Month: September 2016

September 27, 2016

WYC 092 – Winning Championships through Superior Culture – Maureen Monte talks reaching Destination Unstoppable

Maureen Monte builds winning teams by harnessing the untapped talent in the locker room or the conference room and aligning it with success. Her approach has been honed with over ten years of experience in large companies, tech startups, and sports teams – from San Francisco to Singapore. She believes there are three universal truths about teams:

All teams struggle
There is untapped talent on every team
Most teams haven’t defined what success looks like

She has authored a book Destination Unstoppable – about helping a hockey team win the state championship. It is more than a sports success story. It is a team success story – and the world runs on teams.

Website: www.maurennmonte.com

Facebook: Link

Twitter: @maureenemonte

Listen Now:

Listen on iTunes: iTunes link

Listen on Stitcher: Stitcher link

Listen on Google Play Music: Google Play link

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Quote

”We win games because we have great team chemistry” – Mark Dantonio, Michigan State football coach

Building Winning Teams

Maureen has worked with IBM on building successful teams. She has studied the Clifton Strengthfinder to understand how each individual is gifted and can contribute to the team’s success.

How did the opportunity to work with the Cranbrook Varsity Hockey Team come about?

It was a talented team but struggling
She started at the top to see if the coach was part of the problem. He was not.
First step – Define success – Start with the what. Then define the how. Brotherhood, discipline, focus, unselfishness were all areas they identified as lacking. Then she had the players turn to each other and tell them ‘I refuse to let you fail.’
Next step – Evaluate the players’ strengths. 18 out of 25 had competition in their top 5 strengths.
The key was helping team tap their untapped talent on the team.
The coach made heroes in every role. The 3rd string goalie had the strength of harmony. The coach gave him the job of helping resolve conflict between the top 2 goalies.
Another back-up player had the strength of being analytical. His new role was to look at the other teams and analyze what was going on. He now added value.

2 keys to turn this team around

The coach bought in
The kids had a desperate desire to win, so they were willing to try something new

Using the Clifton Strengthfinders tool in a sports environment

The boys loved learning what others on the team were thinking
In a perfect world – start with the coaches, then the captains, then the whole team
The strength finder looks for patterns of excellence. It is 34 different strengths that involves how you think to solve problems, how you execute tasks, how you relate to others, and how you influence. It takes 35 minutes and costs $15 per person to identify your top 5.

Connection between success in business and success in sports

Defining success is key
Mark Dantonio, Michigan State football coach: ‘We win games because we have great team chemistry’

Biggest surprises about this experience

None of the kids afterwards talked about winning the state championship. That moment had come and gone. Being valued by the teammates and coaches, and the unstoppable mindset they had created is what they valued most.
One kid’s biggest strength was he was a learner. So he took on the role of making sure if a kid had a runny nose or cold, he would separate the water bottles so the other kids didn’t get sick as well.

What’s your favorite strengths?

Ideation – Thinking of new ways of doing things
Individualization – Each individual brings something unique

Favorite leadership book and/or quote?

Book – ‘First Break all the rules‘ – Marcus Buckingham – Focus on strengths not weaknesses

Destination Unstoppable book

maurennmonte.com – Get 20% coupon for book
Great story, and great resources on how to build a winning culture

Today’s Sponsors

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September 23, 2016

Culture Journey Week #2

Week 2 – First Leadership Group meeting – Discussing goals

If you are interested in diving deeper on building culture we have started a mastermind group that meets the first and third Wednesday of each month at 12:30 pm EST, see the details at: winningyouthcoaching.com/the-culture-bus-mastermind/. We just had our first meeting this past Wednesday, and it was energizing and exciting to be with likeminded world-changers.

Week 2 – First meeting with our leadership group

We had 9 players made up of juniors and seniors volunteer to be in the group.

We ended our last practice of the week 25 minutes early and I met with them along with another one of the assistant coaches. I discussed with the head coach whether or not he should join us, and we agreed that he would not, but rather we would have the group present back to him the summary of what we came up with, a good opportunity for the kids to lead by presenting back to him.

