precisely that reason, we all need to ask ourselves who exactly our franchise players are, what makes a franchise player such a valuable asset, and how we develop a team of franchise players. We can think of franchise players as not just the best members of the team, but the best when compared to anyone else that has a similar job. They are the players you wouldn’t want to lose for fear of losing a competitive advantage. But make no mistake, due diligence is needed here. All too often, coaches and leaders think they’re getting a franchise player only to learn later that the player almost cost the franchise. SKILLED POSITION? Organizations, whether in football or not, begin by looking at skill sets. For instance, most football teams dream of a special type of running back. One that has excellent size and impressive running skills. One that runs with strength, power, and balance. A running back that 35

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likes to run over people but who can also run around people. A dream back would also possess great vision and know how to drive through a hole with a burst that can transform a four-yard gain into a 40-yard touchdown run. An ideal back would demonstrate patience to allow blockers to open up lanes and would tend to get better and stronger as the game wore on. No doubt about it, these types of skills are in high demand, and today’s leaders must ensure that their players have the educational, technical, interpersonal, and technological skills to be successful within their organization. Skill sets in and of themselves, however, are never enough to reach the pylon. Skill sets are necessary, but never sufficient, characteristics of franchise players. How do we know? Because the above-mentioned skill requirements of this “dream back” reflect almost verbatim the scouting report of Maurice Clarett—one of Ohio State’s most notable and controversial running backs. Unfortunately for Maurice, his franchise potential was never quite realized. Clarett, who once set the Ohio State University rushing record for a freshman and helped the Buckeyes win the 2002 BCS National Championship, is, at the time of this writing, serving a prison term for armed robbery and other charges. Before we exit this argument, we must acknowledge that skill development is a crucial part of any team—on or off the gridiron. Football is about moving the ball down field using every opportunity to make things happen. Whether making big plays, or more likely, consistently gaining a few yards at a time, teams must execute over and over again. The constant push to make it repeatedly to the end zone is an easy concept to relate to any organization. It is this ability to execute that is one of the most important building blocks of successful organizations. Larry Bossidy, former CEO of Honeywell, stated in his book Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done that “no company can deliver on its commitments or adapt well to change unless all leaders practice the discipline of execution. . . . [I]t is the missing link between aspirations and results.”1 If execution is the name of the game, skilled players and skilled employees are a must—a true necessity. As a first step, leaders should take an inventory of the skills needed to perform the job and current skills needed by the organization. In Chapter 5, we will revisit this concept in great detail and identify how to select, recruit, and develop people with skills needed by an organization. An initial examination to identify the skills found within the existing players of the organization will help leaders recognize the potential franchise players already on the team. However, skill by itself is not enough. When skill is combined with the additional characteristics we mention below, teams take a step closer to building a winning franchise.

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Moving the Chains

Build a franchise of highly skilled personnel; they will forever be a source of competitive advantage.

QUICK READS Peyton Manning and Matt Leinart, the former USC star and 2004 Heisman trophy winner, share some common characteristics found in franchise players. They are both highly intelligent people. Their natural and learned intelligence have enabled them both to develop a highly refined and sophisticated understanding of both tactics (the game) and the strategy (the game plan). That is really the key difference between intelligence and knowledge. Intelligence applies to a point in space, whereas knowledge is more integrative and more contextual. Usually, for leaders to develop knowledge, they must first possess intelligence. Both are important. Without intelligence and knowledge, skill sets are often deployed improperly, inefficiently, or not at all. If a skill is a tool, such as a hammer, then intelligence and knowledge tell us exactly how to use that hammer to get the job done. Matt Leinart perfectly illustrated the intersection of all three in one of the more memorable college games ever played—when USC played Notre Dame in South Bend in 2005. Losing to Notre Dame late in the fourth quarter, Leinart found himself and the USC Trojans at risk of blowing a perfect season and a chance for the National Championship. Reduced to what seemed to be their last down of the game after an incomplete pass and a sack, Leinart’s options appeared limited. What options are there when it’s fourth and nine, there’s only 1:36 left on the clock, and you’re back on your own 26-yard line? Out of nothing came something due to Leinart’s intelligence, knowledge, and skills. Leinart saw that the Notre Dame defensive back was playing close to the line, in almost a bump-and-run style, against a heralded receiver, Dwayne Jarrett. Knowing that the defense was playing Jarrett tight, without a cushion, meant that if Jarrett could get behind the defensive back, a big gain would follow. So, Leinart disregarded the call from the sidelines when he saw the defensive formation. Instead, Leinart called an audible fade route at the line of scrimmage. Jarrett ran the fade route to perfection and Leinart dropped the ball in perfectly. A fourthand-nine turned into a 61-yard gain, and the Trojans would go on to win the game. The ability to read, understand, comprehend, and make

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a decision requires a level of analysis that only knowledge and intelligence can provide. Having the requisite skills help too. Again, without skills, there’s no execution. While we will continue to explore the true “X” factor that makes the franchise player a true franchise player, consider the role of knowledge and intelligence as critical franchise variables.

Moving the Chains

The enzyme or lever that makes skills work at their best is always knowledge and intelligence. Build a roster of smart people.

LINE JUDGE Most, but not all of the time, Peyton Manning has shown two remarkable qualities that have earned him a franchise tag that will probably be redeemed one day at the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Draft scouts often talk about the intangibles. With Manning, one of his intangibles has been his judgment and exercising that good judgment during and after the game. People often forget that it was a two-horse race coming out of college for the number one pick in the 1998 NFL draft. Bill Polian, the gifted general manager of the Indianapolis Colts, was trying to decide between Peyton Manning and the strong-armed, NFL-prototype Ryan Leaf out of Washington State University. In what may be considered one of his greatest draft decisions, Polian went with Manning despite a notable, but forgettable, lapse of judgment by Manning. Ironically and because of this one incident, it was rumored that some draft experts wondered if Leaf wasn’t the more mature and grounded player. In 1996, Manning dropped his pants in an apparent “mooning” prank in front of a female athletic trainer at the University of Tennessee. The trainer sued the university and the school chose to settle the claim out of court for $300,000. Interestingly, that may have been Manning’s only lapse of judgment and as truly great franchise players are apt to do, he seemed to learn from this event. Upon his signing with the Colts, Manning donated $300,000 to the University of Tennessee to cover the costs of his prank gone awry.2 Ever since, Manning’s judgment on and off the field has been hard to bet against. His clean, honest, upfront, and down-home reputation has been a boon for the Colts, the NFL, and for Peyton himself.

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Indeed, Manning is one of the NFL’s all-time most marketable players, showing up in a variety of ads and media, including Saturday Night Live. As good as his off-field persona is, his on-field judgment may be even better. From an early stage in his career, the Colts entrusted and empowered Manning to engage in a long pre-snap routine where Manning would call the plays at the line of scrimmage through verbal and visual (hand routine) audibles. On and off the gridiron, it is difficult to overstate the importance of this trait of judgment. And it’s directly related and linked to the characteristics of knowledge and intelligence. The critical learning point, though, is that judgment makes knowledge and intelligence better and more usable to the masses. To use a current day example, both Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling of Enron possessed both knowledge and intelligence. As for intelligence, Lay had a PhD in economics, and Skilling earned a Harvard MBA. As for the knowledge side of the equation, both men were revered early for their incredible knowledge as both were considered the earliest thought-leaders and pioneers on the issue of energy deregulation. However, unlike Peyton Manning, they never really leveraged their intelligence or knowledge for a common good of the broader team. They lacked what Peyton Manning had in large abundance— judgment. We’re getting a bit closer to understanding exactly what a franchise player looks like. So far, the franchise leadership equation looks something like this: skill + knowledge + intelligence + judgment = franchise player.

Moving the Chains

Knowledge, skill, and intelligence are not always used responsibly or for the greater good. Building a roster of individuals with sound judgment ensures that the individual makes decisions that will reflect favorably on him/her and the franchise.

WINNING DESIRE Phil Simms and Peyton Manning are exemplars of another important franchise tag. That tag is desire. Phil Simms made the 1986 allMadden team for toughness and desire because he often played his

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most inspired football when he was injured and hurt. If we were building a quarterback from scratch, we’d want Marino’s arm, Randall Cunningham’s legs, Joe Montana’s brain, and Phil Simms’s heart. A close, modern-day approximation of Phil Simms is Peyton Manning. While Phil Simms best displayed his desire and courage on the field, Peyton is known for his dedication, work ethic, and desire off the field. Manning’s legendary preparation is his almost fanatical study of game tape both before and after the game. Inherent in his film watching is more than just learning about the opposition or about attention to detail. Rather, the atomic unit or the DNA that drives this preparation is his purposeful and deliberate mindset to get better, to improve. It is, more than anything else, about his desire to be the best. Besides film, Manning also emphasizes drill work—doing a play over and over again until excellence and just maybe, perfection, is achieved. Manning once remarked, “There have been plenty of games where I have said that I wish that I could have this throw back or I wish that I would have seen that linebacker, but it just didn’t happen. But I have never left the field saying I could have done more to get ready for that game.”3 The leadership imperative is to add another variable to the franchise mix—desire. During Jack Welch’s tenure as CEO of General Electric (GE), Welch introduced what was known as the “vitality curve,” a bellshaped curve where employees would be assigned as A, B, or C performers. Top performers, A-rated individuals, were the top 20 percent compared to the rest of the organization, while B-rated performers occupied the middle 70 percent, and C performers were the bottom 10 percent. Top performers were rewarded with stock options, promotions, raises, or bonuses while the bottom 10% were managed out of the organization.4 Although this model has become popular in the business world, what many don’t realize is how GE leaders assigned the grading to their employees. In many cases, a matrix was used where an employee would be rated on one axis according to their results, the black-and-white metrics they were personally accountable for. In other words, their ability to execute. The other axis rated their potential, the passion they displayed for the job, and their ability to energize others to meet goals. In effect, these intangibles equated to the employee’s desire. GE, a corporate dynasty of the 1980s, 1990s, and the beginning of this millennium, valued desire as much as it did results. Successful leaders know that having organizational members that simply deliver results is not enough to create a winning team over the long haul. Desire is needed to go beyond set goals and to continue winning over and over again.

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Moving the Chains

In keeping with the spirit of this book, desire and effort can fill the void and, even, compensate for lack of skill and intelligence. There’s no substitute for effort and desire. Build a roster marked by desire, grit, and work ethic. Clearly, we’ve all known from his college days that skills, knowledge, and intelligence are in the company of Matt Leinart. But Leinart also had a momentary lapse of judgment as he entered the NFL when pictures surfaced involving Leinart assisting several young coeds drink from a beer bong. Although it may be easy to write off this incident as a minor mistake that did not injure anyone and pales in comparison to other headline scandals created by other athletes, the pictures raised issues regarding Leinart’s judgment. As successful people are apt to do, Leinart appeared to learn from this event, and it hasn’t happened since. Clearly, without the two critical variables of judgment and desire a person invariably handicaps their chances of becoming a franchise player for a franchise team. A person’s game performance also enters into this equation and Leinart hasn’t yet met the same success as Manning. For now, we shall let history be the judge regarding the efficacy of Matt Leinart’s career. What we know for sure is that for his potential to be realized, judgment and desire need to work in harmony. COMMIT TO STOPPING THE RUN Franchise players don’t always stick with the franchise. In business as in sports, the idea of free agency is the dominant logic. As players and employees build their skills, their knowledge, their intelligence, and their judgment, they make themselves more valuable. Knowing that, many franchise players like to test the market to see if there’s a suitor that’ll pay more for their services. To be frank, there’s no foolproof way for a leader or coach to prevent that. It is, after all, Economics 101. Every now and then, however, leaders and coaches find somebody special—somebody that is actually committed to the organization. Someone that is committed to stopping and stemming the run of losses and of human capital outside the organization. We highlight two special Gridiron Warriors below. Pat Tillman is known for so many things, most of which now transcends the gridiron and touches a deeper nerve, like patriotism. But one of the lesser-known stories about Pat Tillman was a decision he made early on in his NFL career.

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Pat Tillman was always a bit of an outlier. Certainly, many top Division I coaches felt that Tillman was too small to play in a top-tier conference. In 1994, he got a shot at playing competitive football by securing the very last scholarship for the Arizona State Sun Devils. Without question, he made his coaches look brilliant for extending that last scholarship. In his senior season, he would win the Pac-10 Defensive Player of the Year while holding a 3.84 GPA in marketing.5 Like his early college experience, many pro scouts thought that Tillman was just too small at 5 feet, 11 inches and 195 pounds to do damage as a NFL linebacker. Again, he would prove his critics wrong. Almost as an afterthought, the Arizona Cardinals took a chance on the backyard boy in Tempe by selecting Tillman with the 226th pick in the seventh round of the 1998 NFL draft. It was one of the few times in the last 15 years that an Arizona Cardinals draft pick performed better than expected. Indeed, Tillman would guarantee a nice reward for the risk that Arizona took to draft him. In 2000, respected Sports Illustrated writer Paul Zimmerman named Tillman to his 2000 NFL All-Pro team after Tillman finished that season with 144 tackles, 1.5 sacks, 2 forced fumbles, 2 fumble recoveries, 9 pass deflections, and 1 interception.6 Skill, knowledge, intelligence, and desire, aside, though, Tillman displayed a trait that has been out of favor lately—loyalty and commitment. In what is almost forgotten in the story of Tillman’s character is the fact that he turned down a much more lucrative, five-year, $9 million contract offer from the St. Louis Rams out of loyalty to the Cardinals. In Tillman’s mind, it seemed that he wanted to reciprocate the risk and chance that the Cardinals took on him by staying loyal and committed to the organization. Leaders and coaches should try to find teammates and employees that are naturally committed to the organization. Of course, coaches and leaders must also try to instill and inspire that level of commitment. Although Tillman won’t ever go down in history as one of the greatest linebackers, he will always be recognized as a franchise player for the Arizona Cardinals. Before moving on to the next player, take a minute to ask yourself, as a coach or a leader, how it would feel to have a team of Pat Tillmans behind you.

Moving the Chains

Consider building your roster with players and employees who are committed to the organization—even at their own expense. Those types wear the franchise tag.

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SCORE A LOTT Admittedly, it is tougher and tougher to find people who are committed to the organization through thick and thin. Given the economic and competitive realities that surround us today, it may be difficult to find and retain personnel who are organizationally committed. The very next best thing, though, is to find and instill a sense of commitment to the mission—if not to the organization. Perhaps no other NFL player epitomizes this mission-first mentality as Ronnie Lott. As a Hall of Fame strong safety, Ronnie Lott ruthlessly punished opposing offenses wearing four different uniforms—the San Francisco 49ers, the Los Angeles Raiders, the New York Jets, and the Kansas City Chiefs. Toward the end of the 1985 season, Ronnie Lott delivered a brutal hit on Cowboys running back Timmy Newsome. According to a Sporting News article, bone fragments and parts of Ronnie’s finger sprayed to the turf.7 Lott later taped his fingers together so he could play the next game in a NFC Wild Card playoff match against the Giants. During the off-season, he was presented with a choice. The first choice, and the one that many expected him to take, was to go for surgery that involved a skin graft and pins in the bone. For Lott, though, this was unacceptable as it would mean missing playing time during training camp and during the first couple games of the season. Instead, he opted for amputation of the top of his finger. True to form, he would lead the 49ers back to the playoffs that season while earning his third Pro Bowl nod. We know that the organizational commitment would later erode between Ronnie Lott and the 49ers. To this day, it is unclear whether it was Ronnie Lott or 49ers’ management that decided to part ways. Regardless, this example illustrates not so much commitment to an organization. Rather, it shows what it really means to be committed to the mission. In this case, the mission was playing and winning football games. Ever been to a Costco? Chances are, if you’ve been, that your experience was something special. Maybe something different. Costco is a good example of what happens when commitment goes both ways. From leader to follower, from follower to leader, and to organization, and to a mission. Jim Sinegal is the founder and is also the long-serving CEO of publicly traded Costco. In an era where CEOs of Fortune 500 companies demand and receive multimillion pay packages, Jim Sinegal has earned around $350,000 for a good portion of his tenure. That, by itself, is

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notable. But Sinegal has also stood up and refused overtures by Wall Street analysts to pay his employees less and to cut back on health insurance. The average Costco worker earns about $17 an hour and pays only about 9% of that in health insurance premiums—both benchmarks are considerably more employee-friendly than rival Wal-Mart.8 We can’t just attribute Costco’s “specialness” to pay and benefit packages. No doubt, there are other variables at work. The outcomes are compelling, and they speak to employee commitment to the organization and to its mission of being a retail leader. Costco has the lowest employee turnover in retailing, and its turnover is five times lower than the above-mentioned Wal-Mart.9 Gridiron aside, the inherent value of commitment and loyalty to organization and mission allows for franchise players to make franchise winners whether on the battlefield, the law enforcement arena, or, as we can see from Costco, the corporate world. Moving the Chains

Almost as important as commitment to the organization, is commitment to the mission. Having both is what we call a franchise player.

GAME FACE There are two other notable psychological characteristics that we’ve seen time and again, both on and off the gridiron, which contribute to the franchise tag. Maybe a bit abstract and complex, we’ll try to reduce these psychological dimensions to its core. Together, these last two traits just may add up to complete the Game Face—a spirit or attitude common in franchise players that can lift a team and organization to victory. Maybe more important, these two psychological factors often appear missing or absent in losing teams and defeated players. In general, people tend to fall in one of two categories when it comes to a psychological trait referred to by experts as locus of control. We refer to locus of control as either the victim or victor mentality. Reduced to its most basic form, locus of control refers to the degree to which individuals believe that they personally can control events and situations surrounding them. Drawing a further distinction, most people tend to either embrace either an external locus of control or, conversely, an internal locus of control. People that embrace an external locus of control often feel that there’s little that they can directly do to affect and alter outcomes. Rather, they believe that the environment,

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chance, fate, or, just other people, directly and strongly affect their chances for success or failure. In other words, this external orientation believes that the outside environment in the form of fate, luck, chance, or circumstance will always trump the efforts and actions of any single individual. In externally oriented people, the prevailing sentiment is that things happen to them instead of them causing things to happen. An internal locus of control speaks to the other end of the spectrum. People with an internal locus of control believe that their efforts, decisions, and actions can override and, even influence the environment. Whereas the environment or fate or chance reign supreme in those with external orientations, those with internal orientations place considerably more value in the efforts of the individual. The environment always comes as a secondary or ancillary factor for leaders and followers with an internal locus of control. More telling is that an internal locus of control essentially says that individual will can wield tremendous power to change circumstances. Reduced to its atomic unit, externally oriented people declare fate and chance the victor over individual will. In contrast, people with an internal locus of control believe that individual will and desire trump situational and environmental forces. In our experience, the greatest employees, leaders, followers, and teammates almost invariably demonstrate high levels of internal locus of control. It was a sense that they could take over a game and, because of that, would demand the ball or would try to put the team on their shoulders during difficult circumstances. When others fail to act, those with high levels of internal locus of control would act decisively and, indeed, often take control of the game. Interestingly, people with this internal orientation almost always fail to blame others when performance doesn’t meet expectations. This is particularly important as it applies to the franchise tag. We can best see this internal orientation with true franchise players, leaders, and individuals when they (or the team) fall short. Next time in a postgame interview, listen to the quarterback, running back, or better yet, coach after a loss. Are they blaming others? Are they blaming the referees? Are they blaming the play calling? The weather? Are there tons of excuses? In the corporate world, it is almost expected nowadays that a leader will blame the market, competitors, or even employees and customers for falling short of expectations or established goals. Phillip Schoonover, former CEO of the now-bankrupt electronics retailer Circuit City, was heavily criticized for laying off over 3,000 of the firm’s most skilled and experienced employees in 2007 in a failed cost-cutting scheme. The move helped earn him the distinction of being named the worst

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CEO of the year by the Wall Street Journal. Still, Schoonover blamed the bad economy for Circuit City’s plummeting performance.10 True franchise players are likely to possess a firm internal orientation and, because of that, tend to embrace responsibility and accountability when the team doesn’t perform. There are no excuses. Instead, they say that they didn’t perform and will do better in the future. Blamers and those playing the victim tend to embrace an external locus of control. For that reason, it is harder for them to take responsibility. Without a leader taking responsibility for when things go good, but more important, when things go bad, the leader is not a leader. Instead, they are much worse. They are a victim. A great example of this internal and external orientation in public life was the Hurricane Katrina incident. Involved were three leaders: New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco, and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) director Mike Brown. After the Katrina disaster, all three leaders demonstrated a remarkable willingness to abdicate responsibility for emergency and crisis response. In several well-publicized articles, all three leaders, at one time or another, blamed someone or something other than themselves. In keeping with the external locus of control theme, these leaders avoided placing blame on themselves. Instead, they opted to blame others. There is something deeply disconcerting when leaders don’t seek out and embrace responsibility and the accountability that accompanies it. Contrast these leaders with Major General George Weightman, who also encountered failure. General Weightman was the commanding general of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center when poor and dilapidated facilities and services for veterans, many injured in Afghanistan and Iraq, were exposed and brought to light by a variety of media. When questioned during a Congressional hearing and afterwards, Weightman quickly took responsibility for the failure, offered apologies, and would declare that there was “no excuse” and that he felt saddened that he wouldn’t be able to oversee and deliver a solution.11 These two anecdotes offer compelling lessons especially relevant after losses. And dealing with and responding to losses are supremely important as no team goes undefeated forever. There will always, always be some loss. The trick, however, is to deal with that loss in a way and manner that allows the individual and team to get better and move on. In Weightman’s case, we see a temporary failure in leadership as no veteran should have to endure substandard and, downright dangerous, medical care. Weightman, however, displayed grace and poise and, really, a strong internal locus of control when he took responsibility

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and was, consequently, held accountable for poor results. That is the true mark of a franchise player. You see, it’s easy to take responsibility when things go good. Both internal and external individuals can collect the praise when things go well and as planned. However, in our experience, the real degree of separation is how leaders respond when things don’t go well and the stress is piling on. Those with an internal locus of control seem more prepared and willing to shoulder the blame when things go awry. That’s important and that’s what franchise players, leaders, and coaches are supposed to do.

Moving the Chains

Build a roster of franchise players who seek out and embrace responsibility and wish to be held accountable—both when winning and losing. These people have an internal locus of control orientation. Focus on this locus when building your roster!

There are two sides to the Game Face. We’ve just covered locus of control. The other side is what experts describe as learning orientation. When it comes to game day performance, individuals tend to fall along two disparate lines, just as with locus of control. The first dimension of learning orientation is termed performance-goal orientation. This orientation places considerable weight on winning and performance above all else. Indeed, this is important and it’s downright tough to argue against. Individuals with high performance-goal orientations are the types of kids in high school who were driven by the grade, by the A. Opposite performance-goal orientation are individuals with a learninggoal orientation. Sticking with our classroom metaphor, these types of students were more interested in learning and less concerned about a grade or percentage ranking. For learning-goal oriented players and people, learning new skills, competencies, and mastering certain situations will likely result in higher grades, promotions, and rewards. But that’s never the driving force. First, and foremost, is the desire to learn new skills and gain new knowledge. It is the process of learning, not the outcome of performance, which drives these types of individuals. In our experiences, franchise players split these differences down the middle. This is surprising, because most individuals tend to weigh decidedly in one direction or the other. Franchise players, though, are a true study in duality. They tend to be strong in the dual areas of

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performance and learning. To them, they can’t be separated. Winning is important and essential. However, franchise leaders understand that winning consistently and over time really can’t be achieved without a thirst to learn, innovate, and change. In fact, they’re both equally important. You can’t have one without the other. One easy way to spot these types of franchise players, leaders, and coaches is by the mere fact that they tend to get better over time. Through incremental learning and adjustment, they apply a learning orientation to achieve a performance outcome. Tom Coughlin, the Super Bowl–winning coach of the Giants, may be one such example. For several years, Coughlin had the Jacksonville Jaguars knocking on the door of the AFC Championship. However, Coughlin had rubbed some of the Jaguars the wrong way with his tough leadership style and blowups with some of the players. After some adjustments and some slight changes to his approach to interpersonal relationships and soft skills, Coughlin was able to win a Super Bowl with the Giants. Without question, the willingness to make adjustments—to try, experiment, and learn new things both technically and interpersonally—is an essential ingredient if performance outcomes are to be achieved. It is the ability to reinvent that really drives performance over time. We all know that a performance-only orientation may serve to get As within the classroom or during the short term, but without real learning taking place, ignorance and poor performance in the real world are all but guaranteed. The best military forces, the most effective law enforcement groups, and the most competitive of organizations all seem to do both in perfect harmony—winning while learning. Deep down, there is a certain fear that as soon as the learning stops, winning will too. 3M is a living, breathing example of how both forces work to the benefit of all. Remember, though, that it’s the people, the franchise players, who make the franchise win. 3M is a multinational conglomerate with over 75,000 employees who produce thousands of products to include adhesives, abrasives, laminates, passive fire protection, and optical films. 3M has built a reputation on performance through learning and innovation. Specifically, it was the first to invent waterproof sandpaper, masking tape, and scotch tape. It is probably most famous for its Post-It notes. The best indicator of this duality, though, is in its competitive imperative to generate up to 25% of sales each year from new products.12 Additionally, management allows employees to spend up to 15% of their time on independent projects. The innovation engine at 3M is responsible for its market share and revenue growth. Without the ability

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and capacity to learn, the organization would no longer be able to progress.

Moving the Chains

Whereas most people either have a learning- or a performance-goal orientation, franchise players add tremendous value by having both.

FINAL ROSTER CUTS In this chapter, we outlined how important it is to identify and develop franchise players. While many think that there can only be one franchise player per team, per organization, we couldn’t disagree more. The Gridiron imperative is to build a roster full of franchise players. Up until this point, it is unlikely you truly knew what factors made up a franchise player. We highlighted many and, quite possibly, left some factors out. We feel, however, that what we’ve outlined is non-negotiable. Without these factors, it’s hard to really be a full-fledged franchise player. This chapter should resonate with both leader and follower. For the leader, the task is straightforward. Build and develop a Gridiron roster with the characteristics mentioned in this chapter. And as the heading suggests, if the roster isn’t full of franchise players, difficult decisions regarding whether to keep or cut need to be made. This is never pleasant, but great leaders and great organizations do it. For the follower, the lessons are equally important. To increase your own value, your own effectiveness, you must invest in developing the skills and abilities mentioned here. There’s one last factor that is found in all true franchise players who serve in honorable organizations in both the public and private sector. It is such an important characteristic that there’s no real way to do justice by devoting a paragraph or two towards it. In the following chapter we’ll examine together the common denominator of Gridiron Leadership and franchise potential.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Identify your potential franchise players. Take inventory of the current skill sets needed by the organization and those possessed

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2.

3.

4.

5.

by the organization’s members. Look for skills that will help execute the organization’s objectives. The ability to execute is fundamental to a strong organization. Develop the mission-critical skills that are needed or lacking. Elevate players that possess intelligence, knowledge, and sound judgment. Beyond the ability to “get the job done,” team members must have the ability to grasp the organization’s tactics and strategy. Provide team members the opportunity to increase their knowledge, either through training or experience. Recognize and reward those that not only display their intelligence and knowledge but also exercise good judgment. Do not promote junior leaders that display poor judgment regardless of abilities, skills, intelligence, or experience. Ensure that commitment and desire are valued in leader selection. Leaders must possess a strong commitment to the organization, the other members of the team, their own self-development, and most importantly, the mission of the organization. A leader’s desire or commitment can come in many forms—work ethic, dedication, and continuous effort to improve. Commitment and loyalty to the organization’s mission will help ensure the right (and sometimes, tough) decisions are made for the benefit of all and for the future success of the team. Take accountability for all that you control and even that which you don’t. Leaders must accept responsibility for both the successes and failures of their team or organization. If goals are not met or problems occur, take personal accountability and understand what you, as a leader or follower, could do differently in the future to ensure success. Never place blame. Weigh winning and learning equally. Executing and meeting goals will always be an essential focus for leaders; however, leaders must constantly learn new skills, increase their knowledge, and innovate. Be open to new experiences or learning opportunities. Be flexible and willing to try new approaches to solving problems. Experiment with new ideas. And always recognize that personal incremental improvements must be made throughout your career.

NOTES 1. Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan. Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done (New York: Crown Business, 2002): 19.

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2. ESPN Web site, http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=1694048 (accessed March 14, 2009). 3. Peter King, “Monday Morning Quarterback,” Sports Illustrated Web site, http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/peter_king/02/05/super.bowl/ 1.html (accessed March 14, 2009). 4. Jack Welch and John A. Byrne, Jack: Straight from the Gut (New York: Warner Books, 2001). 5. MSNBC Web site, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4815441 (accessed March 14, 2009). For a complete and detailed account of Pat Tillman’s life, see Jonathan Rand’s Fields of Honor: The Pat Tillman Story (New York: Chamberlain Bros., 2004). 6. ESPN Web site, http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=1605 (accessed March 14, 2009). 7. David Falkner, “Passion Play,” The Sporting News, October 24, 1994. 8. Daren Fonda, “Jim Sinegal,” Time, April 30, 2006, http://www.time.com/ time/magazine/article/0,9171,1186981,00.html (accessed March 14, 2009). 9. Alan B. Goldberg and Bill Ritter, “Costco CEO Finds Pro-Worker Means Profitability,” ABC News Web site, http://abcnews.go.com/2020/business/ story?id=1362779 (accessed March 14, 2009). 10. “Circuit City Braces for Continued Losses.” Washington Post, April 10, 2008. 11. Tom Philpott, “Exclusive Interview: Maj. Gen. George W. Weightman,” Military.com Web site, http://www.military.com/features/0,15240,128647, 00.html (accessed March 14, 2009). 12. Informational Web site, http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/3M and http://www.wirtschaftschemie.de/journal/2008_iss2_70-78.pdf (accessed March 14, 2009).

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4 BIG UPSET

Show class, have pride, and display character. If you do, winning takes care of itself. —Paul “Bear” Bryant Keeping track, we now know that skill, intelligence, knowledge, desire, and judgment is needed. There is one add-on, though, that cements the deal. And this is character. Character is related to judgment, but goes a step farther. Character is doing what is right; judgment is doing what is reasonable and responsible. Many times these two characteristics are highly related, but, at times, they’re not. For one, we’ve seen highly honorable men and women who didn’t always exercise sound judgment. Conversely, we’ve been in the presence of leaders who in certain situations acted with clear and strong judgment, but weren’t guided by a moral compass. Using the moniker from Chapter 2, character and integrity have staying power and, in a way, transcend time and place. Tony Dungy, for instance, is a man of integrity whether or not he exercises sound judgment on the football field. Again, character and honor are time independent. Judgment is more tightly linked with time, with context, and with situations. Clearly, character and integrity help shape judgment but they aren’t the same and judgment never shapes character. If anything, character shapes judgment. The essence of this chapter, though, is that character and honor are non-negotiable. Character is old school. It is the words of Vince Lombardi and Bear Bryant who taught athletes that it was possible to be tough, competitive, even mean, but still maintain one’s character and sense of right and wrong. It is staying competitive and winning, but it also means winning the right way and upholding principles of sportsmanship. Admittedly, some of that of recent has been lost. But the integrity of the game, the leveling of the playing field, is so important that it is one 53

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of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s top priorities. We offer below some insights regarding the importance of character and whether its absence can ever be found in franchise players. OFF THE ROSTER What do Lawrence Phillips, Michael Vick, and R.J. Soward all have in common? All had incredible skills and talents, the likes of which only come around so often. Phillips was a bruising running back for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. He possessed the rare combination of strength and speed, and some consider him one of the top five collegiate running backs of all time. After all, it was Phillips that powered the Cornhuskers to two National Championships in the mid-1990s. Michael Vick had speed, but also had quickness and a slingshot for an arm. His moves in the open field are rivaled by only the moves of Gale Sayers and Barry Sanders. Lost in the Michael Vick story is that he’s the only player in NFL history to rush for 1,000 yards and throw for a 1,000 yards in the same season. R.J. Soward had flat out speed. To be precise, 4.27-type linear speed in the 40yard dash. The Jacksonville Jaguars were so enamored by his speed that they spent a first round pick (29th overall) on him in 2000. While they all shared incredible skills, they also shared some severe judgment problems at best, and character and integrity flaws at the worst. The critical question that all three coaches, general managers, and owners had to make when building their rosters with these individuals was—do their incredible skill sets outweigh or overcompensate for some red flags in the character department? All three teams, at one time, thought that it was worth the risk. After careful consultation, our own experiences, and interviews with leaders in the military, corporate, and law enforcement world, we believe that it’s almost impossible to draft and then develop a franchise player with severe character issues. Herein lie several lessons related to general leadership and core human resource management policy. Coaches often think that they can develop anybody, anywhere. And there’s little question that the very best coaches are particularly good at transforming and developing skills, knowledge, intelligence, and, maybe even effort or desire. However, when it comes to character, it is very difficult to do—especially when there are 52 other players on the team and a rival team ready for battle on a weekly basis. That’s not to say it can’t be done, but it’s extremely hard to do and requires effort and time that a coach or leader may or may not have. Dick Vermeil, head coach of the Rams from 1997 to 1999, probably thought that he could influence Lawrence Phillips from a moral,

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character standpoint even to the point of driving him home from prison. Phillips would commit multiple crimes and ultimately get a multiyear sentence for driving a stolen car into a crowd of young men.1 As successful and talented a coach as Dick Vermeil was, he was still unable to turn around Lawrence Phillips. Arthur Blank, owner of the Atlanta Falcons, probably saw warning signs with Michael Vick in the form of an obscene gesture to some fans and a mysterious marijuana tainted water bottle. But to Blank and many others, the talents and skill sets must have outweighed the little character flaws that apparently could be overlooked. Or so Atlanta Falcons management thought. Vick would later lie to Roger Goodell, the NFL Commissioner, and shortly thereafter be arrested and criminally prosecuted for his involvement in a dog-fighting ring. Tom Coughlin drafted Soward and probably thought that his disciplinarian approach would get Soward on track. Soward’s belligerence and drug use were too much, however, and his NFL career would last months—not years. It is tempting to get blinded by skills, knowledge, or intelligence. But when hidden in the blind spots are character issues, the entire team can suffer. And make no mistake, while ethical and moral behavior can be taught, it is much more difficult to do so especially when compared to developing a person’s skills. Some characteristics are more adaptable and amenable to coaching, other traits are not. Character building falls into the latter category. The moral of the story is that morals matter. And a leader needs franchise players that have both—not just one or the other—in terms of character and skills. In very few cases can skills, alone, carry the day. There are exceptions and we acknowledge that. Michael Irvin, the perennial All Pro receiver for the Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s, is one such contradiction. Irvin finished his 12-year career as the Cowboys’ leader with 750 catches and 11,904 yards. Despite modest size (6-foot, 2-inch, 205 pounds) and speed (4.7 in the 40), he went to five consecutive Pro Bowls, won three Super Bowl rings, and was named to the All-Decade Team of the 1990s before being carried off the field with a career-ending neck injury in Philadelphia in 1999. He was later inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2008. Contrast the above information with a news story reported by the Dallas Observer, which stated that in 1996 Irvin was found in a hotel room with topless dancers, plates of cocaine, and marijuana. Shortly after his probation expired in 2000, Irvin was found in the apartment of a woman who federal agents were searching for in connection with the heroin overdose death of former Cowboys lineman, Mark Tuinei.

