In a book I recently read by Tim Grover titled “Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable”, I couldn’t help but relate to the thirteen qualities he finds in the best of the best athletes he’s worked with as a personal trainer. These greats include Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, and LeBron James, to name a few. While I don’t scratch the surface in athletic ability or intensity as these three, I think those who strive to be great leaders all have a few of these qualities.

Grover believes there is a lot of focus put on the athletes who are considered “Closers”, or athletes that prove time and time again to be go-to players who produce results that help their team secure a win. Instead, he believes “Cleaners” (Grover, 2013, pg.3) are more critical to a team and their success. Cleaners, as defined by Grover, are “the most intense and driven competition imaginable.” (Grover, 2013, pg.3). Limitations are refused, you do whatever it takes to get what you want, and you understand “the insatiable addiction to success.” (Grover, 2013, pg.3).

In his Relentless Thirteen, Grover lists the following qualities of a Cleaner:

1. You keep pushing yourself harder when everyone else has had enough.

2. You get into the zone, you shut out everything else, and control the uncontrollable.

3. You know exactly who you are.

4. You have a dark side that refuses to be taught to be good.

5. You’re not intimidated by pressure; you thrive in it.

6. When everyone is hitting the “In Case of Emergency” button, everyone is looking for you.

7. You don’t compete with anyone, you find your opponent’s weaknesses and you attack.

8. You make decisions, not suggestions; you know the answer while everyone else is still asking questions.

9. You don’t have to love the work, but you’re addicted to the results.

10. You’d rather be feared than liked.

11. You trust very few people, and those you trust better never let you down.

12. You don’t recognize failure; you know there’s more than one way to get what you want.

13. You don’t celebrate your achievements because you always want more.

Based on our lessons this year, several of the qualities Grover believes to be required in order to be a “Cleaner” are qualities that are not always highlighted and/or encouraged behaviors. A challenge I find in my profession is finding the middle area between bringing intensity, grit, and relentless play from my playing experience, and tying it into leadership as a coach to foster that behavior in a healthy way. In young teenage athletes, they may look at the list of Grover’s Relentless Thirteen and say, “Number 10 is not a healthy social decision for me, because I want my teammates to like me,” or Number 13 says not to celebrate achievements; does that mean I shouldn’t be happy when we win?”

Over the last few days, I’ve tried to modify Grover’s Thirteen into a set of standards for leaders in my program by using material from our lessons this year to support more leadership qualities and less intensity from a competitior’s standpoint.

The Cardinal Code of Leadership

1. You continue to push yourself when others run out of drive, then you pick them up.

In Lesson 9 of our course work, Shared Leadership (PSU WC, L9, 2019) is described as sharing the role of leader with your teammates. In this case, a good leader in our program will do their job to the best of their ability, as well as pick up others when they struggle.

2. You know who you are, and you maximize your strengths to help others.

In Lesson 4, we focused on the Skills Approach (PSU WC, L4, 2019), and a leader understanding their skill-set(s) that allow them to be successful leaders. As a leader in my program, understanding yourself, specifically your strengths and weaknesses, will help you help others. While Grover believes Cleaners need an exact understanding of who they are, I think knowing your strengths and how you can use those to help others is more critical in a team setting.

3. When things don’t go according to plan, people around you look for the plan.

In Lesson 6, we dug deeper into Leader Behavior (PSU WC, L6, 2019). In order to be a successful leader in my program, I believe leaders need to have a strong ability to lead through Directive Leadership (PSU WC, L6, 2019). Directive Leaders give clear, direct instructions that help achieve the common goal.

4. You make decisions with the best interests of the team first, then ask for input from other teammates.

In the same lesson, Achievement-Oriented Leadership (PSU WC, L6, 2019) explains the importance of leading others to achieve the best possible outcome for the good of the team. As a leader, one must make decisions that have positive outcomes for the team, not just themselves. Often in high school sports, families make decisions to travel, or even to participate in sports, without considering the impact it has on others within the program. If each member of the team is not equally invested in the achievements of the team, those teams will crumble.

