people skills edit
Fri, Nov 24, 2023 3:50PM • 28:33
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coaches, people, coach, leadership, leaders, team, skills, great, talk, players, damian, important, interviewed, names, graham, juergen, fun, feel, call, style
SPEAKERS
Nick Montogomery, Allistair McCaw, Paul Barnett, Damian McGrath
Paul Barnett 00:00
Ellisdon record, it's great to see you again. Where are you in the world? And what have you been up to so far today?
Allistair McCaw 00:07
Same as last time, I'm at home here in Florida. Being busy trying to get Book number seven finished before the end of the year, that's always a challenge to especially the last parts of getting a book ready. I'm sure there's a few listeners out there who have maybe had the experience. The easy part is actually writing the book, The difficult part is getting it published and getting it edited and out there. So that's what I've been. That's what I've been up to.
Paul Barnett 00:36
Well, we're going to continue our discussion on leadership themes connected to your writing and your work with sporting organizations all over the world. And the theme this time is people skills, which, as will, I guess, on Earth through this conversation is very, very important in some say more important than strategy. But I want to start, Allister by asking you what do you think people with good people skills do differently?
Allistair McCaw 01:10
Well, this is something that I really had to work on. Especially from from a young age, I was, you know, my background was an individual sports and running and triathlon, and so on. So I was always a loner, so to say I wasn't really involved in teams after after school. So I'd say my social skills got worse and worse over the years, spending lots of time on the road by myself. But if there's something I've seen in, in what makes good people skills is that people genuinely love being around other people, they enjoy the company. And this is something that has, has struck me observing some of the best coaches, best leaders, best managers in the world is that they really enjoy being around others, there's social people, so to say, but that isn't to say that you can't have good people skills. Because I'm, I'm an example of that, as well, where I had to really work on it more. But something that also that comes to my mind is, you know, being more interested in others than trying to be interesting. And what does that mean is that I'm genuinely interested in finding out more about you and getting to know you. And that's something that the great coaches and leaders do as well, instead of trying to be interesting, and instead of me trying to show you what I can do and who I am, I'm more interested in you. And I apologize. For anyone who's listened to maybe one or two of our episodes here on the great coaches podcast, I always mentioned Coach K. And it's something that that really struck me about him coach care, of course of Duke basketball, and he was the USA Basketball Olympic coach, golden medal winning coach. But, you know, my conversations with him is that he was always deeply interested in new, he would always ask a lot of questions. And, you know, I was the one that wanted to ask him him more questions, of course, but you know, great, great leaders, great coaches, they're more interested in others than trying to be interesting themselves. And then one more thing is that they really make other people feel special. They, when you walk out, when I used to walk out of that office, I felt like somebody always felt important in a way and I find that, that's, that's what they do as well, people with good people skills, is they make you feel valued, they make you feel special. Now,
Paul Barnett 03:29
you mentioned listening in there. But if I was to ask you to sort of unpack the key parts, or the individual components of people skills, what kind of things would you list out?
Allistair McCaw 03:43
Definitely awareness, self awareness and social awareness. So how I behave. So my self awareness would be how I behave, how I interact, how I communicate, that's important to know, first of all, and then of course, the social awareness is being more aware of others of where they're at how they're feeling, how they interact. And, you know, we can go deeper and deeper into this with regards understanding other people's cultures differently and their backgrounds, for example. So to be to have good people skills, it's all about understanding understanding of yourself, and understanding of others. And then, of course, empathy comes to mind as well of having compassion and empathy. [PB1]
And this is something which I really am excited about, the more and more we go with leadership, because looking back to when, you know, I was brought up, you know, growing up in South Africa, for example, it was a very much an autocratic style of leadership do as I say, you would get shouted at in, in practice. You know, the way of coaching back back then was was was screaming and yelling and getting reprimanded, and so on and so forth. And we see that these days, that just doesn't work anymore, for example, so to do As a leader, today's coach is more empathetic. They have more compassion, they have better self awareness, they have better social awareness. So those are some of the things that I find are key parts of people's skills. No,
Paul Barnett 05:15
I mean, to that end, let's do we had Nick Montgomery on recently. And Nick is a great underdog story of his championship winning team here in Australia. And he's now he's gone off to Hibbs, in the Scottish league. And he's, I don't even think Nick's 40 yet. So he's got a long career ahead of him as a coach. But when he was reflecting on the great coaches, he'd worked with himself, he was a professional player. He said that man management was the word he used to describe it, which I think is another way of talking about people's skills. And I'll insert Nick talking about exactly what you were just mentioning here.
