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Leadership. It’s a 24/7 Responsibility

by AdamRingler on February 15, 2011 in Uncategorized with No comments
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The Strength of Many is Greater than the Strength of One

Being a leader isn’t a temporary job.  It’s not season position or a typical nine to five.  It isn’t a trait that you can turn on or off at your disposal.  Being a leader is a permanent characteristic that defines a person.  Coaches often ask for my advice when trying to develop leaders out of their athletes and I often admit that there is no better environment to cultivate leadership growth than the strength and conditioning weight room.  I also find it humbling that many other coaches, much my senior, seek my knowledge and expertise about leadership development.  I credit this personal development to expert mentors who’ve groomed and developed world class leadership experiences for myself to foster in.  I only mention this because leadership is not always a natural process.  As humans, our basic mode for survival often predisposes us to selecting the easiest path of least resistance.  The path of least resistance, however, does little to naturally develop leadership qualities that transfer over to the competitive arena.

At Wichita State, we believe in developing leadership qualities through the combined efforts and struggles shared by a team.  There is no better environment for producing natural challenges that test the physical and mental wherewithal, then the strength and conditioning department.  At Wichita State, there are three foundational principles that all Shocker athletes abide by.

1)      We Are Mentally & Physically Tough

2)      We Don’t Make Excuses And We Don’t Let Others Make Excuses For Us

3)      We Work Hard

These are our most basic levels of principles that I expect out of every single one of our shocker athletes.  From the star athlete to the walk-on redshirt, nobody escapes without meeting those expectations.   You would imagine a strength coach to be overly concerned with developing physical strength; however, I am not impressed by amazing increases of physical strength.  I’m concerned and impressed by the increases of mental strength.  Wichita State athletes are bound to become both physically and mentally stronger through systematic training programs.  Shocker athletes will not make excuses for failing to prepare nor will they accept the false excuses given by fellow teammates.  Finally, Wichita State athletes will go above and beyond and work extremely hard to accomplish their goals.

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Decisions are made by thinking about the team, rather than oneself.

Those selected individuals who are being groomed as team leaders have even higher expectations from our strength and conditioning department.  It is my belief that successful team leaders lead by doing two things;

1)      Accomplish the mission

2)      Protect The Team

First, without a second of hesitation, successful team leaders accomplish the mission through any adversity that is faced.  What I mean by this is that successful leaders, no matter the circumstances, consistently get the job done.  If a task is given to a leader, it is executed.  If I asked the leader to fulfill a particular role, they do it.  If I ask them to confront a teammate, they confront.  Successful leaders do whatever it takes, to accomplish the mission given to them.

Secondly, successful team leaders protect the team.  Understand the orders of these are absolutely critical. Make no mistake; the most successful leaders will sacrifice feelings and emotions for accomplishing the mission.  At the end of the day, leaders execute in order to accomplish the mission.  Good team leaders, however, also protect the team by saying what others don’t want to, and demanding expectations that others won’t.

Leaders protect the team by several different means.  Successful leader protect the team by demanding nothing but the best out of every single teammate.  They don’t allow for excuses to be made nor do they make excuses for others. Leaders also take responsibility for when a plan does not go smoothly.  We groom our leaders after a defeat, to address the team by taking responsibility for the loss.  A teammate’s failure to follow directions or execute a plan is collectively the responsibility of a team leader.  Leaders also give credit to the team when a plan is properly executed.  They naturally take responsibility and credit for the failures and give credit to the team for victories.  Make no mistake; successful leaders will confront others if they are not carrying out the expectations of their responsibility to the team.  Leading is about being comfortable with being alone.  Having the mental strength to stand alone and carry the pressure and burdens of accepting responsibility for defeat and having the ego and capability of giving away credit in times of victories.

We prepare our Wichita State athletes to be great team leaders and great team mates. Be certain, we prepare our shocker athletes, every single day, to fill either role.

How to Lose Talent Within an Organization

by AdamRingler on February 10, 2011 in Uncategorized with No comments

Introduction

Michael Fertik wrote an excellent article titled “Managing Employees in Their Twenties” in the Harvard Business Review last month.  What I enjoyed about Michael’s blog post was the simple to read tips about what it is that keeps talented employees in their mid-twenties within the same company.  Michael went on to write about writing about what motivates these younger employees and what I’m attempting to synthesize further is what influences younger employees to leave a company.