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In between, there was a Dallas cop who tried to hire a hit man to kill Irvin and, most recently, the November 2005 arrest for the infamous drug pipe found in his car.2 Despite these integrity issues, Michael Irvin was granted his pass to Canton and inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Even he knew he beat the odds. During his memorable and humble inductee speech he acknowledged that, at times, he lacked both character and judgment. Remember, though, that skills can always be refined, rehabilitated. But a track record of character misconduct will always be more difficult to fix and require more cognitive and physical energies. Most rational leaders should consider other alternatives.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders have more immediate impact on knowledge, skill, and desire. Character is more difficult and time consuming to build. It requires commitment of time and energy that few leaders have.

FANTASY FOOTBALL Back in 1990, the Colorado Buffaloes were the undisputed NCAA football champions. Or were they? On October 6th, the heavily favored Buffaloes found themselves down to Missouri, 31-27 with less than three minutes left. Playing away, at Missouri, they were also playing without their star quarterback, Darian Hagan. Deep in their own territory, backup quarterback Charles Johnson engineered one of the great drives in Colorado football history. Leading the team almost the entire length of the football field, Johnson hit tight end, John Bowman, who slipped and fell just feet from the goal line. There were less than 40 seconds left on the clock. On first down, Johnson spiked the ball. On second down, they handed the ball to star running back, Eric Bieniemy, who was stood up short of the goal line. Colorado called their third, and final, time out. It was supposed to be third down, but the officiating crew forgot to flip the down marker during the time out; the down marker still read second down. After the time out, controversial coach Bill McCartney again put faith in Heisman hopeful, Bieniemy. In what should’ve been third down, and not second, Bieniemy was again stood up just inches from the goal line. Johnson rushed the team up to the line of scrimmage and spiked the ball, in what should’ve been fourth down, to stop

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the clock with two seconds left. Here, the game should’ve stopped with the Missouri Tigers victorious, 31-27. Instead, the Buffaloes were given another down, a fifth down, and Johnson called his own number, a quarterback sneak, for a touchdown. To this day, it is still unclear whether Johnson broke the plane to score.3 Interestingly, Bill McCartney, himself a former Missouri Tiger football player, was asked if he’d forfeit the game knowing that they had won with a fifth down. He declined. Missouri petitioned the Big Eight football commissioner who allowed the score to stand. Colorado would run the table from there and win the National Championship although Georgia Tech would claim a portion of that National Title based on the Fifth-Down controversy. There are several character lessons contained in that story. And a deeper, and more thorough analysis of the Colorado Buffalo football team, and its controversial coach, suggests that the Fifth-Down game was really a microcosm of a team and coach that had lost its moral compass. Many thought the Colorado football team was more of a criminal gang than a football team. According to the New York Times, there were at least two dozen player arrests between 1986 and 1989—all during McCartney’s tenure.4 There were accusations and arrests surrounding rape, drug dealing, and extortion. Some of his problems would later be chronicled in his autobiographical memoir, Sold Out. What is all the more interesting and intriguing about this case, this football team, and its coach, is that Bill McCartney was the founder, organizer, and leader of Promise Keepers—a wildly successful conservative Christian organization directed exclusively at men. Indeed, Promise Keepers packed stadiums and supposedly holds the record for the single greatest gathering of males during a rally at the mall in Washington D.C. in 1997.5 Taking off the pads, let’s examine the critical and key lessons surrounding this case. Maybe the most important lesson is that integrity and character begin at the top. Gridiron Leaders seem to inherently and intuitively understand the value (and the danger) of role modeling. Teammates and followers, alike, take cues from their leader on how to think, and even more important, how to act and behave. Make no mistake, it’s the leader’s sole responsibility to set the context or to set the stage for ethical and honorable decorum, sportsmanship, and competitiveness. The ties to organizational life are equally compelling and even more damning. In our research and in our own personal experiences, we’ve seen that in cases of severe and systemic corruption and ethical

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transgressions, poor leaders acting as poor role models were a driving and contributing force of such behavior. One of the most infamous examples is Enron, where corruption and dishonor began at the top with CEOs Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, and CFO, Andrew Fastow. They set the tone for the entire organization. Energy traders who, by many accounts, were good people got involved in doing bad things. While we can blame them directly, we look to the leader who is ultimately responsible for setting the tone within the organization. More recent examples can be found in the U.S. financial industry. Former chairman of the NASDAQ stock exchange Bernie Madoff is an obvious example. Convicted of running one of the largest Ponzi schemes ever, it’s estimated that Madoff costs clients a total of $65 billion. There are some special coaches out there. And these coaches know that they will (at one time or another) have to contend with problem teammates. When those situations begin to develop, those special leaders will not allow, nor tolerate a culture of corruption or dishonor to take root and grow.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders know that the best way to influence a spirit of team integrity is to set the example on and off the gridiron. Honorable and ethical behavior is driven by proper role models.

UNDER REVIEW Another notable learning outcome from the Colorado case is equally important because it focuses on one of the most important aspects of any sport—winning. When leaders encourage playing dirty, lying, and cheating, there may be a short-term win, but the ultimate legacy, and the ultimate outcome of victory, will forever come into question. We see it here in the Colorado case. As long as records are kept, an asterisk will follow the 1990 National Champion Colorado Buffaloes. Later, McCartney, himself, would regret the circumstance. Ask any sport historian and they’ll tell you that the 1990 NCAA football championship means a little bit less compared to the others that preceded and followed the Fifth-Down champions. In the heat of the moment and in the heated battle of competition, the temptation is to compromise on the processes, on the means, to achieve the ends or to get good outcomes. Barry Bonds will forever be

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clouded in suspicion and his career outcome of most home runs means a little less because the processes used to get there will always be questioned. Bill Romanowski is another great football example of trying to win but doing so the wrong way. Romanowski was a highly skilled linebacker with a 16-year career in the NFL that spanned several organizations, including the San Francisco 49ers, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Denver Broncos, and the Oakland Raiders. Romanowski accumulated 1,115 tackles, 39.5 sacks, 18 fumbles recovered, 18 interceptions, and started in five Super Bowl games. No doubt, Romanowski made a big impact in the organizations he played for.6 But, Romanowski was both a dirty player and a law breaker. During his career, Romanowski was fined $4,500 for kicking former Arizona Cardinals running back Larry Centers in the head. A couple years later, he was fined $20,000 for a helmet-to-helmet hit that broke Kerry Collins’s jaw. He would also spit in the face of 49ers receiver J.J. Stokes during a Monday Night football game and would throw a ball that hit Jets linebacker, Brian Cox, in the crotch. Towards the end of his career, Romanowski attacked and seriously injured one of his Raider teammates, Marcus Williams, who was forced into injury retirement from a broken eye socket. Romanowski was also implicated in the BALCO steroid scandal, one of the biggest steroid scandals in the history of sports. Just as in the case above and as is likely will be the case with Bonds, Romanowski wanted to win at all costs—irrespective of the processes or means to get there. Romanowski, himself, shared these sentiments with CBS’s 60 Minutes.7 All too often, this scenario plays out in organizational life. A recent, and particularly salient, case is the now-infamous Fannie Mae ordeal. In an expos
e by the Washington Post and supported by regulators at both the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, massive fraud was uncovered at the once-proud mortgage giant. Specifically, chief executive Franklin Raines and chief financial officer J. Timothy Howard committed largescale fraud over a six-year time frame that involved doctoring earnings so executives could collect and cash in on hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses and pay-outs. Fannie Mae and its shareholders would foot the bill of a $400 million settlement with the SEC.8 The important lesson to learn here is the same force that arose in the Fifth-Down game and also in the other sports related stories above—weak leaders will sacrifice the means to achieve the ends. Don’t be fooled into believing that this only happens to the leaders at the top of the organization. Working with many leaders in a variety of

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organizations, we witnessed a number of senior and junior leaders who value winning or a short-term gain over the methods of how to achieve those goals. Many times we heard leaders tell their subordinates “I don’t care how you do it, just make it happen.” This philosophy is very dangerous to the organization, and it’s the farthest thing from what Gridiron Leadership is all about. It is winning, but doing so without compromising integrity, character, and honor. It is about winning the Lombardi way. On a level playing field. Can you win with honor and integrity? We think you can. Gridiron Leaders find a way to perform at high levels with their integrity in tact.

Moving the Chains

Never tarnish the luster of a win by cheating to get there. Gridiron Leaders will always win with integrity.

POSTGAME INTERVIEW Harry Stonecipher’s postgame interview wasn’t very good. In fact, it just wasn’t appropriate. And he’s not a football player. Stonecipher was the former president and CEO of Boeing. On March 6, 2005, Stonecipher tendered his forced resignation to the Board of Directors at Boeing. The crime for such penalty? Stonecipher, a grandfather and husband of 50 years, had an extramarital, consensual affair with another Boeing executive.9 This case was notable because it served formal notice to a truth that many have known for years. For true Gridiron Leaders, you are always on the field of play, and what we do in our private lives has a direct and indisputable affect on our professional lives. Put plainly, it’s just too difficult to have separate lives—a personal and a professional one. They are entangled, intertwined, and integrated. What we do at work affects our home life. And what we do after duty, after practice, affects performance on the field. Boeing seemed to understand that and realized that poor ethical conduct and judgment outside of the boardroom was indicative, and maybe even a predictor, of poor performance and decision-making within the boardroom. It’s hard to imagine two different personas of Tony Dungy, Bill Cowher, or Dick Vermeil—an on-the-field version and an off-the-field version. A team, a group, a follower looks at their leaders carefully, through a microscope, if you will. They are searching for something

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worse than a virus. They are looking for the smell of or evidence of hypocrisy or of inconsistency. When a leader preaches integrity on the field but fails to demonstrate that conduct off the field, hypocrisy, the great silver bullet of leadership, is born. Coaches and Gridiron Leaders rely on the currency of legitimacy to motivate and to power their team forward. Few things sap or drain that currency of legitimacy faster than hypocrisy and inconsistency. When a leader acts with integrity, honor, and character off, as well as on the field, he or she prevents the tentacle of hypocrisy from ever taking hold. Time and again, we’ve found that is a key to a special leader.

Moving the Chains

Especially for leaders, conduct off the gridiron is as important or maybe more so than conduct on the field.

CLEARED TO PLAY Arguably, one of the greatest linebackers for the Pittsburgh Steelers was Greg Lloyd. Lloyd gained notoriety for not just being a talented player, but for his clashes with the media. Most famously, Lloyd dropped an F-bomb in a postgame interview with Jim Gray after an exciting 1995 AFC Championship win over the Indianapolis Colts. Many would consider Greg Lloyd a precursor to Ray Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens. Greg Lloyd was a physical and imposing figure both on and off the field. In many Steelers circles, some consider him the equal or even the better of some great Steelers linebackers, including Jack Lambert and Jack Ham. While many may have forgotten Greg Lloyd, he can make a convincing case as one of the better linebackers of the 1990s. Lloyd was named to five consecutive Pro Bowls from 1991 through 1995 and was also voted by Steelers fans to the 75th Anniversary Team—a team that included only four other linebackers.10 There is little doubt that Lloyd would’ve gone on to several more Pro Bowls and, eventually, to the Hall of Fame if it weren’t for the smallest of problems. A small problem that became a big problem for Lloyd and the Steelers. Greg Lloyd’s promising career ended prematurely. Interestingly, though, it wasn’t a brutal hit, a cheap shot, or the wear and tear of Sunday afternoons that neutralized Greg Lloyd. No, it wasn’t any

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of those. It was a tiny bacteria that brought down the 6-foot, 2-inch, 235-pound frame of Greg Lloyd. Specifically, Lloyd missed the entire 1996 season due to a staph infection. He would miss several games in the 1997 season before trying one last time with the Carolina Panthers in 1998. Never underestimate the power of a staph infection—both medically and organizationally. What happened to Lloyd is a metaphor to what can happen to an organization. There are many types of bacteria that can cause staph infections in different parts of the body. They are tough to treat and many are resistant to most commonly used antibiotics. Infections can be as trivial as mild rashes on the skin to more life-threatening scenarios that affect the bloodstream or lungs. Many public health agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, are concerned over the Staph Super Bug because once it’s in a locker room, it’s difficult to eradicate. Similar to what happened to Lloyd, it can start small, but once it has taken hold, the infected person can have a difficult time beating or escaping it. In the 2008 season, the Cleveland Browns and tight end Kellen Winslow feuded over the frequency of staph infections in and around the Cleveland Browns organization and locker room. Within a relatively short period of time, the Cleveland Browns had at least six known cases of staph. The point is, once present, it is difficult to stop and can spread quickly, easily, and quietly. This metaphor holds as we examine honor, character, and integrity. Or, the lack thereof. And, again, the Colorado Buffaloes football program is a prime example of a team that contracted the organizational form of staph—poor ethical behavior and leadership. The character version of staph infection probably first arrived in Boulder during McCartney’s tenure as at least two dozen players were arrested between 1986 and 1989. His successor, Rick Neuheisel, would experience similar problems while accumulating more than 50 NCAA rules violations within a four-year span.11 Gary Barnett, the successor to Neuheisel, was brought in to restore integrity to the program. Instead, things appeared to get worse. Under his tenure, Colorado was caught up in a recruiting scandal in which it was reported that high school recruits were offered sex and taken to sex shows during on-site visits. Even worse, there were allegations of rape from a female placekicker, Katie Hnida, by a Colorado Buffaloes teammate. That incident, along with other allegations, sparked an investigation by University President Elizabeth Hoffman, and Barnett was placed on administrative leave pending the outcome. Although Coach Barnett was reinstated, and the report did not lay blame directly on Barnett or

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Kn Ski ow lls le & dg e

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Character

Figure 4.1 Components of a Franchise Player

athletic director Richard Tharp, it did say Tharp created an atmosphere of “plausible deniability,” while Barnett was resistant to calls for change.12 The point of this argument is that somewhere along the way, the Colorado Buffaloes team contracted the staph infection of misconduct and rule breaking. And just like the medical version, it was difficult to shake despite a change in coaches and increased media scrutiny. Fifteen years from the first known infection, the bug was still breathing, spreading in Boulder. Gridiron Leaders need to understand the importance of ethics, integrity, and character within an organization and, more important, how it influences not only the present, but also the long-term reputation of an organization. The most effective prevention of this ethical staph infection is to make sure the bug never bites in the first place. And, if it does, Gridiron Leaders must eradicate it immediately before it ever gets the chance to grow and spread.

Moving the Chains

A lack of character and ethical misconduct is akin to a staph infection; once it enters the organization and is given the opportunity to breathe, it can spread with dangerous speed and lethality. Never let it take hold in your organization.

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BEATEN DEEP We’re not completely done with Gary Barnett. Prior to taking the helm of Colorado in 1999, Barnett could’ve claimed a legitimate stake as one of the top 10 coaches of the 1990s. At the very least, his stock was never higher as he entered the Colorado program in 1999. The reason is that Barnett had built a resume of repeated success in a fiercely competitive environment. In 1991, Barnett became the head coach of Northwestern, a school known as an academic juggernaut but an athletic pushover. That would change quickly under Barnett. In 1995, Barnett would lead Northwestern to the Big Ten Title and the 1996 Rose Bowl. A year later, he would take his team to the Florida Citrus Bowl. In many regards, Barnett had done the impossible. He had turned around a program that holds the record for the longest losing streak in Division I-A into a perennial Big Ten powerhouse.13 We know there was something special with Barnett because as soon as he left, so too did the fortunes of the Northwestern Wildcat football team. Up until 1999, Barnett enjoyed a tremendous reputation as a winner at one of the most academically challenging schools within one of the most competitive football conferences, the Big Ten, in the nation. Unfortunately, a decade of great work at Northwestern seemed to be wiped out in a single year at Colorado. Sadly, many may not remember Barnett for those prior accomplishments, but, rather, for the embarrassing incidents that took place at Colorado while he was at the helm. Even after Colorado, Barnett has done some noteworthy endeavors to include establishing the Gary Barnett Foundation that aims to give educational support and opportunities to disadvantaged youth. As we reflect on the value and fragility of this thing we call reputation, we should be struck by the fact that one or two incidents can permanently affect a person’s or organization’s reputation. If you need further evidence, look no farther than Firestone. Firestone is one of the oldest and was one of the most celebrated tire firms in the world. Going back generations and over 100 years, Firestone would, for the longest time, be known as a quality tire manufacturer. That would all change in May 2000 when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration contacted Ford and Firestone about the high frequency of tire failures, particularly on Ford Explorers and Mercury Mountaineers.14 Ford investigated and found that 15-inch Firestone tires had high failure rates, particularly those manufactured at Firestone’s Decatur, Illinois, plant. This was a pivotal factor in closing the long-running Decatur plant.15

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A year of accusations, lawsuits, finger-pointing, and blaming would affect Ford, but would permanently alter the identity and reputation of Firestone. A company that had built a reputation of safety and quality over a hundred-plus years could never make those same claims with such confidence again. Like Barnett, it had taken Firestone over a hundred years to build this reputation only to watch what it had built vanish over the course of a couple of months. Herein lies some important lessons regarding ethics, integrity, character and their impact on a person’s, team’s, or organization’s reputation. First, reputations are valuable. People make major decisions and make major purchases on reputation alone. Just ask Rolex, Mercedes, and Ben and Jerry’s. A reputation is not soft and airy. There are real dollars and cents built into this asset we call reputation. Marketing personnel often speak about a company’s brand. That is, the collection of symbols, images, or experiences associated with a product or organization. Every year, BusinessWeek publishes a ranking of the top 100 global brands. Companies spend millions of dollars to climb to the top of the list because they know the power of having a highly recognizable and respectable brand. No question, branding is important to any organization, profit or nonprofit. As an example, BusinessWeek estimates that Coca-Cola’s brand is worth almost $67 billion, while Microsoft’s brand is $59 billion.16 Closely intertwined with a brand is its reputation. What good is it for consumers to recognize a brand when their perception of the product or organization is low? Brand recognition and reputation are assets that have a direct impact on a company’s bottom line. Nonprofits, military, and law enforcement organizations also benefit as well. A strong, positive reputation has many benefits, such as higher recruiting and more productive relationships with the public. Second, reputations are fragile. Unlike other assets, such as a security plant or local area network, reputations are more difficult to protect. They are under siege from forces both within and outside the organization. In the infamous Spygate incident during the 2007 season, the New England Patriots were caught videotaping the signals of the New York Jets’s defensive coaches. The act was a violation of league rules and the Patriots, and Coach Bill Belichick, were fined and lost a first round draft pick.17 The Patriots would go on to win all the games in the regular and postseason, finishing with a record of 18-0. However, the Spygate incident tainted the Patriots’ almost-perfect season. Many in the public would not only question their 2007 season record but also their winning record in previous years. Regardless that other teams were engaging in the same practice (ironically, the Jets were caught videotaping the Patriots a few months later),18 and the advantage it

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really provided the team is arguable, the incident dented the reputation of the Patriots. Gridiron Leaders should understand this and devote some command emphasis on protecting and preserving a reputation. Third, reputations are equal part reality and equal part perception. A leader must ensure that character, honor, and integrity exist throughout the organization to keep, maintain, and build a strong reputation. It shouldn’t stop there, though. There’s more. The leader must affect perception. They must communicate this reputation to internal and external stakeholders. Remember, a reputation only exists in the eyes and hearts of the fans or the consumers. It is their impression that matters above all else. A Gridiron Leader sometimes speaks directly to the fan base to ensure that the reputation is solid and not shaken. Finally, reputations are inherently unfair. We see that in a piercingly clear way when we examine both Barnett and Firestone. It took years and years for each to develop a strong reputation only to watch it evaporate over the course of seconds, minutes, and days. For that reason, alone, Gridiron Leaders must always be alert and on-guard. More importantly, Gridiron Leaders must recognize that short-term decisions, particularly bad short-term decisions, can affect the much longer term reputation of the team or organization. While convenient and tempting to give into short-term pressures, one must remember that if it goes astray, the larger reputation hangs in the balance.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders create ethical, moral, and honorable climates that impact the value of the team and organization’s reputation. One of the greatest assets that people or organizations can ever have is their reputation.

KEEPING IT SIMPLE According to legend, Vince Lomabrdi used to kick off training camp for the Green Bay Packers by holding up a football and stating, “Gentlemen, this is a football.” He would then speak about the fundamentals, such as the importance of blocking and tackling. We also believe in sticking to the basics and keeping it simple. In fact, we think that keeping it simple is the key to building a climate and culture based on character and integrity. Let’s go over what we mean here.

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Throughout this chapter we discussed the importance of character in selecting franchise players to build out your roster. We cautioned against accepting players with severe character flaws and attempting to rehabilitate them after they’ve made the team. We have also gone into great detail about the important role the leader plays in setting the tone for the organization and enforcing standards that will protect the reputation of the organization. What else can a leader do? In addition to selecting players with good character, setting the example, and enforcing standards, leaders should clearly establish expectations. One tool for the leader is to publish ethical standards or an honor code to ground all members of the organization. Over the last 10 years, we’ve seen the explosion of corporate ethics and honor codes. On first blush, this may appear to be a good thing. We’re not so sure, though. One would think that an explosion of ethical codes of conduct would correspond to a higher level of ethical and honorable behavior. But it hasn’t. Arguably, there’s been an inverse relationship. As the sheer number of ethical codes of conduct rise, the quality of ethical decision-making seems to have gotten worse, not better. How can one explain that? We explain that by looking at an organization’s codes. The most striking characteristic of most codes that we’ve seen is their sheer length. For instance, computer giant, Dell, has a preamble to their Code of Conduct that is 371 words. Honeywell’s Code of Conduct takes up 32 pages and is entitled, “Code of Business Conduct: Your Everyday Guide to Business Conduct.” We’re not picking on these two organizations, per se, because most firms, agencies, and organizations have similarly worded, titled, and lengthy codes. Possibly written by attorneys, it is unreasonable and, just plain unrealistic, to ever believe that a 32-page Code of Conduct can meaningfully impact a person’s ethics and character. It’s just too long. Furthermore, the sheer detail of these documents creates a perception that it exists only to protect the organization from liability. Never forget that ethics and honor codes are meant to shape thoughts and impact decisions. They are not meant and created to provide a legal backdrop or defense against lawsuits. That may be an ancillary or secondary benefit, but it should never be the driving force behind a code. If ever the spirit of legal protection trumps the true goal of a code to create an ethical culture and to spur honorable decisionmaking, cynicism will result. And, ironically, you’ll have more violations of the code, not less. We’ve found that the best ethics and honor codes to shape and influence everyday decisions are the simplest ones. The ones that are

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easy to remember, hard to forget. Many colleges and universities have honor codes, such as Penn State, Stanford, Connecticut, and many others. Some are fairly simple while others may require students to sift through backup documents to understand it all. One of the more famous honor codes that have been subjected to Congressional scrutiny for the better part of two centuries is the West Point Honor Code. It reads, “A cadet will not lie, cheat or steal or tolerate those who do.” Its beauty is its simplicity. At 13 words, it can be easily committed to memory. Isn’t it easier to remember and be impacted by 13 words as opposed to 13 paragraphs or 13 pages? At 13 words, it is so elegant because it says it all. Its brevity is also the power of the code. It serves as the foundation for how cadets are supposed to act and every cadet can easily memorize or internalize it. Notre Dame has something similar that speaks to honor, commitment, tradition, and a culture of high expectations. Lou Holtz placed a sign in the corridor from the locker room into Notre Dame stadium that reads, “Play Like a Champion Today.” At five words, it says it all. Lou Holtz thought that this code was so important, he often took the poster with the team on road games to remind them of their responsibilities. For years, General Electric (GE) employed a simple, informal litmus test known internally as the “newspaper test.” The intent was for employees at all levels to imagine if their actions, decisions, or behaviors made the front-page news of a national newspaper. If they would be embarrassed, ashamed, or have regret, then the employee knew he was potentially about to act in an improper manner.19 We get the point. Shorter may be better as Gridiron Leaders use codes as a tool to build a spirit of honor and ethics within their team or organization. Simple, however, isn’t enough. Gridiron Leaders must bombard and, through repetition, ensure that the code becomes part of a person’s mental DNA. Succinctness is involved, though, as it is easier to commit to memory and easier to repeat and learn a message that is five or thirteen words as opposed to 13 pages. At West Point, the Honor Code is written and spoken everywhere one turns. At Notre Dame, the football players have to touch or tap the metal sign every time they leave the tunnel and enter the stadium. Lou Holtz made it difficult to forget as he got two senses involves—sight and touch. Keep in mind that we are not suggesting that an organization abandon the compulsory policies recommended by the corporate legal department. However, don’t expect people in the organization to act in an honorable or ethical manner because a 50-page document is posted

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to the company Web site and every employee completes a mandatory two-hour training session every year. Our best advice to leaders is to set clear expectations of how to act, and keep it short and simple. If you want to impact thought, deed, and practice, then it must be memorable, communicated frequently, and it must be repeated. By providing easy to understand guidelines or expectations, a leader creates powerful tools to preserve and foster a reputation of integrity and high performance.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Character is the essential element in any franchise player. Do not be impressed with skills alone. True franchise players will have both skills and character. Skills will never compensate for character flaws. Be very wary of selecting and hiring individuals with known character issues—developing character is extremely difficult and requires great effort and time. 2. Organizations will mimic the behavior of their leaders. Integrity and character begin with the leader. Leaders must set the stage for ethical and honorable conduct. If you want the members of an organization to act in an honorable manner, then you must lead by example. Behavior, good or bad, is contagious. The rest of the organization will follow your example as to how to act. 3. Never compromise integrity for short-term gain. Beware of the “win at all costs” attitude. Resist the temptation to compromise ethics, even when internal or external pressure is extreme. In the long run, it is better to fall short of an objective, target, or goal than to achieve a short-term win through poor ethics or illegal means. Never sacrifice the means to achieve the ends. 4. There is no off-season. More and more, we see the blurring line between our personal and professional lives. The two are almost inseparable. As a result, what you do in your personal life has a direct impact on your professional life. Leaders can’t have character while at work and leave it behind at the end of the day. Hypocrisy and inconsistency will quickly erode trust and commitment. Act in the same ethical manner at work as you would in your home and vice versa.

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5. Reputation is an invaluable asset. Character, good or bad, is contagious. A leader’s character doesn’t just impact the present; it extends well into the future. Reputation is an important, but fragile, asset that can easily be compromised by poor ethics and dishonor. An organization can stand out among its competitors on reputation alone and how the organization is perceived. Eliminate ethical problems immediately to prevent the spread to the rest of the organization. Become the guardian and protector of your team or organization’s reputation. 6. Set and communicate clear expectations. Provide simple and easy to understand expectations for how people should act. Communicate expectations frequently and repeatedly. One tool in the leader’s toolbox is to create an honor code or litmus test that is brief and easy to use so that it may be memorized and become part of that person’s subconscious decision-making.

NOTES 1. Peter King, “The Party’s Over,” Sports Illustrated, December 12, 1997, http:// vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1011665/index. htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 2. Richie Whitt, “Busted,” Dallas Observer, January 17, 2007, http://www. dallasobserver.com/2007-01-18/news/busted/2 (accessed March 14, 2009). 3. Stuart Whitehair, “Colorado Football: CU vs. Missouri 1990 (The Fifth Down Game),” The Bleacher Report Web site, http://bleacherreport.com/ articles/31980-colorado-football-cu-vs-missouri-1990-the-fifth-down-game (accessed March 14, 2009). 4. Harvey Araton, “‘Team Player’ Prolongs Colorado’s Woes,” New York Times, February 20, 2004. 5. James Risen, “Christian Men Hold Huge Rally on D.C. Mall,” Los Angeles Times, October 5, 1997, http://articles.latimes.com/p/1997/oct/05/news/ mn-39657 (accessed March 14, 2009). 6. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/R/RomaBi00.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 7. Daniel Schorn, “Romo Comes Clean,” September 17, 2006, CBS Web site, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/13/60minutes/main941102.shtml (accessed March 14, 2009). 8. “Fannie Mae Settlement Proves Anticlimactic,” Wall Street Journal, April 21, 2008.

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9. Rick Anderson, “A New Ethical Era for the Sleazy B?” Seattle Weekly, December 3, 2003, http://www.seattleweekly.com/2003-12-03/news/a-newethical-era-for-the-sleazy-b/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 10. Pro-football reference Web site, http://www.pro-football-reference.com/ players/L/LloyGr00.htm (accessed March 1, 2009). 11. “Inadvertent Errors,” Sports Illustrated, July 20, 2002, http://sportsillustrated. cnn.com/football/college/news/2002/07/20/cu_neuheisel_ap/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 12. Ron Borges, “Colorado Blew Chance to Take Stand,” NBC Web site, May 28, 2004, http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/5069858/ (accessed March 14, 2009). 13. Tim Hyland, “The Longest Losing Streaks in College Football History,” College Football reference Web site, http://collegefootball.about.com/od/ history/a/history-lstreak.htm; Teddy Greenstein, “The 1995 Northwestern Wildcats Go to the Rose Bowl,” http://www.courant.com/topic/chi-chicago days-1995wildcats-story,0,4988072.story (accessed March 14, 2009). 14. St. Petersburg Times Web site, http://www.sptimes.com/News/webspecials/ firestone/timeline.shtml (accessed March 14, 2009). 15. St. Petersburg Times Web site, http://www.sptimes.com/News/webspecials/ firestone/timeline.shtml (accessed March 14, 2009). 16. “The 100 Best Global Brands,” BusinessWeek, September 18, 2008. 17. SportsBusiness Daily Web site, http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/article/ 118608 (accessed March 14, 2009). 18. Rich Cimini, “Spy for a Spy: Jets Started Video Battle,” Daily News, December 12, 2007, http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/jets/ 2007/12/12/2007-12-12_spy_for_a_spy_jets_started_video_battle-1.html (accessed March 14, 2009). 19. Jack Welch and John A. Byrne, Jack: Straight from the Gut (New York: Warner Books, 2001).

