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"LEADERSHIP AND ACCOUNTABILITY"
Great leaders can create a culture of accountability because they start with holding themselves accountable.
When great leaders receive harsh criticism, they keep their emotions under control and stay open-minded. They don’t take it personally. They focus on the information and hold themselves accountable.
The following incident demonstrated Coach Wooden doing this.
In his book Coach Wooden and Me Kareem Abdul Jabbar tells a story about Coach Wooden in a shouting match with one of his players Bill Sweek in the locker room after their victory over Drake in the semifinal game for the 1969 national championship.
During the game Sweek was unhappy with his playing time and he demonstrated this by leaving the bench early and going to the locker room while the game was still being played. After the game Coach Wooden was not happy. When Kareem entered the shower there was Coach Wooden being held back by his assistant coaches while Sweek reeled off several of his grievances and taunted: "You wanna fight me, old man?"
When Sweek awoke the next morning, he was sure he had been kicked off the team but he hadn’t heard anything, so he went to the team breakfast. At the team breakfast Coach Wooden demonstrated what great leadership looks like when he addressed the team as follows:
"I've given a lot of hard thought to what Bill said last night. I can see that what Bill said was not all together without merit.
Now, I certainly don't agree with the way he delivered his opinions or his behavior on the court any more than I condone the way I reacted. But I'm glad we got it all out in the open.
I just want you to know how proud I am of all of you and how happy I am to have the privilege of coaching you." Coach then asked Bill to come up and they shook hands in front of the team.
Coach acknowledged Sweek’s point of view and held Sweek and himself accountable for poor behavior. He then moved on without anger or retaliation.
The next night, with Sweek playing, UCLA won its fifth national championship.
How do you lead?
Yours in Coaching,
Craig Impelman
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COACH'S FAVORITE POETRY AND PROSE
Hard Luck
Ain't no use as I can see
In sittin' underneath a tree
An' growlin' that your luck is bad,
An' that your life is extry sad;
Your life ain't sadder than your neighbor's
Nor any harder are your labors;
It rains on him the same as you,
An' he has work he hates to do;
An' he gits tired an' he gits cross,
An' he has trouble with the boss;
You take his whole life, through an' through,
Why, he's no better off than you.
If whinin' brushed the clouds away
I wouldn't have a word to say;
If it made good friends out o' foes
I'd whine a bit, too, I suppose;
But when I look around an' see
A lot o' men resemblin' me,
An' see 'em sad, an' see 'em gay
With work t' do most every day,
Some full o' fun, some bent with care,
Some havin' troubles hard to bear,
I reckon, as I count my woes,
They're 'bout what everybody knows.
The day I find a man who'll say
He's never known a rainy day,
Who'll raise his right hand up an' swear
In forty years he's had no care,
Has never had a single blow,
An' never known one touch o' woe,
Has never seen a loved one die,
Has never wept or heaved a sigh,
Has never had a plan go wrong,
But allas laughed his way along;
Then I'll sit down an' start to whine
That all the hard luck here is mine.
Edgar Albert Guest (1881-1959)
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