Looking at a topic or an article in reverse often forces readers to completely understand the topic through a different perspective.  As most coaches know, sometimes it takes explaining a drill or exercise different that allows for the athlete to ‘get it’.  This is my coaching attempt to explain this article from a different perspective.

Failing to Provide Educational Growth

Generation-Y is more enthused by having an opportunity to grow educationally rather than financially.  There is obviously some wiggle room on this one as everybody loves extra change in their pockets.  Despite small raises and additional increases to the salary, Generation-Y is more concerned with having an opportunity to learn through educational workshops, conferences, and clinics. Don’t think for a second that a small raise is enough to keep talented employees.  Generation-Y is more likely to accept lower paying positions if the position provides more opportunities to educationally grow.

Not Giving Enough Challenge

If there is a sense of learned helplessness or a loss perception of control, there is a higher chance that the talent will leave.  How do you increase the perception of control and keep Generation-Y from getting stagnant with the mundane?  Provide challenging opportunities for the employee to persevere through.  I’m not suggesting making anything tough for the sake of it, I’m suggesting throwing them into the deep end and allowing the younger people to figure it out on their own.  Allow for the younger employees to sort it out and figure it out on their own. After they conclude, give immediate feedback as post-mortems are excellent ways to accelerate learning.

Generation-Y expects to work hard and have less day-to-day ‘fun’, but they do so not for a paycheck, but to develop further marketable skills that align themselves to a further trajectory for their careers.

Not Publicly Rewarding Great Performance

Failing to give public praise of Generation-Y is likely to produce employees looking for the door. Highlight the great accomplishments of those who are exceeding performance expectations.  Failing to publicly addresses Generation-Y (who thrives off personal growth and acknowledgment) is a recipe for disgruntled employees looking for the next nirvana.

Not Inquiring Feedback or Asking Questions

The Perception of Control and Perception of Competency are two factors hugely related to intrinsic motivation of a task. Intrinsic motivation versus extrinsic motivation is the incentive to undertake an activity based on the expected enjoyment of the activity itself, rather than external benefits that might result.  Asking questions about projects or tasks related to their global picture allows for Generation-Y to feel like they are contributing to the bigger picture.  Failure to ask for feedback places a barrier between Generation-Y and ‘the power’ and results in a decrease of intrinsic motivation.  If the younger people no longer are doing the task out of enjoyment, they are doing it for extrinsic benefits (a salary) and will likely look at other companies that offer more lucrative benefits.

Not Inviting Interaction with Others

Generation-Y grew up with the internet, cell phones and text messaging.  As a result of this technology, this generation is a bit reluctant to seek personal interactions with others.  Failing to invite personal interactions with others will make Generation-Y feel isolated and confined to their sector of the company.

Forgetting to Give Personal Attention

Failing to remember the smaller details of the employee’s personal life sends a message that the manager only cares about performance.  Generation-Y is concerned with a sense of belonging and a failure to recognize the individual behind the company’s performance will likely result in the younger employees seeking companies that do recognize the person.

Creating False Praise for Performance

This is the easiest way to ruin feedback immediately.  Generation-Y is keen on recognizing fake praise and feedback.  As identified above, this generation is focused on personal growth rather than financial growth, and ‘faking’ praise will go against the grain of what they are striving to achieve.  If you fake it, they will recognize and have contempt.  If you initially burn the bridge, they will no longer trust your word when you actually ‘do’ mean it. Be authentic.

Neglecting Long-Term Rewards

Personal growth and rewards don’t come over night.  Providing immediate gratification in terms of short-term pay increases and incentives will overshadow the aspect of long term personal growth.  Emphasize the idea of developing the employee ‘long term’ rather than rewarding the employee ‘short term’, and Generation-Y will value the company more.

Setting Long Term Goals and Failing to Set Short Term Goals

While Generation-Y sets long term goals on personal development, they need to managed with short term goals due to growing up in the internet-fast-pace world.  Blame Facebook or social media for Generation-Y’s short term attention span but the facts remain simple, short term goals work.  Think of about this way, more 20-somethings just finished their undergraduate or graduate programs where weekly or monthly goals, papers, or homework was due.  Generation-Y then graduates with a degree and we throw them into a corporate world where they have annual goals to accomplish versus what they have been doing for the past 20 years of their academics.