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5 FINALIZE THE ROSTER

The secret is to work less as individuals and more as a team. As a coach, I play not my eleven best, but my best eleven. —Knute Rockne Jim Druckenmiller didn’t fit in. Not that it was his fault. He was just the wrong guy, at the wrong time, at the wrong place. And as it is in sports as it is in life, it is hard to overstate the importance of fit. So, stay fit. Jim Druckenmiller was a phenom at the quarterback position at Virginia Tech in the mid-1990s. Often lost behind Virginia Tech’s most famous (or infamous) quarterback, Michael Vick, stands Jim Druckenmiller—an impressive physical specimen and a truly gifted quarterback. At 6-feet, 4-inches tall and weighing close to 250 pounds, many pro scouts counted Druckenmiller as a prototypical NFL quarterback. Legendary for his arm strength, urban legend had it that Druckenmiller could throw the entire length of the football field—a full 100 yards. Selected with the 26th overall pick in the first round of the 1997 NFL draft, hopes were high that Druckenmiller would deliver. In previous chapters, we discussed the importance of selecting franchise players, those with great talent, skills, competencies, or other attributes that will help make the team successful. We also mentioned the importance of going the extra step and finding franchise players with character to help build the team’s legacy. However, having the right raw ingredients doesn’t necessarily mean a leader will have the recipe for success. There are other, essential concepts for leaders to understand if they want to build the roster of a winning team. Druckenmiller’s case illustrates the first of these important lessons. The 49ers did not benefit from the talents of Jim Druckenmiller, nor was he as successful as anticipated because he wasn’t a good fit. And this level of 73

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misfit can be viewed along three separate, but equally important, dimensions (See Figure 5.1). There are three different types of “fit.” The first type of fit is called Person-Job fit, or PJ fit. Ideally, the knowledge, skills, and abilities of a given person should fit nicely with the knowledge, skills, and abilities demanded of the job. The next type of fit is called Person-Organization fit, or just PO fit. Here, the person’s personality and attitudes and motivations should fit, support, and even build upon an organization’s culture. Finally, there is Person-Strategy fit, or PS fit. The notion of PS fit is quite simple—the person should fit with and help execute a given organization’s strategy. For all of Jim Druckenmiller’s talents and the 49ers’ organizational gifts, what we see when we peel back this case is a violation of the Fit Law on all three levels. The Fit Law is simple: a given person should always fit with, complement, and improve upon the job, the organizational culture, and that organization’s strategy. What transpired between this person and this franchise in that spring, summer, and fall of 1997 holds lessons for all organizational leaders and managers. To better explore this idea, we need to first visit PJ and PS fit because they are highly related. The San Francisco 49ers offensive strategy was known as the West Coast Offense. This strategy was groundbreaking in that it rebelled against the typical vertical offensive attack. In a vertical passing offense, the goal is to run the ball first and frequently to draw the linebackers and safeties closer to the line of scrimmage. As they creep up, the quarterback will launch a vertical (airborne) attack, trying to get behind the safeties. In the traditional vertical scheme, teams will run more times than they throw the ball. When they do throw the ball, they will use a strong-armed quarterback to go deep. The West Coast Offense is just the opposite. Instead of a vertical game, the West Coast Offense is noted for being a passing strategy marked by almost horizontal, shorter, and well-timed and accurate

Figure 5.1

Skills, knowledge, abilities

Job

Personality, attitudes, motivations

Organization

Mindset, strategic disposition, risk orientation

Strategy

“Fit” Elements

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passes. And in a true West Coast Offense, the team tries to spread the field with a burst of short passes to many different receivers, which helps open up running lanes and the running game. Quarterbacks in this system throw the ball more but for shorter distances. Unlike the vertical game mentioned earlier where the run opens up the pass, the West Coast Offense uses the pass to open up the run game. Looking back, almost any other team in that given year could’ve made better use of Jim Druckenmiller’s talents and abilities. For starters, Druckenmiller came from Frank Beamer’s traditional, vertical offensive strategy at Virginia Tech. Tech’s success during the 1990s and through this decade has been to run first, pass second. With his cannon arm, Druckenmiller was a perfect fit for a more traditional passing offense. Anything but the West Coast Offense, which rarely called for the quarterback to throw the ball deep downfield. Druckenmiller had no real exposure in college to the West Coast Offense and probably did not train physically for those types of specific skills. His most obvious talent, the cannon arm, was not nearly as important or valued in a West Coast Offense that valued accuracy over distance. Druckenmiller didn’t really fit with the job because he didn’t mesh well with the strategy. A West Coast Offense quarterback is mobile, accurate, and possesses quick decision-making skills. Druckenmiller didn’t look like that. Instead, he was very strong, but not overly mobile. Here, we have a violation of the PJ and PS components of the Fit Law; he didn’t fit with the strategy, and he didn’t fit with the job of a West Coast Offense quarterback. Druckenmiller’s career was over before it began. Unfortunately, this case has all the hallmarks of a lose-lose situation considering that the 49ers used a first round draft pick to obtain Druckenmiller. While the violation of PJ and PS fit are clear to see, there probably was a lack of PO fit as well. The 49ers prided themselves, especially under the management and leadership of coaches Bill Walsh and George Seifert, as a character- and integrity-based organization. Previous quarterbacks like Joe Montana and Steve Young led credibility to the maxim that nice guys could lead teams and win under pressure. During his early years with the 49ers, rape accusations plagued Druckenmiller for an incident that occurred in Blacksburg, Virginia. The New York Times reported that Druckenmiller admitted to having sex with a drunken student, although Druckenmiller claimed that the sex was consensual. Although acquitted of charges, Druckenmiller’s actions and decisions didn’t mesh with the organizational culture nourished by his predecessors, Montana and Young. While this incident played out in court, Druckenmiller lost his backup job to Ty Detmer. His actions didn’t fit with the organizational culture. His days with the 49ers were numbered.

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CULTURE CLASH Violations of the Fit Law are clearly not restricted to the realm of football. The corporate world is notorious for making similar mistakes. Managers, impressed with the laundry list of accomplishments on a candidate’s resume, hire new employees that don’t fit the organization’s culture or don’t have the specific skill set needed to perform the job. Many human resource departments regard selecting and hiring talent as a vital, but rare, skill among hiring managers. Third-party placement agencies, corporate recruiters, and headhunters are all part of a growing multimillion dollar industry, and this growth may be viewed as a sort of admission from organizational leaders that complying with the Fit Law is easier said than done. Even leaders within the best organizations make mistakes. Like the 49ers, the nation’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, violated the Fit Law when it hired an edgy, aggressive, young executive to shake up the company’s marketing department. Julie Roehm, a newly hired 36-year-old marketing executive, simply did not fit in. Perhaps the first clue was when Roehm painted her office a bright chartreuse that contrasted with the bland gray office walls that were standard in Wal-Mart headquarters.1 Or maybe it was when she raised eyebrows at the ultraconservative company by selecting an ad agency that had recently run an advertisement displaying a male lion mounting a female lion. Perhaps it was the introduction of racier ads, such as one commercial with a couple discussing underwear in front of their relatives. Or possibly it was when she showed up at a dinner party in a trendy Manhattan restaurant, thrown by an ad agency, and enjoyed Kobe beef and lychee martinis. Approximately two months after the dinner, Roehm was terminated for violation of company policies, a charge that Roehm denied. Almost from the beginning it appeared that her personal style was almost a direct contradiction of Wal-Mart’s buttoned-up, conventional culture. For Wal-Mart’s CEO at the time, H. Lee Scott, Jr., hiring Roehm must have appeared to be a good move for the company. As sales slowed at the retailer giant, the new goal was to attract upper- and middle-income customers. Wal-Mart wanted these customers to view the retail chain as a place that sold high-end products for low prices. This change in customer perception required a radical change in approach. And Roehm seemed like just the person to lead that change. Roehm, a Purdue University grad, quickly rose through the ranks in the automotive industry before joining Wal-Mart. First, at Ford Motor Company, Roehm was successful at attracting younger buyers to the Ford Focus compact against the stiffer Japanese competition. Within only a few years, her work was enough to land her a job heading

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marketing communications for all Ford vehicles. A year later she moved to Chrysler and began resuscitating the Dodge brand, a distant third place in the market. Under her leadership, the marketing team developed successful advertising campaigns around the slogan “Grab Life by the Horns” and by marketing Dodge’s “Hemi” engine. Despite Roehm’s successes, Scott and others at Wal-Mart headquarters should have recognized the mismatch prior to her employment. It’s possible that Scott or others at Wal-Mart only considered the PJ fit. Obviously, Roehm was talented, intelligent, and had a track record of success. She had the skills and abilities needed to perform the job. However, her personality and attitudes were far different from the organizational culture. Additionally, her approach to executing the company’s strategy may have been too aggressive or risky than what Wal-Mart leadership could handle. Simply stated, she failed the PO and PS fit criteria, and Wal-Mart should have seen this coming. While at Chrysler, Roehm caught more than a few people’s attention when her team developed a commercial for the Dodge Durango that showed two men at a urinal making comments such as “it’s big,” and “seven inches longer.” Only in the last frames of the commercial does the camera pan back to reveal the men staring at a poster of the truck. A year later during the Super Bowl, Roehm tried to get Dodge to sponsor a pay-per-view event called the “Lingerie Bowl,” showing women playing football in lingerie. The event was later pulled, proving too much for even the risk-seeking automotive crowd. Soon after Roehm departed the company, Wal-Mart returned to its advertisements focused on low prices. Wal-Mart denies that it fired Roehm over her approach and is currently involved in a lawsuit with Roehm over such claims.2 However, one can only speculate how long Roehm would have lasted in the company if she weren’t fired. With such an obvious misfit, the outcome was certain regardless. It is important to note that potential candidates for any given role should pass all three areas of the Fit Law. Whereas Roehm was a PO and PS mismatch for Wal-Mart, it is possible for an organization to settle on someone with two out of three areas of fit only to find the result disastrous. In 2000, Bob Nardelli took over as CEO of home improvement retail giant, Home Depot. Six years later, shares for the company had declined by 6%, while arch rival Lowes had increased by 200%. Moreover, customer satisfaction was down, and turnover was high. Nardelli, under pressure, resigned.3 At the onset, Nardelli appeared to be a good fit. Nardelli, the former leader of General Electric (GE) Power systems, was once a top prospect to succeed Jack Welch to run GE. He was known for his financial

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acumen and keen focus on operations. When Nardelli’s appointment was announced, Home Depot cofounder Bernie Marcus remarked, “Bob’s experience at GE speaks for itself in terms of the talent, vision and expertise. . . . [H]e compiled an impressive track record of delivering superior sales and profit growth in all of the GE business units he ran. . . .”4 Nardelli clearly had the skills to do the job (a PJ fit) and was committed to grow the retail giant (a PS fit), but most seem to overlook the obvious difference in his leadership style and the organizational culture (a PO mismatch). Nardelli’s autocratic, command-and-control style of leadership was at odds with Home Depot’s decentralized, entrepreneurial style in which store managers were expected to act independently. Company founders Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank had stressed a pro-customer, employeecentric approach to the business, whereas Nardelli focused on data, cost cutting, and holding everyone strictly accountable to meeting targets. Marcus and Blank used to preach “make love to the customer,” while Nardelli would say “facts are friendly.”5 Nardelli quickly alienated both employees and customers. He replaced thousands of full-time store workers with part-time help in an effort to reduce costs. Store staff reductions led to customer complaints. In the University of Michigan’s annual American Consumer Satisfaction Index, Home Depot was rated last among major retailers in the United States during 2005.6 The laidback culture that once defined the retail giant gradually turned into a culture of fear. Turnover increased. By the time Nardelli left, almost all of Home Depot’s top 170 executives came into their positions after 2001 and over half came from outside the company. In GE fashion, Nardelli began to purge the company of bottom performers. As a result of this policy, store managers that made the cut were often seen nervously checking to see whether they made their weekly targets.7 In the end, it wasn’t his personality or leadership that forced Nardelli out. Nardelli’s tactics did not ultimately create shareholder value. Shareholders, and eventually the board, began to question whether Nardelli was a fit for their company. Nardelli would walk away with a $210 million golden parachute while the company tried to get back on track.8 In retrospect, the PO mismatch couldn’t have been more apparent. Despite Nardelli’s success at GE, he had absolutely no retail experience. Several years into his tenure, Nardelli still believed his plan would work.9 He had seen the business model work in the past; unfortunately, his experience had only proven that the model worked in a manufacturing environment. Nardelli was not wired for a business that was supposed to care more about treating customers well than slashing costs. Marcus and Blank were likely impressed with Nardelli’s

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track record without truly understanding where Nardelli achieved such a record. He was a franchise player back at GE but couldn’t adapt to the culture of a new team. Although his skills and his vision for the company’s future demonstrated that he was a fit for the job and the strategy, he could not overcome the incongruence to the organization. And in such a case, the employees, shareholders, and customers ultimately paid the price.

Moving the Chains

Violations of the Fit Law can have a devastating impact to the organization. Make sure incoming members match all three areas of fit.

READY . . . SET . . . NO! Ever hear of Rashaan Salaam? Whereas Druckenmiller never fit, Salaam was just never ready. Leaders assess fit and then they ask: Is that person ready for the job, ready for the responsibility? In Rashaan Salaam’s case, the answer to both questions was no. Rashaan Salaam literally burst onto the college scene. With little to no playing time during his first two seasons with the Colorado Buffaloes, expectations were muted as he assumed the starting running back position. He blew away and just flat out outran both expectations and competition in the 1994 college football season and went on to win the Heisman Trophy. In that special season, Salaam became one of four college players to run for more than 2,000 yards in a single season.10 Averaging a staggering 187 yards per game, he had great speed and was known for some across-the-grain cuts that would leave linebackers flat-footed. In one memorable span, Salaam ran for more than 200 yards—in four consecutive games! In one of the most exciting individual performances by a college football running back, Salaam racked up 362 yards in a 34-31 win over the Texas Longhorns despite flu-like and heat stroke-type symptoms. After his junior season, Rashaan Salaam believed he was ready for the pros. The Chicago Bears were not that far removed from the Walter Payton years and were hoping for the second coming when they took Salaam with the 21st pick in the 1995 NFL draft. Unfortunately, the excitement and human highlight film never materialized. During Salaam’s four-year career in the NFL, he gained 1,684 yards. However, 1,074 of those yards were in his rookie year, and he would fumble

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11 times during that same season. Granted, 1,074 yards in a single season is pretty good, and he did rank 13th in the league. But in that same year, Emmitt Smith gained 1,773 yards and notched 25 touchdowns. After some careful examination, we would argue that Rashaan Salaam left school too early. He wasn’t ready personally, and he wasn’t ready professionally. Let’s begin with the professional readiness. Rashaan Salaam was on a truly loaded team in the Big XII that had one other notable team that year in Nebraska. On that 1994 Colorado Buffaloes team was the Hail Mary Tandem of Michael Westbrook and Kordell Stewart. Opposite Westbrook was another talented and speedy receiver, Charles Johnson, who was drafted early in the first round by the Pittsburgh Steelers. Kordell Stewart was a particularly dangerous weapon because he could kill you with the run or the pass. Some argue that this talent made it very difficult for teams to concentrate on stopping the run in general, and Salaam in particular. What’s more is that some analysts predicted early on that Salaam’s upright running style would expose him to vicious hits in the NFL. They were right. His short-lived career was marred by several nagging injuries. During his four years in the NFL, he played in only 33 games out of a possible 64.11 Maybe even more, and what few people realize, is that Rashaan Salaam only had one full season of traditional 11-man football before joining the Bears. And that was his junior season at Colorado. At his high school, La Jolla Country Day School, there were only enough players and other competing high schools to play 8-man football. Only once in his high school career did he play and run in a traditional 11-man game. During that game, he was held for under 100 yards for the first and only time in his high school career. Why is this important? It’s important because he only played a total of 13 high school or collegiate games with the mandatory 11 players before entering the National Football League. Don’t get us wrong. Rashaan Salaam had one of the best seasons ever for a collegiate running back. The problem is that it was only one. A great deal of decisions and emphasis were placed on that single season. One makes for a great season, but one doesn’t necessarily mean you’re ready to join the NFL, and one doesn’t spell a successful career. Rashaan Salaam wasn’t quite ready to play in the NFL, and it showed. How both he and the Bears missed the signs that he wasn’t ready, we’ll never fully know. Leaders know there’s more than a professional commitment to a job or to an organization. There’s also a personal commitment, and it’s likely that Rashaan Salaam wasn’t ready here either. While his injuries

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were a roadblock in his quest for a successful career, an even bigger problem was his self-admitted “addiction” to marijuana. To play and succeed at the highest level of competition requires more than professional readiness. It also requires personal readiness. Here, Rashaan Salaam came up a couple yards short. The lesson for all of us is simple and straightforward—leaders and coaches need to make sure their people are ready both professionally and personally. If they’re not, wait until they are and help them get there. In general, we don’t think we do a good enough job as leaders at answering the very basic question— is he or she ready to play today?

Moving the Chains

Not only do people need to fit in, they need to be professionally and personally ready to contribute.

IDENTIFYING THE STARTING LINEUP If you find potential franchise players, and the players pass the Fit Law, how do you know they’re really ready? We spoke with many organizational leaders and managers that often complained about the difficulty of assessing readiness. In many organizations, if a person did a good job in an individual contributor role, he was promoted to management. In some cases, these newly promoted managers failed and quickly exited the organization. Organizational leaders would agree that when a person performed well in one role, that success didn’t always guarantee the person would perform well in another role. Yet, these same leaders would continue to select managers based on their most recent performance appraisal in a trial-and-error approach to determine who would work out. Many organizations have addressed this problem with a number of different approaches. However, the first step in this process is to ensure that a job analysis has been done before a leader starts reviewing potential candidates. A job analysis is a detailed description of the work required; tasks or responsibilities; and the necessary skills, knowledge, abilities, or attributes required to successfully perform the role. Like a good football coach, a leader should have an in-depth understanding of every position on the team and what’s needed for someone to be a success in that spot. Once the job analysis is complete, the leader can begin the selection process. Interviews may be the most common selection tool in corporate America, but there are other approaches to select the right candidate.

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One of the most controversial, but most widely used, draft tools for quarterbacks is the Wonderlic test. The Wonderlic test is a 12-minute, 50-question test that taps into a person’s general mental ability. It is the football version of an intelligence or IQ test. A score of 50 is the maximum possible score, while a score of 20 indicates average intelligence. Akili Smith, former Cincinnati Bengal bust at quarterback, scored a 15. Jeff George, one of the great journeymen in NFL history despite incredible physical gifts, scored a 10. Heath Shuler, a quarterback out of Tennessee that the Washington Redskins pinned their future on, scored a 16. Compare that with Eli Manning (39), Troy Aikman (29), or Steve Young (33). There’s more than coincidence at work here. Intelligence is a factor in all winning—in and away from the arena. The three quarterbacks just mentioned all won Super Bowls. To the best of our knowledge, in the modern Wonderlic era, there’s been no Super Bowl-winning quarterback who scored less than 20. If intelligence is a factor in winning, then coaches need to target players with the right mental aptitude and testing is one method to measure it.12 In the same manner, organizations can use assessment testing to gauge a candidate’s potential success in a new role. An organization may rely on the Myers-Briggs test to identify personality types that will match certain job functions, whereas a manufacturing company may use a hands-on simulation to test mechanical skills, and another organization may use a written ethical assessment to predict how someone will act in certain job-related scenarios. Regardless of the specific type of test used, pre-employment assessment testing can be a useful tool for leaders to build their teams. Note that we don’t advocate 100 percent reliance on assessment testing. It is one tool among many. Reflecting on the case with Rashaan Salaam, it’s possible for a candidate to score highly during a preemployment screening test and still not perform to expectations. Another evaluation method for leaders is through observation. By observing how candidates perform in different situations, a leader can better assess how that person will perform in a desired role. Great leaders know that a person has to be viewed from many different angles to truly assess potential. A coach with this mindset would have been hesitant to select Rashaan Salaam until he had been through several seasons. By understanding the requirements from the job analysis, leaders can closely review a candidate’s past experiences, ensuring the candidate has demonstrated proficiency in a variety of environments. We are, of course, not referring to the simple resume check that most employers do, checking for key words or phrases before bringing a candidate in for an interview. We are suggesting an intense review of the candidate’s

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background to understand the alignment between the candidate’s previous roles and the job analysis. However, the background examination, coupled with the interview process, can be an effective means to determine whether a candidate is ready.

Moving the Chains

Leaders have many tools to evaluate whether a person is ready to take on a new role. Use multiple methods to make the best possible choice.

READY AND WILLING? Some may contend that Scott Frost and Eric Crouch were the same person. As we look at these two storied Nebraska quarterbacks, we couldn’t disagree more. Both were ready, but only one was willing. Leaders need people and players that are both. Let us explain. Frost was one smart guy. He started at Stanford University before transferring to Nebraska after only two years. Frost was a winner at Nebraska, racking up a record of 24-2 during his two years as a starter. In his final year as a starter, 1997, he led the Nebraska Cornhuskers to victory for Tom Osborne’s final National Championship ring. Skilled at leading the option attack, which emphasizes running and decisionmaking from the quarterback position, Scott Frost proved that he was good in that position and in that scheme. However, Eric Crouch was even better. In 2001, Eric Crouch recorded one of the best seasons ever by a collegiate quarterback. In that 2001 season, Crouch surpassed Tommie Frazier as Nebraska’s all-time total offensive leader. A couple of weeks later, he became the Big XII’s all-time career rushing quarterback. That same season, Crouch broke the record for career touchdowns by a quarterback and became only the fourth player in Division I history to both pass and rush for 3,000 yards in a career. Shortly before winning the 2001 Heisman trophy, Crouch became only the ninth quarterback to win 35 games as a starter. Sadly, however, Crouch, who also won the 2001 Walter Camp Award, would not have the NFL career that Scott Frost had. And the reason may have been that he was ready, but not willing. Crouch and Frost were both exceptional option quarterbacks. In NFL speak this meant discipline, strong decision-making abilities, fast legs, ability to take a hit, but less-than-average arm strength. In line with the Law of Fit, option quarterbacks very rarely make good NFL quarterbacks regardless of the system (vertical or horizontal game).

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The Saint Louis Rams understood this and took Crouch with the 95th pick in the third round of the 2002 draft in the hope of converting the quarterback to a wide-receiver position. For whatever reason, he resisted. Only too late in his career did he grudgingly convert to the strong safety position (with the 2005 Hamburg Sea Devils of NFL Europe). Many might think Crouch was too stubborn. If only he was willing to convert, he may have had a more successful career. Scott Frost, on the other hand, was obviously willing to make some changes and understood early on that he’d have to be willing to adjust as there were no NFL teams willing to take him as a quarterback. He made it known early that he was willing to play any position given the opportunity. So, in the third round (66th pick), Bill Parcells drafted Frost to play defensive back for the New York Jets. He would finish his career as a special teams/defensive back sub for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after six seasons. Of course, leaders need people that are ready. But, maybe even more important, leaders want a team of people with Scott Frost’s mentality; people who are not only ready, but who are willing to fill in at any position to make the team better. When leaders build teams with personnel who possess that same type of thought process, both the individual and team benefit. The task then for leaders is to find people and players who are both ready and willing to contribute.

Moving the Chains

Ready isn’t good enough; leaders find people and players who are both ready and willing to contribute.

FLEX THAT MUSCLE Deion Sanders was as dangerous a weapon on the football field as any that have ever suited up. If we were to survey 100 football fans on what made Deion so dangerous, we’d likely hear things such as speed, quickness, field vision, low center of gravity, intelligence, and a natural football instinct that seemed to blend and balance risk and reward to perfection. On closer examination, however, we don’t think there was a single factor that made Deion such a valuable component of a team’s Human Capital strategy. Rather, the reason teams coveted Deion Sanders to such a degree was that he could do it all (and did). Few players disrupted the competition like Deion Sanders. And when we say that Deion could do it all, we mean ALL. There were few

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positions, or sports for that matter, that Deion couldn’t step into and contribute. In the NFL, he excelled in several positions on both offense and defense for teams such as the Falcons, 49ers, Cowboys, Redskins, and Ravens. Deion also had several productive seasons for the Atlanta Braves and the Cincinnati Reds, where in 1997 he finished second in the National League with 56 stolen bases in 115 games. How flexible a resource was Deion Sanders? He is the only athlete ever to play in both a Super Bowl and World Series. Many forget that in the 1992 World Series, Sanders batted over .500 with four runs, eight hits, two doubles, and one RBI—all while playing with a broken bone in his foot. He’s also the only player in sports history to hit a home run and score a touchdown in the same week. Because Deion could adapt and was flexible, he gave his teams a powerful competitive advantage. One of the greatest cases where this flexibility was exploited for competitive advantage was Super Bowl XXX. To spark the Dallas Cowboys in the early going of the first quarter, coach Barry Switzer lined Deion Sanders up as a wide receiver. It was a good call as Deion blazed by Steelers cornerback Willie Williams for a 47-yard gain that brought him to the Steelers’ 14-yard line. Three plays later, Troy Aikman hit Jay Novacek in the end zone to put the Cowboys up 10-0 in the first quarter. The Cowboys would trump the Pittsburgh Steelers to win their fifth Super Bowl. Embedded in this case are several leadership and management lessons. As leaders, we want to build teams with at least a couple of people and players that can do it all. The reasons are many. In the NFL, players go down to injury and coaches need players that can fill in and adapt. Leaders see this in organizations. Sometimes people move on in a moment’s notice through promotions, layoffs, or resignations. When that happens, leaders need people who can step up and fill in. More important, and as we can see from the Deion case, is that flexible people make organizations more flexible and adaptable. This, in turn, puts rivals off their game, off their toes, and in backpedal mode. Leadership and organizational success is rooted in creating opportunities that rival organizations cannot easily respond to. If you can build an organization that is more flexible and adaptable than others, competitive advantage will be yours. Deion’s case is not the lone example. Ten years after the Super Bowl, another flexible player would turn the tide. And this time, it was the Steelers who would gain the advantage. Seemingly learning their lesson directly from Deion and the Dallas Cowboys, the Steelers decided to turn Antwaan Randle El loose. A former record-setting quarterback at Indiana University, the Steelers had converted Randle

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El to a punt/kick return specialist with wide-out duties. Using a trick play based on his earlier talent as a quarterback, Randle El sealed the game on a fake reverse, 43-yard bomb to receiver Hines Ward to put the Steelers up 21-10 over the Seattle Seahawks. The Patriots used players like Mike Vrabel, a linebacker by training, in other positions, like tight end and fullback. This mixes it up and puts defenders on their heels. Patriots coach Bill Belichick has used receiver Troy Brown as a defensive back on occasion due to injuries. Kordell Stewart’s best years for the Steelers was when he was nicknamed Slash, returning kicks, throwing passes, and receiving. Ironically, Kordell Stewart maintained his flexibility later in his career, but lacked the willingness. He wanted to be the Steelers full-time starting quarterback. This lack of willingness shelved his greatest assets: flexibility and adaptability. Both the Steelers and Kordell would lose under this arrangement. How valuable was Deion’s flexibility and adaptability? Keep in mind, in the prior year, the San Francisco 49ers won the Super Bowl with Deion Sanders. Realizing the value of such an asset, the Dallas Cowboys got Deion and won the Super Bowl the very next year. The common denominator in both Super Bowl victories was Deion Sanders. When Deion “Prime Time” Sanders was, indeed, in his prime, he gave the organization unparalleled flexibility. Strive to find some players or employees that move beyond the franchise label. Look for individuals that are more than just extremely proficient in their current position but can quickly adapt to new roles and excel regardless. Of course, this places an added burden as it relates to PJ fit. For most situations and according to the PJ model, the leader attempts to match a single individual with a single job. But with special people and under unique situations, like the Deion case above, the leader can gain added value by finding a single person who could be successful in a multiple of positions—or PJs fit (Person-Jobs fit). Again, this means that the leader must fully understand the talents and abilities of the individual along with a nuanced understanding of all the jobs under his command. Put plainly, to put Deion to use, the coaches in San Francisco and Dallas had to first and fully understand and appreciate Deion’s talents and how those talents translate to success in not just one job, but multiple ones. No doubt, this places a bit more of a burden on the coach, but, then again, it can pay enormous dividends by increasing the flexibility of the entire team. In any regard, build the team with flexibility in mind and reward that flexibility. And being flexible is a step towards winning and a step towards competitive advantage.

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Flexible people are those that can help an organization adapt and survive. How flexible is your human capital?

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER The themes contained in this chapter can be applied to almost any organization. GE provides an excellent example of an organization that was able to put it all together—the readiness, the fit, the willingness, and the flexibility—to go all the way. GE, in the latter half of the twentieth century, was a famed company and a firm that equaled the dynastic teams like the 49ers, Patriots, Cowboys, or Steelers. Not all parts of GE came to life, however. One division in Erie, Pennsylvania, GE Locomotive, was facing human capital problems. As Jack Welch puts it, GE Locomotive was behind the caboose for something that was almost beyond their control—location. GE Locomotive had a rough time attracting top-shelf human capital to Erie. Consequently, without the best people, Jack Welch and others feared that GE Locomotive would be an also-ran. Erie had some big problems in the 1980s through the early to mid1990s. First, it was cold. If it wasn’t the cold, the lake effect snowstorms made Erie a tough place to live. Second, it was isolated. Erie was about two hours equidistant from the closest points of civilization (Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Buffalo). Third, Erie was depressed. Erie was dying a slow death with more people leaving or dying than being born or coming in. Erie was losing population at a rate far faster than most cities their size. The leaders at GE faced a difficult situation—how to get talented people to move to Erie to contribute to the success of GE Locomotive. Their answer was the junior military officer or JMO. In short, GE needed people who were a good fit for the locomotive business, who were ready to lead but who were also willing and flexible. In JMOs, they found young officers that were all of the above. GE is largely credited with upping the market value of JMOs after the Erie experiment paid off. Most junior officers were a good fit for the blue-collar aspect of the locomotive business. Many were ready to lead, having led men and women into and through difficult situations in places like Grenada, Panama, Kuwait, Somalia, etc. Furthermore, many of the officers were highly educated graduates of our nation’s top universities: West Point, the Naval Academy, Princeton, University of Pennsylvania, Ohio State,

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and Auburn University, to name just a few. Finally, the JMO was both willing and flexible. Accustomed to living in not-so-great areas such as Killeen, Texas (Fort Hood), Fayetteville, North Carolina (Fort Bragg), or Jacksonville, North Carolina (Camp Lejeune), most JMOs didn’t think twice about Erie. Further supporting the concept of flexibility and willingness, many of the spouses of JMOs were accustomed to moving and thought little of the move to Erie as well. Incidentally, spouse resistance is a major contributor to job dissatisfaction and placement failure. With JMOs, GE found human capital that addressed all major learning points above.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Move beyond the individual. Individual talent is never enough. That talent must always fit. Make sure people fit the job. Recruit and select people that fit nicely with your strategy. Hire people that fit with the team and organizational culture. If they don’t, get rid of them and find somebody that does. Consider the Fit Law in all staffing decisions. 2. Get ready. Many people aren’t ready for the promotion or the job. As leaders, you need to assess the readiness of your people. Evaluate the potential of your human capital. If your people aren’t ready, don’t place them in a position where they’re set up for failure. Instead, groom and mentor talent to ensure readiness. 3. Reward willingness. There are plenty of talented people out there who could fit in if they wanted to. The problem is that too many people are ready, they just aren’t willing. As a leader, reward and retain those teammates who are willing to do the hard jobs. The difficult job. Build a team around the ready and the willing. 4. Create a living, breathing organization. Living and breathing means change. Leaders want organizations that can change and adapt. To build teams and organizations that can do that, leaders need multitalented, flexible people. When Human Capital is flexible, an organization can adapt and survive. 5. Put it all together. Taken by themselves, the ideas of fit, readiness, willingness, and flexibility will never lead to winning. Winning requires that leaders demand all of the dimensions above.

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NOTES 1. Gary McWilliams, Suzanne Vranica, and Neal E. Boudette, “How a Highflier in Marketing Fell at Wal-Mart,” Wall Street Journal, December 11, 2006. 2. Michael Barbard, “Official Fired by Wal-Mart Fights Back,” New York Times, May 26, 2007. 3. Brian Grow, “Out at Home Depot.” BusinessWeek, January 9, 2007, http:// www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jan2007/db20070103_ 456441.htm (accessed February 28, 2009). 4. “The Home Depot Names Robert L. Nardelli President & CEO,” December 6, 2000, http://www.appliancedesign.com/Articles/Breaking_ News/359d3b0b96938010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0 (accessed March 1, 2009). 5. Brian Grow, “Out at Home Depot,” BusinessWeek, January 9, 2007, http:// www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jan2007/db20070103_ 456441.htm (accessed February 28, 2009). 6. Brian Grow, “Out at Home Depot,” BusinessWeek, January 9, 2007, http:// www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jan2007/db20070103_ 456441.htm (accessed February 28, 2009). 7. “Renovating Home Depot,” BusinessWeek, March 6, 2006, http://www. businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_10/b3974001.htm (accessed March 9, 2009). 8. Brian Grow, “Out at Home Depot.” BusinessWeek, January 9, 2007, http:// www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jan2007/db20070103_ 456441.htm (accessed February 28, 2009). 9. “Renovating Home Depot,” BusinessWeek, March 6, 2006, http://www. businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_10/b3974001.htm (accessed March 9, 2009). 10. At time of publication. 11. NFL Web site, http://www.nfl.com/players/rashaansalaam/profile?id= SAL066622. 12. Quarterback Wonderlic scores and information can be found at http:// www.unc.edu/~mirabile/Wonderlic.htm. More Wonderlic scores can be found at http://www.ducksportsnews.com/blog/2008/04/lets-compare-dixonswonderlic-to-past-qbs-scores. It is important to note that Akili Smith scored a 15 on his first try. They averaged his first 15 + 37 to get his average of 26.