Nick Montogomery 05:50
That's probably say their word man management, if that's one word or two words, but I just think the way that people manage the staff, the players, the group as a whole, I think that's probably the most important aspects of the successful leaders and coaches in any sport. And that's something that I really try hard over the years to learn from the good ones that I worked with. And you mentioned a few then, as well as I've been fortunate to have to spend time in Mike feeling and people of that caliber. So yeah, it's just amazing to share experiences and to, to learn from people like that.
Paul Barnett 06:31
So Aleister, you, you talk a lot about habits, it's one of the things in your book that really resonates with me small things you can do every day, that make a difference to your overall performance. And I'm wondering, when you reflect on some of these people you've interacted with that have got great people skills? What is it that they do in this habit space? Is there anything that you've seen that they do differently continually, that helps them improve in this area?
Allistair McCaw 07:03
Well, I think you know, in leadership, and in coaching, respect is very important, first of all, but I believe that likeability is your best ability and coaching. You know, player, you speak to players and teams, or even even, you know, teams in the corporate world, they will work harder, and they will push further for a coach or a leader that they like. Respect, of course, is important. But likeability is important as well as it, you've got to, you've got to enjoy somebody's company, you got to delight them, if we just look at, for example, Juergen Klopp, but Liverpool, how he's assembled a group of players that play for him, you can just, you know, I follow a lot of their inside training and, and monitor a lot of their, their off the field work as well. And you can just see, there's a group that just really love enjoy being together. And that's something I've seen in successful teams, corporate or in sports is that they just really, and that's what a good culture is, as well as that you really enjoy going there, you love to be around other people. And, you know, that's important. So likability is, is an important habit. [PB2]
One of the other things I've seen in great leaders and great coaches is how they prepare as well. They're very adaptable, you know, they're able to change to change course very quickly, as well, they there's solution finders, they're not stuck on the problem too long. These are, these are habits that they've built over time as well. They might not get all the decisions right all the time, but they definitely can make a decision. So you know, being decisive is important in it as well.
Also, just, you know, you know, they say that, you know, first impressions last as well as just when you meet. When you meet these kinds of people as well, you really feel a warmth towards them as well, they're, you know, getting back to one of our first points as well as they're really interested in you. I'll keep going back to that as well. By getting to know you asking a lot of questions and you know, that only makes another person feel, feel good about themselves feel special about themselves.