Keeping Poor Performers Around

Nothing is more corruptive to the personal growth of Generation-Y then seeing the acceptance of poor performance.  This generation is cut throat and watching ‘fake praise’ or the acceptance of those who do not perform sends a message from management that ‘performance doesn’t matter’.  When management sends that clear message, it is often translated to ‘the work that you do, and the efforts that you give, doesn’t matter’.  Can we predict an immediate drop of motivation?  Absolutely!

Keeping Toxic People Around

One bad egg can completely ruin the rest.  The acceptance of toxic entities in a corporation is even more damaging then the person themselves.  Have the ability to properly manage and cut ties when faced with a potential bad egg.

Managing Younger Employees like Older Employees

Understand that Generation-Y isn’t motivated by the same factors that 30 year olds are.  401K’s, HMO’s, ROTH IRA’s, and Long Term Financial investments aren’t going to sound like the Holy Grail to a 20-29 year old.  If you want to effectively manage younger employees then you must first understand their interests and what motivates them.  If we already know that Generation-Y is more influenced by learning and personal growth, perhaps offer learning or continuing education incentives.

Conclusion

I think wrapping this article up is best done in an article quote by Douglas LaBier, Ph.D.  In LaBier’s article “Gen X and Gen Y — How They’re Driving The New “4.0″ Career”, he goes on to write the following:

[box]Younger workers: “These older people just don’t get it. They expect us to just fall into line, follow bureaucratic rules, and they don’t show us respect for what we know or what we can do.”

The older workers: “These young people just don’t understand how to function within an organization. They want recognition, promotion, everything before they’ve earned it, step-by-step, like we had to do. That’s not how reality is.”

They remind me of a couple who said about each other, “It’s not that we see things differently. It’s worse than that: We’re seeing different things!”

-Douglas LaBier, Ph.D.[/box]

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Why Are They Still Crunching?

by AdamRingler on February 5, 2011 in Uncategorized with No comments

Why are athletes still crunching for core development but more importantly why are coaches still programming abdominal crunches and sit-ups?  I don’t think both parties are doing it to spite researches like Stuart McGill, but I got to believe that athletes and coaches just don’t know any better.  I’ll buy the ignorant card.

I know there are some people out there that simply cannot wrap their heads around discontinuing crunches and sit-ups despite the plethora of research.  The most common thing I hear from people initially is that “Adam, it doesn’t currently hurt my back – why must I stop?”  I often think that people sometimes do not look at the entire effect of what crunches and sit-ups really do.

Rarely in athletics and the world itself, does the core function to “crunch” together.  The only time I really think I ever crunch in my daily life is getting out of bed.  So the first understanding needed is that the core is not designed to crunch together.  When doing a crunch, the muscle that is being developed is the rectus abdominus, however, the important fact is that is wrongly pulling the rib cage down or depressing the ribs.

This downward pull sets off a cascade of other events that result in the loss of thoracic spine extension.   If you followed much of my blog, you will know that I stress and write frequently about how important thoracic spine mobility is to both the stability of the scapulae and lumbar spine.   Athletes and coaches need to realize that with the trade off with utilization of the crunches for core development, we’re losing thoracic extension with every sit up.  Is a sit up really that effective and important that we’re willing to risk limited thoracic spine mobility, poor scapulae positioning, glenohumeral inpingement, the ability of overhead pressing, and back squatting?  Not a chance!

What I do at Wichita State’s Strength and Conditioning department, I focus on developing proper core strength through utilization of a multi-mode and multi-directional set of principles that focus four movement patterns.

The first three of the four movement patterns consist of resisting against an external weight while maintaining a neutral spine throughout the movement patterning.

  • Anti-Extension
  • Anti-Lateral Flexion
  • Anti-Rotation

The fourth movement pattern remains the only movement that resembles any flexion based movements at the hip.  The important take home message of this category is to notice that our athletes are executing hip flexion rather than lumbar flexion.  We requires our athletes to lock the lumbar spine in a neutral spine position by contracting their abdominals.