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6 THE CALL ON THE FIELD STANDS

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday. —Abraham Lincoln “Please tell me he just didn’t do that.” That must’ve been the thought of citizens of Detroit and the thousands of Detroit Lions fans around the world in late November 2002 as the Lions won the coin toss in overtime against their nemesis, the Chicago Bears, and elected not to receive the ball. In the NFL, unlike NCAA football, overtime is played in sudden death, meaning that the first team that scores, wins. This policy has been the topic of continued and spirited controversy since too much luck and not enough skill is at play. Very simply, the team that gets the ball first in overtime has a much, much greater chance of winning. For that reason, almost always, the team that wins the toss elects to receive the kick. In fact, up until 2002, there was no conclusive evidence that a team chose otherwise. It seemed to be a NFL law; if you win the coin toss in overtime, you automatically elect to receive and start off with the ball. That automatic decision, alone, ups the chances of winning dramatically. Until November 24, 2002, there had been no exception. Unfortunately, one-time Detroit Lions coach Marty Mornhinweg may be forever known as the lone exception. In a hard fought game at Soldier Field against the Chicago Bears, the Lions found themselves tied at the end of regulation. Fighting 17 mph winds blowing off Lake Michigan, Mornhinweg elected to kick with the wind—and not receive the ball—in overtime. On several levels, this was a significant decision gone wrong. First, regardless of the wind, statistics were on his side if he chose to receive. There’s some debate to the exact number, but the 91

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advantage is probably around 65-35, meaning that 65% of the teams that win the coin toss, and elect to receive, win the game. Second, there is that recurring theme and problem of knowing your people and their talents, which directly parlay into operational decision-making. Besides Barry Sanders, Billy Simms, and Herman Moore, one of the Lions’ best players of all time was their kicker, Jason Hansen. Known both in college and in Detroit as “Thunderfoot,” he was known for both accuracy and leg strength. At Washington State, he earned school and PAC 10 records for his 57.1 accuracy rating for field goals of over 50 yards that stand to this day.1 He also kicked a 62-yard field goal in college that stood as an NCAA record for years. At the end of the 2007 season, Hansen ranked ninth as the all-time leading scorer in NFL history with 1,705 points. Even accounting for Kentucky windage—manually adjusting for the wind off the lake—and the laws of physics on that particular day, Mornhinweg’s task was rather straightforward—get the Lions between the 30- and 40-yard line of the end zone and let Hansen, an accurate and strong kicker, carry the team to victory. It appeared that either Mornhinweg lacked faith in his offense or his kicker, because he elected to kick off with the wind to his back. That’s where most fan memories stop. But there’s more. Mornhinweg almost escaped with a victory, despite the poor initial decision. To make matters worse, his next decision appeared to contradict with the logic of the first decision that focused almost exclusively on the wind. In overtime, Mornhinweg ordered the Lions to accept a 10-yard penalty on Chicago’s game-winning drive. If he would’ve declined the penalty, the Bears would’ve faced an uncomfortable decision—go for it on fourth-and-eight or try to kick a 52-yard field goal into a stiff wind. By accepting the penalty, Mornhinweg gave the Bears two downs to cover 18 yards as opposed to one down to cover eight yards. The Bears would convert. Together, these two decisions snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and followed Mornhinweg for the next two seasons. Additionally, it could be argued that this set of decisions seemed to mare the franchise as a whole; after that game, the Lions would go on to a 3-13 record under Mornhinweg. During two seasons with the Lions, he would compile a 5-win, 27-loss record. AFTER FURTHER REVIEW . . . We open with this story to emphasize the core theme of this chapter— effective decision-making, primarily at tactical and operational levels. Up to this point, we’ve talked about motivation, power, about building the roster, the importance of character, honor, and judgment, and the notion

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of fit. These incredibly important themes all serve to set the stage for the last line of defense before execution—decision-making. To be sure, this may one of the strongest tie-ins to the gridiron metaphor. Up until this point, it is hard to say with clarity and confidence whether and to what degree the Gridiron Coach has control over issues such as fit and building the roster. Without a doubt, their input is significant. In the NFL, however, we’ve seen the rise of activist owners such as Dan Snyder of the Washington Redskins and Jerry Jones of the Cowboys. This breed of ownership is heavily involved in strategy, recruiting, scouting, drafting, and even discipline. We recognize that leaders in every organization are influenced by external forces outside their control. It is between the hash marks, however, that the Gridiron Coach or Leader is still ultimately responsible for the decision-making and execution of his team. As we scoped out this book and thought about all the leadership, management, and strategy lessons the game of football offered, we felt that decision-making, particularly under pressure or under duress, offers some particularly relevant and rich lessons for leaders of all levels regardless of organizational context. Throughout this chapter, we’ll detail some decision-making tools that you’ll want to embrace, along with some decision-making landmines that you’ll want to avoid at any and all costs. It is our intent that, when you get to the end of this chapter, you’ll know what to do during the overtime coin-toss and in those critical situations when the game is on the line. WORKOUT WARRIOR Mike Mamula was barely on anyone’s radar prior to the 1995 NFL Combine—where NFL hopefuls gather to be measured in myriad ways. A smallish defensive end with a big motor, Mamula accounted for 17 sacks in his last season at Boston College. Despite a year of eligibility remaining, Mamula tried to capitalize on his strong season by entering the NFL draft early. Mamula deserves a ton of credit because he did a competitive analysis of the NFL combine. The NFL combine is now an event worthy of Hollywood attention. Its original intent and purpose was for teams to carefully screen potential NFL players on a series of strength, agility, and speed drills. The scores on these tests are measurable, quantifiable, and serve as benchmarks on which to judge. Many a player’s stock has risen and fallen due to their performance during the NFL combine. Mike Mamula’s story would be among the very first of a stock split, a mind-baffling rise from the third or fourth rounds to among the first picks in the 1995 NFL draft.

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His analysis of the NFL combine would pay off dramatically for him; he would be among the first ever to develop a detailed, organized, and disciplined approach to his preparation for the NFL combine. Mamula would train religiously with then Boston College strength coach, Jerry Palmieri. Palmieri, too, offered a bit of genius. Palmieri demanded that Mamula practice the same, exact combine drills hundreds and maybe even, thousands of times prior to the actual event. Prior to Palmieri and Mamula, players and coaches focused on football-type drills, not strength, speed, and agility drills such as the 10-, 20-, and 40-yard dashes; vertical jump tests; broad jump tests; 20- and 60-yard shuttles; and bench presses. Due to his practice and repetition, Mamula would have one of the greatest combine workouts ever. His running times were as fast as some linebackers and he benched 225 pounds as often as many offensive linemen, who weighed upwards of 100 pounds more.2 The Philadelphia Eagles ownership along with the coach at the time, Ray Rhodes, may not have been wowed by Mamula’s performance in the Big East, but they were, however, blinded by Mamula’s combine workout. After that workout, the Eagles knew they wanted Mamula and were willing to do almost anything to get him. Remarkably, the Eagles and Ray Rhodes traded up with Tampa Bay from 12th to 7th to snag Mike Mamula. Tampa Bay would use the 12th pick to take Warren Sapp and used two other second-round picks from the Eagles as a bargaining chip to get linebacker Derrick Brooks with the 28th overall pick in the first round. Essentially, the Eagles, based on a series of workout performances, got Mamula in exchange for two Hall of Fame defensive players that would solidify and guarantee the Tampa Bay Buccaneers a 2002 Super Bowl win. Mamula would be out of the league in five seasons with just shy of 32 total sacks. You may think the lesson here is in the competitive analysis performed by Mamula and his strength coach, Palmieri. There’s little to dispute there; that was solid, progressive, and forward thinking decision-making by these two men. The real lesson, though, is to tease apart the decision-making process of the Philadelphia Eagles and, in particular, coach Ray Rhodes, who desperately wanted Mamula. At times, they seemed to ignore all other important variables such as size, previous performance at Boston College, the defensive scheme used at Boston College, the strength and nature of competition of the Big East, and whether Mamula would be a good fit in the NFC East with teams that had tremendously large offensive lines such as the Dallas Cowboys. Somewhere along the way, Rhodes may have developed tunnel vision—a myopic and focused view of a single variable in the decisionmaking process—the combine workout.

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Psychologists would refer to this as the Halo Effect. The Halo Effect is potentially dangerous because it can surface as a strong cognitive bias— essentially influencing accurate assessments of people and situations. Researcher Edward Thorndike was among the first to uncover the power of the Halo Effect. In a study of Army Officers and their evaluations of their soldiers, Thorndike found that almost all positive traits were correlated and all negative traits were also cross-correlated.3 What this means is that people tend to oversimplify their evaluations of both people and situations. In regards to people, we tend to view people as either good or bad across all metrics or categories of measurement. In essence, the Halo Effect is when one trait colors or contaminates our objective assessment of all other traits and characteristics. Using Mamula as an example, his bench press and times in the 40 became the dominant factor in his assessment and colored all future impressions of his performance. By the way, a follow-on study by researcher Solomon Asch seemed to verify what we already know—attractive people get a pass due to the Halo Effect.4 When assessing highly attractive people, we tend to think all other traits and characteristics are as attractive as their physical appearance. Clearly, this is nonsensical and even dangerous. But that’s how our brains work. One or two traits can influence how we see an entire person’s or entire organization’s repertoire. A corporate example just may be the story of Al Dunlap. Dunlap developed a reputation among executives and directors as a downsizer. Like Mamula, Dunlap became particularly skilled at the same or similar set of routines. He would lead massive downsizing efforts at Scott Paper and at Crown Zellerbach. These dramatic downsizing efforts involved shedding thousands of employees and shuttering factories, often with little notice or delay. On a short-term basis, Dunlap would deliver on stock price. As he downsized, stocks would upsize (for a short period). His methods failed to deliver when he took over at Sunbeam, and he would later pay $15 million to settle a shareholder lawsuit regarding a “Bill and Hold” scheme.5 In business reports and cases published after the fact, many Wall Street analysts and directors pointed to the Halo Effect as the reason they recruited and then supported Al Dunlap for so long. Dunlap did one thing particularly well—cut costs and downsize, which affected short-term share price. Many in the business community saw Dunlap as a great executive because he could drive share price. His ethics, operational skills, and long-term value creation plans were never fully vetted because many stopped their assessment with share price. Al Dunlap’s “combine” performance of driving up stock price is all that anyone needed to see. If he could do that well, many reasoned, all else was good too.

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If we take a step back and reflect, we know that we’re all guilty of wearing or seeing the halo. Much of this is how we’re hardwired. Our DNA, which has evolved from the GEICO cavemen, programs us to think in simplistic, linear terms. However, the world around us has advanced at a much faster rate and is ridiculously more complex than it was 10 years ago, 100 years ago, 1,000 years ago, and 10,000 years ago. The problem is that our brains just haven’t caught up. The Halo Effect is a powerful, hardwired, cognitive bias that oversimplifies the complex. Predictably, this creates large and dangerous blinds spots that influence us to make bad, uninformed decisions. SECOND GUESS THE COACH “Please tell me he just didn’t do that.” Dan Marino had a storied career and was a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Marino ended his career with 420 touchdowns. Of all of those touchdowns, one in particular stands out. In 1994, the Dolphins and Jets met in a critical game. The Dolphins were 7-4 and the Jets were 6-5, and both teams were fighting for first place in the division. The Jets, playing in front of one of the largest home crowds in team history, looked to have the game in hand, leading at one point late in the game 24-6. Undeterred, Marino brought the Dolphins back in what has been simply known as the Clock Play. As time was winding down in the fourth quarter, Marino and team advanced within the 10-yard line of the Jets. With about 30 seconds left on the clock, Marino made a spiking motion that most in the crowd and virtually everybody watching on TV interpreted as Marino was going to spike the ball to stop the clock. Worse, that’s what rookie cornerback Aaron Glenn apparently thought too. When Marino hiked the ball and made a short spiking motion, Glenn relaxed and held up as receiver, Mark Ingram, headed for the goal line. Of course, Marino didn’t spike, but delivered a strike to Mark Ingram in the end zone. The Dolphins would win the game on that play and, eventually, earn a playoff berth that year. All because nobody would second guess. You may think that it is Marino’s foolery and genius that is the lesson to be learned here. Instead, we turn to Aaron Glenn, the seventy thousand-plus in the stands, and the coaching staff of the Jets to unravel the decision-making phenomenon that occurred here. Dating back to the early 1980s, there’s evidence of what many cognitive psychologists and management experts refer to as the prior hypothesis bias. The thrust of the prior hypothesis bias is that leaders

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and managers (and players) tend to overestimate and place more value on information that confirms their initial hypothesis or belief set while virtually ignoring any and all information that would argue against prior-held beliefs. This is a particularly dangerous decision-making bias as it can leave a Gridiron Leader flat-footed. We see it here in the Clock Play. Aaron Glenn and most of human civilization watching the game probably had a prior hypothesis that involved the following inference—that when a quarterback rushes his team up to the line of scrimmage against the pressures of time and is making a spiking motion with his hand, then he will spike the ball to stop the clock. We’ve seen it hundreds of times so, logically, we embrace it as truth, as law. All of the actions leading up to the Clock Play would do nothing but confirm the hypothesis of cornerback, Aaron Glenn. In his mind, he might have been sure that Marino was going to spike the ball. A closer look, however, suggests other information was available that would contradict this hypothesis. Here, for example, are just a couple of reasons why Marino would not have spiked the ball. First, the Dolphins were not playing at home; they were playing in New Jersey. Without home field advantage, the Jets should’ve known that with the game on the line, the Dolphins were going to go for the win. They would play aggressively. Second, first place was on the line and the stakes were high. For both teams, it was a must win. “Must Wins” demand extraordinary circumstances. Third, there was the issue of momentum. The Dolphins and Marino had finally seized momentum. Spiking the ball could’ve thrown water on a team that was on fire. Finally, Marino, at this point in his career, was a battle-tested veteran who was prone to improvisation. Just as Brett Favre’s improvisation skills seemed to grow with age, the same could be said for Marino. All of this seemed to wash over Aaron Glenn and to be fair and honest, most everybody in the stadium along with the television audience. And it is precisely for this reason that the prior hypothesis bias is so dangerous. Essentially, it closes the mind down and it limits the amount of alternatives that we’re willing to consider. As Gridiron Leaders, we need to open our mind to all sorts and sources of information. From here, it is important to occasionally reflect on the efficacy and evidence that support our hypotheses. The very best leaders consider multiple angles and routinely challenge their mental models and their convictions or hypotheses between cause and effect. If they can’t do this adequately, they are smart enough to pull in someone to play devil’s advocate to force them to consider new ideas. An applied, everyday example of the prior hypothesis bias phenomenon can be seen personally every time you drive up to your local Starbucks.

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The prior hypothesis bias was once squarely directed at what Americans now crave, coffee. You see, the original Starbucks was not the coffee shop we know today. Back in the early 1970s, three partners (a music teacher, a history teacher, and a writer) opened a coffee-roasting and coffee-equipment shop. That’s all it was until around 1983 when entrepreneur Howard Schultz came aboard. After a trip to Milan, Italy, Schultz became convinced that coffee could be more than a commodity. He reasoned that a good coffee shop could be a social experience or the proverbial “third place” besides work and home. In addition, Schultz saw coffee along the same lines as fast food. As more and more Americans worked, especially dual career couples, there would be less time to brew and enjoy coffee at home. With that limitation, an opportunity arose to provide coffee on the go. However, the partners resisted seeing coffee as a romantic, social product due to their prior hypothesis bias as something only described in an old Folger’s commercial—a commodity that is consumed (not really enjoyed) in one’s home. Years and years of consumption habits, thousands of Folger and Maxwell House commercials, and just the traditional way of drinking coffee seemed to confirm their hypothesis while they simultaneously disregarded Schultz’s message and information. Around 1987, the partners sold their interest to Schultz, who quickly rebranded his franchise outlets as Starbucks. We would know how this story ends up. Starbucks is now part of our nation’s DNA. Remember, though, that the compelling piece of this story is that Starbucks (as we know it today) could’ve started almost five years earlier with at least three more major partners, but the original founding partners held on and confirmed their hypothesis at the expense of a great and novel idea. There are some tools that we, as leaders, can adopt to help us in our decision-making, especially as it relates to the prior hypothesis bias. By far, the best we can do is keep an open mind. When we are open to learning, we allow our hypotheses and beliefs to be challenged and refined. We can increase our openness to learning by reading more, listening better, and actively reflecting on our belief systems. That takes practice, we know, but that’s something Gridiron Leaders know how to do well.

Moving the Chains

Entertain diverse viewpoints and allow your beliefs to be challenged. If you dismiss all disconfirming information out of hand, you’ll end up flat-footed and surprised.

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GRIDIRON COMMITMENT TO THE EXTREME Clearly, a major theme in sports and in this book is the value of commitment and loyalty. However, commitment to a goal like making the playoffs is much different than commitment to a failed strategy like running the ball 40 times a game when the opposing team is putting eight or nine in the box—moving players close to the line of scrimmage to stop the run. Actually, a blind commitment to a failed strategy detracts from the greater mission of commitment to a valued goal (i.e., winning the Super Bowl). Joey Harrington, Akili Smith, and Ryan Leaf were picked high in the draft and many predicted that each would have a successful career. Unfortunately, none of them seemed to meet those early predictions or expectations as successful quarterbacks in the NFL. Let’s begin with the second player taken in the 1997 NFL draft, after Peyton Manning, Ryan Leaf. Leaf retired with a 4-17 record as a starter and a passer rating of 50.0, one of the all-time worst. Akili Smith, with one really good season at Oregon, catapulted himself to the third pick in the 1999 NFL draft. Chosen by the Cincinnati Bengals, Smith won just three of his 17 starts as a NFL quarterback. His 52.8 passer rating is slightly above Leaf’s. Joey Harrington, like Smith, was selected with the third pick in the NFL draft. Also like Smith, this Oregon Duck was selected in the 2002 NFL draft to resurrect a franchise, the Detroit Lions. While his passer rating of almost 70.0 is significantly better than both Leaf and Smith, his winning percentage is not. Chosen to start in almost 70 games, Harrington would lose almost 70% of the games he started. In examining all three quarterbacks, a subtle difference emerges that helps explain why Cincinnati to some degree and San Diego to a much larger extent improved in the 21st century while Detroit failed to progress. To be clear, Harrington started almost double the combined starts of both Leaf and Smith. What this tells us is that San Diego and the Bengals were quick to realize their folly and quickly abandoned their course of action. Not so with Harrington. Here, the Lions demonstrated an escalated commitment to a failed course of action and were unwilling to break from it even as data and poor outcomes continued to pile in. In every case of systemic operational and organizational breakdown, we’ve seen some evidence of this phenomenon, which cognitive psychologists refer to as escalation of commitment. Brought to prominence by the famed behavioralist, Barry Staw, escalation of commitment is a dangerous decision-making bias that causes people to continue to commit and support and devote resources to a flawed and failed strategy.6 As it goes, the more pronounced the failure, the more committed the

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decision-maker is to supporting it. Research has conclusively demonstrated that leaders bit by the escalation of commitment bug will allocate even more resources to a project (or person) even after receiving feedback that the project is failing. Ironically, the leader is more apt to devote resources to the project when the feedback is negative as opposed to more favorable feedback. The counterintuitive twist is that rather than seeing the feedback as evidence of project failure and a need to change strategy, they take the feedback as a signal to spend more on the project in an effort to save it. Of course, more resources to a failed strategy just aggravate and expand the demise. Saving a bad strategy is a losing strategy. The truly great Gridiron Leaders seem to know, understand, and reconcile the tension between an incubation period that allows for some failure and a longer commitment to a flawed strategy. The difficult question, then, is when to hold on and support a given process or person versus cutting losses and moving on. Armed with this question, it becomes even more difficult when the leader had some stake in the initial decision. By cutting losses and moving on, the Gridiron Leader is essentially acknowledging a failed initial decision that they had a critical part in making. That personal attachment to the initial course of action may explain why some leaders hold on for too long in the hope that their initial course of action will be validated and that their reputation as a decision-maker will be saved. The problem is that with every additional resource that is committed, especially as it relates to time and money, the more difficult it is to reverse direction. In a sense, we see this often with men who refuse to ask for directions. The best time to ask for directions is almost always at the initial feeling of being lost. Running counter to that fact, many men (authors included) keep driving farther and farther away from our intended target. With every minute in the car and every additional mile down the road, it becomes harder and harder to ask for directions. Interestingly, Staw was among the first to bring a decision-making slant to the Vietnam conflict. Where many saw it as a policy failure, Staw saw it more as a decision-making problem driven largely by the escalation-of-commitment phenomenon. According to Staw’s escalation-of-commitment framework, when the United States committed large numbers of troops and then experienced heavy casualties, it was difficult for American presidents to reverse course. To stem the bad news and to save face, civilian and military leaders devoted more resources, not less, to the Vietnam conflict. Given that the Vietnam conflict had no exit strategy nor was it a war that was deemed winnable

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by many within and outside the military, the escalation of commitment appears as a classic example of throwing good money and resources after bad. Escalation of commitment is particularly troubling and dangerous when some initial success is experienced followed by a slow, gradual decline. A case in point could be Motorola. On at least two occasions, Motorola fell into the escalation-of-commitment trap. The first case is what we’ll call the Iridium case. Iridium was a billion-dollar project that was notable on the scientific and researchand-development front. In the mid- to late-1990s, after years of development, Motorola created the first truly global communication network. Using a set of 66 satellites that would carry and pass signals from one to another, Motorola developed the Iridium system that enabled communication from almost anywhere on the globe. Despite some evidence that the market was not ready, the firm continued to invest in the technology at a huge expense to the firm and its shareholders. Ultimately, Motorola enjoyed a hollow victory. It created the first global communication system that worked, but, unfortunately, had few customers willing to buy the technology. Next on Motorola’s escalation-of-commitment list came the RAZR phone. Propelling Motorola to huge profits in the early part of the 21st century, the popularity of the colorful and slim RAZR flip phone seemed unquenchable. To no one’s real surprise, Motorola continued to escalate in their commitment to the RAZR flip phone without adequately considering alternatives. Up through 2005, the RAZR could not be stopped. At one time in 2005, it was estimated that over 110 million RAZRs were sold. However, with an escalation to this one commitment, Motorola ignored others. And as the market began to change to BlackBerry and touchscreen phones, Motorola was left woefully behind. In the fourth quarter of 2007, Motorola’s handset division posted a $1.2 billion loss.7 Media and review outlets called Motorola’s latest round of phones and technology boring, repetitive, and not very innovative. Trailing by a distant margin to upstarts like Research in Motion, Nokia, and Apple, Motorola has been trying to reverse direction. Cutting thousands and thousands of jobs, it is still unclear how Motorola will recover. Supposedly, it has seen its market share dwindle from 18.4% to 9.7% in a year’s time.8 The undying and escalating commitment to an initially strong strategy of RAZR phones has proven ill-advised. The best way to deal with escalation of commitment is to remain unemotional and rational regarding the facts, data, and feedback that surround the decision. Of course, you want to give everybody and some strategies a chance to succeed and, as we said earlier, a second chance

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is part and parcel of leadership. However, second and third chances should yield improvement over time. When second and third and fourth and fifth chances yield progressively deeper losses, a leader must carefully and unemotionally examine quantitative and qualitative feedback to determine whether the person or strategy deserves continued support. Otherwise, you’ll continue to waste resources by putting precious time and hard-earned money behind a losing proposition.

Moving the Chains

A critical question all leaders must make is whether to stay the course, even if it’s the wrong course, or cut losses and move on. Beware of our tendency to back failed courses of action due to escalation of commitment.

COMEBACK Why are big comebacks so special? Our hypothesis is that big comebacks are so special because they happen so infrequently. They are the Haley’s Comet of the football world. To better understand why comebacks are so infrequent, we need to turn our attention back to the art and science of decision-making. The very first step to good decision-making is diagnosis. And diagnosis of the situation or problem must satisfy two conditions. First, the diagnosis must be accurate. If the diagnosis of the problem isn’t accurate, it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to devise strategies and tactics to rectify the problem. Second, it must be timely. The longer it takes to diagnose a problem, the longer it takes to devise potential solutions. It closely follows that as the Gridiron Leader is spinning their wheels to diagnose and devise, the competition is distancing itself from you. Put differently, with every passing minute, the competition is increasing its lead over you, making catchup hard, difficult, demoralizing, and, at the extremes, impossible. How much so? Consider the evidence. As of 2008, there have been 68 NFL teams that have started the season 0-2 since 2000. Of those, only six made the playoffs. When you extrapolate across more years, the numbers aren’t much better. Since adopting the 16-game format in 1978, only 27 teams that have started 0-2 went on to make the playoffs. Since 1990, only the 1998 Bills and the 1995 Lions were able to lose their first 3 games and still make the playoffs. Only the 1992 Chargers were able to give up their first four

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games and still make the playoffs.9 As the brutal facts make clear, it is difficult to comeback if you don’t diagnose and fix your problems early. The later it takes, the harder it becomes. There are plenty of practical examples that demonstrate the importance of early diagnosis in the decision-making process. Top on that list would be Gateway. Gateway enjoyed both accolades and market share in the early 1990s. By the late-1990s, the legend of Gateway Computers had steadily and permanently eroded. As is common in late diagnoses, Gateway launched a flurry of activities to try to stop the bleeding. In 1998, it attempted relocation. It relocated from South Dakota to San Diego. Three years later, it moved again from San Diego to Poway, California. About a year later, it moved again to their current headquarters of Irvine, California. Akin to their relocation strategy, it launched a variety of desperate business model changes including withdrawal from international markets, the opening and then rapid shut down of Gateway retail stores, and entry into the consumer electronic business with a focus on cameras and flat screen televisions. None were overly successful at returning the firm to profitability. The after-action review expressed by Wall Street analysts and academics alike is that Gateway just waited too long to diagnose its problems (and react to competitors). As Gateway market share plummeted, Compaq, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Sony, and Toshiba all gained at Gateway’s expense. This, coupled with the previous football examples, speaks quite loudly regarding the importance of early and accurate diagnosis. The prevailing lesson is that Gridiron Leaders must understand that their margin for error is small and the competition strong; Gridiron Leaders must put intellectual energy into accurate and timely diagnosis. And, if they’re wrong, they must rediagnose quickly.

Moving the Chains

Leaders must be able to evaluate problems accurately and quickly. Failing to correctly and quickly diagnose problems means the organization is at risk to falling behind the competition.

SPURRED TO VICTORY Love him or hate him, there seems little in between when it comes to Steve Spurrier. The 1966 Heisman winner and former quarterback

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for the San Francisco 49ers and Tampa Bay Buccaneers is probably better known for his coaching. Many forget that Duke, at one time, had a great football program. That was when Coach Spurrier was there from 1987 to 1989. Both in 1988 and 1989, Spurrier would win ACC Coach of the Year honors. He would immediately go on to Florida, where he coached from 1990 to 2001. During that time, Spurrier would average ten wins a season and delivered the National Championship to Florida in 1996. After leaving Florida, Spurrier took the top post as head coach of the Washington Redskins. While there, it appears that Spurrier fell victim to two decision-making biases: the illusion of control and the law of small numbers. Let’s begin with the illusion of control. The illusion of control is when leaders and decision-makers overestimate their own personal control over strategic outcomes. The illusion of control is akin to overconfidence—a trait some use to describe Spurrier. When leaders fall prey to this illusion, they believe that through their own effort and genius they can affect strategic outcomes. If nothing else, we’ve come to know in this chapter that oversimplification is a dangerous thing, and there are often multiple variables that account for and predict both success and failure. One of the more famous researchers on this topic of illusion of control was Ellen Langer, who found that her subjects expressed an expectancy of personal success much higher than the objective probability would warrant or show.10 Few would question Spurrier’s knowledge regarding the collegiate game. His experience and knowledge of the NFL, however, was a little more suspect. Demonstrating some illusion of control, some feel that Spurrier tried to force the college game into the NFL. Two respected writers at ESPN, Merril Hoge and Len Pasquarelli, hint at this illusion of control. Both writers contend that there was too much University of Florida, both in terms of players and coaching assistants, on the Washington franchise. Hoge is a little more direct saying that the Fun ’n Gun offense imported from Florida was doomed for failure in the NFL. Hoge argued that, “Spurrier tried to do things his way—the college way” and “the college way doesn’t fly in the NFL.”11 Merril Hoge brings good logic to the argument. He wisely noted that in the NFL, coaches don’t get to select their schedule, and there are no “easy” teams to play against—especially in the NFC East. Reportedly, Spurrier was even reluctant to bring a playbook to practice in favor of just using Florida schemes for both practice and games. Indeed, the late 1990s and early years of the 21st century saw a flurry of college coaches try their hand at the NFL. Besides Spurrier, they include such notable coaches as Nick Saban, Butch Davis, Dennis Erickson, and Rich

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Brooks. This list is living proof that the college game is significantly different than the pro game. It also suggests that the control coaches come to expect in college in a controlled, highly regulated academic/ athletic environment does not always translate well into the NFL where control is ceded to high-paid players, high-paid staff, and activist owners. It is important to note that there is a fine line between internal locus of control and the illusion control. As we’ve discussed previously in Chapter 3, locus of control refers to the degree to which individuals believe that they can personally control events and situations surrounding them. Leaders, like Spurrier, with an internal orientation to locus of control believe that their efforts, decisions, and actions supersede external factors. Although this can-do attitude is important to possess, one cannot ignore the other powerful influencing factors at work. Spurrier may have believed he was making the right decisions, but, in reality, he probably controlled much less than what he thought. Thus, while an internal locus of control is important and should be celebrated as a critical leadership trait that leads to a CAN DO spirit, illusion of control is anything but. Rather, illusion of control is about fantasy, poor judgment, cognitive bias, and works against the realities of the situation. As a result, we should all strive to develop an internal locus of control without it bleeding into or transforming into an illusion of control. The most glaring drawback of the illusion of control bias is that it ignores powerful stakeholders, usually in the external environment, who do, indeed, affect the organization and, as a result, organizational outcomes. The imperative is straightforward. Gridiron Leaders must understand what their contribution really is and how they can truly affect organizational change. Is it through personal effort or is it through management of external stakeholders? Regardless, know that the illusion of control gives too much credit to the coach and ignores many of the contextual and situational variables that impact victory and defeat.

Moving the Chains

Illusion of total and utter control by the Gridiron Leader is just that—an illusion. The illusion of control ignores powerful stakeholders that exist both within and outside the organization.

Stephen Davis and Danny Wuerffel were two great football players. One was better in college and the other was better as a pro. It was

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unclear whether Steve Spurrier knew the difference. When these cases are examined together, we see the effects of mixing two dangerous decision-making biases—the illusion of control and the law of small numbers. Like his mentor and coach, Danny Wuerffel was a prolific Heismanwinning quarterback at the University of Florida. Few will ever match the numbers that Danny Wuerffel put up week-in, week-out at the University of Florida in the middle of the 1990s in the Swamp in Gainesville. His success on the college gridiron, however, did not translate to a successful career in the NFL. Concerns regarding his arm strength accompanied him throughout his tenure. Well-respected and well-liked in and out of football, his biggest fan may just have been Steve Spurrier, who gave him repeated chances to perform as starting quarterback for the Washington Redskins. Reportedly, Spurrier’s reluctance to move away from Wuerffel caused riffs with the owner, Dan Snyder, who didn’t believe Wuerffel was NFL material.12 After some analysis and discussion with knowledgeable football scholars, the best way we can explain this is through the law of small numbers. The “law of small numbers” is another decision-making bias that leaders often make. Specifically, the law of small numbers occurs when leaders base conclusions and make sweeping generalizations off relatively small samples or cases. In this case, Spurrier extrapolated Wuerffel’s college career and thought that two great seasons at Florida would translate to a great career in the NFL. Early research into this phenomenon suggests that the law of small numbers is more pronounced when the leader or decision-maker is “vividly” and intimately involved in the case. In other words, Spurrier was probably too close to Wuerffel to accurately assess whether he could perform at a high level in the NFL. Spurrier’s decision to marginalize Pro Bowl running back, Stephen Davis, suggests the law of small numbers working in the opposite direction. Despite prolific seasons running the ball for Spurrier’s predecessors, Spurrier seemed to count Davis out without providing him much opportunity. To this day, some question whether it was the Fun ’n Gun Florida scheme that marginalized Stephen Davis’s role with the franchise or whether it was just Spurrier discounting Davis out of hand. Regardless, you see the folly in extrapolating and generalizing from a small sample size. In general, this decision-making bias is troublesome because small, unique cases are hardly, if ever, representative of the greater population. Time and again, though, we all tend to make and base our decisions on a relatively small set of data or experiences. There are several tools that a decision-maker and Gridiron Leader can use to warn against the effects of the illusion of control bias and

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the law of small numbers. First, be a friend of research. The conclusions drawn from research almost invariably get stronger when we base inferences off of larger sample sizes. Second, seek out a variety of different sources to evaluate and assess a particular individual or a specific course of action. Adding diverse and varied views to the discussion works against the illusion of control along with the law of small numbers. Finally, find some trusted colleagues or staff members who feel comfortable providing candid advice. We’ve found that many a times, the illusion of control is actually bolstered when a leader surrounds him with “yes” men or women.

Moving the Chains

Leaders need to be cautious of making decisions or determining courses of action based on limited information or small samples. Strive to get a variety of views and sources of information.

FIRST PLAY OF THE GAME One thing that always surprised us watching high school, collegiate, and professional games was the incredible reluctance to take a gamble or call a high-risk, high-return play to start the game. It seems that almost without exception, the first play of the game is wasted in a rather predictable, conservative way. If we were Gridiron Coaches, as opposed to Gridiron Leaders, we’d be bold on the first play knowing full well that it may be a wasted play. Our rationale for being bold especially on the first play can be traced back to another common, but often ignored, decision-making bias—the primacy effect. The primacy effect is also referred to as the law of first impressions. What the primacy effect states is that decision-makers tend to overweigh the importance of initial events in analysis and observation. Another way to think about it is that the first events tend to be recalled, remembered, and processed more frequently than events that occur in the middle of a sequence. A big play at the beginning of a game, even if it has no chance of succeeding, is advantageous to the offense and disruptive to the defense. A gutsy first call gets burned into the memory of the opposition and keeps them guessing and defensive for a longer period of time. That same big call in the middle of the game never packs the same

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punch. The initial call, benefiting from primacy, sets the tone of aggressiveness and risk taking that can last the entire game. If part of beating the competition is to get inside their head, then using the primacy effect to your advantage is one such way to do exactly that. The primacy effect is neutral in a normative sense. It can either work to your advantage or it can work against you. For these reasons, planning for initial entry into a market or locale becomes even more important. A historical example that will be debated for years is the invasion of Iraq to oust Saddam Hussein. Despite the success of the surge strategy, people will invariably remember the initial months and year of the war. Without sounding too trite, there truly is only one chance to make a first impression. Think carefully and plan accordingly for your chance at your first impression. More is riding on it than you may think.

Moving the Chains

The primacy effect means that we pay too much attention to the first events in a sequence and that affects how we evaluate people and strategies. Guard yourself against the bias of first impressions.

KNEEL If all doesn’t go well on the first down of the game or during the first product launch or the first year of a war, there is, thankfully, one more chance. And that’s the recency effect. The recency effect says that lasting impressions are often the last impression. Our minds and memory systems are programmed to recall and process either the first (primacy) or last events better than all the stuff in the middle. That’s why the last down of the game or a career is so important. Our earlier example of Woody Hayes is a case in point. Many forget just how good a coach he was. If not for that one event, Woody Hayes would be remembered as one of the top five college coaches ever. Instead, his last act as a coach, the “punch,” will be remembered more than all of the great achievements he amassed during his career. Barry Sanders left at the high point of his career. His last impressions on the gridiron will be memorable ones. While some say that Sanders had up to three more great years left, there’s little doubt that Sanders legacy will be secure as his last seasons were among his best seasons. The recency effect will forever guard his legacy.