5. You’d rather be respected than liked.

Different from being feared, I think a good leader in my program should be respected. Only in totalitarian leadership models is fear a source of motivation, and when working with young adults, they want to feel as if they helped either make or significantly influenced the decision. The same goes for leaders and their teammates. Leaders will fail among their teammates if the value of being popular outweighs makeing the right decisions for the team.

6. Celebrate your achievements with your team, with the understanding that there is always more work to be done.

Without acknowledging achievement, teams can splinter when the relentless pursuit of perfection can grow to be more important than being with one another and accomplishing a goal together. While good leaders are satisfied with achieving team goals, I believe great leaders bask in the grind to achieve a goal, and can’t wait to start the process over again.

While my list is a constant work in progress, I think much of what Grover has set out to illustrate with his Cleaner model of leadership (Grover, 2013) can be modified to incorporate specific leadership skills, and be more flexible with the needs of getting others to work with you, rather than always working against you.

 

References:

Penn State World Campus, 2019

Grover, T. Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable, 2013

Generally speaking, educators and their role in the education system could be the picture paired with the definition of servant leadership. Servant Leadership, as defined by Greenleaf (1970), is a leader who has a need or desire to serve others in order to develop themselves, therefore, performing to meet organizational standards. As teachers, our job is to serve our students by guiding them in their development as young adults socially, academically, and sometimes through athletics and other clubs on campus. In our class text, Northouse (2013) lists ten characteristics of a servant leader; Listening, Empathy, Healing, Awareness, Persuasion, Conceptualization, Foresight, Stewardship, Commitment to the growth of people, and Building community. As a teacher, each of these characteristics are equally important to the overall leadership one provides to students at their school.

While servant leadership is all but a requirement for the role of a teacher, I think students and parents can easily abuse the servant element in servant leadership. I think this is even more the case at small, private schools, where families are paying for their son or daughter to attend. As a private school teacher, I believe the line between parental expectations and staying true to the standards of the school can unnecessarily move for reasons often outside of a teacher’s control.

For example, some parents believe by paying tuition for their son or daughter, they are buying a high school diploma regardless of their child’s academic performance. This can be troublesome for obvious reasons, but mainly because the standards of the school and the teacher are put to the test by complaining parents who expect the teacher, and often the school, to bend over backward for their son or daughter in order to receive a good grade in the class. In a study by Fatma Bikmaz from Ankara University titled, “What Parents Expect From Classroom Teachers and How Classroom Teachers Measure Up To Those Expectations”, her study was conducted among both private and public school families. The research showed that parents of both private and public school students were not well-informed enough to make a determination on the expectations of a teacher, and encouraged educators to hold more seminars, parent-teacher conferences, and open up communication with families to define a teacher’s role more clearly. Combine an uninformed parent with unrealistic expectations that they believe they are paying for, and you could find yourself in a troubling position as a teacher.

In my experience as a private school teacher, I have found that parents, while they claim to have their child’s best interests at heart, often don’t know the full story when it comes to their children and life outside their household. While their son or daughter may be an angel at home under the watchful eye of their parents, at school, their behavior and effort in the classroom can be quite sub-standard. For example, I have a student this year who does not enjoy my class, Strength and Conditioning. Despite trying several different ways of getting this young man motivated to develop proper physical fitness, he has little to no motivation outside of his video games. When discussing this with his parents, they are taken aback at how I have portrayed their son; unmotivated, without a desire to perform the daily tasks of the class. They provide his grades from other classes, where he performs well, and they can’t even imagine this behavior from their son. When provided with his data collected from my physical fitness testing, the excuses flood the conversation about fairness, and the lack of clarity provided for their son to properly understand what is expected of him to perform in class. At some point, a teacher in this situation is faced with a decision that challenges their ethical standards; should the student be forced against his motivational will to meet expectations in the class, while being supported by his parents, or does the teacher modify expectations for this student in order to meet the expectations of the family.

