As I reflect on leadership lessons I have learned through the arena of athletics, it is impossible to summarize all the education I have received through the sports I have played and the debt of gratitude I owe to the professors, or as many call them coaches, that I have had the privilege of learning from through the game.  Rather than try to expound on a handful of those lessons, I would like to start a conversation about the impact and need for athletics to be viewed as arguably the most critical life shaping leadership tool in a young person’s life.  Research in multiple places has demonstrated that high school athletes outscore their non-athlete peers on leadership ability. As a dad of 4 children with varying interests, I am observing firsthand the role that both sport and music play in the life of my children.  Two of my children need no encouragement when it comes to sport, yet all 4 of our children are participating in the disciplines of sport (as well as music) as part of what my wife and I believe is critical to their development into young adults. Instead of copying the world’s model of winning as a priority, we have embraced a growth mindset that sees learning and improving, responding to various situations, giving their best, playing unselfishly, and taking on new challenges as important parts of their sport experience. 

Our oldest daughter, who loves reading a lot more than basketball, told me last season that she understood that she was the worst player on her middle school team, but she loved learning to do something she never did and loves being part of a team.  When she scored the first two points (and only two points) of her career last season, I experienced temporary joy but it pales in comparison to seeing my daughter practicing 3-4 nights a week because “she needs to help the team” this year rather than just be a late game replacement. Before our children were born, my wife and I agreed not to push our children toward sports but to encourage their development in their interests and stretch their growth.  While our daughters do not love sports the way I do, their involvement in what I see as the best of sports (the life shaping lessons from the game) has served as a springboard to many conversation about things that really matter in life.  My wife and I have no aspirations of our children playing professional sports or getting scholarship offers, but we do aspire that our children learn from their sports experience, that life-guiding character will be shaped and molded through the game, and that they will enjoy the disciplines and excitement of team. Winning is vitally important to me, and developing leadership through sport competition is a big part of winning to me.

I would like to begin a list and ask you as coaches to add to this list of leadership qualities that can be shaped through the game if we as coaches use our influence properly.  My list is hardly expansive, and I hope it simply points us toward qualities we want to see shaped in the lives of those we coach every day on and off the field or court.

These leadership lessons include:

• Dealing with disappointment both personally and as a team
• Relating to different kinds of people (teammates, coaches, fans, official, opponents)
• Working together toward a common goal; the importance of teamwork
• Giving your best at all times
• Responding right when others are wrong
• Responding properly to authority regardless of whether they are right
• Learning how to follow
• Learning how to lead
• Learning how to embrace challenges and obstacles
• Shaping character qualities like trust, integrity, and self-control
• Embracing values like hard-work and self-discipline
• Learning how to win with class and lose with honor

There are many other lessons, and I believe a day rarely goes by that I do not glean a leadership principle from either my coaching or playing days in sport.  As my coaching now focuses on leading various non-athletic teams across our campus in administration as well as my most important role as coach of the Beers family, I am forever indebted to the influence of the coaches who shaped leadership in my life through the competition of sports that I so deeply love.

In closing, I must also express that sadly not every coach I played for challenged me in this way.  To quote Ralph Sabock, who used to oversee and teach in the graduate program of Sports Administration at Penn State University, “It is possible that sport itself does not teach youngsters anything, but rather they learn things through sport from the adult who provides the leadership. Sad to say, not every coach understands this.”