AchieveGlobal's blog

A Coach ’s Epiphany: “Open Your Eyes and Bend Your Knee!”

By Craig Perrin

A conversation this week recalled an epiphany from my early career, when I coached tennis.

As an academic at the time, I found it difficult at first to build physical skills in week-end hackers, hot-shot juniors, and pre-teens with their parents eyeing me from the bleachers. One break-through came when I learned to keep groups moving for an hour. A more serious problem was individual instruction. I shouted – “Open your eyes as you strike the ball!” or “Bend your knee!” – and then I puzzled why students couldn’t integrate my superb advice in one smooth stroke. I wondered, numbly, “Why is everyone so bloody frustrated?" Finally, I thought, “How did my best coaches coach?” One thing they did was point out progress, no matter how slight. So I tried something different in my next lesson. Instead of correcting a jittery beginner, I called her attention to anything at all that she did right. To my youthful astonishment, she promptly started ripping cross-court forehands! I continued to refine this method: “I loved the way you punched through that volley!” “That was beautiful when you took short steps to the ball!” Eventually, I found myself praising every student for any hint of doing something right. I might say, “Your wrist looks firmer now!” – even if only barely. And it all worked. Students gained more confidence, rallied more consistently, made more difficult shots, and laughed more often. Soon I had more students and raked in more money. That career morphed into something else, but to this day problems of my own making often follow when I forget that early epiphany. What approach works for you when you coach, or receive coaching? What epiphany can you share?

Learning When the Score is Nil-Nil

By Andrew Calvert Manchester United played Tottenham Hotspur in the League Cup final a few weeks ago. The match was 0-0 at full time and remained scoreless after an overtime period. At that point, the match referee called the managers and team together to prepare a list – a detailed sequence in which all 11 players on each team would take a penalty kick. The team with the highest score would win (and get 12 months of bragging rights). During the eight minutes or so that it took to compile the list, the Manchester United goalkeeping coach took his goalkeeper aside and showed him a iPod video of Tottenham players taking penalties. A few minutes later, Ben saved one penalty and unsettled the Spurs’ other penalty kicks. Manchester went on to win 4-1. Click here to read an article about the event. What an excellent example of just-in-time, mission-critical, workflow learning mediated through technology! But if you think about it, the video and immediate coaching (valuable as they were) were only the tip of the process. This goalkeeper works out many times a week, conditioning his reflexes, and gets coaching in every aspect of his profession – penalty-saving just a part of it. So, a lot of thought, practice, and dedication – and then at the critical moment, the iPod video... Technology is good. It helps. But without practice and dedication, would this goalkeeper have saved the game? What are the lessons here for blended workflow learning in a corporate environment? I'd welcome your thoughts...

How Can You Prepare Managers to Support Training?

By Craig Perrin This is the fourth of my five-part discussion with Kim Stafford, AchieveGlobal’s Director of International Development. This week we ask, “How can you prepare managers to support training?” CRAIG: If we want managers to support training, we have to stop shaming them. Instead, we should reduce their coaching responsibilities by changing the way we train. Rather than big training events followed by inconsistent or short-lived coaching, we need shorter increments of training over longer periods. Instead of a two-day employee workshop every six months, what if we had a one-hour session with an immediate application assignment and ongoing collaboration with peers, every week for two months? What if we leveraged all the technology now available – Internet, intranet, YouTube-type video, online social networking? What if trainers helped peers to coach each other? What if we developed dedicated coaches – people who like to coach, with the time to observe, provide feedback, and recognize employees? This kind of training isn’t idle fantasy. It’s already here in many organizations, functioning very well, and taking this pressure off managers to be everything to every employee. KIM: That’s one approach, yet it’s not always realistic. For better or worse – and I think it’s better – most organizations will continue to deliver traditional classroom training. As a long-time former trainer and director of training, I’ve seen the power of classroom learning. The classroom remains the number one place where skill development takes place. Larry Bossidy, author of Execution, says “Every leader and supervisor needs to be a teacher; classroom learning should be about giving [both managers and employees] the tools that they need.” People are worth the effort it takes to develop them through formal classroom training and skilled coaching. Dofasco Steel’s tag line is: “Our product is steel. Our strength is people.” In my view, the best way to improve human performance is to prepare managers to coach and then to measure how well they coach. That’s also the best way to reduce turnover and move toward key business goals. I’ll leave you with this thought: The main way employees – whether managers or individual contributors – learn new skills is through training, and the main way they grow and develop is through coaching.

What ’s Self-Esteem Got to Do With It?

By Craig Perrin It’s at the foundation of our view of leadership, an article of faith at AchieveGlobal – a “Basic Principle,” even: “Maintain the self-confidence and self-esteem of others.” To my knowledge, no one has ever questioned Basic Principle 2, so I expect to be burned at the nearest stake for the following account of recent family events. This Fall my son Greg began studies at a well-known music conservatory. We’ll call his violin teacher “Professor V,” an octogenarian and living legend who still performs and often gets calls from the world’s top soloists seeking performance tips. I went with Greg to his first lesson with Professor V, lasting four hours, during which I directly observed his stamina, clarity of mind, and teaching methods – all since confirmed by Greg in many phone calls and a beautiful essay he wrote about Professor V for a humanities class. Let’s not mince words: Professor V is the most brutal teacher I have ever met. More brutal even than my college mentor-slash-torturer, who used to skewer me intellectually, in public, like the Olympic fencer he had been. Professor V does not give a fig about maintaining the self-confidence and self-esteem of others. From Greg’s essay:

The freshman, visibly nervous, again plays the first bars. Laughing, Professor V interrupts: “You speak the language, but you have no idea what you are saying!” He demonstrates on his violin. “Now play!” The student imitates his teacher’s playing. Professor V shouts, “No! Don’t just copy me! Use your imagination and phrase according to what the composer wrote!”

Compared to Greg’s reports and what I saw, this episode is mild. When a student displeases him, Professor V can explode –in shouts, sarcasm, or both – with the sharpest criticism that I’m sure these young people will ever hear. Students occasionally cry during a lesson. Yet talented young musicians from all over the world flock to Professor V, if he will have them, and most have impressive careers after their time with him. Why? Again, in Greg’s words:

I sense a profound love that Professor V has for his students. All his criticisms, painful as they may be for students to hear, reflect his many decades of performing, teaching, and observing. Today, all is focused on requiring this student to rise to the highest standards and realize whatever promise he may show. To conclude two hours of brisk instruction and unvarnished criticism, Professor V says, calmly, “I want you to succeed. I am on your side. But I am preparing you for the people who aren’t.”

The devotion that his students show, the results that he gets, and the love that he expresses so ferociously – I saw it as well – all lead me to ask, Is it always best for a leader to maintain the self-confidence and self-esteem of others?