So and another thing, I think, which is important, as well as that they see the good in others, they see that you know, they're not i the old style of leadership, the older code style, leadership was always critical, was always finding what you did wrong and being reprimanded and so on and so forth as where today's leader is, provides feedback and in a different way, with more compassion, more empathy, as we spoke about, but they also they also look for the good, more and we know that appreciation and positive feedback is the best form of motivation there is in in coaching and leadership. So these are some of the things I've observed and seen around some of the best the best teams the best corporates, if I just think for example, was my visits to Brentford football club in London as well. With with Thomas Frey, Anchor, which, who I know that you've interviewed, in fact, it's one of my most favorite interviews of yours. I think it was actually probably the very first episode that I listened to you have Paul was was with Thomas Frank. And when you walk into the building there, you just feel a great culture. You wouldn't know who the leader is there, you wouldn't know who the main person is there everybody. You know, it's just, it's just part of one big family and one great culture and yeah, that's, you know, just observing those type of leaders like like Thomas Frank and, and Juergen Klopp. And Coach K. They, the players love them, they, you know, they, that's why they play hard for them every week. One of
Paul Barnett 10:46
the things I've noticed is, particularly in the great coaches I've interviewed is something that you just did then which is they mentioned your name. And I remember interviewing very early on a gentleman called Damian McGraw, he's a rugby sevens coach, and he was interesting because Damian's brother is also a great coach, he coaches cricket and he, he won the county championship in the UK. But Damian tells this great story about Graham Murray, the Australian Rugby League coach coming over to England, and how before he arrived, he got a list of everybody's name in the club and their partner's names, and he memorized it in day one. And I just thought, What a great way to, as you just say, then to cue into that likability factor when, when someone remembers your name, it's such a powerful idea. I'll insert that, that clip here. So you can hear this, this story about great Marie from Damian,
Damian McGrath 11:38
the man I regard is the greatest coach, and that's great Marie and Australian. So Leeds employed Greg Murray, who had a big success around the NRL clubs in Australia. And I didn't know what to expect, I've never met him, and I received a phone call from him. And we're going back to the 90s. Now before emails and such, like, we're really the accepted form of of how to do things. And we talked for half an hour on the phone, and he gave me a list of things he liked me to do. And one of them was, could I get a list of names of all the staff and players and put it in a letter or a fax, I think it might fax and also get a name of their wives, husbands or partners, and send that across. So I did that to Lee's was, was a big organization, much akin to a soccer club at a commercial department. And in fact, there was a run the Cricket Stadium as well. So it was a big thing. So I did that and sent it over to Graham. When he arrived, we went to pick him up from the airport, and came in and he was laughing. He always laughing always. And it reminded me of Paul Daley. And then fuse YaSM was easy to see and, but he, he made me feel as though I've known him for years, which was a skill in itself. We went into the main office, and he came across and people stood up to come to meet him as the chief exec took him out. And he went over to Dooley in the shop, who's the head of the Leeds rhinos shop, and Gary, Heather into the chief exec said, Oh, Ben Graham, this is Julie. She's the Julie, how are you? How's Paul? Well, you could see your shoulders went back and he knows me, he knows who I am and how easy it did that with about four or five different people at different times in the next hour or so. And he was on circus trick, I suppose a you know, the memory thing. And just by showing an interest in people and those everybody in different parts of the organization thought he knows me, and he knows something about me. And even within that first hour, he had people in the palm of his hand and I thought what what amazing thing to do?
Allistair McCaw 13:41
Well, that was you know, there was something that that Sir Alex Ferguson used to do as well now his style of leadership. It's very interesting. You know, one of my questions is would straight Alex Ferguson style of leadership work today? And it's incredible how many different answers and opinions you get on that as well. Of course, you know, he was incredibly successful at Manchester United for 27 years and coached for generations of of players. You know, he was he was a master at at being able to adapt to situations but you know, always held his values firm and his standards are always very high, and so on and so forth. But, yeah, he made sure everybody knew the names of every single person that Carrington at their training ground. family names, as they, you know, speaking to Phil Neville, who played for Manchester United. He said that Sir Alex remembered everybody's names. Everybody's partner's names their kids. He just said it was just an incredible, incredible trait that he that he had.
Paul Barnett 14:45
What do you think the difference is when? So you've developed these people skills, and you've arrived in a team, but What difference do those skills make? In a thriving team? How is that difference visible?
Allistair McCaw 15:02
You know I if I look here in Florida, for example, there's there's a university Right, right. Right down the road from me called Florida Atlantic University. And there's a coach there called Ricky Gonzalez who's been there I think for probably about 810 years now. And he reminds me a little bit of what Juergen Klopp has done with Liverpool with a limited budget. But just getting a great team together of players that were maybe overlooked from other other colleges, other universities, for example, and, you know, every time I would visit, you know, their practice, I would sometimes just stopped by there, it's, you know, it's down here in Boca Raton. There was only so much always so much fun and laughter at the practice sessions. But there was hard work, there were serious hard work. And this is something I also see with Juergen Klopp, and Liverpool is that when I watch their practices, and when I watched their, you know, their gym sessions, there's just so much there's always so much laughter and fun and camaraderie going on. And that, you know, for me, those are winning teams.