  • Hip Flexion with Neutral Spine

In conclusion, you will not find our athletes performing lumbar spine flexion during any of our workouts.  I also don’t allow it at our facility if an athlete so chooses to “do extra”.  It would be the same thing if an athlete asked if he/she could repeatedly run full-speed head first into a wall.  Would you allow it?  Absolutely not, they certainly would become injured over time.  Then why are we doing the same for crunches?  Do athletes/coaches not know any better?

“Disc herniation is associated not only with extreme deviated posture, either fully flexed or bent, but also with repeated loading in the neighborhood of thousands of times, high-lighting the role of fatigue as a mechanism of injury.” (Gorden et al.,1991; King, 1993).”

“While much ergonomic effort has been devoted to reducing spine loads, it is becoming clearer that repeated spine flexion- even in the absence of moderate load-will lead to discogenic troubles. Furthermore, recent evidence shows that the direction of the bending will determine the location of the annulus damage.” (Aultman et al., 2005)

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Preparing Athletes From the Neck Down & The Neck Up

by AdamRingler on January 28, 2011 in Uncategorized with No comments

Be a Team Player

Despite what the formal Wichita State Strength & Conditioning job description specifies, part of my responsibility is protecting the WSU teams’ integrity from opponents and from within.  This may mean preparing the team for the physical and mental difficulties that they will face on the field/court/course. This also means setting up the athletes for future success by developing leaders within the team.  I do both tasks by addressing a multitude of different facets within our Strength and Conditioning program.

Physical Preparation

I proud myself and our program’s integrity by our efforts of staying on the edge of current research in the strength and conditioning industry.  The monetary, time, and effort sacrifices made by myself and our staff to continuing education, attending seminars, dissecting research and connecting with the best in the strength and conditioning field is well worth the effort.  Our athletes are training using cutting edge methods, research based methods in combination with a series of philosophies and principles that guide our program.

The strength & conditioning program at Wichita State is focused on two central goals. First, our program is based around injury prevention, and secondly, enhancing the development of performance potential.  We accomplish the first goal through utilizing the latest researched based modalities and recommendations of training.  We take the clinical research and the “in the trenches” experiences from colleagues like Mike Boyle, Bret Contreras, Gray Cook, Stuart McGill, Eric Cressey, Mike Robertson, Bill Hartman, and an ongoing list of other professionals who are all exceedingly the smartest people in the field.

Mental Preparation

We accomplish our second goal, enhancing the development of performance potential, by using strategies that affect the neck down and the neck up.  When I write about affecting the “neck down”, I mean training the body from a physiological standpoint using multi-modality, multi-joint, multi-planar, and multi-set approach.  Our training is extremely physical but is appropriately periodized around the competitive needs of our athletes. The often missing component of a team based strength and conditioning program, is affecting the “neck up” or the mental component of our athletes.

Having worked along the side of sport psychologists, we utilize our strength and conditioning environment to empower our athletes by continuing raising the bar and expectations and allowing them to compete against their self, their willpower, and their fortitude.  We’ll do team challenges that force our athletes to rely on the strength of the team rather than the strength of one individual.  How many times have you heard that?  I want our athletes all walking in lockstep.  I’m not interested in developing a collection of individuals who all play the same sport; I want to develop the best TEAM.  Watching fellow teammates struggle, compete, and fight through adversity allows for the team to bond through shares adversity and struggle.

The Mental Component to Training Athletes

We instill our Wichita State athletes with four strategies to help them overcome the fear, anxiety, and struggles of competing at an extremely high level of performance.  These four strategies are the same methods that highly trained Navy Seals use while during training missions and in field combat operations.

Goal Setting: In the same way that Navy Seals go through the daily grind of BUDs by micro-goal setting, we encourage our athletes to micro-goal set.  I do expect an athlete to go from pressing 100lbs to 300lbs overnight, but we set up micro-goals for accomplishing feats of strength and condition.  Can we add 0.5lbs to the bar today? Can we add another 0.5 the next training session?  These micro-goals add up over time and make the most impossible tasks seem palpable. I encourage our athletes to do the same while competing. Setting up micro-goals for competition allows athletes to remain focus of the mission at hand, or the micro-goal, while the chaos of the competition ensues.

Visualization: I want our athletes to visualize having successful outcomes and achieving their micro-goals. Successful sport performance and sport psychology research has a strong correlation with the use of visualization strategies in preparation for competitions.  Whether the means our athletes use visualization to “see” themselves successfully executing the exercise or achieving success through micro-goal setting.