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Another exciting runner, this time in the form of quarterback Vince Young, used the recency effect to his advantage. In just three games prior to the 2006 Rose Bowl, Vince Young’s draft status was a probable late first round, early second round pick. His unconventional throwing motion coupled with a tall, rigid frame that would invite injury caused many NFL teams to question whether he was worthy of a top pick let alone being drafted in the first round. His last college experience, however, was so heroic and so incredible that, to this day, this is how most people remember Vince Young. Again, we see the power of the recency effect. One of the best performances ever seen in college football, the 2006 Rose Bowl between Texas and USC was the one remembered and recalled going into the 2006 NFL draft. Notice, too, the Halo Effect and the law of small numbers at work here. One Vince Young performance colored everything. Most forget that he orchestrated an almost equally impressive comeback, the year prior, in the Rose Bowl against Michigan. If you were to play wordname association with some friends and mention Texas quarterback Vince Young, chances are they’d recall the 2006 Rose Bowl. It shouldn’t surprise then that many draft experts and NFL scouts primarily used this one event rather than combine performances and mechanic analysis to deduce that Young would have an equally impressive career in the NFL. Much like the primacy effect, the recency effect offers several insights into both leadership and decision-making that we need to heed. First, understand that this bias exists. While it may be convenient to remember the most recent events, always try to consider the full body of work. Second, try never to deduce causality from the recency effect. For instance, we know of one college coach at the Division III level who admitted to us that the recency effect interfered with his game preparation and, ultimately, his game planning and execution. The year prior against a rival in the conference, his team gave up 389 yards rushing and 49 yards passing. The opponents’ rushing attack was so dominant that they rushed the ball 64 times and only passed the ball four times. Naturally, and like many others, he assumed causality for their next meeting. He assumed that because they ran the ball in such a dominant fashion the year prior, they’d do the same during the current season. He planned accordingly, devoting schemes and plans of attack to stop the run. To his surprise and counter to the recency prediction, his rival switched gears and passed 60 percent of the snaps and ran only 40 percent of the time. The result was the same; his team had lost. However, this time he lost through the air, by his opponent’s passing game, as opposed to the running

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game. This vivid example shows just how flat-footed and mentally offguard we can be when we assume that future events will mirror recent past events. Finally, a thorough appreciation of the recency effect should prod a leader into always devising a graceful, purposeful, and orderly exit. In other words, always have an exit strategy as that last down is supremely important and may just affect how well regarded you, your team, and the organization’s performance is remembered. Maybe one of the best historical examples of the recency effect may just be the Vietnam conflict. In a simple but telling field test, we asked ten colleagues to give us one incident that best summed up how they remembered the Vietnam War. A stunning seven out of ten told us that they remembered the helicopters being dumped off the U.S. Embassy in Saigon—one of the truly last events of the Vietnam conflict. They didn’t recall the beginning or middle. They remembered only the end.

Moving the Chains

Exit strategies are very important because we are programmed to remember the last event that took place at the expense of everything that came before. This colors and works against accurate decision-making processes.

COACH’S CALL The dominant thrust of this chapter is that it’s hard to make a good decision. Forget about all of the environmental and external forces at play that make a hard decision harder. Maybe most disturbing is our internal forces. We’ve got personal biases that work against making sound, effective, and timely decisions. For successful decision-making, we must confront these forces. Put this into perspective. It is almost impossible to separate leadership from decision-making. Reflect and ask whether you can have one and not the other. Certainly, you can be a good decision-maker without being a leader. There’s plenty of research and scientists that’ll support us on that point. But the corollary holds—it is impossible to be an effective leader without being a good decision-maker. After all, almost every facet of leadership from building the roster, to assessing fit, to determining which source of power to use, to creating and devising

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smart strategies and effective tactics revolves around the Gridiron Leader’s ability to make good decisions. This isn’t to be taken lightly. And some of the forces that we mention in this chapter make it hard for leaders to decide. Those that can figure out how to beat these biases will have a competitive advantage over those that can’t.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Recognize your biases. All people have natural biases and a tendency to over simplify people, situations, or events to understand the complexity. Take a personal inventory of your own biases and tendencies. Force yourself to look objectively at situations or evaluate people. View things from many different angles, metrics, or other categories of measurements. 2. Keep an open mind. Routinely challenge your personal convictions. Be careful of only accepting information that confirms your personal beliefs. Be open to all sorts and sources of information. 3. Know when it is time to switch strategies, approaches, or stances. Don’t stick with a decision or strategy that is flawed regardless of how much investment has already been sunk. Keep emotions out and don’t become personally attached to decisions. Diagnose problems accurately and quickly. Be willing to experiment and accept some failure, but know when it is time to move on. 4. Be realistic in your approach. Know the things that you directly control versus what you can only influence and the things that may be impossible to predict. Don’t overestimate your own personal capabilities to a point where you ignore powerful stakeholders or others that influence outcomes. 5. Seek diversity. Seek out others or information that will challenge your assumptions. Assess and evaluate courses of action from a variety of views. Find trusted peers or team members that will provide candid feedback. Ask others to play devil’s advocate to intentionally look at things from different angles.

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NOTES 1. At time of publication. 2. Pat Yasinskas, “Combine Star Mamula Was Burdened by High Expectations,” ESPN Web site, February 19, 2008, http://sports.espn.go.com/ nfl/draft08/columns/story?columnist=yasinskas_pat&ID=3252718 (accessed March 9, 2009). 3. Edward L. Thorndike, Educational Psychology (Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing, 2008). For a thorough discussion of cognitive bias, see Dan Hellriegel et al., Organizational Behavior (Cincinnati: South-Western College Publishing, 2001). 4. Informational Web site, http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Halo_ effect (accessed March 14, 2009). 5. Stanford Law School Web site, http://securities.stanford.edu/news-archive/ 2002/20020904_Settlement03_Roland.htm (accessed March 14, 2009). 6. Barry M. Staw, “Knee Deep in the Big Muddy: A Study of Escalating Commitment to a Chosen Course of Action,” Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 16 (1976), 27–44. 7. “Motorola Considers Spin-Off of Handset Division,” Telecommunications Industry News Web site, http://www.teleclick.ca/2008/02/motorolaconsiders-spin-off-of-handset-division (accessed March 14, 2009). 8. “Strategy Analytics: Motorola, Sony Ericsson, and Apple Lose Global Handset Marketshare,” Reuters.com, http://www.reuters.com/article/press Release/idUS44111+25-Apr-2008+BW20080425 (accessed March 14, 2009). 9. Information accurate at time of publication. 10. Ellen Langer, “The Illusion of Control,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 32 (1975), 311–328. 11. Merril Hoge, “More Than Money.” ESPN Web site, December 1, 2004, http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=hoge_merril&ID= 1696857 (accessed March 9, 2009). 12. “Spurrier to Ignore Critics, Open up Offense,” St. Petersburg Times, October 24, 2003, http://www.sptimes.com/2003/10/24/Sports/Spurrier_to_ ignore_cr.shtml (accessed March 14, 2009).

7 A WINNING STRATEGY

However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results. —Winston Churchill Kmart and the Oakland Raiders of the last two decades share more in common than you may think. Before there was Wal-Mart, there was Kmart. The Kmart of the late 1970s and 1980s essentially enjoyed a monopoly in the low-cost consumer retail arena. In keeping with our discussion on decision-making, Kmart erred in several key areas and failed to adhere to a specific strategy. This strategic waffling would cripple them for some time. The critical year was probably 1994, when Kmart closed 110 stores. Analysts concluded that Kmart was penny-wise, dollar foolish, as it lagged both Wal-Mart and Target in technology and computer investment, particularly the technology to manage its unwieldy and inefficient supply chain.1 Over the next ten years, Kmart would flip-flop between a low-cost and a differentiation strategy. A low-cost strategy is indicative of Wal-Mart. Low-cost approaches demand operational efficiency, a tendency toward commodity-type goods, which, in turn, mean the absolute lowest cost for the consumer. This is Wal-Mart’s core competency—what it does best. Kmart pursued this approach, at times, with their blue-light special promotions that ran from Kmart’s founding up through 1991. In 1991, the blue-light program was shelved only to resurface about a decade later. In contrast to the low-cost strategy is the differentiation strategy. Here, you have Target. And, at times, Kmart. A differentiation strategy avoids commoditizing products and, instead, attempts to take-in higher margins through a real or perceived quality service or product enhancement. The Michael Graves collection (Graves is a renowned architect) 113

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at Target is one such example of something that is different and that suggests a heightened level of quality. This is Target’s core competency— offering higher-quality goods in exchange for a slightly higher price premium. Kmart pursued this approach too with their Martha Stewart collection, which spoke to higher quality and customer sophistication. By now, you’ve probably realized the problem here. Kmart was a strategic flip-flopper. It confused employees, investors, and, most importantly, their customer base by trying to be two things at once or flipping between one approach and another quickly and without any apparent resolve. All of its major stakeholders were confused as to what exactly Kmart was and what mission it was to accomplish. In organizational speak, Kmart lacked strategic coherence and strategic focus. Interestingly, with this lack of strategic focus, Kmart became less efficient and more prone to mistakes and errors at the operational level. Personally, all three of us stopped visiting Kmart in the mid-1990s because the stores were dirty, not lit well, cramped, sloppy, and some shelves were bare. In short, and as Kmart’s decline clearly illustrates, the shopping experience was often not a good one. Herein rests an important tactical lesson that follows a lack of strategic discipline—errors and costs tend to rise when there is a lack of strategic coherence. The Raiders of most of the 1990s and the better part of this millennium are the NFL equivalent to Kmart. With the exception of the first two or three years of the 21st century, the Raiders are a classic case of strategic flip-flopping and the poor execution that usually follows this strategic lack of discipline. After reaching and losing the Super Bowl in 2002, the Raiders would lose more games than any other franchise in the NFL over the next five seasons. From 2003 to 2007, they won only 19 games, which was a hefty seven-fewer wins than the next-worst team—the Detroit Lions. We contend, along with several NFL pundits, that a lack of strategic focus and strategic coherence is the main, causal variable that explains the culture of losing that has suffocated the Oakland Raiders. Consider these facts. From 1989 to 2008, the Oakland Raiders had ten separate head or interim coaches during that period. That’s a new coach every two years. Compare that with the Pittsburgh Steelers, who had three coaches over an almost 40-year period, or the Minnesota Vikings, who had four coaches during the same 20-year span as the Raiders’ coaching carousel. Since the head coach plays a large part in determining and dictating a team’s strategy, we can easily see that the revolving coaching door created a revolving strategy. This flip-flopping of strategy meant that no one strategy could get traction, and the people who were

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brought in to fit with the strategy (remember Person-Strategy fit!) didn’t quite mesh when the new leadership came in and changed strategy again. It’s tough not to see this. Mike Shanahan, considered an offensive genius, ended his Raider coaching assignment in 1989 after coaching less than 21 games. The man who replaced him was Art Shell, a Hallof-Fame offensive tackle for the Raiders, who was known as a bit more conservative than Shanahan. Mike White briefly succeeded Art Shell; White was known primarily for his expertise in developing strong quarterbacks like Tony Eason. This back and forth continues to this day. Lane Kiffin was fired five games into the 2008 campaign and replaced by offensive line coach Tom Cable. With this change at the top came a concurrent diversity in people and strategy. For instance, Rich Gannon and Coach Jon Gruden offered the only real bright spots over the last two decades in the Raider Nation. Rich Gannon was an incredibly accurate passer. In fact, Gannon won the NFL MVP award in 2002 largely due to his accuracy. During that 2002 season, he completed an astonishing 418 passes in just 618 attempts—a completion percentage nearing 70 percent. Remembering our discussion on Person-Strategy fit, Gannon fit beautifully within the West Coast offensive scheme demanded by coach Jon Gruden. Three years later, both Gruden and Gannon were gone. The team replaced Gannon and others with quarterback Kerry Collins, wide-receiver Randy Moss, and running back LaMont Jordan. All three players, but particularly Collins and Moss, enjoyed success both before and after the Raiders. But not during their tenure as Raiders. The reason seems to be a lack of strategic coherence emanating from turnover at the top. All three players are really known as power players in the traditional sense. They’re at their best playing the vertical game—not the West Coast offense. It showed as the Raiders languished through the 2005 and 2006 campaigns. Collins would go on to lead the Tennessee Titans to the playoffs and the best record in the AFC during the 2008 season. Moss would help the Patriots reach another Super Bowl. Through it all (the turnover and lack of definitive strategy), and not unlike Kmart, operational breakdowns quickly followed this lack of strategic focus. Look no further than the Raiders’ history of penalties. From 1991 to 2007, the Raiders enjoyed the honor of being the most penalized team during the regular season a whopping eight times! Said differently, in 16 seasons from 1991 to 2007, the Raiders were the most penalized team in the NFL 50 percent of the time. Remember, there are 31 other teams in the NFL. The 1994 and 1996 Raiders had a remarkable 156 penalties during both of those seasons (second in NFL history).

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The point here is that all teams, all divisions, and all organizations must select and follow through on a specific strategy. If an organization goes back and forth between strategies, then it will never be able to maximize operational efficiencies. Even organizations famous for their differentiation strategies, such as Lexus and the Ritz-Carlton, must exercise complete operational discipline to achieve both incredible quality standards but also to contain costs. Again, the Raiders offer incredible insight into two powerful lessons that all can embrace—a lack of strategic coherence will always show up on the field as a lack of operational focus and such lack of discipline will always drive up costs. As a consequence, that prevents you from winning. RUNNING THE REVERSE Cocktail anyone? The world’s largest cocktail party can be found in Jacksonville, Florida, in late October or early November every year. You can count on it. The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail party is the official and unofficial name for the annual Georgia–Florida football game. Held at a “neutral” site, some 45 miles from Gainesville, Florida, and 350 miles from Athens, Georgia, the Georgia Bulldogs enjoy a 46-38-2 advantage over the history of the rivalry.2 But the Georgia Bulldogs have steadily seen their fortunes decline against their hated SEC rival. From 1990 through 2008, Florida has won 16 of the 19 meetings. Florida’s dominance withstanding, we’d like to focus on one of its aberrations—a loss to the Georgia Bulldogs in 1997. It was a loss that was never supposed to be. It was Jim Donnan’s second season as Georgia’s head coach, and there was little evidence that he’d be able to reverse course against Steve Spurrier’s Florida team. After all, Spurrier’s team had won the last seven meetings between the storied programs. Donnan, known as an offensive schemer, devised a plan that would cripple a talented Florida team with a noted speed differential over Georgia. Florida was led by one of the most prolific gunslingers in NCAA history, Rex Grossman, and many thought this game would be a blowout favoring Florida. Donnan did a magnificent job coaching the Bulldogs on that Saturday afternoon; his use of mismatches and misdirection plays would carry the day. Donnan knew that the Florida defense was incredibly fast and strong evidenced by the number-one rushing defense in the country at game time.3 Brilliantly, Donnan used Florida’s strengths of speed and aggressiveness against them by calling several misdirection and reverse plays.

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Benefiting from Georgia’s “Mr. Everything,” Donnan used Hines Ward in numerous roles including receiving, rushing, passing, and returning. The best plays, though, were the reverses and misdirection plays. Very simply, a reverse gets momentum moving in one direction and then quickly shifts direction. In Florida’s case, their aggressiveness on defense would often lead to over-pursuit. Hungry and risk-taking, they left parts of the field uncovered and exposed as it seemed the entire defense would swarm to the ball. Knowing that, Donnan called a couple of misdirection plays in which, as predicted, the Florida defense overran leaving the other side of the field wide open. Misdirection refers to changing operations (not strategy) on a dime and hoping that the competition over-pursues. Over-pursuit means the competition is still running in one direction, while you are off in another, seizing an opportunity. The recent interaction between two equally formidable rivals, Airbus and Boeing, showcase the dangers of over-pursuit. Additionally, this case demonstrates the benefits of creating, and pitfalls of falling for, misdirection. Initially, it was Airbus that over-pursued. In the early part of this millennium, Airbus went whole hog into a bigger-is-better strategy and mentality. In 2007, Airbus christened the A380 or Superjumbo on its maiden voyage from Singapore to Sydney. Built in an all-economy style, it could transport almost 1,000 people. Boeing bet that Airbus over-pursued with this Bigger is Better mentality. It pulled a reverse that caught Airbus by surprise. Shortly after the launch of Airbus’s massive Superjumbo, Boeing announced the design and projected manufacturing launch of their 787 Dreamliner. The Dreamliner was, in many regards, the opposite of the A380. It was half the size of the A380 and boasted enormous fuel-efficiency advantages. It also promised a smoother and lighter ride, as it was the first aircraft to be made almost entirely of composite materials. Its mid-size status was appealing to many cities that couldn’t offer the runway length required of the gigantic A380. On its announcement, orders soared. And it looked like Boeing had run a perfect misdirection. It would’ve scored if it weren’t for some of the biggest manufacturing and supply and sourcing issues ever to grip a firm. Choosing to outsource around the globe for parts, the plan was to manufacture and partially assemble the plane in different locales and fit the larger pieces together in Seattle. Boeing couldn’t manage its suppliers adequately, and there was significant variance between what Boeing wanted and what it got from its throng of global suppliers. What will be sure to be a Harvard case study for years to come, the execution and management of the supply chain was so

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difficult and cumbersome, Boeing found itself unable to fill orders on time, causing customer dissatisfaction and racking up financial penalties all the while. The tides were turned once again, and now it was Airbus that was capitalizing on the over-pursuit of Boeing. Both the football and organizational examples offer valuable insight. First, it is tough to get caught up in over-pursuit if the fundamental strategy is balanced. A balanced, deliberate strategy is about taking calculated risks without overexposing yourself or the organization. In our analysis of both football and profit/nonprofit strategies, we found that extreme strategies weren’t nearly as effective as balanced strategies— especially over the long term. Think, for a moment, of the great NFL dynasties. The Cowboys, Steelers, Patriots, 49ers, and, maybe, the Redskins all showed some semblance of strategic balance. All dynastic teams mentioned here, for instance, had both a good offense and a good defense—a balanced strategy. These great teams could also both run and pass. An extreme strategy creates large gaps and holes that make you and the team vulnerable. Second, from an Art of War mentality, individuals, teams, and organizations that are able to bait others into over-pursuit will enjoy competitive advantage. Not only did Donnan do that for that 1997 game against Florida, but he did something else that deserves attention. He took the strengths of the Florida team, speed and aggressiveness, and turned them into weaknesses. What’s remarkable about this strategic and tactical mindset is that you are using the energy of the opponent, in a sense, to secure victory. Sadly, early analysis of the War in Iraq suggests that this is just what Al-Qaeda did to coalition forces. They used the sheer size advantage against them by framing size as a liability (more opportunities and places to attack) instead of a strength. Finally, there is an intellectual agility and awareness component to this. The best way to avoid over-pursuit is to catch it before it goes too far. The very best Gridiron Leaders either instinctively know or learn over time when either they or their team is going too far, too fast in one direction. Sensing that they are becoming exposed, they make adjustments. This requires a leader to carefully and continuously monitor and assess both strategy and execution. Make no mistake, there is an inflection point at which it is difficult, if not impossible, to reverse direction. Think about it for a moment. When a company, military, or team over-pursue for a significant amount of time, it tends to devote considerably more resources at a considerably faster rate. In metaphorical terms, it is the equivalent of digging a bigger ditch faster. At a certain point, it becomes hard to stand in front of this wave of organizational momentum.

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Moving the Chains

Misdirection and over-pursuit can be your friend or foe. Make it your friend.

LOOK FOR A MISMATCH Just like we have misdirection, Gridiron Leaders create value and devise winning plans by creating mismatches. There are really two complimentary ways to create mismatches. Either through people or through strategic planning. One of the more memorable and by-design mismatches could be traced to former Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka’s use of William “the Refrigerator” Perry. Although there is considerable debate to Perry’s playing weight, most believe that this 6-foot, 2-inch defensive lineman out of Clemson was close to 400 pounds. Despite his enormous weight, Perry had quick feet and displayed surprising agility for a man of his size. Ditka capitalized on this and used Perry in goal-line situations either as a fullback blocking for Hall-of-Famer Walter Payton, or as the ball carrier himself. Remember, it was Perry, not Payton, who scored a rushing touchdown in Super Bowl XX against the New England Patriots. The entire premise here, though, is what Perry created—a mismatch. At his size, he could literally fall forward and gain three or four yards. Used as a ball carrier on goal-line situations, he created problems for goal-line defenses because he was as big as, or bigger than, the defensive linemen trying to tackle him. And he possessed an enormous size advantage over the linebackers that would have to try to stand him up at the goal line. Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots is also quite skilled at combining people and strategy to create mismatches. Belichick will devise specific plays along with larger game plans to exploit mismatches. Belichick knows how difficult it is for a 250-pound linebacker with 4.9 speed to cover a wide-receiver with 4.3 speed. That’s why he creates situations where that will occur. He’s also been known to use players, such as Mike Vrabel, a linebacker by trade, in goal-line situations as either a fullback or tight end. He can block, run, or catch and causes problems because offensive linemen can’t really cover Vrabel too well if he blocks and releases into the end zone. The allure of Reggie Bush out of USC was grounded in this notion of mismatch. Here was a running back that had Barry Sanders–type moves but also had Randy Moss–type speed. A linebacker could match

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Reggie Bush’s size but couldn’t deal with his speed. For the cornerback, it was just the opposite. They could deal and keep up with his speed, but they couldn’t keep up with his size. This is why both Pete Carroll at USC and Saints coach Sean Peyton tried or try to create “space” for Reggie Bush—one-on-one situations with Bush on a linebacker or Bush on a cornerback. As mentioned earlier, both lead to mismatches. One last personnel mismatch that led to a long-term strategic mismatch was Tony Dungy’s draft of Dwight Freeney. It is difficult to tease out causality here. Specifically, it’s unclear whether Dungy first dreamed up a light, but speedy, defense, or whether the draft of Freeney came first, which led to the adoption of a speedy, but undersized, defense. Out of Syracuse, Freeney was pinned on many draft boards as a big question mark. By most accounts, he was considerably undersized as a defensive lineman at just over 6 feet and 255 pounds, with many draft scouts predicting that his only chance of a successful NFL career would be to play linebacker. After all, a recent first-round pick out of Virginia Tech with similar attributes, Corey Moore by the Buffalo Bills, was a total bust. Tony Dungy thought differently. He saw Freeney’s explosiveness and 4.42 speed as key attributes to build a high-energy, supercharged defense capable of creating chaos on opposing offenses. Dungy’s projections were more accurate than many scouts. Freeney helped transform the Indianapolis defense, much maligned as a much distant second cousin compared to Indianapolis’s prolific offensive scheme led by Peyton Manning, into a dominant force in the AFC. Dungy’s speedier defense would dominate for several years against divisional opponents like Tennessee or Houston who opted for bigger, but slower, offensive linemen. Freeney would anchor that defense as a three-time All-Pro and was the third fastest in NFL history to reach 40 sacks.4 Lastly, through strategic planning and tactical execution, there are ways to create mismatches by simply employing the strongest aspect of your team or organization against the absolute weakest part of your rival’s. Frank Beamer, the head coach at Virginia Tech, has built a legendary reputation of doing exactly that. Beamer’s genius is that he knows the weakest part of most collegiate (not professional) programs is the kicking game. Therefore, Beamer invests heavily in special teams’ plays and players who attempt to block kicks and punts. To that end, Beamer and what is known as Beamer Ball has been extremely successful by putting a strength (his special teams’ plays and players) against the Achilles heal of most NCAA programs, their kicking games. In fact, from 2000 to 2007, Virginia Tech blocked 36 kicks, trailing only Texas and N.C. State in that category. The moral is clear—deliberately

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putting your strength against another’s weakness is a surefire way to create a mismatch.

Moving the Chains

Creating mismatches, either via people or via strategy or a combination of both, is a guaranteed way to secure victory.

GAME CHANGER In looking at the mounds and mounds of strategy books on the market dating back five or so years, we noticed a common theme. Many of the books focused on what comes after strategy—execution. This focus, of course, values the outputs of strategy. As the opening Winston Churchill quote attests, we don’t discount the value of results. However, we feel that the true source of a sustainable competitive advantage lies in looking at the inputs, not the outputs, of strategy. The inputs we’re referring to are tough to quantify and identify, which, predictably makes them so valuable and unique. We are referring to the strategic inputs of critical thinking, creativity, and innovation. Make no mistake, a creative strategy is a game changer. A game changer is some factor or variable that fundamentally and irrevocably alters the game to your favor. Atop all of our wish lists should be to identify and isolate that variable that can tilt the game dramatically to one side or the other. This phrase, game changer, is in vogue. For example, it was used frequently in the successful campaign of President Barack Obama, although many are unsure of exactly what it means. Pontiac, which for years has sponsored a weekly Game Changer award on ESPN, celebrates the performance of a single play that changed the face of the game. Regardless, we like it because it rolls off the tongue with force and command. But in true Gridiron style, we’re looking for something more. We challenge all to find a season changer—a strategic variable that doesn’t change the face of a single game, but alters a season or a series of seasons. Undeniably, the most critical strategic factor that can truly alter the course of a season is innovation and creative thinking. It is these strategic variables, the inputs to the strategy-making process, which transform the ordinary to the exemplary. At its extreme, this spirit of innovation can result in a dramatic paradigm shift that by any and all accounts contribute directly to victory.

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BUDDY BALL When innovation, strategic development and planning, and execution all intersect, a monopoly over rivals occurs and a sustainable competitive advantage is all but guaranteed. The imperative then is to invest and reward innovation and creative thought. Look no further than Buddy Ryan and the 46 defense to see the impact of innovation and the competitive benefits that accompany a paradigm shift. Buddy Ryan became immortalized for designing and using the 46 defense for the Chicago Bears while he was the defensive coordinator for the team. The “4” stands for four down linemen and the “6” signifies six linebackers. Two of those six are cornerbacks who play bump and run coverage and who will also blitz—essentially making them a linebacker/ cornerback hybrid. The uniqueness of the 46 is that the defense was weighted to the weak side (opposite the tight end) with the defensive end split out wider than normal, occasionally referred to as being out on an island. Another defining characteristic of this defensive scheme was that both outside linebackers would line up on the same side of the formation. In the 46 scheme, the linebackers would position themselves almost directly behind the linemen, sometimes only one or two yards behind. Maybe Buddy Ryan used some of his military expertise (he was a Master Sergeant and served in the Korean campaign) because with this formation, he could concentrate two or more defensive players on a single offensive lineman. This concentration of force would quickly break through and sack the quarterback or stop the runner in the backfield. This defensive scheme was particularly troubling for quarterbacks who didn’t know if, when, or where a blitz would be coming from. Back in the 1980s, the run was more popular than the pass. The 46 scheme made it harder to run and to do play-action since offensive linemen no longer had the time to do simple pulling, trapping, or pass protection schemes. Put bluntly, it caused chaos for offenses. The 1985 Chicago Bears would win every single game that season except for a Monday Night Football game against the Miami Dolphins, led by Dan Marino. This was significant because if the Dolphins hadn’t stopped them, then the Bears would’ve shared the distinction with Shula’s ’72 Dolphins as the only NFL team to go undefeated and win the Super Bowl. The 46 defense was a true season changer; it would propel Mike Ditka, Buddy Ryan, and the Chicago Bears to a 15-1 season and a 46-10 dominance over the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX. Ironically, it would take another paradigm shift to account for and neutralize the 46 defense. Bill Walsh’s West Coast offense with its

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immediate and short passing game finally put an end to the effectiveness of the 46 defense. It is difficult to overstate the importance of paradigm shifts in strategic thinking as a source of competitive advantage. Actually, referring back to the opening quote also triggers the thoughts of several paradigm shifts, some of which were so powerful that they almost gave victory to a force that most experts would’ve dismissed out of hand. Consider the case of the German submarine in World War II. Known also as the U-boat, Churchill would later confide that he thought the U-boat was the only factor that could’ve prevented an Allied victory. After World War I, the Treaty of Versailles would limit the scope of the German surface Navy. Smartly, they decided to go beneath the surface for competitive advantage. It is impossible to dismiss the destruction and devastation of the German U-boat, especially during the Second Battle of the Atlantic. The U-boat campaign offers a unique glimpse into a pattern of innovative strategic thinking. First was the initial emphasis on submarines mentioned earlier. Second, was the manner in which the U-boats were deployed. The Germans created “wolf packs,” or Rudeltaktik, that would capitalize via mass attacks. It worked simply. After a U-boat would identify a supply convoy, the single submarine would call out to all other submarines. The submarines would convene in a wolf pack formation and would track the convoy (usually British) and launch a coordinated attack under the cover of darkness. The destruction of these convoys almost derailed the entire British war-fighting machine since the inputs into manufacturing could not make it to port. Not until radar and sonar did the Allied forces really have a true answer for submarine warfare. When combined with escorts and spotting via aircraft, the German advantage of the seas would decline. Finally, and almost forgotten, is the use of radio encryption in the wolf pack attacks. Here, the Germans combined one innovation, submarines and submarine attack tactics, with another innovation, technological communication. The Germans would use the Enigma machine to encrypt and code messages. The U-boat wolf packs were among the first navies (or militaries) in military history to widely use and embrace encrypted communication. Up to that point, the scope and scale of effective encrypted communication was quite limited. For the German submarine fleet, it became a source of competitive advantage until Allied cryptologists were able to break the code. The lesson is clear. Regardless of the context (i.e., corporate, profit, nonprofit, military, or law enforcement), paradigm shifts provide monopolistic

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windows. These widows allow competitive gain with little to no resistance as competitors try to devise catch-up strategies.

Moving the Chains

Never underestimate the value of creative thinking and innovation. At its extreme, it can foster a paradigm shift that provides for a sustainable competitive advantage.

HALFTIME ADJUSTMENTS In the previous chapter, we discussed why comebacks were so special. The allure and potential to reverse direction or beat the odds is one of the most attractive and appealing aspects of the game. Comebacks are total Hollywood. We’ve already mentioned how rare comebacks are, but there are several reasons for their infrequency. For one, time is running out. The competitive odds are no longer on your side when in comeback mode. Comebacks require you to not only beat your opponent, but to also beat the clock. Second, momentum is working against you as well. It can maybe best be explained by Newtonian physics—things in motion tend to stay in motion. A losing team tends to gravitate towards losing, and a dominant team tends to stay in motion toward the winning end of the spectrum. The third element that makes comebacks so difficult is due to a human element. You see, when strategies, tactics, penalties, and poor execution lead to poor performance and a predictable loss, a terrible side effect emerges—poor morale. In the face of all of these obstacles, people give up on the execution plan and their teammates. The probability of a comeback erodes because members of the team simply do not believe that a comeback is possible. Despite these incredible forces working against a leader and against a team, Gridiron Leaders find a way to engineer comebacks. Legends such as John Elway, Joe Montana, Dan Marino, and Jim Harbaugh built their careers on the capability to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They were the comeback kids of the NFL. In truth, though, comebacks are only in part about the leader’s ability to inspire the team. There’s more. One game, in particular, shows that a comeback is equal parts leadership and strategy and execution. As far as comebacks go, the 1993 Buffalo Bills-Houston Oiler Wild Card playoff game holds a sacred place in Gridiron Lore. At the very

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outset, this game was special. For reasons that are not entirely clear, the game, held in Buffalo’s Rich stadium, never sold out. As a result, the game was blacked out meaning that it was televised nationally, but not locally. Buffalo fans could not watch from home and missed the game. Many who remember watching the game or who are just students of the game think that the central figure in the comeback was Frank Reich, a perennial backup to Jim Kelly. There is some allure to this presumption, as Frank Reich has a rather storied career of being a backup that came in to lead a comeback. Frank Reich was the backup at the University of Maryland when thrust into an active role during the 1984 Orange Bowl game against the University of Miami, when Maryland starter Stan Gelbaugh went down with an injury. Down 31-0 at the half, Maryland was expected to roll over during the second half with this little-known backup, and in the process, suffer one of the greatest beat downs in Orange Bowl history. Except the story didn’t go that way. Reich rallied Maryland for a 42-40 come-from-behind victory over the Bernie Kosar-led, and heavily favored, Miami Hurricanes. Almost a decade later, Reich would engineer another spectacular comeback. But there’s more to it than Reich. We explain below. The Houston Oilers, led by the prolific Warren Moon, simply dominated every facet of the game during the first half. Moon was nearly perfect, going 19 for 22 for 220 yards and 4 touchdowns in only one half of play. The Oilers kept the ball for more than two-thirds of the first half—21 minutes to Buffalo’s 9 minutes. The wave and force of momentum was clearly with the Oilers; with 1 minute left in the half, Moon connected with Haywood Jeffires for a 27-yard touchdown. The Bills would enter halftime down 28-3. The comeback began in the locker room and, contrary to popular belief, the comeback probably started with Defensive Coordinator, Walt Corey, as opposed to Frank Reich. Corey carefully examined the tactical aspect of executing his defensive strategy, and he decided to change course. Specifically, he went from a 4-3 defense to a 3-4 defensive scheme. The difference is significant. A 4-3 defense means that there are four down linemen and three linebackers. This defensive scheme is good at stuffing the run. In the 3-4 defensive scheme, there are three down linemen and four linebackers. Corey’s move was a good one. The extra linebacker helped shut down the shorter passing attack of Moon and his receivers, “Moonbeams” as they were often called. After this call, Moon would not throw another touchdown for the rest of the game. The Bills, who were at one time down 35-3, would win the game in overtime, 41-38. There are several important lessons relating to both tactics and strategy that we can learn from this game. First, know the difference

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between strategy and tactical execution. Corey wasn’t drastically altering his defensive strategy of aggressiveness, speed, or risk-taking. Rather, he focused on the tactical execution of that strategy. His decision to change from a 4-3 to a 3-4 was a change in tactics, not strategy. They are, however, related. Poor tactical execution can make any strategy look bad. Or put differently, it is hard to properly assess and evaluate any given strategy, if the tactical execution and day-to-day operation of that strategy is poor. For evidence of this, turn to the Houston Oilers and not the Buffalo Bills. The day after this crippling loss, the Oilers made a strategic decision to fire their Defensive Coordinator, Jim Eddy. In our analysis, this decision was not provoked by a poor strategy, as the Houston Oilers defense performed well enough during the regular season to make it to the playoffs. This is an important distinction; the decision to fire Eddy wasn’t strategic flip-flopping a la Kmart and the Raiders. Rather, this case illustrates how important halftime adjustments related to operations and the tactical execution of that strategy are. Eddy failed to adjust, and got the boot as a result. The secondary lesson here is the importance of monitoring and evaluating how strategies are executed. On occasion, strategies should be revisited and adjusted or modified to meet changing internal and external conditions. At no time, however, should strategic coherence be sacrificed, and Gridiron Leaders should always shy away from mindless strategic flip-flopping. On many occasions, though, execution plans should be evaluated and assessed—almost continuously. The Buffalo Bills almost waited too long to make their adjustments. If it weren’t for some lucky breaks in the second half, like Houston fumbling some snaps, the adjustments made at the half would’ve been useless. For better and more immediate results, the Buffalo Bills should’ve made their adjustments sooner.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders have to constantly monitor and evaluate their strategy while simultaneously ensuring tactical, day-to-day execution is performed to a high standard.