They're very careful of who they select for the team, in terms of not just skill, but just will these players get along with my players I have right now. So they understand those dynamics better. They're not just looking at stats and goals and shots and assists and so on, so forth. They're looking at personality, more than anything. [PB3]
I think in my book, becoming a great team player, I talk about that winning teams or teams that are having fun. And that's an you know, it's like the chicken and the egg theory, well, do you have to start winning to have fun? Or should you have fun first before you start to win, and it's important that the result is taken out of it and more the process of enjoying going to work every day, if that's what you can call it for something that you love to do like sports, for example. But they just thriving, thriving cultures is where there's, there's, there's laughter There's, there's fun, there's enjoyment in the process.
Paul Barnett 17:31
It's fascinating listening to you, because I think I'm starting to form this, this idea that there's a link, particularly from the people I interview around this idea of fun, empowering learning, there is a connection there. That is that is very powerful. And I even see it with my own children, if they're having fun in the classroom. If they're enjoying that environment, their ability to learn and recall goes up. And I think there is great coaches are able to tap into this. I know Steve Kerr talks about about joy, which I guess is a subset of fun, but equally I remember talk when we interviewed Justin Langer. He said, you know, camaraderie is the glue that keeps teams together. And I thought that was such a powerful idea. But it also empowers his people skills. I think it's probably a double edged sword. Absolutely. Ellison. Was there a an event a moment? Was there, someone you met at a project you were on, where you suddenly started to see the value of people's skills amongst the many other competencies that that leaders, leaders and sport leaders in the corporate world need to have?
Allistair McCaw 18:45
Yeah, I would, you know, there's two examples. I'd go back to what I had the pleasure to work with Graham Smith, the South African cricket captain in South Africa, when Graham was 18. And he was just breaking through Of course, he was a very good Junior cricketer as well. He played for South African schools, and he played for the South African Protea team as well under eighteens. And already, then I could tell his, you know, see his leadership skills already back then that he was going to be a fantastic leader, which of course, he kept in South Africa for a long time as well. But just seeing it already, at that age of how he would deal with people and how he would stay calm under under pressure and under under adversity was was very impressive. So that was that was one example. Another example was Carlos Quiros, who has coached the Portugal national football, soccer team football team wherever you are in the world right now. He was Alex Ferguson's number one as well when Ronaldo was at Manchester United. And I got to meet Carlos when he was coaching the South African national team and this was probably back in Gosh, late 90s. And I remember I remember being in the hotel With the players and Carlos came in. And just getting back to one of our previous topics was names. And Carlos came into the hotel now that now the team would usually stay at the hotel was the Intercontinental in in Sandton in Johannesburg. And what, you know, back then maybe I didn't understand leadership as much. But what I remember most is that he remembered everybody's names, the receptionists, the workers, the the janitors, he would go into the kitchen, where he would greet everybody. And of course, you know, being the National Soccer manager, he was an icon. I mean, you'd hear them scream loudly and cheer when you'd go into the kitchen at the hotel. But just the skills, you know, he could have been someone that felt he was important that he would get his room, he would get his key for his room and go straight up to his room because he was super busy. But that was something that really spoke to me about now that is leadership. And you can you could tell that that hotel was just would do anything for that team would do anything for him to make make help them win, for example. So that was for me, a genius. Also, just the way he was with players as well. You know, he was a big big part of Ronaldo coming to Manchester United and of course that was a that was a genius of Sir Alex to bring a Portuguese coach in when he wanted to bring Ronaldo in because obviously call us new. And so yeah, those are two examples of of things that really jumped out to me.
Paul Barnett 21:38
So Alastair, we've talked about being calm. We've talked about laughter, we've talked about names, we've talked about likability, but if I was to put you on the spot, and say, right, one thing we can all do tomorrow to start improving our people skills. What would you recommend?