Self-Talk: We don’t allow our athletes to use negative self-talk.  We train our athletes to continue using positive self-talk even while struggling through the most rigorous adversity and struggle.  We know that humans use a high rate of self-talk while completing tasks.  If we can train our athletes to use positive self-talk while accomplishing or struggling through tasks, it helps our athletes remain confident and allows for their will and fortitude to not diminish.

Arousal Control: There are times that we setup impossible goals for our athletes and ask them to continue attempting to achieve the criteria. We do not do this to be mean, cruel, or punish athletes.  We do this to train their mental capability by giving them an opportunity to control their arousal.  I often train this arousal control mechanism under the guise of competition.  During these “mental training” drills, I will routinely call out winners who clearly did not win a race in order to test the arousal control or fortitude of the athlete who should have won.  Some athletes react by competing harder on the next race – these athletes pass the mental test and understand how to control their arousal.  Other athletes who fail to recognize their emotions will react with anger by thinking I’m being unfair.  With these athletes, I will share the identity of the true nature of the mental drill.  The drill or mental exercise is about controlling and channeling this arousal in a nature that is productive.  It’s showing that the athlete has the maturity to understand that not every call the umpire or referee will be fair.  I hate to say this but not every call in sports goes your way and it’s up to the team and the athletes to respond maturely and professionally.

Conclusion

These are just the few ways we continue to train our athletes to be some of the best in the Missouri Valley Conference. I believe it is the mission to train our athletes to be both physically and mentally prepared for the challenges of competition ahead.  It’s my coaching philosophy to

“Know the person, teach the student, train the athlete, motivate the competitor and lead the player.” Whether all those responsibilities are actually in my job description, I don’t mind taking them on.  It’s part of being a coach. It’s part of my passion.

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Applying the Five Levels of Leadership

by AdamRingler on January 18, 2011 in Uncategorized with No comments

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What The Five Levels of Leadership Are

Level 1: Position (Power) – Given by Company
People Follow Because they Have to.

Level 2: Permission (Relationships) – Earned
People follow because they Want to.
People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.

Level 3: Production (Results) – Earned
People follow because of what you have done for the organization.

Level 4: People Development (Reproduction) – Earned
Team follow because of what you have done for them.
Loyalty begins to develop.

Level 5:  Personhood (Respect) – Given by People
Team follow because of who you are and what you represent.
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[box]

Climbing the Steps of Leadership

Step 1: The higher you go, the longer it takes.

Step 2: The higher you go, the higher the level of commitment.
Your commitment to your team, and the team’s commitment to you.

Step 3: The higher you go, the easier it is to lead.

Step 4: The higher you go, the greater your success.

Step 5: You never leave a level below, you build on it.

Step 6: As a leader, you won’t be on the same level with all of your team.

Step 7: You must work to carry other leaders with you up the steps.

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[box]

The Three Key Levels of Influence and Leadership

Level 2: Permission Level
Your ability to connect with your team.
(Getting your teammates to work for you, when they are not obligated)

Connecting Thoughts on Level 2
1. Connecting with People Begins with Caring for People.
2. Connecting with Teammates Continues by Communicating with Teammates.
3. High Achievers Cared about Teammates And Results.

The HELP Method
H: Offer Hope
E: Offer Encouragement
L: Care and Love for Your Team
P: Increase their Personal Value

Level 3: Production Level
Your ability to lead your teammates and the team.

Level 4: People Development Level
Your ability to grow and train your teammates.
[/box]

Three Questions You Must Ask Yourself and the Team

1. What’s Our Dream?
2. Who’s On The Team?
3. What Should My Dream Team Look Like?

The Team Determines the Dream.  The Quality of the Team Determines the Quality of the Dream.  Your Team must be equal or exceed the dream.

The Law of the Bench

Great Teams have Great Depth

Future of a Team can be Predicted by Three Things

1. Recruitment: Who is joining the team?
2. Training: Are the team members being developed?
3. Losses: Who is leaving the team?

Keys to Finding and Keeping Great Teammates

1. Recruit them Strategically.
2. Develop them Continually.
3. Place them Correctly.
4. Value them Highly

 
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