USE YOUR TIMEOUT There’s an old saying that goes something like this: You can’t fix an airplane while you’re flying it. Rooted in this maxim is that the very

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act of execution makes evaluation and fixing things difficult. Especially today. The fast pace and busyness of today’s organizational climate means that there’s barely enough cognitive and physical capital to focus on execution, let alone focus on both execution and evaluation. Gridiron Leaders, though, find a way to do both because they know that execution without reflection and evaluation could result in getting to the wrong place faster. We’ve found both on and off the gridiron, the best way to do this is to take specific moments to clear your head and the minds of your team. Taking a timeout to discuss and evaluate the execution of strategy is important to do. We see this done during effective off-site retreats, but also during specific periods of the day. We know of one sales manager that would end each day with a 15-minute, after-action review of the workday. If need be, scheduling or promotional changes were made so the following day would be better. This is more about evaluating and assessing execution than it is about drastically altering strategy. But, again, they’re both inextricably tied.

Moving the Chains

Make time to assess and evaluate the execution of any given strategy. Don’t wait until halftime to make halftime adjustments.

DEEP THREAT The Korean War wasn’t going too well for the United States. That is, until Douglas MacArthur decided to go deep. In June of 1950, the Communist Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) launched an attack into South Korea. During those initial months, both South Korea and U.S. forces fared badly. It seemed as if Korea would soon be controlled by Soviet-backed Korean communists. General Douglas MacArthur, commander of both U.S. and U.N. forces, decided the best overall strategy to gain an upper hand in this conflict was to stretch the field and go deep. And stretch the field he did. In one of the great military strategic maneuvers of all time, MacArthur ordered a successful amphibious landing on the Incheon peninsula, deep behind North Korean lines. Using both naval and close air support, the Marine and Army forces outflanked the entire North Korean Army, which forced a hasty retreat northward. This strategy helped turn the tables because it was

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surprisingly bold and also deep. After the landing at Incheon, the North Korean Army had to play honest and divert forces to cover flanks and the rear. MacArthur’s call made North Korea less aggressive and more restrained. In our analyses of truly successful teams and organizations, inherent in all strategies was at least some component of going deep, of stretching the field, of embracing some element of risk. During the first decade of this millennium, risk-taking was taken to the extreme in terms of the securitization and spread of subprime mortgages and mortgage backed assets. Entire firms went down, and economic collapse loomed. Those strategies were faulty because, and like the North Korean Army, flanks were left exposed and vulnerable. There was just too much risk, and organizations were trying to stretch the field all of the time. Whether in football or outside of football, that strategy just never works. What we’re talking about are calculated risks and, really, just even the threat of risky behavior. Even the most conservative organization or team can benefit from incorporating a small amount of high risk into their strategic plans. The reasons are many. First, taking a calculated, big gamble can pay off. Since its creation, Apple was a computer company. It decided to go deep and try its hand at music and music devices while simultaneously engaging in its bread and butter business—building great Mac computers. Keep in mind, Apple didn’t abandon its core strategy. Rather, Apple just complimented it with a risk component. It turns out that the company’s deep pass connected and, in the process, changed the entire music industry. So, going deep can produce outstanding returns. Two, going deep and stretching the field keeps rivals honest and, if it doesn’t keep them honest, it can burn them. Toyota’s investment in hybrid technology before everyone else, particularly Detroit’s GM and Chrysler, stretched the field. GM and Chrysler could’ve played for the deep pass but didn’t and ignored it. They’ve played catch up ever since. A deep pass should force others to take notice. In the process, rivals must divert at least some resources to protect against the deep pass. This allows a team or organization to work other parts of the field more effectively. There’s a method to the madness when Bill Belichick calls a 50-yard fly route to Randy Moss. The likes of Randy Moss, Terrell Owens, Willie Gault, Herman Moore, and Lynn Swann were all known to stretch the field at one time or another. When a coach or quarterback calls a 50-yard fly route to a deep-threat receiver, only good things can typically happen. First, and like Apple, it can connect. It can be a

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completed pass. Two, there can be a pass interference call where the defense bumbles and stumbles over themselves in an effort to prevent the receiver from making the play. Finally, going deep sticks in the minds of the defense. They can’t crowd the box, and they become more conservative in their own defensive strategies. That allows the offense to attack other parts of the field. Put another way, stretching the field uses the “long” field to open up the short field for the offense to operate. Just the threat—not necessarily the action—is important here. Former Chicago wide receiver Willie Gault is one such example. Willie Gault was an Olympic athlete and part of a world record–setting 4  100 meter relay team. Every time he stepped on the field, he was a deep threat. For that reason, defenses had to account for his presence whether or not he actually went deep or not. The important thing is that he had the capacity (and the reputation) to go deep. This threat alone changed defenses. His presence was particularly important for a team, such as the Bears, that had a dominant running game anchored by one of the all-time greats, Walter Payton. There’s little doubt that Gault’s deep-threat potential opened up running lanes for Walter Payton. The ironic twist, and a lesson for all, is that it’s the most conservative teams and organizations that need the deep threat the most. Without the deep threat and the occasional stretch of the field, the organization or team becomes stale and predictable, and it becomes easy for rivals to plan for and plan against it. By the way, the worst that can happen on a 50-yard downfield bomb is an interception. In many cases, that’s the same as a punt. Going deep once in a while (never all the time) should be part and parcel of any team or organizational strategy.

Moving the Chains

The best strategies will try to stretch the field every now and then. There’s no better way to keep competition honest than to have a deep threat. NO HUDDLE OFFENSE Erwin Rommel fought on the wrong side during World War II. The former Nazi General will be forever known as one of the great tacticians and tank commanders in the history of warfare. An aggressor by nature, one of his most-referenced quotes is, “In the absence of orders, go find something and kill it.” There’s little doubt that battlefield commanders such as Patton or Rommel wouldn’t have fallen in love with the No-Huddle Offense.

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The No-Huddle Offense is, as its name suggests, an offense that goes without a huddle. By so doing, they rattle off plays in a much quicker clip since they aren’t taking 10 or 15 seconds out to huddle. Between the three of us, we’ve probably played in or have seen close to 3,000 football games at the high school, collegiate, and professional levels. One consistent truth that we can all agree upon is that time and again, the No-Huddle Offense seems to work. It produces points. Coaches and players offer different theories on why it seems so successful more often than not. A majority opinion is that a No-Huddle Offense is both a competitive strategy and tactical plan. As such, the No Huddle is a decidedly aggressive, fast-paced, attack strategy. When executed well, it disrupts the timing of rivals, particularly the defense. Similarly, many coaches suggest that when run well, the No-Huddle scheme allows the offense to dictate the flow, pace, and rhythm of the game. Often, we see defenses back pedaling, on their heels, in response to a barrage of a No-Huddle Attack. Because there’s no huddle, defensive and rival responses are imperfect. A critical explanation is that in a No-Huddle scheme, the defense can’t seem to substitute players or schemes fast enough to catch up. Several years back, we heard John Madden wonder aloud during a telecast why the No Huddle isn’t used in more circumstances given its effectiveness. Outside of the gridiron, on the academic field as opposed to the athletic field, are strategy scholars that would agree with the core premise. One of the top strategy scholars may just be Dr. Ming-Jer Chen, an internationally acclaimed scholar at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia. Professor Chen is recognized as one of the leading researchers in the topic of competitive dynamics, which studies how or under what processes one firm tries to outcompete a rival firm for a competitive advantage. A key and critical finding of his research, which often examined the U.S. airline industry, is that competitively aggressive firms enjoy more market benefits than firms that are slower, more competitively conservative, and trigger shy. Put differently, airlines that go on the competitive attack and launch aggressive moves against their rivals are more successful and more competitive. The lesson here is simple, but profound. Regardless of context, setting, or situation, competitive attack and competitive aggressiveness are better and stronger indicators of competitive victory. The question then is straightforward—if you don’t have a No-Huddle offensive attack component to your strategy, what are you waiting for? It is precisely this lack of waiting that makes a No Huddle so dangerous to your rivals.

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Moving the Chains

A No-Huddle Offense is a strategic mindset of attack. This attack mentality allows one to take the offensive and dictate the parameters of competition.

UNANSWERED POINTS One day we sat down with a rather successful high school coach who’d built a strong and consistent program over two decades in and around Western Pennsylvania. At one juncture, we asked him to identify the key variable that best explained his success. He didn’t hesitate, “Above all else, the best teams respond and answer after an opponent scores.” On the gridiron, there are answered or unanswered points. With answered, a team responds to a rival’s score with a score of their own. With unanswered, a team fails to respond to an opponent’s score. Sensing the importance, we asked him to clarify. “You must answer a score with a score of your own,” he declared. “There are several reasons. Chief among them is that you never, ever want the game to get out of hand. The best way to stop a tsunami is to immediately answer a score with a score of your own. You stem the momentum. You never let the rivals get into a groove. Responding to a rival is also about confidence. It shows that you aren’t scared and that you’ll stand toe-to-toe with them. One of the things that we emphasize and one of the things that we believe that’s made us so successful here is that we believe that we must respond and respond in force to each and every rival move. It is a statement. It is about our mettle.” CLOSING SPEED Another parallel and complimentary concept from the gridiron is that of closing speed. The best defensive backs and corner backs like Champ Bailey, Troy Polamalu, Ronde Barber, Al Harris, Ty Law, and Dre Bly have this special skill, called closing speed. Closing speed is special because it allows you to close quickly on an opponent even if you’re originally out of position. Defensive backs with strong closing speed are less likely to get burned for big plays downfield since they can catch up quickly. Analogous to closing speed is response speed. Closing fast means responding fast.

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Another major finding from Professor Ming-Jer Chen’s strategic research on competitive dynamics, particularly that of the U.S. airline industry, is that answering scores with a score and closing speed are two central tenets to achieving and securing a competitive advantage. Chen found that airlines that were slower in responding to a rival’s actions or competitive moves or who simply didn’t answer them demonstrated response lag. The greater the response lag, the quicker the loss of market share and profitability. His findings are clear and unequivocal—when a rival acts, strong competitors respond quickly and in force. Think about it for a moment. When an airline launches a price cut or a change to policy, the most competitive airlines answer quickly with price cuts and policy changes of their own. Sometimes within minutes! Deep price cuts by one airline, say American, are met almost simultaneously by rival firms like United. Failure to answer a rival’s action can result in fewer customers and fewer dollars. A strategic imperative, then, is to respond and respond quickly to rivals. Strong organizations and strong teams emphasize the closing speed in both strategy and tactical execution. This, in turn, allows them to be competitive day-in, day-out.

Moving the Chains

When a rival acts, respond quickly. Answer all scores with scores of your own. Never cede momentum. Work on closing speed. OPTION ATTACK We never knew why the Baltimore Ravens got rid of Trent Dilfer. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers released Trent Dilfer in the spring of 2000. Dilfer quickly signed with the Baltimore Ravens and initially served as the backup to Michigan State phenom Tony Banks. Banks would struggle, however, and lost his first two starts of the season. Banks, a strong-armed quarterback with strong legs, seemed to be mistake prone and would make some questionable decisions. By comparison, and in replacement of Banks, Dilfer would engineer one of the great streaks in NFL history by winning seven straight to finish the 2000 season. In so doing, the Ravens earned a wild-card berth. Dilfer was extremely efficient during that seven-game winning streak and also through the playoffs. His mistake-free mentality coupled with sound decisions in the Red Zone carried the Ravens to Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa where they would pound the New York Giants 34-7.

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What is truly remarkable, however, is that Brian Billick, the Raven coach at the time, decided to release Trent Dilfer shortly after the Super Bowl win. Trent Dilfer occupies a dubious record—he’s the only Super Bowl–winning quarterback released the following season. In the short term, it was the end of Trent Dilfer. In the longer term, it was the end of Coach Brian Billick. During his five or six more years after his Super Bowl win, he’d never find another quarterback. During that time frame, the Ravens tried Elvis Grbac, Kyle Boller, Chris Redman, and Steve McNair. None, not even Steve McNair, accomplished what Trent Dilfer did. The reason we raise this story is to raise an important lesson regarding strategic alternatives. Often, we’ve seen leaders abandon, change, or flip-flop strategies without first identifying a series of suitable options or alternatives. Maybe even more important, Gridiron Leaders should ensure that their option-in-waiting is significantly better than their current situation. Clearly, Billick’s decision to throw out Dilfer for another option never panned out. The Army, for the longest time, owned the slogan, “Be All You Can Be.” The slogan was synonymous with the Army and generally viewed as an effective recruiting tool. After 20 years of this slogan, the Army changed their marketing strategy and slogan to target the more individualist-centered youth of the Millennial Generation. Their next best alternative and option, they believed, was the slogan of “Army of One.” Many, including some powerful pundits and thought leaders such as George Will, thought the slogan interfered with and even contradicted the “teamwork first” mentality necessary for Army functioning and operations. This slogan barely lasted five years. In 2006, the slogan was changed to Army Strong. Contrast that with the Marines and their successful slogan—The Few, The Proud, The Marines, which is nearly almost two decades old. We won’t belabor the point, but it’s important nonetheless. Before shelving a strategy, Gridiron Leaders must be confident, if not sure, that the back-up strategy is equal to or better than the current one. If it isn’t, wait until further alternatives and options are generated, vetted, and researched.

Moving the Chains

When it comes to strategy, be careful about abandoning a course of action without identifying and ensuring that better options and alternatives exist.

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Selecting, developing, implementing, and following through on an organization’s strategy can elevate the organization above the competition or to new heights in performance. Strategy is the game plan for how the organization will accomplish its goals and missions. It is this game plan that guides decision-making. Make no mistake, though, a successful strategy is a leader’s responsibility. Strategies, and more often, tactics, will evolve over time to meet the challenges of changing environments, but leadership is continuous. Leaders at all levels are responsible for the execution of strategy. Direction may be set by leaders at the top of the organization, but it’s the leaders throughout the ranks that ensure the strategy lives beyond mere concepts and ideas. All leaders have the ability, and duty, to translate strategy into performance.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Chose a strategy and follow through. Don’t be a strategic flipflopper. Changing strategies often means that no one idea can gain traction. Since personnel may be chosen based on their fit to a given strategy, changing strategies can also lead to higher turnover, especially at the top of the organization. 2. Ensure a balanced strategy. Having a balanced strategy decreases the likelihood that the organization will over-pursue competitors. Leaders with a balanced strategy are free to maneuver or take calculated risks without overexposing the organization. Continuously monitor and assess strategy and operations. 3. Find the game changer. Play to your strengths and find variables that make you or your organization better than the competition. Identify the niche to exploit. Use creativity and innovation to shift the paradigm and create a competitive advantage that lasts. 4. Make necessary adjustments. Poor tactical execution can make any strategy look bad. Know the difference between strategy and tactics. Take time out to evaluate the execution of a strategy. Don’t be afraid to make changes to operations (tactics) to meet changing conditions. If the strategy needs to be changed, ensure there are suitable, well-researched, and well-thought-out alternatives.

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5. Take calculated risks. Competitively aggressive organizations enjoy more benefits than their more conservative rivals. Even conservative organizations can benefit from incorporating some element of risk into their plans. Go for ideas that are market disruptors. Never let a rival’s move go unanswered or let momentum swing away from you. Respond quickly. Hesitation or lagging response time can handicap the success or growth of any organization.

NOTES 1. Amy Tsao, “How Good a Buy Is Kmart?” BusinessWeek, January 13, 2004. 2. As of December 1, 2008. 3. We recommend viewing the following video: Georgia 37, Florida 17. A copy can be found at http://www.amazon.com/Georgia-Florida-1997-CollegeFootball/dp/B000N5XU2C. 4. At time of publication.

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8 BECOMING A PLAYOFF TEAM

In order to have a winner, the team must have a feeling of unity; every player must put the team first—ahead of personal glory. —Paul “Bear” Bryant During the 2008 Monday Night Football Season, ESPN analyst and legendary Eagle quarterback Ron Jaworski mentioned almost in passing that the game of football is first won in the locker room. Implied in his observation is that a divisive and fractured locker room cannot produce results on the field. Cohesive teams will always execute better, faster, and stronger than a mere collection of individuals. It is this notion of teamwork that carries the day and leads to competitive advantage. Football is NOT tennis. Whereas tennis is about the individual and independence, football is about the group and interdependence. That’s what makes it a great game and that’s also a critical reason why the concept and theory behind football is so important in today’s context and in today’s profit and nonprofit organizations. Very simply, we live in a world of teams. In our own personal experience, we’ve seen hiring managers look almost exclusively at this trait of teamwork in the hiring decision process—those that could play well with others got the job. Those that couldn’t, didn’t, or wouldn’t were never even considered. In fact, it’s just about impossible to overstate the importance of teamwork. Leaders and organizations that can build strong, cohesive, and motivated teams will enjoy a sustained performance advantage over those that can’t figure it out. In this chapter, we draw on several Gridiron Lessons to help you figure teams out.

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Moving the Chains

Current-day life is all about teamwork. Gridiron Leaders build great teams for great execution and, even better, performance.

A TRUE PATRIOT In 2001, the New England Patriots were the Super Bowl champions. That same year, they sent exactly zero players to the Pro Bowl. In 2003, the next time the Patriots won the Super Bowl, they sent a whopping three to Hawaii for the Pro Bowl. Two were defensive players—Lawyer Malloy and Ty Law. The other was their kicker, Adam Vinatieri. The very next year, the Patriots won the Super Bowl again. During that 2004 campaign, the Patriots only sent one Pro Bowler on offense (Tom Brady) and one on defense (Richard Seymour). To put this into perspective, the year that the Patriots won their third title in 2004, the following teams had more talented players as reflected in the number of Pro Bowl selections on offense and defense: Colts, Chargers, Steelers, Chiefs, Ravens, Bengals, and Jets. How can one even begin to explain that? Arguably and according to Pro Bowl rosters from 2001 through 2004, the Patriots ranked below average in terms of Pro Bowl selections. In fact, from 2001 through 2004, both the Miami Dolphins and the Cincinnati Bengals received more Pro Bowl invites than the New England Patriots (not including special team players like Adam Vinatieri). Despite this supposed lack of talent, the Patriots won three of the four Super Bowls from 2001 to 2004. Even if one were to explain some of the success based on Spygate-type arguments, the fact still remains—the New England Patriots were able to perform better, more consistently, and over longer time periods than their more talented rivals. As we look closely at this team, one truth is indisputable—the Patriots epitomized strong teamwork. With them, the maxim certainly applied: The whole was much, much greater than the sum of their parts. The Patriots were able to take 2 + 2 and turn it into 5 while more talented teams, like the Cincinnati Bengals, seemed to do just the opposite.

Moving the Chains

A true-tale sign of great teams is that they perform markedly better than what their talent level would begin to suggest. In true teamwork, synergy transforms average talent into extraordinary results.

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T.O. Skip Bayless is one of ESPN’s more colorful and controversial figures. As one of the hosts of ESPN’s morning program, First Take, Bayless has been known to take some rather controversial stances. For instance, Bayless feels that field goals and extra points should be eliminated from the game of football. While we don’t agree with this particular stance, we do overwhelmingly agree with Bayless’s criticism of Terrell Owens. Bayless comically and consistently remarks that T.O. should stand for Team Obliterator. This is also where the Patriots seem to excel. Instead of hiring prima donnas and Team Obliterators, the Patriots tend to draft, recruit, and retain, well . . . Patriots. A true Patriot is a man or woman who subjugates and shelves their personal ambitions for the collective good—usually, love of country. Over the first decade of this millennium, it is tough to argue against. The Patriots seem to act, play, and execute like Patriots— individuals who are willing to forget about personal ambitions and interests to accomplish team goals. The opening quote from Bear Bryant captures exactly this point. A championship-caliber team cannot exist as a collection of self-interested individuals. They must be willing to sacrifice their own desires, their own glory, for the glory of the team. This is so central to the notion of teamwork that we felt obligated and compelled to start this chapter off with this main point. We want to be clear, though, that with great teams, self-interest is still certainly involved. However, it’s what we call enlightened self-interest. In enlightened self-interest, individual and team goals are aligned. With enlightened self-interest, the players realize that, in the long-term, shortterm sacrifice on behalf of the team provides long-term benefits for themselves. For instance, if the team wins, then they tend to win as well. This can take the form of extended and more lucrative contracts, greater playing time, or more exposure on a greater stage. The point is that everyone tends to win when playing for a winning team. This is a concept that true Patriots appear to instinctively grasp. And, herein, lies the true definition of a team—a group of people who share similar goals (e.g., to win a championship). Unfortunately, these points remain a foreign concept to teams with Obliterators on them. Moving the Chains

On and off the gridiron, great teams are composed of Patriots—those willing to sacrifice their own interests for the good of the team. Make sure you build your team with Patriots.

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LOCKER ROOM INFLUENCE Academic journals will never be confused with game-day programs. The same may be said when academic perspectives regarding teamwork and leadership are compared to the Gridiron Standard. In academic circles, there is a tendency to classify personalities, individual skill sets, and even team types. Teams tend to be broken along several lines. Most notable is the idea that teams can either be friendship/ relational oriented or task/outcome oriented. Friendship teams are social animals. People congregate and get together for the sole purpose of friendship and social support. Many times, friendship teams or groups are spontaneous and informal. On the other end of the continuum are task teams. Task teams concern themselves with getting the job and task done. These teams have a mental framework of putting mission above friendships. Predictably, these teams are a bit more formal and a bit more sterile. In our experience, and in classic Gridiron Style, the best of teams are a blend of the two. Actually, the forces are mutually supporting. Strong friendship and relational roles allow the team to better tackle the ups and downs of a task. Similarly, a tough goal or task tends to make relationships and social interaction stronger, not weaker. Gridiron Leaders can get involved here. Empirical psychological research shows that individuals tend to gravitate towards the relational and social or the mission or task perspective—but not both. As individuals, we are predisposed to be either one way or the other. But the true beauty of teams is that they can be balanced. Knowing this, Gridiron Leaders should carefully build a team that has both social- and relational-oriented people, as well as task-driven individuals. There must be both. A team with just social glue alone isn’t really a team, but a collection of people at a bar or picnic. Conversely, a team of task-only people is a place where Johnny would never go because as Jack Nicholson put it in The Shining—all work and no play can make Jack a dull boy. We’ve personally borne witness to task-only teams. Without exception, these teams were models for personal burnout and, not surprisingly, were riddled with hard and angry feelings. If we were to examine the truly dynastic franchises, we’d see team balance between the relational/social and the task perspectives. How do we know? Largely, because these teams won consistently and tended to stay together while doing so. From informal and formal accounts, we know that Steelers running back Jerome Bettis was a leader within the locker room. Under difficult and pressure-packed situations, he was good at keeping the locker room

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loose. Interestingly, toward the end of his career, Bettis appeared to change his focus from that of a goal orientation to a relationship orientation. In the 2005 run to the Super Bowl, Bettis was transferring the starting role of running back to Willie Parker. Parker, an undrafted speedster out of North Carolina, was concerned with one thing and one thing only—running the ball and performing his task. Bettis balanced that with relationship-focused activities like befriending and grooming not only Parker but also Ben Rothlisberger. We won’t belabor the point any further. Suffice to say, Gridiron Leaders must build teams with both a task and relational component. It can’t be one or the other. It has to be both.

Moving the Chains

Truly great teams combine social friendships with a collective will to get the task or job done. Great teams are balanced in their pursuit of both.

In examining teams on and off the gridiron for a combined 75 years between us, we believe we’ve uncovered some universal truths that apply to effective team functioning and performance. We discuss many of these principles below with the aid of some sports metaphors, of course. BLOCKING ASSIGNMENT What do sailors on nuclear-powered Navy aircraft carriers, great football squads, and the very best organizational teams all share in common? Threaded through all of them is this notion of a collective mind. In 1993, Professors Karl Weick and Karlene Roberts published a study that involved an almost anthropological look at how work gets done on nuclear-powered Navy aircraft carriers. They were amazed at the intricacies, complexities, and interdependence of operations involved on the ship. The ship was both dangerous and complex. But time and again, this nuclear-powered ship would successfully launch and land multi-million dollar aircraft in a safe and efficient manner. One of their most notable findings from this study were two concepts termed “collective mind” and “heedful understanding”—both of which allowed the sailors on this aircraft carrier to perform safely at a very high level.1 A collective mind is a team mental model. It goes beyond the individual. It is as if the team or group had its own conscience, own will, and own understanding of the competitive situation. Closely related to

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this concept is that of heedful understanding. To Weick and Roberts, the sailors not only knew their own job well, but they also knew the job of the person to their left and right, upward and downward of them. Maybe even more important, these sailors had a “heedful understanding” of how their job fit with and affected the upstream and downstream performance of their colleagues and fellow sailors. The bottom line is that they knew how their job and performance fit into the larger picture of team and group operations and performance; they got the bigger picture. Herein, rests a central truth regarding the most potent teams. Gridiron Coaches train, develop, and inspire players to think on a higher, more global, level. Gridiron Coaches teach how one player’s assignments affect a series of other players’ assignments. Gridiron Coaches, if you will, are not entirely unlike spiders. They weave interlocking webs and make sure that everybody has an understanding of their place in the web and how they are linked to others. Of course, this involves recruiting unselfish, intelligent players that can truly and almost instinctively grasp network operations at a level beyond the individual. But it also involves repeated communication. Again, we notice that Bill Belichick seems to do this especially well. His players seem to grasp how their performance directly and indirectly affects the performance of other players. If nothing else, Belichick shows all of us how we can be certain that we’ve obtained this state of a collective mind and heedful understanding. How? The answer is part Eli Whitney. Eli Whitney was one of the early fathers of our entire American manufacturing base. Besides inventing the cotton gin, Whitney is also best known for conceptualizing and then inventing interchangeable parts. He did it first for the musket. The way we know that we’ve built this collective mind and heedful understanding is the degree to which we can interchange parts. Belichick has moved linebackers to running backs, linebackers to tight end positions, and receivers to cornerbacks. What makes this particularly noteworthy isn’t necessarily the physical skills that must be transferred. Instead, it is the mental and intellectual skills that are remarkable. For Belichick’s Patriots, there are linebackers who know the plays and schemes for running backs and tight ends. To be sure, this isn’t to say that we should be able to move an accountant to a marketing position or a human resource leader to a cost analyst position for any real length of time. However, we should approach the essence of this concept. Human resources should know well how they fit with and impact manufacturing, accounting, and marketing and vice versa. No doubt this is a high and difficult standard to reach. But we’re not talking about an ordinary team or just a collection of individuals. Rather, we’re

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talking about a collective mind and a heedful understanding—hallmarks of a true Gridiron Team.

Moving the Chains

Great teams develop a mind all of their own. Gridiron coaches help develop and refine a group’s consciousness.

SIGNAL CALLER One of the more interesting conversations we had was with a highly successful high school football coach. The topic was strong teams. He didn’t waste any time relating his theory: “Without question, the number one driver of team execution is communication. You can blindfold me and put me on a sideline, and I can tell you within three minutes who the better team is even without looking at them.” We didn’t quite follow, “We’re not tracking here, coach. What do you mean?” “I mean that the best teams are chatter boxes before and during the snap. I can be blind, but if I hear a defense talking and chattering and communicating in rapid fire as the offense breaks the huddle, I know somethin’ is goin’ right. When that ball is snapped, if I don’t hear linebackers screaming at cornerbacks and safeties screaming at linebackers, I know instantly somethin’s wrong.” We nodded our heads in agreement. We knew he was right. He continued, “Look guys, I’ve been doing this for the better half of a century. Of course, football has changed much since I first suited up, myself, in the early 1950s. But one thing remains constant, unchanging decade after decade, and that’s communication. The best teams talk. They talk with everything—their hands calling out signals and also by yelling, screaming, and barking. Bottom line, gents: the best teams talk. The worst teams are silent. That’s why I don’t even have to see ’em. I just need to hear ’em to know if they’re worth a damn.” This coach spoke the truth that day, and we all know it. The best teams, both on and off the gridiron, communicate freely. We’d probably extend this coach’s philosophy regarding communication. The communication after the snap, and even after the game is over is equally important. To us, it seems that formal, informal, social, and goal oriented communication is continuous with great teams. As Jaworski highlighted in the opening of this chapter, it is the communication that occurs within the locker room, and off the practice field, too, that

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is important. In our experience, one-dimensional communication such as football-only talk can be found on mediocre teams. Great teams, instead, enjoy a variety of multi-dimensional communication. Walk into any locker room. If there’s talk about the weekend mixed with discussion about a television show last night interspersed with talk about somebody’s family laced in with some game or tape talk, you know that both communication channels are open and the team is strong. To the extent that Gridiron Coaches can influence and even encourage rapid, honest, transparent, professional, and personal communication among teammates, the team will be better for it. There’s little to argue against here—the best teams are a team of communicators and the coach is ultimately responsible for manning and fostering these communication lines.

Moving the Chains

Great teams know how to talk.

SPECIAL TEAMS UCLA has had some success in football. In 1954, it won a share of the National Championship. It produced one Heisman winner, Gary Beban, in 1967. Up through 2008, the UCLA Bruins won their conference, the PAC-10, 17 times while feeding the NFL some 30 consensus All-Americans. Football aside for a moment, maybe the most substantial expert regarding effective teams at UCLA never played on the gridiron. Instead, she was in the classroom. Her name is Professor Connie Gersick. Gersick gained some fame of her own by coming up with a model of team development that is used throughout the world today. One of the early pioneers and supporters of the Team Stage model, Gersick along with Bruce Tuckman at Ohio State predicted that teams are not static. Rather, they are dynamic and go through certain stages and states. Maybe more important, both Gersick and Tuckman would argue in their complimentary group models, was how well a team navigated a stage would predict how well that team would do during their next stage. Many probably have gotten wind of either Tuckman’s or Gersick’s model; the stages of Tuckman’s model are more widely known as forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. The stage names speak for themselves. However, we want to focus for a second on the second stage—the storming stage—because we’ve

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seen this stage wreak both havoc or provide wild success depending on how teams dealt with it. T.O. REVISITED Skip Bayless was probably right about Terrell Owens and his impact on the teams he played for. Owens began his career with the San Francisco 49ers. Under the leadership of Steve Young and playing alongside or behind Hall-of-Famer Jerry Rice, Owens kept his feelings to himself during his early years with the team. This quiet and reserved behavior is normally associated with newly formed teams or newly hired employees or teammates. This behavior is consistent with the forming stage. We would see this trend with Owens and the teams he blended into at San Francisco, Philadelphia, and Dallas. Initially, everything was quiet. The quiet never lasted long. It was the quiet before the storm. The next stage is the storming stage. Here, Terrell Owens seemed to catapult a team that was either forming or performing back into the storming stage. Owens would feud regularly with Young’s replacement, Jeff Garcia, and seemed to be at odds with 49ers coach, Steve Mariucci. (Soon after Owens left the 49ers for the Eagles, Owens would publicly comment on the manhood and sexuality of quarterback, Jeff Garcia, in a widely circulated Playboy interview.) Once in this storming stage, the 49ers never seemed to get out. Actually, they probably retreated. For five or six years after, the 49ers reverted back to the forming stage, constantly reinventing themselves and trying to find their identity. The 49ers never really made it past the storming stage with Owens, and the team was worse off for it. Things started similarly in Philadelphia. The first year, the forming year, of the Terrell Owens–Eagles teaming relationship went better than expected. The Eagles won 13 of their first 14 games with Owens averaging a touchdown per game. With two or three games left in the season, Dallas Cowboys safety, Roy Williams, did a horse-collar tackle on Owens, which fractured his fibula. In all of the escapades surrounding Owens, many fans forget what transpired next. Supposedly out for the remainder of the season, Owens announced that he would play no matter what in the Super Bowl if the Eagles made it. And made it they did. Owens was a bright spot during that game in which the Eagles lost to the Patriots; he would finish the game with nine catches for 122 yards. The storming would come almost immediately after the Super Bowl. Owens first suggested that the media response to his bravery was tepid and that Brett Favre would have been considered a hero for doing what Owens had done. Next, Owens ripped Donovan McNabb for getting

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tired toward the end of the Super Bowl. Things were further aggravated when Owens was denied permission to play in a summer basketball league affiliated with the NBA Sacramento Kings. Bad blood was further spilled when Owens and his new agent, Drew Rosenhaus, tried unsuccessfully to lobby the Eagles for a new contract. During his second season with the club, Owens was suspended four games without pay and, ultimately, deactivated for the rest of the season. Owens would be released in the off-season and join the Cowboys franchise. It would take the Eagles some time to fully emerge from the storming stage and to re-enter the performing stage. By now, this may be reading a bit like Groundhog Day. Owens and his impact on his new team would be replicated almost perfectly with the Dallas Cowboys. The year 2006 started slowly, and there were some instances of locker room tirades. However, Owens would rebound the following season and would help guide the Cowboys to the playoffs, where they would lose a close game to the eventual champions, the New York Giants. In 2008, Owens would feud openly both in private and through the media with coaches, quarterback Tony Romo, and tight end Jason Witten. So much so, the Cowboys released Owens during the off-season. Gridiron Leaders should understand several key aspects of the storming stage. First, it is almost impossible to avoid, and leaders should resist the temptation to ignore team conflict or the desire to suppress team conflict. Believe it or not, conflict, if managed properly, can make the team stronger. And every team we’ve ever known, both in and outside of sports, dealt with some form of conflict. We’d even go as far to say that there’s something deeply wrong with a team or organization that has no conflict. Second, our experience tells us that the storming stage can get worse during periods of intense pressure and competition. Under extreme pressure to succeed, some people buckle and others might blame. Third, conflict in the storming stage tends to surface around the internal jockeying over the leadership role. Until a formal or informal leader is agreed upon, it is likely that the storming will get worse. Gridiron Leaders can help here by backing a particular leader— whether formal or informal. This informal leader tends, but isn’t always, the quarterback. Coincidentally, Andy Reid, the head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles, came under some criticism for not backing more quickly or strongly his quarterback, Donovan McNabb, during the feud with Terrell Owens. Without a clear mandate for a leader within the locker room, the team remained divided. Finally, the old adage stating that which does not kill you makes you stronger certainly applies. Those teams capable of navigating through and dealing with conflict will go on to the next stage—the performing stage.

