Process Thinking--Baby Steps & What About Bob

One of our constant messages with our team is "Trusting The Process".. We want a process oriented approach in all that we do versus a result oriented approach.  Coach Meyer always speaks about the movie, saying it should be required viewing for all coaches and players-- "What About Bob"..The following clip illustrates the simple process--of one small action compounded will ultimately lead to the desired vision.

The 10/50 Rule For Improvement

We spoke to our team today about what we call the 10/50 Rule For Improvement.  The message we want them to understand and apply now and throughout their lives is that they must control the controllables.  We want them to play to their strengths and work daily to minimize their weaknesses.  Thus, the 10/50 Rule
10--Improve the things I do well by 10%.
50--Decrease the negatives by 50%.

First, they must dig deep and self analyze. Then we left them with the following thoughts:
•There are certain things within my control.
•Everyone has the ability to reduce what they do negatively towards an outcome
•No one has to do anything incredible
•Everyone knows what they can get better at, and what they need to do less of.
•Do what we are asked to do 10% better.
•Don't let the things that keep you from doing what you need to do occupy your mind.
•Make it happen before it happens.
•It takes work, not luck.

Discipline & Passion Precede The Process

We spend a great deal of time teaching our team to be process vs result oriented.  However, as John Maxwell notes in his "Maxwell's Minute" that no process is strong enough to give us discipline and passion.

Discipline and Passion do not come from the process, they come from the soul.  We must go inside of ourselves to find those two words--Am I a person that wants to make a difference? In my life? In my family's life? In the lives of others?

Go inside find the answers and make the words active in our lives...Then the process will work for you.

The Desire To Win

From the book Wooden:

"Players fifty years ago wanted to win just as much as players today. Foot soldiers a thousand years ago wanted to win the battle as much as combat troops today. Athletes today have no greater desire to win than athletes at the first Olympic games. The desire then and now is the same.

The difference is that everybody worries about it more today because of the media and the attention they give to the question of who's winning and who's losing.

Did I win? Did I lose? Those are the wrong questions. The correct question is: DID I MAKE MY BEST EFFORT? That's what matters. The rest of it just gets in the way.

In classical times, the courageous struggle for a noble
cause was considered success in itself. Sadly, that ideal has been forgotten. But it is well worth remembering.

John Maxwell's Thoughts On Results

In our Game Day Team Meeting we shared John Maxwell's, "Minute with Maxwell" and his thoughts on results.  We talked about Results from the perspective of our Process.

"Amazing that some people are surprised that

they aren't getting some positive return

out of their laziness..."

A few thoughts that we shared from Maxwell to the team:

1. Work Hard & Work Smart
2. Make a list of the things you want to see accomplished at the end of the game, the results you would like to experience.
3. What will you INTENTIONALLY do tonight that will give the results you desire to the at the end of the game.

Wooden & Walsh On The Process

The following was taken from an interview that Steve Jamison did about writing about these two coaches.

 Bill Walsh said the score takes care of itself. And he really meant that. In our conversations, he explained how he placed his emphasis on doing things the right way. His primary focus when he took over the 49ers was not on telling everyone when the team would win the Super Bowl. He talked a great deal about his expectations for everyone in the organization. He wanted players, coaches, and staff members to focus on executing the details of their roles.

John Wooden has some maxims on this topic that I really like. He says, “Little things make big things happen,” and “There are no big things, only an accumulation of little things done well.” He never said, “We will win a championship this year,” or “Our goal is to go undefeated.” He never talked like that. He never announced an audacious goal such as winning a national championship. He focused on doing the right things right now.

Process Oriented Thinking & the GPS

To begin our individual workouts we discussed "process oriented thinking" vs "results oriented thinking".

This battle between "process" and "results" is a constant battle for coaches and players, because we live and work in a result oriented society and work in a result oriented industry.

To make our teaching point, we used the analogy of a GPS. We empasize the next best action. Just as a GPS gives "turn by turn" directions, one at a time, to lead you to a destination.

In our team meeting we set our Vision and Goals for the pre-season, non-conference and season. However, we must focus on the "turn by turn" process to reach our "destination".

Life, just as in driving, offers detours and many times we have to "recalculate", re-route and continue the process to our destination. Some times these detours are because of choices we make, clutter that we allow to interfere with our process and often the detours result from things outside our control.

Nick Saban On Being Great

" I don't think it's normal to be great. I think it's special. The human condition is to be average and to survive. And everybody assumes that everybody wants to be as good as they can be all the time, but that's not true. If that was the case, everybody would be doing fantastic out there. So it's special to be as good as you can be. It's special to work to reach your full potential. It's special to go do it every day, day-in and day-out and never give yourself a break."
--Nick Saban

Results or Excuses

Many years ago, I met a person who gave me a word of advice that I'll never forget. He said, "In life, you either have results or excuses."

I think he was right. But these days ... his advice would not be considered "politically correct." After all, almost everyone these days seems to have a "justifiable" excuse for his/her own lack of results.

Nonetheless, I still think his comment is worthy of consideration ... that "In life, you either have results or excuses."

Think about his comment, and then think about all the people you know. How many of them get all the results they'd like? I'd venture to say ... not very many of them. And I'd also venture to say that one of the main reasons they don't get all the results they'd like is poor time management.

As a consultant and speaker to many, many organizations, I see it all the time. I see lots of activity ... with paltry results. I see people racing to meetings, and I see projects spinning out of control. I see people feeling overwhelmed, living in crisis mode, thinking that every task that crosses their path is somehow "important."
--Dr. Allan Zimmeran

Process Oriented Thinking

Focusing on the Process allows you to remain focused on "What Creates Success". Make sure your Process Focuses: 1. On Taking Responsibility 2. On Controlling What We Can Control 3. On Staying On Purpose 4. Away From Acting On Feelings

Apollo 13 Problem Solving--Noise of a Thousand Crises

Ron Howard discussed his process of Problem Solving in the January issue of Success Magazine. He uses the interviews from the Apollo 13 crew as a basis for his philosophy.