Many teachers in this position can be challenged by their desire to serve in a servant leadership role, while also maintaining their standards as an educator to meet academic expectations in their course. The traits of this role support a teacher going above and beyond to make this student not only successful in the class, but hopefully enjoy the class over the duration of the school year. In physical fitness, each student or sub-group of students will have physical restrictions based on their fitness level, while each family expects their son or daughter to earn an “A” level grade. Add in the students who have little to no motivation to be in average healthy, physical shape, and you have families paying a school for their child’s education, and relying on high grades for their next level of education post-graduation.

I once had a student who was very high-achieving, who had her sights set on Stanford as her collegiate destination. She was on the academic track to get there and be admitted to the school, until her 12th grade Spanish teacher decided to offer no make-up opportunities for assignments. This student completed one assignment one day late, and the teacher did not offer flexibility, thus the student earned a grade lower than her work deserved. Due to this poor grade, this student’s GPA was impacted the week Stanford required applications to be due, and she did not get admitted to Stanford. After four years of high academic achievement, this student and her family’s investment in her education was impacted by a grade earned for turning work in late. This was obviously an issue with the family, and they decided to pull their younger children from the school because of this teacher’s lack of flexibility. Again, in a situation where a teacher has to decide whether their academic standards are more important than their willingness to work with students to bend expectations to better position themselves, parents can misplace their expectations for what they are paying for with private school education.

While servant leadership is displayed by educators each day they arrive on campus, it is a leadership style that can be easily abused by students and parents, alike. For those who work day in and day out to meet the needs of their students, these teachers can be put into tough spots professionally and ethically to attempt to make their requirements fit the needs of the individual students who do not want to follow the track set by their teacher, and use their parents (and their wallet) to influence a teacher’s decision. Strong academic administrators will take the side of a teacher in most cases, but at private schools, the parents paying for a product (their child’s high school diploma and a GPA high enough to meet high academic standards at colleges and universities) often get their way.

References:

Bikmaz, F. (n.d.). academia.edu. Retrieved November 11, 2019, from https://www.academia.edu/1362140/What_Parents_Expect_From_Classroom_Teachers_and_How_Classroom_Teachers_Measure_Up_to_Those_Expectations.

Greenleaf, R.K. (1970). The servant as leader. Westfield, IN: The Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership.

Northouse, P.G. (2013).  Leadership: Theory and Practice.  Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

As my first season leading the Bishop Diego Girls Volleyball program nears its eventual end, I appreciate the opportunity this course has provided me each week to reflect on leadership within my program, especially among my players. Last week, our team made school history by winning their first playoff match since 1978, and we build on that momentum with another win last night to advance to the Quarterfinals of our division. While I have experienced these playoff moments of intense competition, the need for focus at the most important times, and the pressure to succeed, all of these feelings are new to my players. Traditionally, our girls basketball and soccer teams would have begun practicing last week, and many of our players would be involved with those sports. In their mind, they look at their calendars and can’t believe our season is still going. If I would have bet money on our season going this far based on some of the potential issues we’ve dealt with and continue to work through, my money wouldn’t have been on winning a playoff game, let alone two.

This week, our lesson covered the importance of leadership within a team. On the surface, leadership is an assumed function that is assigned to the coaching staff, and possibly one or two players on the team who earn a role as a Team Captain. In reality, leadership is the responsibility of everyone involved, both personally and within the group. As I wrote in our discussion forum this week, Roles within a Team was what stuck out to me the most, as it remains an area which I think can single-handedly disintegrate a team from the inside out.