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Interestingly, the Terrell Owens case highlights many of the characteristics mentioned above. The conflict got worse because the competition was fierce and expectations were high. The informal leader was never fully vetted and fleshed out. Unfortunately, the teams associated with Terrell Owens had a rough time exiting through the storming stage. We’ll talk more in a moment on what coaches can do to build a strong team that can get through the worst of storms. Before we close on this topic, we want to highlight a quick story. Several years ago, we attended a two-a-day practice at a regional university. At a point during practice, one of the assistant coaches launched into Oklahoma drills, which are football’s version of cockfighting. Oklahoma drills pit two players in a type of mortal combat within a confined space. The purpose of this drill is to teach defenders to shed a block and then to make a tackle, usually on a running back. During one particular vicious hit, a fight broke out between the two players. We were standing by the head coach who initially did nothing. After several seconds, we couldn’t help but ask. “What are you waiting for?” Through his dark sunglasses, he responded quickly, “I’m goin’ to let these boys scrap a bit.” We were confused, “What? Why?” “I’m not going to let them hurt themselves. But I’ll give ’em another 30 seconds before I break it up. Let ’em get some steam out. Obviously, there’s some frustrations out there. It’s never good to keep those frustrations bottled in. Conflict is one way to deal with these frustrations.” A similar scene was replicated with Denzel Washington in the classic football movie, Remember the Titans. Just as in the movie, it seems the best coaches have a knack of allowing a certain level of conflict without it destroying the team. That should be the goal of every Gridiron Leader.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders manage conflict; they don’t succumb to it or try to avoid it.

HALFBACK OR FULLBACK? Lorenzo Neal is and will forever be a fullback. But nobody really likes fullbacks, do they? How out of favor are fullbacks you may ask. In 2001, not a single fullback was drafted. In the year prior, only one fullback was taken. Terrelle Smith was drafted in the fourth round from

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Arizona State by the New Orleans Saints. In the year after, again, only a single fullback was taken. And again, he was taken in the fourth round. Jamar Martin was a bruising fullback taken out of Ohio State by the Dallas Cowboys. Not only do teams not like fullbacks, but we’re not sure if fullbacks like other fullbacks. The fact is that there’s really just a couple of Lorenzo Neals out there. The fullback position is a tough role to play for many reasons. The fullback is responsible for two primary duties. First, and maybe most important, the fullback is the lead blocker for the halfback or tailback. The fullback is to put a hit on a defensive lineman or a linebacker to create a hole for the halfback to scurry through. The fullback is really a human Bangalore torpedo. A Bangalore torpedo is a tool usually used by elite U.S. Army Engineers, called Sappers. The Bangalore is a piece of metal pipe filled with an explosive that is used to blow a hole and create a path through an obstacle—usually concertina wire. And that’s exactly what a fullback is. They’re a human torpedo, meant to break the line for others to get through. It is painful and certainly not glamorous. In our record and statistical analysis, we never found a single fullback in modern NFL history who rushed for more than 500 yards in a given season. The secondary duty of the fullback is to block blitzing defensive players who are trying to get to the quarterback. Let’s return to Lorenzo Neal for a minute. We’re not sure whether he knows this, but we believe that Lorenzo Neal is an inspirational force as it applies to teams and teamwork. Lorenzo Neal is probably one of the top two or three fullbacks to put on pads over the last 30 years. There’s a reason that Lorenzo Neal earned four invites to the Pro Bowl and three All-Pro selections. More than anything, Neal knew what his role was and accepted his role without question or reservation. You need both ingredients. There are plenty of people out there who know what their role should be, but refuse to accept or be satisfied with it. Interestingly, Neal had a role that is shunned by many others. As mentioned before, Neal’s job and role were to perform the duties of fullback to the best of his ability. This required him to essentially serve others who would often get the glory behind his hard work. Take a moment to look at what Lorenzo Neal did for others. In 1997, he blocked for Jets running back Adrian Murrell who would eclipse the 1,000-yard mark. The very next year for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, he would clear holes for scat back, Warrick Dunn, who would also surpass the 1,000-yard mark. The following years, under the service of the Tennessee Titans, Lorenzo Neal would make Eddie George a future Hall of Famer by creating wide running

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lanes for George to lumber through. In 1999 and 2000, Eddie George had great years—running for more than 1,300 yards in both years. The next year, at Cincinnati, he would perform his role well again. With Neal leading the way, Corey Dillon would also rush for more than 1,300 yards in two consecutive seasons. However, some of Lorenzo Neal’s best years were when he was a Charger blocking for future Hall of Famer, LaDainian Tomlinson. It would be the fifth 1,000-yard back that Neal would block for. It isn’t coincidence that those were also some of LaDainian’s best years as well. All organizations have someone like Lorenzo Neal. Someone that performs a role vital to success, even though the job is unglamorous or is underrated. We knew a senior manager in a Fortune 500 company who was known by many titles. Officially, he was the chief of staff to one of the company’s vice presidents, but to most he was simply known as the “slide guy” or other derogatory variations of that nickname. Most saw him as the person that put together the vice president’s PowerPoint slides, but his role went far beyond that. He would take the executive’s concepts and turn them into tangible visions. After the executive team generated creative ideas, he would be the one that followed up to make sure things got done, diligently tracking deliverables and metrics, or doing the legwork. When there was an undesirable project, he usually got stuck with it. He was the admin-on-steroids, the one that could herd cats, the corporate firefighter, problem solver of the unfixable, and the underappreciated slide guy. When we asked him why he wasn’t on Monster.com looking for another job, he only laughed. “Don’t tell anyone,” he joked, “but I actually like my job. When I was a project manager years ago I always volunteered to take the projects no one else wanted. Maybe it was the satisfaction of doing a good job on something no one else could or would do. There’s some personal satisfaction in doing something that others didn’t want to touch. I know many others wouldn’t want my current job. Many couldn’t do my job. I know that, and I know people value me because of it.” The lesson here is rather simple and straightforward. As mentioned before, understanding your role is essential in creating this collective mind and heedful understanding. But that isn’t quite enough. You also need players on your team who are satisfied with their role and who are willing to perform their job to the best of their abilities even if that means the job isn’t pretty and is without glory. When examining the Lorenzo Neal case, the starkness of this lesson is evident. It is still unclear and fairly unlikely that Lorenzo Neal will make the Hall of Fame. But during his career, he ensured that at least two of the backs

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he blocked for (Tomlinson and George) would be a lock for Canton, with Warrick Dunn and Corey Dillon also possibilities. The unselfishness and willingness to do his job meant that the running backs that he blocked for would get more yards, more touchdowns, and more money. Still, he did his job. The leadership imperative for Gridiron Leaders is to find people like Lorenzo Neal to build a strong team— people who not only know their role but also accept it unequivocally.

Moving the Chains

Getting through the storm stage is a bit easier when you have players who know and accept their roles on behalf of the team.

WILDCARD When it comes to teambuilding, we’ve found that one of the wildcards that a leader owns and controls is that of recognition. In any team, anywhere, and just like the Lorenzo Neal story above, there’s usually only a slight few that receive the glory. This is unfortunate since one person’s glory is often built on the backs and shoulders of a great support staff like Lorenzo Neal. The trick then is for leaders to spread some of that glory around by recognizing the unrecognizable. Keeping with the fullback theme, Jerome Bettis was an informal leader for the Steelers who truly understood the value of recognizing the unrecognizable. Bettis made it a practice to buy a ticket to Hawaii for the fullback that blocked for him whenever Bettis made the ProBowl as a running back. The thousand or so dollars in expense is more symbolic than anything else. What Bettis did with this free trip to Hawaii for fullbacks like Dan Kreider or Chris Fuamatu-Ma’afala spoke volumes about recognizing the efforts of others in his success. This is great leadership. It brings a team together and it shows that the support staff and personnel aren’t really “support.” Rather, they’re essential and the team can’t win without them. Leaders like Bettis instinctively understand this. Again, this is more than great leadership. It is Gridiron Leadership. Before moving on, we want to highlight that Gridiron Leaders can extend this concept of recognizing the unrecognizable by applying it to more than a single person. Feel free to apply it to teams or squads. One quick example here. In a ten-year span from 1995 through 2004, the Denver Broncos produced six different running backs that surpassed the 1,000-yard mark.

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Maybe more impressive, not a single one of those running backs were first round picks. These backs include: Terrell Davis (1995–1998; sixthround pick), Olandis Gary (1999; fourth-round pick), Mike Anderson (2000, sixth-round pick), Clinton Portis (2002–2003; second-round pick), Reuben Droughns (2004; third-round pick of the Lions), and Tatum Bell (2006; second-round pick). While the running back situation always remained fluid in Denver, the offensive line did not. A hallmark of the Mike Shanahan era was his emphasis on the offensive line. And while the media didn’t always focus on them as a squad, Shanahan repeatedly did. Shanahan knew how to recognize the unrecognizable.

Moving the Chains

Recognize those that usually receive little recognition. The appreciation and accolades will increase team cohesion and make team members perform even better.

NO MISTAKEN IDENTITY As we examine the mediocre, good, and great teams, a theme begins to emerge that seems to explain the performance difference between teams. In our analysis of special teams on and off the gridiron, we found that with the very best teams, there was no mistaken identity. Just the opposite. These teams knew who they were, what they were supposed to do, and what they stood for. And the Gridiron Leader influences those feelings along the way. We offer a couple of examples. Maybe the best place to begin is where we left off with Mike Shanahan and the Denver Broncos. Shortly after Shanahan arrived in Denver, he instituted a tradition in which the offensive linemen refused to talk to the media. It was a simple sign of solidarity. By keeping silent, no one player from the offensive line would take the spotlight and become more visible than the others; the offensive linemen would be perceived as a team and not individuals. This served as a cohesive bond amongst the offensive linemen and became a point of pride for the entire team. Leaders can further use symbols and names to compliment traditions to promote this sense of identity. In the mid-1990s, the moniker Desert Swarm was applied to the University of Arizona Wildcat defense. The name, alone, seemed to inspire by giving an identity to a defense and a university that was

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known for their basketball way more than their football. This shared identity would pay off—Arizona would smother and shut-out a talented Miami Hurricane team in the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s Day, 1994, 29-0. The Steel Curtain defense of the 1970s’ Pittsburgh Steelers squad became the team’s identity. Besides providing an identity and sense of purpose that would result in four Super Bowls during that decade, the identity seemed to stick. To this day, the Steelers value a vicious and unrelenting defense first characterized by the Steel Curtain label. Gridiron Leaders wield tremendous influence and power in shaping a team’s identity. Not only do they use symbols, names, and traditions to build a team’s identity, they also shape a team’s identity through their willingness to stand up for and defend these traditions and symbols. One more notable example regarding the use of symbols to inspire identity occurred in June 2001. During that month, Army Chief of Staff, General Eric Shinseki, ordered the U.S. Army to switch headgear to black berets. At that time, only units such as the Army’s Special Forces, airborne units, and the Army Rangers wore the distinctive headgear and the beret had become a symbol of a unit’s elite status. The change to allow all soldiers to wear the black beret was to symbolize the Army’s transformation from a Cold War legacy to a new, adaptive force that could meet the challenges of the new millennia. This was unthinkable to many, including the 75th Ranger Regiment. This elite force was the only one that had worn the black beret. Not surprisingly, they took offense that other Army units would wear headgear that was symbolic of the pride and warrior spirit of the Rangers. Few, however, could anticipate the incredible resistance that current and former Rangers would levy at the Department of the Army, in general, and, General Shinseki, in particular. For instance, retired Rangers launched nationwide marches to Washington D.C. as a form of protest. On the surface, this may seem a lot like insubordination. But we sense something more. The level and depth of outrage illustrate something positive—not negative. The 75th Ranger Regiment owned, guarded, and would defend their shared identity. Many inside (and some outside) the Rangers knew that this shared identity was the cohesive glue that enabled, even encouraged, Rangers to commit acts of selfless bravery. To many civilians, it probably seemed quite silly. After all, this was just a piece of nylon headgear. Those in the know, however, understood it was so much more. It was a symbol; it was part of their identity. And it was this identity that led to cohesion. And it was this cohesion that drove the remarkable, dangerous, and heroic performance of the 75th Ranger Regiment over time and across borders. Unfortunately for the Rangers, the policy was not overturned.

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However, several months after General Shinseki’s decision the Rangers won a small victory and were able to change their beret color from black to tan to ensure they maintained their distinct identity.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders foster a sense of team identity. It is the invisible driver of team performance.

FLYING HIGH We end this chapter with a short anecdote we heard about Southwest Airlines. The airline is one of the largest, and most successful, in the United States and consistently has some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings in the industry. Some may credit Southwest’s strategy for its success—a low-cost model that primarily operates only one type of aircraft (Boeing 737) and departs from traditional huband-spoke flight routing systems in favor of a point-to-point that brings the carrier into secondary airports in most major cities. We, however, think there is more to their success than their cheap fares. And we believe that this anecdote summarizes many of the themes we have discussed. We once were told a story of a business traveler that fell asleep in his aisle seat during his flight. When he woke, he was startled to see a flight officer in full uniform standing in front of him. “Can I get you anything?” the flight officer asked with a smile. The business traveler asked for water and the flight officer quickly retrieved a couple of bottles from the galley. Still groggy from his nap, the traveler could only muster a thank-you and watch the flight officer continue down the aisle offering to help other passengers. So impressed with the flight officer, the traveler followed him to the back of the plane and approached the flight officer as he was taking his seat. The flight officer was deadheading; that is, catching a flight back to the airport where he would board another plane to join the crew. When asked why he was walking up and down the aisle helping passengers, the flight officer simply laughed. He liked meeting the passengers and giving the other crew members a break. He saw it as his job regardless if he was part of the crew on that specific plane. You see, the flight officer didn’t have to do anything. He was not a flight attendant and wasn’t required to wait on anyone. He wasn’t even part of that flight crew. He didn’t need to do anything but sit in his

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seat like other passengers and relax until he got to his destination. But he wanted to help out. It’s a simple example, but it’s a telling story about the organization. Southwest Airlines has built a playoff team. The company has found team players that can place the organization’s goals (customer satisfaction) above their own personal ambitions (relaxing on a deadhead flight). These team players are willing to perform other roles outside their own job description for the benefit of the company. Handing out bottles of water may not be sexy, but it is appealing to these team members that care about their customers. We’re sure this flight officer also fostered a strong bond with other members of the flight crew by helping out and, perhaps, the flight officer was thinking broadly about how his actions could, in a small way, impact the overall perception of Southwest. We won’t lie and tell you that finding team members like this flight officer is easy, but if you do, you’ll soon find yourself soaring over the competition.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Build the team. We live in a world of teams. Leaders and organizations that can build strong, cohesive, and motivated teams will enjoy a sustained performance advantage over others. Cohesive teams will always execute better, faster, and stronger than a mere collection of individuals. Ensure the team is balanced between being relationship and task oriented. That is, foster strong bonds among team members and ensure those relationships are valued, but also make sure the team is focused or structured to achieve specific goals. 2. Find your patriots. Hiring managers and leaders should look for individuals who are willing to place the goals of the team or organization above their personal ambitions and interests, or at least find those that see how achieving team goals will help accomplish their own personal goals. Also, find players who will be satisfied in their role and who are willing to perform their job to the best of their abilities even if that means the job isn’t pretty and is without glory. 3. Train and develop team members to think at a broader level. As a leader, help the team develop a collective mind, creating a common consciousness or understanding of the competitive

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situation. Team members should not only know their own job well, but also know the job of the team members around them. Within the best teams, members have an understanding of how their job fits into the bigger picture and how their individual performance impacts the group. 4. Manage conflict. Don’t ignore or try to suppress team conflict. Conflict, if managed properly, can make the team stronger. Gridiron Leaders can help here by backing a particular leader— whether formal or informal. Allow members to vent if needed, but know when to intervene. Don’t tolerate team obliterators and those that care nothing for the team and don’t allow conflict to spin out of control. 5. Create an identity. The best teams know who they are, what they’re supposed to do, and what they stand for. The leader influences those feelings along the way. Promote the team’s sense of identify and encourage team members to stand up and guard that identity.

NOTE 1. Karl E. Weick and Karlene H. Roberts, “Collective Mind in Organizations: Heedful Interrelating on Flight Decks,” Administrative Science Quarterly 38 (1993), 357–381.

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9 A CULTURE OF WINNING

The Bears are who we thought they were! . . . Now, if you wanna crown them, then crown their ass! But they are who we thought they were, and we let ’em off the hook. —former Arizona Cardinals Coach Dennis Green, immediately after a 2006 Monday Night Football loss to the Chicago Bears We end Gridiron Leadership on the important topic of creating, building, and sustaining dynastic, championship cultures. Maybe the best way for us to end is to look at another ending. Specifically, the end of the 2008 NFL season played out in spectacular theater between Pittsburgh and Arizona. These stories and histories of these two teams offer tremendous insight into how to change, build, and maintain high performance cultures that we can all put into practice. We start with the Arizona Cardinals. By examining their magical journey all the way to Super Bowl XLIII, we can learn several lessons on how to first, and foremost, change a culture. A high school coach once remarked to us that some teams somehow never learn how to win. He went on to argue that some organizations will either learn winning or will learn losing. And once it is learned, it’s difficult to change. The Arizona Cardinals were a team that seemed only to know how to lose. The opening quote is a powerful indicator of the gravitational pull of a culture of losing. In this particular game played on October 16, 2006, before a national, prime-time audience on Monday night, the Cardinals surged to a 20-point lead over the heavily favored and Super Bowl-bound Chicago Bears. But on their home field and in front of a nationally televised audience of several million, the Cardinals would surrender 24 points to the Bears. With about

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40 seconds left, one-time Pro Bowl kicker Neil Rackers missed a 41-yard field goal that would’ve cemented the win for Arizona. Notwithstanding this monumental collapse, the most memorable portion of the evening erupted from the Arizona coach at the time, Dennis Green. He would launch into a profanity-laced tirade with reporters in the post-game press conference. Many of us thought that Arizona, a team who last won a championship in 1947, had developed a culture of losing too embedded, too deep, and too toxic ever to amount to anything in the NFL. The very next day, we heard a radio announcer mention that parity now existed in the NFL. In any given season, any team could win the Super Bowl unless, he paused, you had a cactus in your backyard. But Arizona did improve. They were able to right the ship in a way and manner that deserves the respect and admiration of not only every football fan, but also of every organizational leader or scholar. Very simply, there’s a ton we can learn from how the Arizona Cardinals were able to turn things around.

OUTSIDE THE LINES When teams or organizations are in a funk, the first maxim is to go outside the lines. And what we mean by this is that it’s okay to experiment and mix things up in an effort to reverse a culture of losing. When a team or organization is losing and losing consistently, it means historical and current attempts are not getting results. The charge then is to get creative and to push the boundaries a bit. Arizona did just that. After the team moved to Arizona from St. Louis, the Cardinals went through a series of coaches, Raider-style. The Cardinals went through eight coaches from 1988 through 2008 including the likes of Gene Stallings, Vince Tobin, Joe Bugel, Dennis Green, and Buddy Ryan. Bill Bidwell, the longtime owner of the Cardinals, seemed to hire slow, but fire fast. If the hire didn’t work out, he canned him and tried for another. The key and critical difference between this strategy and the Raider coaching carousel is that Bidwell, unlike Al Davis, wasn’t canning winners like Shanahan, Gruden, or Art Shell. Gruden and Shanahan would go on to lead other teams to championships. Not a single Arizona coach that left went on to coach again with any meaningful results. Finally, Bidwell settled on Ken Whisenhunt, the former offensive coordinator for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Here, he found a winner. The lesson here, though, is straightforward. Sometimes it takes a series of trials and error before finding the missing variable or missing set of variables to turn things around.

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BUDDY BALL REDUX We’ve already mentioned Buddy Ryan and his colorful persona. Almost immediately after arriving in Phoenix as the Cardinals’ new coach, Ryan told the media, “You’ve got a winner in town.” Buddy Ryan was just a bit premature in his celebration. He would go 12 wins and 20 losses over two seasons before Bidwell fired him. But, we love the concept. To build a winning team, you must find individuals who’ve won before and know how to win. On Arizona’s meteoric rise to Super Bowl XLIII, we see something conspicuously absent from prior Arizona football teams—a core group that had experience in winning and who’d experienced the pressure and the demands required of winning at the very highest levels of the game. On the coaching staff besides the head coach, Ken Whisenhunt, was Russ Grimm, assistant head coach and offensive line coach. Both men had experience in winning, both in the coaching and playing roles. Whisenhunt and Grimm were offensive masterminds for the Pittsburgh Steelers, propelling the team to a victory over the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XL. Grimm, himself, knew how to win as a player; he was one of the Washington Redskins offensive lineman referred to as “the Hogs” and won three Super Bowls as an offensive lineman under Redskins coaching legend, Joe Gibbs. Add to that two special players in the form of Edgerrin James and Kurt Warner and the Cardinals were off to a good start. Edgerrin James was the former All-Pro running back from the Indianapolis Colts. While Edgerrin never made it to the Super Bowl with the Colts, he was on a team that won and won consistently with the help and leadership of Peyton Manning. By our count, Edgerrin played in nine playoff games prior to joining the Cardinals. Kurt Warner was and will continue to be a winner on many levels— not just the least of which is football. Warner knew how to turn around poorly performing programs. As quarterback for the St. Louis Rams, he along with Dick Vermeil took a team that struggled for many years to the Super Bowl twice (once with coach, Mike Martz). Prior to joining the Cardinals, Warner racked up two NFL MVPS, two Super Bowl visits, one Super Bowl win, and one Super Bowl MVP. It is difficult to overstate the importance of bringing in winners to an organization. Especially for young organizations or teams that have never known winning. People like Grimm, Whisenhunt, Warner, and James add immediate credibility and legitimacy. Other teams have done the same thing. Steve McNair showed Baltimore how to win again after leaving Tennessee. He led them to a 13-3 record and first in the AFC North shortly after his arrival. And Joe Montana did the same

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for Kansas City after leaving San Francisco by leading the Chiefs to an 11-5 record and first in the AFC West. In every case, their resumes and their examples helped propel others to win. With this role modeling and experience sharing, a culture can begin to change. The greatest evidence of this may just be the 2008 Arizona Cardinals.

Moving the Chains

Bring in people that know how to win to an organization.

GAME OF INCHES On first blush, it may seem that a culture is too big, too abstract, too metaphysical to really change at all. Ironically, though, we’ve found that it’s the small things, the tactics at the margins that can, at least, start to make a culture difference. It’s the small stuff, the inches, which add up to change a culture. Again, let’s examine Arizona. In spring 2005, Bidwell seemed to reach for the mundane by announcing a uniform change. More specifically, Bidwell didn’t think the bird on the helmet, which had been in place since 1960, was mean enough. So, Bidwell ordered a meaner, sleeker, more menacing bird on the helmet. In a nod to a culture shift, Bidwell noted, “Hopefully, it will be worn by tougher and faster and meaner players.”1 Call us crazy, but we call this a step in the right direction. Leading scholars and researchers of organizational culture note that symbols and language can constitute the core of an organization. Since the uniform and mascot are symbols, this is a natural place to start. For Bidwell and the Cardinals, this was particularly important since the “old bird” was consistently and continually mocked throughout the league, often referred to as a parakeet. Sometimes, the change of a symbol can be dramatic. In our experience, when a clean break is needed to clearly demarcate the old from the new culture, a more dramatic symbol change is in order. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are a prime example of this. For years, the Buccaneers wore an orange and white uniform with a “swashbuckling” pirate on the helmet. The logo or mascot also had a knife clenched between his teeth. This mascot became the ridicule of the NFL. All kinds of remarks ranging from the absurd to the obscene fell at the feet of this swashbuckling pirate named Bruce the Buccaneer or Bucco Bruce. More important, though, the logo soon came to signify and represent a franchise in disarray and in continual decline.

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In 1997, there was a move to not only remove Bucco Bruce, but to undertake a change of team colors. Moving away from the “Creamsicle” orange and white, the Bucs moved to more intimidating colors: red, pewter, black, and orange. Instead of Bruce the Buccaneer, the team moved to a skull and crossbones look. Not only did they change the colors, and the logo, the team also changed the lettering to a more Gothic style. Remarkably and consistent with Raider ownership and management, a lawsuit was launched by the Raiders on the Bucs’s new uniforms based on trademark infringement. The Raiders would also attempt to bring suit against the Carolina Panthers who also used the Raiders colors of silver and black. Anyway, even for throwback games, where teams will wear vintage uniforms, the Bucs have refused to return to the past by donning the orange and white with Bucco Bruce. Consider the facts for yourself. From 1976, the first year in the League for Tampa Bay, to 1996, the Bucs made the playoffs just 3 times in that 20-year span. After the uniform and symbol change, the Bucs would go on to the playoffs seven times and would win the Super Bowl in 2002 (XXXVII). Of course, we can’t directly attribute these successes to these dramatic changes in symbols. Other factors are at work. But we can’t dismiss them out of hand, either. Again, it’s what the symbol change represents—a clean break from the old culture of losing to the new spirit of winning that is of primary importance. If the Steelers could weigh in, here, they’d agree. The Steelers are a team built on symbols and logos and all that they mean and imply. The black and gold of the Steelers are important colors; throughout the country people associate the black and gold with the team. The Steelers logo on the helmet is based on the “Steelmark” which was the original logo for U.S. Steel. The colors of the hypocycloids, the diamonds with inward curving edges, signify the steel-making process— yellow stands for coal, orange for iron ore, and blue for scrap steel. In a game of toughness and discipline, the Steelers logo connotes the most gritty and hard of all manufacturing processes—the making of steel. That toughness seems to carry on to this day on the gridiron. Finally, the Steelers wave a black and gold “Terrible Towel” that was designed and dreamed of by legendary local broadcaster, Myron Cope. The Towel is often waved in frenzied fashion and is a symbol of the cohesion and toughness of the Steelers Nation. The point is that leaders can manipulate, change, and alter small things—like logos, uniforms, and language to begin to change the meaning of a culture. Think this is only possible in the world of sports? There are examples of how leaders use symbols to create culture in almost every type

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of organization. One notable example in the corporate world is consumer electronics manufacturer, Apple. Apple has long been known for its intense work atmosphere, corporate casual style, and individualistic nature. Much of the culture appears to emanate from the personality of cofounder Steve Jobs, but the company has also used symbols in the past to reinforce their culture and values. According to Silicon Valley folklore, Jobs told the team developing the Macintosh that it was “better to be a pirate than join the navy” during an off-site meeting in 1983. Jobs feared that the burgeoning team was already becoming too bureaucratic. Jobs famously founded Apple in the shadow of corporate giants like IBM and wanted to ensure the company retained its rebellious nature. Programmers Steve Capps and Susan Kare quickly created a pirate flag—skull and crossbones with the Apple logo as an eye patch—and hung it over the team’s newly occupied building. The flag remained over the Mac team building for over a year and was even photographed with the team in Fortune magazine. The pirate flag became the symbol for the independent spirit of the team and how it differentiated itself from the competition. The military is also known for its use of symbols or other mechanisms to change organizational culture. Many years ago we came across a story about a U.S. Army company commander who was about to take over one of the worst-performing intelligence companies in the brigade. His charge was to improve this lot of misfits. His actions within the first 48 hours are telling. First, he replaced or, essentially, fired his first sergeant. This is important and is indirectly related to the argument above about bringing in winners. Before you bring in winners, it is necessary to remove the losers. We often see this in the corporate world when poorly performing companies will sack the CEO in exchange for a fresh face and an opportunity to change. This is often a sad, but true, aspect of changing organizational culture; it requires a change in leadership. The second action that this company commander took was to give the company of 100 or more soldiers a name. For years, they were only known as Alpha Company. The new company commander understood that meant nothing. He called a company formation and pulled out some T-shirts and hats with the name “Jackals” on it. Forever more, he told the unit, they’d be known as Jackals, and it was important to protect and support your fellow Jackals. Embedded in this choice of names are several meanings. Jackals travel in packs. They are cautious, but aggressive. They are survivors and creative scavengers. They are sly. T-shirts and hats and a new name aren’t, by any stretch, a cure-all for an organization’s problems. What it does do, and what it did in this

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case, is give a group an identity. That’s important because people tend to want to work for teams, groups, organizations, or companies that stand for something. People psychologically latch on to an identity and the very best Gridiron Leaders are skilled at creating and fostering a team with a collective identity. During the research for this book, we reached out to this former company commander, who is now a year shy of being promoted to the rank of colonel. According to him, thirteen years after he renamed this company the Jackals, the name continues to stick. And the company is no longer the bottom dweller in the brigade. During and ever since his departure, the company has performed in the top third of all units in the brigade. And, again, Arizona’s got experience here too. After leaving St. Louis in 1987, in 1988 the Cardinals became the Phoenix Cardinals. However, this name was limiting, and in 1994 the Phoenix Cardinals expanded their fan base by becoming the Arizona Cardinals, much in the same way it is the New England Patriots as opposed to the Boston Patriots. Of course, in isolation, a name change here, a change in leadership there, a uniform modification here could never change an entire culture in and by itself. But there’s an interaction effect. When these small variables are put together, some synergy builds and it can take a life all of its own. Many are in complete disbelief that the Cardinals made it to Super Bowl XLIII. We can see, however, that the wheels were put in motion awhile back. The trick for the Cardinals will be to maintain and sustain.

Moving the Chains

Many small steps can quickly add up to a large leap forward for culture change.

OFFENSIVE . . . LANGUAGE Next time within your team or organization, stand quiet for a second and what do you hear? Listen to the language being spoken. Like symbols, logos, and names, the words we speak become the brick and mortar for both strong and weak cultures. Is the language defeatist? Is it negative? Does it blame? Does it gossip? These are words that invariably lead to a culture of repetitive losing. We prefer offensive language. That is, language that goes on the offensive. Leaders use offensive language when the words they use are

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inspiring, positive, blame-free, frank, simple, and forward looking. Mike Tomlin, the youngest coach ever to win a Super Bowl and current Pittsburgh Steelers coach, is a great case study in the use of offensive language. Mike Tomlin told USA Today that “people aren’t very good listeners by nature” and “part of being a good communicator is recognizing and understanding that and trying to make the complex simple.” One of Tomlin’s favorite lines is from the movie Glory where he tells his players “the time’s coming when we’re going to have to ante up and kick in like men.” Tomlin’s other great lines as reported by the USA Today is “I’ll tolerate you until I can replace you, and iron sharpens iron.”2 These statements of few words convey great meaning. Tomlin, like other successful Gridiron Leaders use language, use words, to communicate and transfer concepts such as motivation, performance excellence, toughness, and winning. There is also a bit of contagion at work here. When leaders use defeatist, depressing, or negative language, it is picked up and circulated throughout the organization many, many times over. The trick, then, is to use and transfer positive energy by the very words we use throughout the organization. And, by the way, very few do it better than Lombardi who seemed to offer the perfect quote at the perfect time.

Moving the Chains

Great leaders use words as a special type of symbol to inspire and drive culture change.

HELMET DECALS Ever notice what’s on the back of Ohio State helmets or the helmets of Florida State Seminole football players? At Ohio State, players are awarded Buckeye decals that go on the helmet for particularly good performance on the gridiron or practice field. Players on these teams covet these buckeye stickers and are willing to exert tremendous effort and the desired behavior to earn one of these decals. Frank Beamer and defensive coordinator Bud Foster do something similar at Virginia Tech with the lunch pail. For years, the defensive MVP of the previous week’s game was awarded a beaten old lunch pail. For most anyone else, a beaten and bruised lunch pail means nothing. But at Virginia Tech, it means a great deal because it symbolizes the worker’s mentality: a blue-collar style of working hard. Like the decals for the programs

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mentioned above, players go all out, all of the time, for the privilege to carry around the lunch pail. Take, for instance, Darryl Tapp. Darryl Tapp was a vaulted defensive end for the Hokies who won the lunch pail early on in his career. He kept it every week for two years by consistently outworking others on and off the field. It became such an important part of Tapp’s persona that he was allowed to take the pail with him when he was drafted in the early rounds of the 2006 draft by the Seattle Seahawks. Here, again, we’ve got two very important lessons—one new, one old. We are reminded about the power and the use of symbols to create and foster a high performance culture. It is hard to believe that a 15cent decal or a beaten old lunch pail could drive such strong and determined behaviors. Of course, though, it isn’t the decal or the lunch pail that are, themselves, important. Rather, it is what they represent. It’s what they stand for and symbolize that’s so important here. The decals and lunch pail have meaning, which, incidentally, is provided by the coach or leader. Leaders infuse meaning into symbols. The second lesson is how leaders reward or punish behaviors dramatically affect an organization’s culture. Notice that the symbols mentioned previously, the decal and the lunch pail, weren’t static. Rather, they were used as rewards and could be taken away as a form of punishment. In fact, there’s probably no quicker way for a new employee or teammate to learn about an organization’s culture or about an organization’s values than through the reward and punishment system. The essence is simple and straightforward; when rewards and punishments are attached to certain behaviors, the employees or players begin to know firsthand what the organization’s priorities are. Let’s return to the Super Bowl XLIII Champions, Pittsburgh Steelers, for a moment. Several months before the big game, in training camp, Coach Mike Tomlin placed star nose tackle Casey Hampton on the physically unable to perform roster, as a form of punishment and stigma for the overweight player. What’s the message here? We don’t tolerate players who are out of shape and overweight. Or when wide-open rookie wide receiver, Limas Sweed, dropped a touchdown pass in the AFC Championship game. After the drop, Limas fell to the ground and didn’t immediately get up, costing the team a much-needed time out. Upon returning to the sideline, Tomlin chewed him out. Again, the message is clear—make plays when you can but if you don’t, bruised ego or not, get up quick and get back to the huddle. Switching gears to the other side of the ball, we can see Ken Whisenhunt deftly use rewards and punishments to spark a team that was drifting back towards mediocrity—or worse. The Sunday before Christmas 2008,

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Arizona traveled east to Foxboro to play the Patriots. In what would be one of the biggest blowouts of the entire NFL season, New England blistered Arizona to the tune of 47 to 7. Making matters worse, the score doesn’t reflect how bad and to what degree Arizona got beat. The Patriots were up 28 to 0 at halftime and 44 to nothing after three quarters. With the playoffs fast approaching, Whisenhunt clearly saw this as a turning point. The old culture of poor performance and low effort was rearing its head, and a sense throughout the sports community was that Arizona’s culture was regressing. Whisenhunt sought to stabilize the team culture through rewards and punishments. Here’s what he did. First, Whisenhunt went back to full pads for heavy workouts. The emphasis on heavy pads was both punishment and symbolic—they needed to be tougher and show more grit. Second, he called practice in a chilly rain on Christmas Eve day. Third, he called for practice on Christmas morning. Finally, Whisenhunt told the team during one of the practices that anyone who didn’t try their hardest would not play in the playoffs. The timing of rewards and punishment are also important—something we haven’t yet mentioned. It appears now that Whisenhunt delivered the message and doled out the consequences at precisely the right time. The Cardinals would respond by beating the Seattle Seahawks during the last game of the season before entering one of the great playoff runs of all time. Looking back on that season and playoff run, many sports authorities point to Whisenhunt’s response during the late season swoon as not only saving the season, but also moving Arizona’s culture to that marked by victory as opposed to defeat. We return to this notion of the little things. The inches that comprise a yard. None of this is particularly groundbreaking. However, when used in concert, the little things add up. Knowing that rewards and punishments are among the most potent drivers of human behavior, Gridiron Leaders must use carrots and sticks in a judicious way to send the intended message that will eventually lead to a high-performing culture.