Agenda for meeting:

1 – Discuss the role of being in this leadership group

2 – Review what successful leaders do

3 – Brainstorm on how we will define success for this team

1 – Discuss the role of being in this leadership group

I shared 4 keys to leading change, adapted from Stephan Schwartz’s 8 Laws of Social Change:

1 – Share a common goal

2 – Be OK that you may not get credit for any changes made

3 – Be OK that the change may not happen while you are still on this team (it could take years)

4 – Believe that a small group can make big changes

I then asked for their agreement and commitment to these, and they all agreed

2 – Review what successful leaders do

I shared that as leaders, the priority is not to fix everybody else, but rather to fix ourselves. I shared the quote ‘Anything you see our team do, we either: 1 – modeled it and did it ourself OR 2 – allowed it.’ So the goal of this group is to figure out how we can model the behaviors we want the team to have.

I again asked for their agreement and commitment, and they all agreed.

3 – Brainstorm on how we will define success for this team

I lead a visualization exercise as follows:

“Close your eyes and picture our end-of-season banquet last year. What were you feeling at the banquet? Were you proud of something you accomplished individually? Were you proud of something the team accomplished?”

“Think about that for a second. Now switch gears and look forward to the banquet at the end of the upcoming season. What do you want the team to be celebrating? What do you want to be proud of accomplishing individually and as a leadership group?”

Then I had the group share their thoughts on this by finishing the following sentence: “I will consider this season a success if: ___________”

The responses were interesting, some were very win/loss specific, but there were several that dealt more with culture. Here is a sample of the responses:

Have a winning season
Beat our rival
Finish in the top 3 and win at least one playoff game
Have awesome communication – On and off the field, during all elements of practice and games
Be committed: Show up to practice; Be on time; Try hard during our conditioning; Work on your game outside of practice
Show up to fundraisers
Less hero ball & don’t hold the ball more than 5 seconds
Have multiple seniors sign scholarships to play lacrosse in college

I shared mine at the end: ‘Have everyone who sees us see both how much fun we have and how excellent we are at what we do, so they want to be a part of it.’

Next week’s plan

We have 4 more full weeks left in the fall session, so we are going to break down our definitions of success into 4 categories to create actionable steps and cover 1 category each of the remaining 4 weeks.

1 – Excellence in practice

2 – Commitment & Accountability

2 – Communication

3 – Keep eye on prize – Team>Individual

Interesting Observation(s)

There was good participation for the first 15 to 20 minutes, then the conversation definitely started to drift. Probably good to keep our meetings with this age group to no more than 20 minutes to keep their attention span.

I am excited to walk this journey with you. I welcome any feedback, ideas, and suggestions you might have as you read through this. You are also welcome to share this with any other coaches you think could benefit from it, and please have them email me at [email protected] if they would like to be added to this email list.

September 23, 2016

Culture Journey Week #1

I am excited to walk this journey with you. The plan is to give weekly updates on my journey in turning around the culture of a program I help coach. I welcome any feedback, ideas, and suggestions you might have as you read through this. You are also welcome to share this with any other coaches you think could benefit from it, and please have them email me at [email protected] if they would like to be added to this email list.

If you are interested in diving deeper on building culture we have started a mastermind group that meets the first and third Wednesday of each month at 12:30 pm EST, see the details at: winningyouthcoaching.com/the-culture-bus-mastermind/

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The Background (I’ll only include this in this first post)
This is my 2nd year as an assistant coach for a boys high school lacrosse team.
My son is a sophomore on the team.
The head coach was hired and helped start the program 10 years ago. There are 2 other assistant coaches, one played for the program and is currently in his 3rd year of college, the other has been involved with the program right from the beginning.
There are approximately 30 kids on the team, only 5 are seniors, there are a bunch of juniors, only 5 or 6 sophomores, and 5 freshmen who have played for several years and 5 more freshmen/sophomores who are brand new to lacrosse.
Lacrosse is a spring sport that runs from February to May. We also do an optional fall tournament in early November with 8 weeks of practice leading up to it, practices are 3 days a week in the fall and 5 days a week in the spring.
I would rate the culture from last year as a 3 out of 10.
The good: The head coach means well and is very knowledgeable about lacrosse. The biggest malcontent player from last year was a senior and is gone.
The bad: The head coach struggles with ‘the curse of knowledge’ – he is older and has been around lacrosse his whole life, playing in college at the Naval Academy. This background also leads to him being pretty old-school in his style and not placing much of an emphasis on building culture.
Last year this team exhibited all of the ‘Five Dysfunctions of a Team’ by Pat Lencioni:
1 – Lack of trust
2 – Fear of conflict
3 – Lack of commitment
4 – Lack of accountability amongst the team members
5 – Failure to keep an eye on the prize

