Secrets to Becoming a Leader: Discover a Lifetime of Lessons Learned On and Off the Field

INTRODUCTION

As each of us takes our journey through life, we move in and out of various roles. Some of these are common to most people: child, student, neighbor, spouse, parent, coworker, and friend. As teens and then as adults, we take on more specific roles: musician, stockbroker, rancher, chef, counselor, nurse, and so on. I have been blessed to take on a wide variety of roles in my lifetime. I have been a professional athlete, a coach, a congressman, a teacher and an administrator. I have been a leader in various capacities, a public figure, a father and a husband—and a fisherman.

It is my hope that, through it all, I have been able to serve.

For me, leadership begins with being a servant. It is not about accolades, power or prestige. It’s about serving over selfishness. This may sound like very idealistic thinking, as we live in a very me first society. Servanthood is often the last thing people think about. But I am firmly convinced that the key to unlocking the secrets of great leadership begins with the art of service. All the principles I outline in this book focus around this truth.

Great leadership doesn’t happen overnight. It is a process cultivated over time. I think it’s important to note that I never consciously said, I want to be a leader. Generally speaking, I’ve sought more responsibility in every role I found myself in. As an assistant coach, I wanted to have the responsibility of being a head coach. When I retired from coaching, I thought I could still do something of use and considered going to Washington. I always wanted to be in a position to make my time and efforts count the most, to serve others in some way and ultimately make a positive difference in society.

My life is about developing and using whatever abilities I have to the fullest. I have always wanted to fulfill the opportunities I was given; I didn’t want to waste them. I certainly didn’t want to look back at the end of my life with regrets concerning things I could have done or should have done.

The secrets of great leadership begin with wanting to take responsibility and to impact those around you, to live your life in service to others. It is my hope that, as I share with you many of the lessons I have learned in my leadership roles, you will be inspired to create a foundation for the leadership role you will play in the future or to enhance the quality of how you lead others today. Each of us is given many opportunities to lead, and you are no exception. I hope that this book will cause you to look at leadership from what may be a different perspective, which will benefit those around you.

LEADERSHIP STYLES

There are effective leaders and there are ineffective leaders—and I’ve been both at one time and another. I think that one thing I’ve had going for me is that I have always tried to learn from my mistakes. I believe that this is an essential quality for anyone who desires to grow into effective leadership.

I have been in various leadership positions for many years, and that means I’ve had plenty of chances to make mistakes and learn from them. I have also had a lot of time to observe both effective and ineffective leaders at work and to learn from their mistakes and successes. One thing I have noticed: worldview and effective leadership are often linked. In the leadership courses I’ve taught over the years, I have tried to help my students make this connection because I think it is so important.

How a person leads is greatly influenced by his or her understanding of the world. Leaders are called on each day to make decisions that affect the lives of many people, and those decisions must be based on a foundation more solid than feelings, opinion polls or personal preferences. This is why I believe that worldviews are inextricably tied to leadership.

When I was coaching, we began each season by gathering our coaching staff to write our coaching philosophy for that season. What principles would we adhere to in dealing with players, staff members and each other? What values would we model to our athletes? We also collectively wrote our offensive and defensive philosophies. Were we an attacking or a reading defense? Offensively, did we emphasize the run or the pass?

A mental picture of what our program should look like preceded playing the games. In a similar way, a worldview precedes how we live our lives. As a Christian, I understand there are principles we are meant to live by, aligned with good instead of evil, and that realization is what transforms us from the inside out. If you trust a moral authority that transcends your own feelings, opinions and experiences, you will usually make decisions based on that worldview and live life according to those principles.

The same is true as it concerns leadership in business, politics, community and family. As we explore the characteristics of several different kinds of leaders, keep this connection between worldview and leadership in mind.

Laissez-Faire Leaders

I believe there are three basic approaches to leadership. The first is a laissez-faire (hands-off) approach, which is, in a sense, an absence of leadership. You might say, Well, that really isn’t a type of leadership, but I would answer that there are a lot of people who have the title of leader but who really avoid leading. When they are pressed into making a decision, they often boycott their own leadership.

I saw this in politics quite often. For example, a governor who has pledged not to raise taxes may choose to defer to the state legislature when a severe economic crisis reduces tax revenues to the point that there is no option left but to raise taxes. The State Patrol, Medicaid recipients, schools, roads and other entities require state money and can’t endure cuts beyond a certain point, so the governor forces the legislature to find ways to keep the state running, which means tax increases. The governor then vetoes these tax increases and keeps his pledge to his constituents, knowing full well that the legislature will have to override the veto and take the political hit. The point is, however, that someone has to decide which taxes to raise and by how much, how the revenues will be allocated, and which programs will be cut or streamlined. Laissez-faire leadership lets someone else make the tough decisions.

Laissez-faire political leaders are concerned about protecting their image at all costs, so you can never be sure where they stand on an issue. They take a poll, find out what people want to hear, and then make decisions based on what will get votes or approval ratings. It’s a popularity contest in which they seize on those things that seem to resonate with people—their hot buttons. They refuse to take a position on the tough issues, or they only give a vague response when asked to comment on a particular concern, which allows them to straddle the fence.

Many laissez-faire leaders avoid responsibility by appointing a committee. I once knew a football coach who hired offensive and defensive coordinators who made all the calls during a game. The head coach would never make a decision himself but would criticize the coordinators unmercifully if their calls didn’t work. As a result, the coordinators were unwilling to take necessary risks and limited themselves to safe calls that were less likely to draw fire from the head coach.

You can’t lead that way. As a leader, you have to take responsibility for decisions you make—whether they work out or not. I saw this behavior exemplified in University of Nebraska head coach Bo Pelini after the painful loss we had against Missouri in 2008. Some coaches would have come into the locker room and screamed or cursed at the players. Bo came in and said, I gave you a game plan that was too complicated for you to execute. That’s my fault. He offered encouragement to his players and shouldered the blame when he later met with the press. This gesture solidified his assistant coaches and his players. They knew that they would not be sacrificed to appease the fans.

In business, I see leaders who are reluctant to tackle