• Develop a process for dealing with problems
• Identify the most important tasks
• Can’t let the “noise of a thousand crises overwhelm me.”
• Lessons from Apollo 13:
--Astronauts, Jim Lovell and Fred Haise kept talking about “working the problem”
--They use that as kind of a mantra..It’s basically that as a test pilot, you’re trained that you could crash your plane and die on one of these test flights. That happens. But if you crash, you’d better crash flipping switches and trying to figure it out. Because every once in a while somebody figures it out 10 feet from the ground. So that notion of clear out all the “stuff” and work the problem is a simple mantra that makes a lot of sense.
--Part of what you have to do is to not avoid the problem.

Reasons You Come Out Of The Game

Reasons You Are Taken Out Of The Game

How many times have you had players ask, "Why did I come out?" or say, "I was afraid you would take me out?" Or my favorite, "The coach took me out for one mistake."
The list goes on and on. We are up front about why and when we substitute. Here are our guidelines:

1. Multiple Mistakes

2. Loaf/ Lack of effort

3. Poor Attitude

4. Sulk, Pout, Pity Party

5. Normal Rotation (rest)

6. Match-Up

The Law Of Attraction

• It’s called the “Law Of Attraction”
o It says that the more we focus on something, the more we think about something, the more it shows up in our lives.
 For instance, every time you buy a new car you start seeing it everywhere on the road.
o Thoughts are magnetic. What we think about, we attract. What we think about expands and grows. What we put our energy and attention on starts to show up more in our life. And the energy we project through our thoughts is the energy we receive.
o It’s important that you spend your time thinking about what you do want rather than what you don’t want. You’ve got to focus.
 Do you know people who all they do is complain? They focus on what they don’t’ want, don’t like and don’t have.
 If you’re complaining you cant be thinking about or creating what you do want.

Thoughts From Butler Head Coach Brad Stevens

Thoughts From Brad Stevens:

1. Understand and believe in greater good.
2. Thad Matta told him to think like a head coach every day, even when he was the director of operations.
3. Learn, Watch, Listen
4. Take lots of time planning practice
5. Doesn’t talk about goals, instead talks about the process.
6. As a head coach, just be yourself.
7. Be authentic.
8. “Soar with your strengths.”
9. Believes in short precise workouts. “Deep practice philosophy”
10. Teach them specific things that are applicable for success on the floor.
11. Come up with new challenges daily, get them to try to achieve something.
12. Every player, every practice has to get up 100 shots in practice, this doesn’t include pre or post practice.

Teaching Mental Toughness

Teaching Mental Toughness

Concentration is the ability to focus on what’s important and let go of everything else.
Identify the most important thing to think about at any given time they’re on the court.
The key to effective concentration is always being in the present moment. A lot of athletes “time travel”—they think about something that happened earlier in the game or what will happen next if they miss their shot.
Everybody loses focus at one time or another, but it doesn’t’ necessarily have to hurt their performance. What hurts performance is when yo lose your focus and don’t bring it back right away. You hang on to the mistake you just made, and that gets you into trouble. Your ability to stay calm under pressure and rebound from setback is a direct result of your ability to concentrate.
One of the biggest mistakes players make is to focus on stuff they have no direct control over, like how good their opponent is, playing time, officiating, things people in the stands are saying, and so on. When you focus on those uncontrollable, three things happen: Your stress level goes up, you get tight and nervous and your confidence level drops.
The best way for coaches to combat a team’s misplaced focus is to define those uncontrollable, collect them into a list and post them in the locker room.
These thoughts apply to all of us as coaches and players.
--From “Teaching Toughness” by R.J. Anderson

Bob Ladouceur's Program Beliefs-- De La Salle

Bob Ladouceur’s Program Beliefs

To be a successful coach—be vigilant and know technique.

His program is based on the belief that if you do everything precisely right, if you make a commitment to your coaches and teammates and sweat through all the grueling hours of workouts and bond with your teammates and play for them and not yourself, winning just happens. It’s a byproduct. But in the end the byproduct isn’t as important as paying attention to the details.

Process Oriented Thinking Examples

As we continue to study and work with our team on process vs result oriented thinking using various resources I went back to some notes from the book Influencer.

Process Oriented Thinking Examples

From the book, Influencer—The Power To Change Anything

By setting small goals (daily monitoring and recording) and meeting them, people will now focus on things that they can see and control. This enhances their sense of efficacy.

Influence masters have long known the importance of setting clear and achievable goals. First, they understand the importance of setting specific goals. People say that they understand this concept, but few actually put the concept into practice. For example, average basketball players set goals to improve their “concentration” (exactly what is that?), whereas top performers decide they need to practice shooting the basketball by holding a high one second follow-through—and they understand each element in holding a proper follow-through.

As part of this focus on specific levels of achievement, tip performers set their goals to improve behaviors or processes rather than outcomes (Process thinking vs Outcome oriented thinking). For example, top basketball performers set process goals aimed at receiving the ball with two hands, with two feet in the air and land in a jumpstop. Mediocre performers set outcome goals such as winning scoring so many points or playing so many minutes.

Another example, players who routinely hit 70% or more of their free throws tend to practice differently from those who hit 55% or less. How? Better shooters set technique-oriented goals such as “Keep elbow in,” or, “Hold a high follow-through”. Players who shoot 55% and under tend to think more about results-oriented goals such as, “This time I’m going to make ten in a row.”