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What’s been done
Over the summer
I approached the head coach in the offseason and let him know I had been to 3 different clinics/conferences over the summer that focused on building culture. I asked if I could take on the role as ‘Culture Coach’ for the team this year. He and the other assistant coaches were very receptive to this and acknowledged last year was one of the worst teams they had been around chemistry-wise.

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Coaching staff training
I had the opportunity to meet with the Scott Hearon, the co-founder of a local organization called the Nashville Coaching Coalition. They do coach training to help programs build great culture into their program. 2 weeks after meeting with Scott he contacted me and said they had been given a grant and could train our coaching staff at no cost. This training includes meeting once per week for 8 weeks and we will go through the book Inside-Out Coaching by Joe Ehrmann. The staff agreed and we are scheduled to do this in November and December.

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Leadership/Captain training
I proposed we purchase Adam Bradley’s LeadEmUp program for $329 to train our captains, we are discussing this and hopefully we can do this in the downtime from November to January before our spring season kicks off.

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Leading up to the season
I have since attempted to get us together several times to establish some core covenants as a coaching staff before our fall session begins, never got much response or traction with this.

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Week 1 – Establishing a PLC (Player Leadership Council)
The head coach asked me for any ideas I had been thinking of to build culture. I proposed we get ownership from some of the leaders of the team. So here’s what we did:
At the end of the last practice of the week, here’s what I communicated to the team:
“Are you guys excited about this team this year?” – An enthusiastic “yes” response from most players.
“Do you think there are things we could do better than we did last year?” – Again an enthusiastic “Yes, many things” from most players.
“Well, do you know whose team this is? It’s not mine. It’s not (assistant coaches). It’s not even (head coach)’s team. This is your team. So we would like to give you guys the opportunity to make decisions about how we do things on this team. From how we practice, what we do in practice, how we do things in games, you name it, we can discuss it. So here’s what we’re going to do – we are going to form a player leadership council. Any junior or senior on the team who is interested in being involved, we will meet weekly during practice to discuss how things are going and how we can do them better. This is totally optional, and it will not replace the role of captains that we will vote on for our spring team. It’s just a chance to step up your involvement and develop some leadership skills. Think about it over the weekend, and if you’re in then let one of the coaches know at the beginning of practice next Tuesday.”

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Next week’s plan
The plan is to use a room in the library that is right next to our practice field and have a 45 minute kickoff meeting with the PLC. We will have them brainstorm on what their vision for this team is, and what we can do better from last year. Then we will start the process of going through our practice format and discuss better ways of doing things. For example, starting right at the beginning – we run 4 laps to start practice. The players all run at different paces, and cut all of the corners. Should we run as a team or in position groups or keep doing it as we have been? Should we put cones in the corners and commit to not cutting them?

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Question if you have feedback: I am debating whether or not to include the head coach in this meeting. Do we come up with suggestions/improvements and then have the players propose them back to the head coach in a separate forum? I am leaning towards this option because I like the idea of the players getting to develop their leadership, presentation, and selling skills.

