Take Me To Your Leader

Take Me To Your Leader

By Jerome Green

Edited by Vicky Sun

Recently I’ve heard many high school and college basketball coaches lamenting the fact that they can’t get players to step up and assume leadership roles on their teams. This seems to be a pervasive issue with coaches all over the country. I was watching a roundtable discussion on the Big Ten Network this week and the panelists debated why Illinois, Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State and Northwestern were having difficulties with player leadership. The key issue that the coaches mentioned was a lack of communication within the team. An example of this was the way Illinois coach Bruce Webber banned his team from talking to the media because they don’t talk to each other in the locker room.

Jim Jackson stated, “The problem is that kids come to school and it’s not in their personality to be leaders.” In response to that statement, Dan Dakich said, “ You should never leave college the same way you entered college”.

Dakich feels that leadership can be taught. So if you want to win, if you want to learn, then becoming a leader is part of the process.

Being a leader comes with responsibilities and my sense is that we have a generation of players who don’t want to be burdened by that role. Players may say they want the title of being a leader, but not many of them want the pressure that goes along with it. When I was captain of my high school and college teams, I remember having the responsibility of being the first at practice and the last to leave. My coaches held me to a higher standard. If the team wasn’t acting right, the coach came to me and told me to fix it. I was fortunate none of my coaches were screamers, but boy were good at giving me an icy stare. The look that meant, step it up.

Many players today, however, don’t want that responsibility. If you are a leader or captain of a team, you should go up to the coach at the beginning of the year and say, “Coach, whatever you need from me, I am here to provide it. If you get frustrated with the team, yell at me. If we are not winning the games we should win, hold me responsible.”

Leadership is about having a commanding presence, demonstrating excellence on and off the court and being able to guide your teammates. You have to be less interested in making friends on the team and more concerned with providing companionship. Companionship means being painfully honest, generous, and having compassion. When you can provide all of those principles, you have the beginning makings of a leader.

Learning To Listen to and Follow Conscience.

Remember the story of Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket? There are lessons to be learned from the very famous cartoon pair. Pinocchio is like most of us. We go along, live our lives and as long as we aren’t pressured or held to high levels of accountability, we are fine. When the pressure hits, that’s when our true selves are exposed. Pinocchio would hear Jiminy say, No don’t do that, or that’s not the path. But Pinocchio made sure he never listened and did his own thing despite Jiminy’s warning. Jiminy represented Pinocchio’s conscience.

We all have an inner voice that directs us and helps us grow. Our conscience allows us to develop wisdom, accept criticism and stay in the flow. What we have now is a lot of players, who are devoid of a conscience. They play for the name on the back of the jersey instead of the front. Some of this is a result of how much media attention is focused on personal achievement versus team accomplishments. But great teams are made up of individuals working towards a common goal to help contribute to the overall growth of the team.

I believe that to teach leadership, you have to first be able to tell student-athletes how to follow their conscience. By listening to their conscience they will learn how to:

Listen and give instructions
Be responsible and accountable for their actions
Give and accept criticism
Respond under pressure
Resolve conflicts
Have compassion for themselves and others.

I feel that coaches need to demonstrate what leadership looks like. They should be able to show how they listen to their own conscience. It would be beneficial for all of your players to classes throughout their careers at your school on how to be an effective leader by following their conscience.

The leader is the conscience.