Moving the Chains

Gridiron Leaders concentrate on the basics, like rewards and punishments, to communicate organizational values and priorities. These are among the best tools to shape a culture.

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TAILGATE One of the unintended benefits of writing this book was that we came into contact with some of the greatest sports fans on Earth. Oftentimes, we came across these fans during tailgate parties. We came across two guys from Maine who traveled 700 or so miles for every Steelers home game and would host a tailgate party that became the talk of the town. We talked to one Auburn fan who wrote a 25-page tailgating plan during the off-season. We spoke with one crazed West Virginia football fan who went to the same tailgate at the same location dating back to Major Harris’s days as WVU quarterback. But one of the most memorable events came after September 11th. About 10 days after the attack, we went to a Big East football game. As we sat and talked about what had transpired, we talked openly about our collective yearning and hope for normalcy. The guy who was hosting the tailgate from his RV spoke up. “This is where I find peace.” We asked, “In football?” “Not that,” he shot back. “This. The tailgate. I’ve been doing this for 13 years and it’s now a family tradition. It is the tradition that keeps me going.” In preparing for this book, the three of us talked about this story, in particular, and the power of traditions in general. We know what he means. Many label tradition as dwelling on the past and as a force that works against change for the future. We’re not so sure. In a world that is complex and ever changing, people need to feel comfortable, and they need to base their beliefs and feelings on something solid, something unmovable. Tradition is one such force. The very best Gridiron Leaders are able to juggle this tension between embracing tradition and being a voice for change. Some leaders even create traditions. We all know why—tradition creates a feeling of cohesion and esprit de corps. It’s the glue that keeps people together—even when they’re moving forward in change. We’d even go as far to say that high velocity and rapid change organizations need some type of tradition exponentially more. It’s in these high-paced environments that employees or teammates can get lost, distracted, or disconnected. Creating or fostering traditions aren’t as difficult as you may think. In fact, we can all do it, just like the family we talked to prior to the Big East football game. Planned activities in the form of organizational or team ceremonies or rites is all we’re talking about here. For instance, we know of one small department of a highly successful technology firm that holds planned and spontaneous dinners that they call “Hails and

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Farewells.” The “Hail” is to welcome any new member into the department. The “Farewell” is to celebrate and recognize the team members who are leaving the department for any reason. It has become a tradition and one that provides constancy and consistency to a turbulent working environment. One team member even remarked to us that it made change easier knowing that this tradition was in place. Of course, some are better at fostering traditions and, even, creating traditions. Look no farther than Texas A&M University. While none of us are alumni, we’ve had a chance to visit College Station, home of the Aggies. There is a closeness to that entire community that goes beyond football, but football is surely a part. More than anything, it is the collection, preservation, and respect for traditions that help foster this esprit de corps. Here is just a sampling of some of those traditions. Texas A&M is the home of the 12th Man. All fans consider themselves the 12th man that supports the 11 players on the field. To symbolize this support, the Texas A&M student body stands the entire game. In a tradition grounded in respect, students will also step “off the wood,” which means that they’ll step off the bleachers onto the concrete whenever a player is injured on the field. Senior members of the Corps of Cadets at A&M will also join the “Boot Line.” The “Boot” stands for the cavalrystyle boots that seniors wear in the Corps of Cadets. In any regard, the “Boot Line” will line up on the north end of Kyle field to greet the players back after halftime. One of the more special experiences is the Midnight Yell Practice, which is a pep rally that usually fills a good portion of the stadium. For home games, it is held on Friday at midnight. The yells and cheers are led by motivated and charismatic “yell leaders” who are selected from the student body. Remember, this chapter is about building winning cultures. One of the ways to accomplish this feat is to keep true to some traditions. They provide stability and can help create cohesion. To be sure, some traditions aren’t worth keeping. The best Gridiron Leaders seem to intuitively grasp that some traditions add value and some detract. Rituals, ceremonies, and rites of passage are part and parcel of building a winning organizational/team culture. Reflect right now on how many of those activities you’re involved with on a quarterly or annual basis.

Moving the Chains

All high-performance cultures count on tradition to bring people closer and to get the job done.

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GONE—BUT NOT FORGOTTEN Creating and maintaining traditions is not only a rite of passage to foster team cohesion, it also connects organizational members to past members and builds a sense of purpose. The belief that individuals are part of something far bigger than themselves can be a powerful draw for team members. Leaders can use this to their advantage to help share their vision, craft their strategy, or motivate their team to execute. In one of our training sessions with a large law enforcement agency, we met a training officer with over 20 years of experience. He described in detail how new recruits were sworn in before they would start training. When the oath was complete, the recruits were guided through the station and down a narrow hallway leading out of the station house. The walls of the hallway were lined with pictures of those that died in the line of duty. The training officer would draw the attention of the group to the pictures and read the inscription, “These are the men and women who have given the ultimate sacrifice in the service of our noble profession. Although they are gone—they will never be forgotten.” By design, all officers have to use the passageway daily. It is necessary to gain access to other parts of the building or to obtain anything they would need for their shift. And every time the officers use the corridor, they pass the photographs. It is a subtle reinforcement that the officers are part of a great lineage of those protecting the community. The instructors reemphasize these thoughts during training sessions. Over and over again, the instructors use the phrase “noble profession” and remind the recruits that they are part of something great. This constant reinforcement creates a connection between the officers and the organization. Feeling that they are part of something special, the young officers are more willing to accept the values of the organization and take pride in their role. More important than the actual tradition or rite of passage is how leaders make members feel about being part of the organization. Willie Davis, a Hall-of-Fame defensive tackle for the Green Bay Packers in the 1960s illustrates this point. Upon entering the NFL and playing two seasons with the Cleveland Browns, Davis was traded to the Packers. Admittedly, he was surprised, upset and briefly considered quitting until he met his new head coach, Vince Lombardi. Davis later said, “When Coach Lombardi said, ‘You were chosen to be a Green Bay Packer,’ he made it sound like something unique and wonderful.”3 It meant something to wear the uniform of the Packers, and it represented excellence both on and off the field. Lombardi did not use anything more elaborate than words to convey his feelings about the organization. But his words seemed to have an effect on Davis’s playing

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ability. Davis would go on to become an All-NFL selection five times in six years from 1962 to 1967 and was selected to play in five consecutive Pro Bowls. Additionally, he played a major role in Green Bay’s winning tradition of the 1960s that included five NFL championships and six divisional titles in eight seasons.

Moving the Chains

Leaders can use rites and traditions to make organizational members feel that they are part of something bigger than themselves. This will help create cohesion and commitment.

OUT OF BOUNDS When people first enter an organization, join a unit, or become part of a team, they often don’t know how to act. This may seem counterintuitive, but even the most seasoned adults look for cues on how to act. Because of this, leaders who aim to build high-performance cultures seek early to set and establish boundaries on what is, and what isn’t, acceptable behavior. Take for example, our friend Brian, a district manager for a large pharmaceutical firm. Within 48 hours of a new pharmaceutical rep joining his team in his region, he sits them down and goes over the rule of 3s. Verbally and in writing, he tells his new representatives the three things that will help ensure they get promoted or bonuses. And then he tells them the three things that are sure to get them low performance evaluations, or worse, fired. By the way, boundaries only really mean anything if they’re enforced. Constantly “redrawing lines in the sand” and moving boundaries do more to erode a culture than to sustain it. When the boundaries are clearly violated, the leader must hold true and enact a consequence for the boundary breach. The amazing thing is most people, from toddlers through retirees, all appreciate boundaries. Boundaries are about safety and about consistency and about everybody knowing what ground they can cover. When leaders fail to set or enforce boundaries, there is no firm, strong, or agreed-upon culture. Instead, you’ve got a mess. Remember, that high-performing cultures are about maintaining some consistency. Without this consistency, individuals can’t make sense of what’s going on, they can’t pick up on cues for what’s acceptable behavior, and they’re given no direction. At the very highest level, a strong and highperforming culture provides an invisible hand that guides and directs decisions and behaviors consistent with organizational goals.

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One respected collegiate defensive coordinator confided to us that his worst season was when he applied different standards to different players on a routine basis. Because of that, there were always questions regarding boundaries and what was and what wasn’t acceptable conduct on and off the field. Enough said here. We know our charge—set and enforce boundaries that will become the pillars of the culture you’re trying to build.

Moving the Chains

Know this—leaders build cultures by setting boundaries to what is and what isn’t acceptable behavior and performance. START WITH THE END IN MIND Perhaps the most important factor in changing an organization’s culture is for leaders to know what culture they want before shaping it. As we have discussed throughout this chapter, leaders have various tools and methods to impact organizational culture (See Figure 9.1). At a minimum, the actions of the leader, through decisions, communications, and even appearance, will have an effect on culture, whether

Leadership Vision

Traditions & Rituals

Setting Boundaries

s hi

er

ers

Symbols

hi

p

ad

Lead

Reward Systems

Language & Communication

p

Organizational Culture

Le

Figure 9.1 Organizational Culture Influencing Factors

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intentionally or not. For this reason, it is critical that leaders consciously plan out what they want their culture to be. Remember, culture is ultimately the reflection of the leaders within the organization. This is not to say that embedding the desired values into the fabric of the organization is easy. And it will not occur overnight. Only through conscious effort and consistent, continuous action can leaders build a winning culture. Of all the concepts we have mentioned throughout this book, creating a winning culture just may be the most important. In the beginning, we mentioned that the greatest legacy for a leader is to create a dynasty. To create a sustainable competitive advantage that would allow the organization to win over and over again. To climb to the top and remain there. Indeed, the dynastic component of this entire book is rooted in organizational culture. A high-performance organizational culture contributes to a sustainable competitive advantage because it endures as organization members, even leaders, come and go. Organizational culture is what helps new members play at their best and reach their full potential. It can accelerate the execution of strategy and support decision-making. It is also responsible for freeing the leader from a command-and-control leadership style and, instead, allows and enables a commitment-based approach. It’s not necessary for the leader to constantly dictate action or be directive because the high-performing culture does that heavy lifting for the leader. In essence, culture is a strong, invisible hand that is there to do the leader’s bidding. Even more, a strong, high-performing organizational culture allows team members to lead themselves toward organizational goals. Sustainable competitive advantage is impossible without developing a winning culture. Our journey through this book has led to this point. We began with individuals, the leader and the team member, and we end not just with a high-performing team, but with a system of shared beliefs that connects current members and will extend to future members as well. That’s what a true dynasty is all about.

TIP DRILL

Apply these Gridiron tips and principles now— 1. Try something new. Momentum can be good or bad for an organization. For organizations that have created a culture that perpetuates losing, it can be hard to break the cycle. Leaders need to experiment, try new approaches, and use different ideas to identify the needed variables that are required to turn things around. Never be afraid to mix it up.

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2. Attract winners. There’s an old adage that if you want to be successful, then surround yourself with successful people. The same is true for organizations. Recruit, select, and retain only the very best people. Fill your ranks with those that have proven track records of success. Successful organizational members can serve as role models and share experiences with everyone else. 3. Leverage the various tools at your disposal. Leaders can manipulate, change, and alter small things to make a big impact on changing the culture of an organization. Logos, uniforms or appearance, symbols, and language can begin to change the meaning of a culture. Be cognizant of how people communicate. The attitudes or images conveyed through the language people use can be contagious. Ensure the language within the organization is consistent and positive. 4. Stand for something. People want to work for teams, groups, organizations, or companies that stand for something. Create a collective identity for the team or organization. Ensure the right behaviors are rewarded and the wrong behaviors are corrected in order to get desired results. Organizational members can quickly learn what the organization values through the reward and punishment system. 5. Start off right. Ensure there is a socialization process to bring in new members that will reinforce the organization’s culture. Create traditions or revitalize existing ones. Rituals, ceremonies, and rites of passage will create a feeling of cohesion and esprit de corps. Don’t forget to also establish boundaries. Seek early to set and establish boundaries on what is, and what isn’t, acceptable behavior. 6. Pick your end zone. Whether it is intentional or not, leaders drive the culture of an organization. Decide what culture should define your organization. Then, determine what actions, steps, and communications should be reinforced to ingrain the desired values throughout the team or organization. NOTES 1. “New Uniforms to Come This Spring,” http://www.cardsclubhouse.com/ forums/viewtopic.php?p=122137&sid=c9071594c0a7d4d047870c60e2424f3e (accessed March 14, 2009). 2. Jarett Bell, “Having a Sway with Words,” USA Today, January 30, 2009, 1C. 3. Motivation Lombardi Style (Aurora, IL: Successories Publish, 1992), 39.

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AFTERWORD: POSTGAME ANALYSIS

Things that hurt, instruct. —Benjamin Franklin This book works. But this isn’t our conclusion to write. It’s yours. So, go ahead and write it. Draw it up on the board. Then live it. There’s little doubt that cynicism is spreading into the arena of sports. Poor behavior, performance-enhancing drugs, and big contracts seem too often to be associated with big-money sports. But we’re not buying it. And, chances are, you aren’t either. The media seems to enjoy sensationalizing some of the not-so-good aspects of sports, whether that’s football, baseball, and basketball. But still we watch. Still, we play. Why? The reason is because we know that sports, in general, and football, in particular, aren’t like that. Those cases are the tiniest of minorities. We know the scales of good and bad lean overwhelmingly toward the good. We know because we all live or lived sports. Ever wonder why on a job interview they ask about affiliation with sports? Ever wonder why the Ivy League colleges and universities and the military academies want to know whether an applicant played a sport? We know the answer because, oftentimes, we’re the ones doing the asking. We ask because it matters. Sports improve us. Some of our greatest learning lessons occurred on a field or within a stadium. Unlike many of the lessons found in textbooks, the lessons upon the field seem to stick a bit more. They’re lasting; they’ve got staying power. None of us had to be a Division I athlete to appreciate and understand these lessons. The instruction, coaching, and training that were heaped upon us in Junior High, Junior Varsity, or Varsity hold just the same as if we were being coached in the National Football League. The level of competition may change, but the leadership 175

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themes and messages that we heard when we were eight years old on some Pee-Wee team apply equally to the Super Bowl champions. Of course, sports build character. But they do so much more than that too. On the football field or baseball diamond, we all learned to lose. That doesn’t mean that we had to like it. More important, though, we learned to deal with setbacks and temporary failures. For the three of us, it was our involvement in sports that taught us the importance of rising up after being knocked down. Life isn’t easy, nor is it always fun. And not everybody always wins all of the time. There will be times that you’ll lose. Moreover, there are countless times in life where you get metaphorically punched in the mouth. Sports reveal our character and improve upon it by showing us how to lose, how to dust ourselves off, and how to suit back up to play again. That’s life—not sports. Incidentally, one of the most memorable examples of what losing can teach us occurred in the 2007 NFL season. It was the last game of the regular season played on December 29, 2007, between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots, who had gone the entire regular season without losing a game. The outcome of the game was immaterial especially for the Giants; the Giants were locked into a fifth seed in the NFC. The Patriots were playing for history and to secure their undefeated regular season, but their first seed and initial playoff bye were already in the bag. In what caused an initial uproar due to possibilities surrounding injuries, Giants head coach Tom Coughlin decided to play all of his starters and play to win the game. In a wild swinging contest, the Patriots prevailed—38-35. However, both Coughlin and the Giants learned quite a bit from the loss. Most notably, they knew that they could go toe-to-toe with what many called the best team ever in NFL history. The confidence factor, alone, was significant. About a month later, the Giants would again meet the Patriots. Only this time, the stakes were much higher. A Super Bowl was at stake. In one of the most talked about upsets in football history, the Giants defeated the Patriots 17-14 in Super Bowl XLII. There’s little doubt that the manner and method in which the Giants lost that final game of the regular season actually led to their eventual win. Losing can do that. This is a classic, American story—get knocked down, learn the ropes, get back up, and win it all. For the three of us, sports are also where we felt stretched and challenged. Sports aside, there are few life activities that demand us to push our boundaries. That stretch us. That challenge us. Sports are a place and a time where we often feel just a little lost, just a little outside of our comfort zone. It’s important to learn how that feels like. Because,

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again, that feeling goes way beyond football. It is life. The very best corporate, military, profit, and nonprofit leaders are constantly pushing themselves, reinventing themselves, stretching themselves. No individual, no organization ever improves without testing boundaries and limits. Sports, in general, and football, in particular, are pushing hard against those boundaries to get better. Again, that’s not so much valuable to the gridiron as it is to life. If we were to randomly poll 100 Americans on our nation’s greatest strength, how many of them would say rule of law? Probably very few. However, we are a nation where rule of law reigns supreme. We see it often but take it for granted. Our private property is usually safe, and during political elections, there is always a peaceful transfer of power. Where else in the world does that occur? This is important since rules and regulations are the grease that lubricates a society. Without them or ignoring rule of law means that we are closer to chaos and societal anarchy. The three of us talked about this issue on several occasions, and we would ultimately return to the influence of sports in producing a citizenry with a healthy respect for the law. After all, it was while playing sports at an early age that we were socialized into playing by the rules and regulations. Importantly, we learned quickly that consequences existed for breaking rules. A 15-yard penalty for holding not only hurt the player, but it hurt the entire team. To millions of youngsters across this nation, their initial socialization and indoctrination to rule of law wasn’t when the police officer visited their elementary school. Rather, it was when the referee blew the whistle on the gridiron or the hard court. Rule of law and a level playing field, where all play by the same rules, is so essential and central to capitalism and social order. In fact, you cannot argue against it. Without rule of law and fair competition, we don’t have capitalism and we don’t have a society. Keeping with this theme, every society depends on some type of mechanism to socialize its citizenry. Surprisingly, many overlook the role and influence of sports in indoctrinating a populace on desired social norms. Besides learning about rules and regulations, we learn to play with others. We learn the value of teamwork. We learn about roles on a team and subjugating personal desire (at least temporarily) for the benefit of the greater team. We learn about how to live, function, and accept a hierarchy. In most sports, there are both formal and informal leaders. And not everybody can be one of them. It is while playing sports that we first learned to follow before we could lead. We all quickly realized that the team captain and a variety of coaches were at the top of the food chain, and most of us learned to respect that. At the very least, we came to accept that. In any smoothly functioning

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civilization, recognizing and operating within the framework of a hierarchy is critically important. Here, we thank sports for doing a job that society couldn’t easily perform on its own. We, too, are a nation that loves to compete. Our political economy depends on just that—our ability and desire to effectively compete. Democracy and, more specifically, capitalism, are continually thirsty for the competitive spirit. Without this competitive spirit, innovation, technological advances, and, eventually, an improved standard of living is all but a pipe dream. Have you ever wondered where this competitive spirit comes from and how it gets passed on from generation to generation? We feel that this competitive transfer process can largely be attributed to sports, in general, and football, in particular. Steven Covey got rich on habits. The author of numerous leadership books, of which the most famous was Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Covey made a rather simple claim that was impossible to dismiss. Simply, the most effective people in society, time and again, demonstrated tremendous and productive habits. Where do you think this habit-forming process begins? We wrestled with this, too. And, again, the lines on the map brought us back to sports. Whether tennis, baseball, basketball, or football, we would learn in piercingly clear ways that practice matters, that repetition matters, and that strong work habits matter. Those that didn’t buy into this premise would quickly find themselves on the sideline. Forget about what the drills or the practice were about. That’s not important. It was the very act, the process itself, however, of practice and repetition that is of such importance. We need a generation, a society of leaders and workers, who aren’t afraid to work hard, to practice, to roll up their sleeves. Without the toil of hard work and repetition, we have a soft society—a society that our very own Benjamin Franklin seems to hint towards in the opening quote. Pain and hard work is the input into the learning and value-creating process. Up to this point, we’ve been conceptual. So, don’t take our word for it. Let’s look at what the empirical has to say about sports and the value it adds to our life. Consider a study published in the Journal of American College Health that examined risky behavior between student athletes and nonstudent athletes. In a sample size that surpassed 550 students, the authors of the study concluded “the athletes were found to engage in significantly fewer risk-taking behaviors than the nonathletes (drug and alcohol) and to be at less risk for HIV.”1 Or how about a recent article in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence, which examined the influence of organized sports on the choices and decision-making of young women. Here the authors report “women’s

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involvement in organized team sports was favorably associated with sexual risk taking behavior,” meaning that women who played sports were less likely to engage in risky sexual behavior.2 Of course, this book is no public policy treatise. However, let us be the first to say what many think—everybody that is able (and even some who aren’t) should play sports throughout life. But, early on, we believe it is essential. Not for reasons of child obesity, while that still applies, but more about what it does on the inside as opposed to the outside. As these studies suggest, sports do something psychological, something emotional, which may even dwarf the physical benefits. It is precisely these emotional and psychosocial benefits that help develop a future generation of leaders. We’re done with this point, but take it to the house—all sports matter because it makes us mentally tough and better leaders. It is a game changer. Better yet, sports are a life changer. Finally and maybe a bit abstract, esoteric, but still real, is the role sports can play on our individual and collective psyche. Let’s begin with the individual. All three of us (just like all of you) have experienced some low points in life when we were confronted with setbacks. Time and again, we’d turn to loving friends and family to rebound. But we also turned to playing and watching sports. There’s a catharsis in playing and watching that soothes the soul. Even with football; out of a violent game can come peace. What is true for the individual exists at the collective. Perhaps in the writing of this book, we’ve talked to 200 or more people. One thread that was deep but still exposed in many that we talked to was the role of sports at the local and national level that helped them heal during times of crisis or tragedy. The terror of September 11th was acute. One of the catalysts in the healing process, many argued, was watching college and NFL football on TV or in person. Or with a group. Or watching their grandson’s junior varsity football game. Never underestimate the power of sports to act as a healer. Many relayed to us that sports help them cope and hope. In that, there’s beauty. Related to this point, when thousands upon thousands enter a stadium to root for a single team something special occurs. All classes of society come together for a football game. Differences melt away and, before you know it, connections are built between complete strangers who are now inviting you to a tailgate or offering a high-five in celebration. Our society, in both good times and bad, need this particular type of activity. While many of us are shirking and shrinking behind laptops and iPods, this collective unity, even for an afternoon, is something special to a community and a society that is tough to quantify or even articulate. We just know that it’s needed.

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So, enjoy all the themes contained in this book. On first blush and on the first turn of the very first page, you may have thought that this book would be light, airy, and inconsequential. If you’re reading this last sentence, we hope and trust you feel otherwise. We’ll see you in the end zone. NOTES 1. Patricia K. Kokotailo, “Health Risk Taking and Human Immunodeficiency Virus Risk in Collegiate Female Athletes,” Journal of American College Health, 46 (1998), 263–268. 2. Stephanie Jacobs Lehman and Susan Silverberg Koerner, “Adolescent Women’s Sports Involvement and Sexual Behavior/Health: A ProcessLevel Investigation,” Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 33 (2004), 443–455.

INDEX

Airbus, 117–118 Apple, 128, 162 Arizona Cardinals, 42, 157–163 Arizona Wildcats, University of, 151–152 Asch, Solomon, 95 assessment testing, 82 Baltimore Ravens, 132–133 Barnett, Gary, 62–65 Bauman, Charlie, 20 Bayless, Skip, 139 Beamer, Frank, 75, 120 Belichick, Bill, 65, 86, 119, 128, 142 Bettis, Jerome, 140–141, 150 Bidwell, Bill, 158–160 Billick, Brian, 133 Blank, Arthur, 55, 78 Boeing, 60, 117–118 Bonds, Barry, 58 Boston College, 93–94 Brock, Stan, 12 Bryant, Paul, 53 Buffalo Bills, 120, 124–125 Bush, Reggie, 119–120 Callahan, Bill, 22–23 Carroll, Pete, 29 Chen, Ming-Jer, 130–132 Chicago Bears, 79–80, 91, 119, 122, 129, 157 Chrysler, 77, 128 Churchill, Winston, 121 Circuit City, 45–46

Clarett, Maurice, 36 Cleveland Browns, 62 Clock Play, 96–97 Coca-Cola, 65 Colorado, University of, 56–58, 62–63 comebacks, discussion of, 124–126 commitment, 41–44; to mission, 43–44; to organization, 41–42 Corey, Walt, 125–126 Costco, 43–44 Coughlin, Tom, 48, 55, 176 Covey, Steven, 178 Cowher, Bill, 15 Crouch, Eric, 83–84 culture, 157–173; boundaries of, 170–171; change of, 158–173; communication, role of, 163–164; rewards and punishments, uses of, 163–164; symbols, importance of, 160–162, 165; tradition and rituals, value of, 167–170 Dallas Cowboys, 2–4, 85–86, 94, 146 Davis, Stephen, 105–106 Davis, Willie, 169–170 Dell, 67 Denver Broncos, 150–152 desire, importance of, 39–41 Detroit Lions, 91–92, 99 Dilfer, Trent, 132–133 Ditka, Mike, 119 Donnan, Jim, 116–118 Druckenmiller, Jim, 73–75 181

182

Index

Dungy, Tony, 21, 53, 120 Dunlap, Al, 95

Howard, Timothy, 59 Hurricane Katrina, 46

employee flexibility, 84 employee willingness, 83–84 Enigma machine, 123 enlightened self-interest, discussion of, 139 Enron, 58 Erickson, Dennis, 31 escalation of commitment, in decision-making, 99–101 ethical codes, 67–68

illusion of control, in decision-making, 104–107 Indianapolis Colts, 120 innovation, discussion of, 121–124 intelligence, value of, 37 Irvin, Michael, 55–56

Fannie Mae, 59 Firestone, 64–65 fit, 73–79; Person-Job (P-J) fit, 74–78; Person-Organization (P-O) fit, 74–78; Person-Strategy (P-S) fit, 74–78, 115 follower readiness, 79–80 Ford, 64–65, 76 46 Defense, 122 Freeney, Dwight, 119 Frost, Scott, 83–84 Gateway, 103 Gault, Willie, 128–129 General Electric, 40, 68, 77–78, 87–88 General Motors, 128 German U-boat Campaign, 123 Gersick, Connie, 144 Glenn, Aaron, 96 Glenn, Terry, 1–3 goal orientation, 47–48 goal theory, 15–16 Goodell, Roger, 54 Grambling State University, 13 Grimm, Russ, 159 Gundy, Mike, 12–13 Halo Effect, in decision-making, 93–96, 109 Hansen, Jason, 92 Harrington, Joey, 99 Hayes, Woody, 19–21, 108 Hnida, Katie, 62 Holtz, Lou, 68 Home Depot, 77–78 Honeywell, 67 Houston Oilers, 125

Jackson, Steven, 9 James, Edgerrin, 159 Jaworski, Ron, 137 job analysis, 81–82 Jobs, Steve, 162 Johnson, Jimmy, 3–4 judgment, uses and importance of, 38 junior military officer (JMO), 87–88 Keane, Jack, 30 Kiffin, Lane, 26 Kmart, 113–114 knowledge creation activities, 37–38 Korean War, 127–128 Kotite, Rich, 2–3 Kotter, John, 15 Kram, Kathy, 12 Langer, Ellen, 104 Latham, Gary, 15–16 law of small numbers, in decision-making, 104–107, 109 Leaf, Ryan, 99 learning orientation, 47–48 Leinart, Matt, 37, 41 Lloyd, Greg, 61–62 Locke, Ed, 15–16 locus of control, 44–47 Lombardi, Vince, 53, 60, 66, 169–170 Lott, Ronnie, 43 MacArthur, Douglas, 127–128 Madoff, Bernie, 58 Mamula, Mike, 93–95 Mangini, Eric, 23 Manning, Peyton, 37–40 Marino, Dan, 96–97 McCartney, Bill, 56–58, 62 McNair, Steve, 159

183

Index mentoring, 12–13 Miami Dolphins, 96–97 Miami Hurricanes, University of, 11 Microsoft, 65 Montana, Joe, 75, 159–160 Moon, Warren, 125 Mornhinweg, Marty, 91–92 Motorola, 101 Myers-Briggs personality test, 82 Nardelli, Bob, 77–79 Neal, Lorenzo, 147–150 Nebraska Cornhuskers, University of, 10–11, 83–84 Neuheisel, Rick, 62 New England Patriots, 1, 65, 86, 119, 138–139, 176 New Orleans Saints, 7–8 New York Giants, 176 New York Jets, 23, 65, 84, 96–97 No-Huddle Offense, 129–131 Northwestern University, 64 Notre Dame, University of, 68

Reich, Frank, 125 reputation management, 64–66 Rhodes, Ray, 94 Richards, Curvin, 3–4, 7 Roberts, Karlene, 141–142 Robinson, Eddie, 13–14 Roehm, Julie, 76–77 Romanowski, Bill, 59 Rommel, Erwin, 129 Rudeltaktik, 123 Ryan, Buddy, 122

Palmieri, Jerry, 94 Parcells, Bill, 1–3, 8, 84 Payton, Walter, 119, 129 Perry, William, 119 Peyton, Sean, 120 Philadelphia Eagles, 94, 145–146 Phillips, Lawrence, 54–55 Pittsburgh Steelers, 15–16, 85–86, 152, 161 power, 19–34; coercive, 23–24; expert, 27–28; legitimate, 22–23; network, 30–32; referent, 28–30; reward, 25–27 primacy effect, in decision-making, 107–108 prior hypothesis bias, in decision-making, 96 problem diagnosis, in decision-making, 96

Salaam, Rashaan, 79–82 Sanders, Deion, 84–85 San Francisco 49ers, 27, 43, 73–76, 86, 145 Schoonover, Phillip, 45–46 Schultz, Howard, 98 Shanahan, Mike, 114, 151–152 Shinseki, Eric, 152–153 Simms, Phil, 39–40 Sinegal, Jim, 43 skill inventory, 36 Smith, Akili, 99 Southern California, University of, 29, 37 Southwest Airlines, 153–154 Soward, R.J., 54 Spurrier, Steve, 103–106 Spygate, 65 Starbucks, 97–98 Staw, Barry, 99–100 Steward, Kordell, 80, 86 Stonecipher, Harry, 60 strategic coherence, 114–115 strategic focus, 114–115 strategic misdirection and overpursuit, 117–118 strategic mismatch, discussion of, 119–121 strategy: adjustments to, 124–126; aggressive, 127–129; attack, 129–131; competitive, 113–116; differentiation, 113–114; low cost, 113–114; response, 131–132; risk component, 128–129 Sunbeam, 95

Raines, Franklin, 59 Randle El, Antwaan, 86

Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 94, 160–161 Tapp, Darryl, 165

Oakland Raiders, 26, 114–115 Ohio State University, 19, 36 organizational flexibility, 86 Osborne, Tom, 10–11 Owens, Terrell, 139, 145–147

184

Index

Target, 113–114 teams, 137–151; collective mind of, 141–143; communication within, 143–144; heedful understanding of, 141–143; identity of, 151–153; recognition of, 150–151; relation orientation, 141; role theory, importance of, 147–150; stages of development, 144–147; task orientation, 141; team synergy, 138 Tennessee Titans, 115 Texas A&M University, 168 Thorndike, Edward, 95 3M, 48 Tillman, Pat, 41–42 Tomlin, Mike, 164–165 Torre, Joe, 29 Toyota, 128 Tuckman, Bruce, 144

Vermeil, Dick, 54–55 Vick, Michael, 54 Vietnam War, 100–101, 110 Virginia, University of, 7 Virginia Tech, 73, 75, 120

UCLA, 144 U.S. Army Rangers, 152–153 U.S. Military Academy at West Point, 68

Young, Vince, 109

Wal-Mart, 44, 76–77, 113 Walsh, Bill, 27–28, 75, 122–123 Ward, Hines, 117 Warner, Kurt, 159 Weick, Karl, 141–142 Weightman, George, 46 Welch, Jack, 40, 77, 87 West Coast Offense, 74–75, 122–123 Whisenhunt, Ken, 158, 165–166 Whitney, Eli, 142 Wonderlic test, 82 Word, Barry, 7–8 Wuerffel, Danny, 105–106

Zimmerman, Paul, 42