September 14, 2016

WYC 091 – Youth Baseball – Paul Niggebrugge talks Empowering Kids and Be Your Best Academy

Paul Niggebrugge was born in Sao Paolo, Brazil and moved to the United States when he was about 6 years old, not knowing a bit of English. He fell in love with the game of baseball, and went on to coach Caravel Academy Baseball Team for 30 years, won 4 State Championships and Qualified for the State Tournament 27 out of 30 years. He is 4th all-time in Delaware with 400 wins and in 2016 was inducted into the Delaware Baseball Hall of Fame. He is currently a Nationally recognized trusted authority in Batting, Pitching and the Mental Game Coaching – Clinician, Evaluator, Educator and Coach providing instruction or information in over 30 states and 2 countries. And maybe the most impressive stat: Paul has been Married for 36 years and raised 6 happy & healthy children!

Website: www.BeyourBestAcademy.com

Facebook: /Be-Your-Best-Academy

Twitter: @BBABaseballDE

Listen Now:

Listen on iTunes: iTunes link

Listen on Stitcher: Stitcher link

Listen on Google Play Music: Google Play link

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Quote

‘Yell and tell is out. Empowering questions are in.’

Coaching your own kids

If you are aware of the pitfalls, it can be a great experience
Paul once had a coach who overreacted about issues with his own kid, and he decided it was best to not to continue to have him coach

My Cringe Moments

‘I thought I knew it all’ and that my way was the only

Teaching Skills

‘You can be critical without being negative.’ Whatever you feed grows.
Less ‘yell and tell’ and more empowering questions and sharing
There is not a right and wrong with their mechanics, it’s just where are you right now in the progression
3 key elements every person is looking for:
- 1 – Adventure – great experiences
- 2 – Grow – mentally, physically, socially
- 3 – Contribute and share what they’ve learned
Fun games:
- 1 kid is at home base, 1 at 2nd – and they race
- Throwing/catching games – They start up close with a partner, then keep taking 3 giant steps back, once they drop a ball they’re out – but even after they’re out they can keep throwing (so they’re not standing around)

Mental Toughness/Achieving Peak Performance

It’s all about empowerment: Focus, Feel, and Feedback (Funergy – Fun positive energy)
Kids love the classroom – Get away from the ballfields and ask open ended empowering question: why did we lose, what did you feel, how did you handle pressure
PEACE: Performance and Execution After a Critical Error
- ‘You can’t teach a drowning man to swim while he’s drowning’ –
Before every practice and game – they spend 5 to 15 minutes connecting their mind and body – Coach Paul has created some sound waves they listen to with positive affirmations – Link to article about Neuro-training tool

Culture – Discipline/Rewards/Teambuilding

No one is above the game.
We will not tolerate: SPEND: Sloppiness, Pouting, Excusitis, Non-verbals, or the Disease of Me
After our games you should not be able to tell whether we won or lost
3 phrases they use: Game Hugs; Gamechanger; VIP passes(which can get them out of doing something they don’t want to)

Connecting with and Impacting Kids

Paul had two different players who you never would have thought would have been able to be good baseball players, but they stuck with it and both ended up having great seasons

The One that got away

Paul makes it a practice to immediately evaluate losses, then

Best borrowed/stolen idea

From Coach K – Go learn everything you can, but then make it your own. ‘You’re going to write your own story, make sure you use your own pen.’

Favorite coaching book/quote

Book: Emergence– by Derek Rydall – Life doesn’t happen to you, it happens through you
Quote: ‘Not making a mistake is a big mistake. As long as you don’t repeat the mistake.’

Be Your Best Academy

BeyourBestAcademy.com
Baseball instructions, videos, podcasts

Parting Advice

Yell and tell is out. Empowering questions are in.

Related Episodes

WYC 080 – Youth Baseball – David Klein talks Living a Legends Life

WYC 045 – Youth Baseball – Mark Linden from BaseballPositive.com talks practice planning and the pace that kids learn

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Today’s Sponsors

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September 7, 2016

WYC 090 – Overuse Injuries – Drs. Steve Grosserode and Jared Vagy talk Injury Prevention

Dr. Steve Grosserode and Dr. Jared Vagy were collegiate athletes and soccer players. Both suffered injuries that affected their ability to play and led to the pain of lifelong injury. Determined to figure out why injuries happen and how to prevent them lead both to pursue our Doctorates in Physical Therapy from the University of Southern California, the #1 ranked program in the country. It was at USC that they began to understand how to prevent injury. After nine years of study, the singular reason for continued injury became clear; misaligned movement.

