Leadership - aka customised customer service (where your team are your customers...)
Updated: Oct 4, 2024
Through the lens of directing and sports
Here MBJ alludes to a very important concept in leadership, the realisation that the individuals that make up a team tend to need to be motivated and managed differently in order to best position them for collective successful outcomes. A personalised, tailored approach is critical in leveraging empathy to make your team feel seen, heard, understood and valued.
Tom Brady references a similar approach, from leadership in the sports context:
"I would try to connect with that player on a level that he's really interested in, that he can relate to. I want to find out about what's going on with him in his life and why he's feeling the way he's feeling, then try to rationalise things, to a degree, and say, 'I understand what you're saying, but from my standpoint, this is how I see it.' So it's about creating that connection through that relationship that you're building with those particular receivers.... That's why it's very important to understand there are emotional aspects of every athlete as well. We often evaluate athletes only on their physical ability."
Couldn't have said it better (so I won't), I'll simply end off with another great, referencing the same tool in leadership, being essential to his playbook:
Sir Alex Ferguson also attributed a key part of his success in leadership to his ability to build deep personalised relationships with the teams he lead by understanding players' families, circumstances, upbringing and ultimately, what motivates them. As Chat-GPT put it, "He paid close attention to players' personal lives, recognising that what happened off the pitch influenced their performance on it. This attention to detail helped him connect with his players on a deeper level, allowing him to motivate them based on personal circumstances, rather than using a one-size-fits-all approach".
Unexpected sources for business strategy and leadership - entertainment (film and sports) - demonstrate once again how a diverse information diet is crucial to creativity. As Ann Bordesky puts it in her article, The Ambidextrous Career (LINK), our creativity can often benefit from exploring interdisciplinary experiences. And in this case, from interdisciplinary exploration we find that the one thing business leadership, directing, quarterback play and managing a football club have in common, is the need for a customised, tailored, personalised leadership approach.
Full videos:
Comments