According to our lesson, Group Roles “are group expectations associated with specific jobs or positions in the group. They can be both positive and negative. Roles can change as situations and groups change. Task roles deal with getting the task done and include initiating, information seeking, information sharing, summarizing, evaluating, and guiding. Relationship roles support relationships within the work group and include harmonizing, encouraging, and gatekeeping. Dysfunctional roles include dominating, blocking, attacking, and distracting.” (PSU, WC, L9, 2019). Within a high school team of young women, roles can change for a variety of reasons. Playing time, relationship status, friendship status, coach-to-player relationship, results, production, and effort are all keys to developing a role for players. For players who identify themselves with their place on the team as a starter, captain, “a star”, or “Senior”, their role is their main focus. Their role outweighs the results of the team, the coach’s decision-making, etc. These players would rather lose knowing that they were the best player on the team.

Early on in our season, which happened to be my first season at Bishop Diego, I could sense issues with roles on our team. Beginning in our Tryout Week, I set the stage early by letting everyone know that their performance last year, including the team they made and the position they held, would almost certainly change. I also made it clear that I wanted the best players and teammates, and the best skill players play, not upperclassmen regardless of ability. From that moment, the players who thought they were going to get their way were on notice, and those who saw the opportunity to take a position they believed they could fill were aggressive to play hard to earn a place on the team.

Once our tryouts were complete, we almost immediately had issues with positional changes and anticipated roles in the lineup. As someone who has coached this level for over ten seasons, I knew what we had to do next. I followed tryouts with group meetings with players, where we discussed role opportunities for the upcoming season. While these meetings can be uncomfortable, I thought our team did a nice job overall of being realistic with their skills and their abilities to positively impact the team. Next came the toughest part; acceptance of their role.

I find role acceptance to be the hardest part of a young, student-athlete’s career in sports. The initial acceptance of the role is the easiest part, but once they understand what their role means after living the role, unhappiness and dysfunction emerge. For example, I met with a player in the beginning of the season who was an impact player the year before. She believed she improved over the summer, and said she would help the team in whatever role she could serve. I asked that she be an emotional leader, and come in the game when we needed a defensive adjustment or a tough serve. She accepted the role, but did not know that she would come off the bench to replace a freshman, while she was a junior. With her social status in jeopardy, her displeasure grew as the weeks went by because the freshman, one of our best players, was not making mistakes, thus we did not need this player to come off the bench. When she asked me after a routine win against a league rival why she didn’t go in the game, I reminded her of her role, to which she replied, “I’m no longer happy with my role on this team.” She was one of four players who I met with throughout the season to discuss evolving roles to meet the team’s needs.

In our lesson, Northouse (2013) mentions there are two critical functions of leadership: helping the group accomplish its task (task function) and keeping the group maintained and functioning (maintenance function). With our players who struggled with their roles, I leaned on my leadership experience, as well as those of my coaching staff and unnamed captains on the team. With the task function (Northouse, 2013), our team had very little issues among our best 8 players. We were rolling through opponents we didn’t expect to win, and most of our success came as a surprise. The hardest part came from the maintenance function (Northouse, 2013), particularly with those who were not receiving the playing time they felt they deserved.

As our season continues, we are entering the Quarterfinals of our Playoff Division for the first time since 1978. While most of our community is ecstatic with the results we’ve achieved this season, those who are not accepting their roles are still not enjoying their membership on the team.

In an ad posted online by Nike in 2013, an image of Tiger Woods served as the background to a quote, “Winning takes care of everything.”(Nike, 2013). After this season, more than any other time, I am convinced that winning doesn’t take care of everything. It takes care of those who care about winning. Those who cannot accept their role can serve as the kryptonite to a successful team. Role understanding, acceptance, and continued Leadership Maintenance are all essential to sustaining a successful high school athletic program.

 

References:

Nike’s Tiger Woods ad draws critics. (2013, March 26). Retrieved from https://www.espn.com/golf/story/_/id/9100497/nike-winning-takes-care-everything-tiger-woods-ad-draws-critics.

Northouse, P. G. (2018). Leadership: theory and practice (8th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Pennsylvania State University World Campus (2019). PSYCH 485 Lesson 9: Team Leadership. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2008237/modules/items/27074716