Through many years of research and practice, they consolidated there plan into a three step process. The three step system popularized and they began teaching seminars internationally to soccer coaches on how to prevent injury. They soon realized that we needed to spread the word to as many players, coaches and parents as possible. They knew that if they could stop injuries from occurring, they would be able to change the course of a player’s career and life. They now have written ebooks and have an online academy to share what they have learned, much of which we will discuss in this episode.

Website: yourmovementsolutions.com

Link to the ebook from website and a link to the paperback version on Amazon available after Sept 1st:

Prevent Soccer Injuries eBook

Prevent Soccer Injuries Paperback Amazon

Listen Now:

Listen on iTunes: iTunes link

Listen on Stitcher: Stitcher link

Listen on Google Play Music: Google Play link

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Quote

‘If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space.’

Injury Prevention Discussion

How do ACL injuries and other non-contact injuries happen and who is most at risk?
How has sports injury prevention changed over the years? What does the current research show?
Why do these injuries continue to occur in youth sports?
What are the best methods to prevent injuries in youth sports?
How do you make an injury prevention program specific for each individual player?
What can parents and players do to stop injuries?
How can coaches help prevent these injuries?

Lessons learned on these topics

Learn what to watch for in athletes – A knee diving in, body leaning off to one side
A large majority of non-contact injuries can be avoided – it’s by identifying high-risk athletes – there are 5 specific movements that put athletes at the highest-risk
Early sports specialization is a big cause of dramatic increase in ACL injuries
Videotaping athletes on the field and then analyzing their movements is a really effective method
3 Step process for coaches

1 – Analyze movement

2 – Provide exercises for homework to change movement

3 – Coaches give cues to athletes when they see

Static stretching – Don’t do it before practice/game. 10 minutes of Dynamic stretching before the practice/game is good, then static stretching can be done after the practice/game – or even better is to do static stretching throughout the day. Muscle-Activation exercises with bands before you do the dynamic warm-up is the latest and best method – see more at yourmovementsolutions.com
Parents – Add an exercise to your kid’s bedtime or morning routines to strengthen their muscles

Favorite coaching book/quote

Quote: ‘It’s not ease, but effort; it’s not facility, but difficulty, that makes oneself. There is perhaps nothing in life in which difficulties have not been encountered and overcome before any decided measure of success can be achieved.’
Quote: ‘If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space.’

Best borrowed/stolen idea

Dr. Chris Powers taught how showing is much more effective than telling – so videotaping an athlete when you see a knee diving in, then showing them how it looks when they do it right, is very effective
Dr. Clare Frank – shared ‘the body takes the path of least resistance,’ so make sure you are providing them the right way to do things, even if it’s harder

Your Movement Solutions

yourmovementsolutions.com

Loaded with resources:

Articles, pictures, videos, tips, ebook (with free sample)
Online training academy for coaches

Related Episodes

WYC 030 Performance Training – Amanda Kephart from Akron General Sports Performance talks getting faster, stronger, and more powerful

WYC 085 – Performance Training – Bryan Schwebke talks Building a Strong Base

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Today’s Sponsors

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September 6, 2016

Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch – Part 10 – Building a Program without Self-Entitlement

When NFL Pro-Bowler Joe Ehrmann lost his little brother Billy to a tragic fight with cancer, his introspection led to the realization that life is all about 2 things:

Relationships
Working for a cause bigger than yourself

Self-entitlement is a direct result of a focus that is opposite of those 2 values. It is no accident that the first and last components of this 10 part series on building championship culture involve creating a team-first and others-first environment. It is where everything starts and ends.

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Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch Part 10 – Case Study – Building a Program Without Self-Entitlement

John Doss is the head coach of Brownsburg Lacrosse, which is a program located in a suburb of Indianapolis. John understands the importance of selflessness in building a championship culture. So he set out to look for a way to build this into his culture, both on and off the field. What his team came up with is brilliant. The best way to describe their Mission 2 Assist program is to share their value statement:

What do we value at Brownsburg Lacrosse?

On the field, we all want to score goals, but what we REALLY VALUE are the plays that lead up to those goals. The unselfish pass to an open teammate. The “hockey assist” pass that leads to that pass. A hard fought ground ball possession. Tenacious defense that leads to a big takeaway. A critical save and quick clear that starts a fast break. That’s what we value on the field.

Off the field we value gratitude and servanthood. We appreciate the fact that we get to play a game we love and know that there are those that are not so fortunate. Because of this, we want to help others that cannot play lacrosse or cannot play lacrosse in the same manner that we do.

Why are we telling you this? Well, we found out that there is a national wheelchair lacrosse league and a local group is raising money to start a team here in Indianapolis. We want to merge our values to help them. This is a group of athletes and competitors just like us and all they want to do is compete, just like we do.

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How did they accomplish this? They tracked the plays they value, these “assists” that led to goals, over the course of their season. Then they got sponsors to reward those “assists”. John describes how they set this up in WYC Podcast Episode 81, check out all of the details here: Link to show notes and episode

They used the walk-a-thon type forms to fundraise – but used assists instead of goals as the pledge criteria. By the end of the season they raised almost $10k for the Wheelchair Lacrosse Organization.

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Check out the homepage for The Mission 2 Assist program to see short videos on their program and for a link to a video that describes WLUSA- the Wheelchair Lacrosse Organization: www.bblaxassist.com

September 2, 2016

Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch – Part 9 – Daddy Ball 101

One of the biggest culture killers in youth sports today is Daddy Ball. Should we just eliminate it? Is there a way to have parents coach their own kids and still have a great team culture?

Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch Part 9 – The Mom/Dad Coach

I was an assistant lacrosse coach for 4 years, helping coach my son’s teams. Then he reached high school. The program he was going into was down a little bit down in attendance, and there only two assistants helping the head coach, and one of them was often working and not at practice. I approached the head coach and offered my services if he wanted another assistant to help in any area, particularly this was a team of 34 players so many of the kids played on the JV team, so I could help work with those kids when he was working with the varsity. (I hate kids standing around and watching.) Then I saw the look. ‘Oh boy, here’s another daddy-ball coach wanting to get in here and get his son all of the favoritism and playing-time.’ I could see the same look on the assistant coaches. Fortunately they expressed their reservations and after sitting down and discussing the expectations and my agreement to not show any favoritism, they were open to bringing me on board. Now I am going into year 2 in this position, and we have agreed to step up my role on the team and I will serve as the Character Coach.

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It is possible to coach your own child on a team, and done well can be a wonderful experience, but you need to be aware of the possible negative effects that can creep up. Here are 5 tips that can make it be a positive experience:

Talk to your son or daughter about it before you agree to do it. Get their buy-in. Be very clear to your son/daughter that there could be negative comments from other kids and other parents. But also let them know that you are doing this to help every kid on the team and you will not be able to focus on them any more than the other kids.
Talk about the elephant in the room to the entire team. Don’t work too hard to treat your own kid as a coach – it’s good to be truthful and authentic in front of the team and treat your own kid from a parenting point of view sometimes. Don’t be over the top – but kids enjoy and learn from watching you enjoy spending time with your child.
It usually works better to have assistant do more of the instructions to your kid. Also utilize your assistants to get an honest assessment of what position/how much your child should be playing. (Sometimes we need help taking off the rose colored glasses!)
Turn off the coaching hat. On car ride home – ask your child ‘Anything else you want to ask coach?’ Then go back to being a dad again.
The Team Manager can be a conduit to hear concerns/complaints from parents – embrace this! Have a great parent manager who keeps you in the loop of any concerns, and one that has your back and can help squelch 90% of the problems before they ever make their way back to you.

It is important for your child to have a positive sports experience early on – and if that means you need to step up and be coach, step up and do it. Don’t let the fear of the perception of being a daddy-ball coach stop you if you truly are doing it for the right reasons.

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Check out the rest of this 10 part series on Culture: Go to blog posts