Allistair McCaw 21:56
I would say be more self aware of, of your conversations of your interactions, your behaviors, how you deal with with people, I think that would be the first thing. So self reflect is a great exercise, especially at the end of the day, or whenever you might feel and, you know, journal, write down some things of how you how you felt you did that day with, with conversations. Self awareness is a massive one, in terms of improving yourself. You know, we say that, you know, how do you become a more positive person, for example, is that you're aware of when you're being negative, that's one of the first steps and you're able to stop that quickly in its tracks, you know, positive, people still get negative. But the difference is that positive people are more aware of it and can change that quicker. So self awareness is a massive one in leadership[PB4] . For me,
Paul Barnett 22:54
I know journaling is something you always talk about, and I think at least 30% of the coaches we've interviewed all talk about journaling as well. I think it's a common practice to against all people that are in this type of high pressure leadership environments. But what about the trigger points? Aleister? What have you noticed about the trigger points when people lose sight of the importance of people skills? And of course, coming to mind is all those coaches throwing things on the sideline and yelling and screaming, which always gives me a little bit of a chuckle. But what are the trigger points that people should be aware of? Where your focus on people skills drops?
Allistair McCaw 23:34
Yeah, I would say definitely pressure, when pressure comes around how you you're able to react, I think that's a massive one as well, that the great leaders, the great coaches are able to stay calm, they're able to step back and analyze it a little bit better than make rational decisions. So definitely, pressure can can change somebody as well. Also, power as well. And being in a position of power can also become problematic as well, where you know, that I could just say, you know, someone like color squares can have the choice of being a very important person, which he is, and, you know, get his key and go up to his room and not want to be bothered with anyone, but you know, he chose to have a different style of leadership of being a people's person. So you know, for me, when we're talking about people skills, call it definitely always come comes to my mind. And then the third one, I'd say would be how they deal with problems. You know, do they blame? Do they complain, too, they point fingers or do they take responsibility? You know, I'm sure you've heard that, you know, great coaches. great coaches are able to endorse and share the accolades with the team when they win, but also take responsibility when they lose, as well which is not always an easy thing to do. You know, especially in today's world of sports, and if we look at premiership, so locker. I think that last season had the highest amount of of coaches getting getting fired or getting sacked. I think it was incredible. I think it was something like 13 or 14 coaches in one calendar season. That that's insane. You know, so yeah, I would say those three things is how they deal with pressure, how they deal with problems, and of course, how they deal with power of being in that position do they do they take advantage of it? Those are three, three trigger points, I believe that can change a leader.
Paul Barnett 25:33
This idea of power is a fascinating one. I know in the book, I think it's Doris Kearns, and may have got her name slightly wrong, the Team of Rivals where she talks about Abraham Lincoln's presidency, and she talks about the fact that he would have a public opinion bath every week. And I thought it was such a great idea of just staying humble and being grounded by listening to people's everyday concerns. At the same time, you're trying to run a game
Allistair McCaw 25:58
Abraham Lincoln used to have, he used to have a 4pm where he would have you know, a few of his councilman, come into the come into the office, and they'd have a Scotch or a brandy, or whatever. And they would sit around and talk about about these types of things as well. So there you have it, you know, we're great leaders are able to share, you know, share it with others as well, instead of, you know, always trying to make the decision themselves. So yeah.
Paul Barnett 26:26
Let's do one final question, if I could, and it's one of the things I love about your writing, actually, in both the books and in social media is your ability to frame questions. And I've talked about this before, when I've interviewed you. And I would like to finish by just asking you, are there any questions that we could be asking ourselves on, as we reflect on our own approach to people skills?
Allistair McCaw 26:53
I think one of the most important questions is How do I want to be seen as a leader? How do I want to be perceived as a leader? Another one is, am I approachable? As a leader, these are I think those are two important questions. So how do I want to be perceived as a leader? So again, that will that will, you know, we've spoken a lot on about self awareness? And am I approachable, and there's a very simple exercise I do with leaders sometimes is, I asked them and, you know, listeners, if you if you want to do this, if you got a pen and paper, it's something I do when I listen to podcasts, always sit with a pen and paper and take down notes. And I've got pages of your, your, from your podcast of your guests, Paul, but is write down three to five key words of how you would like to be seen as a leader. So those key words could be compassionate, they could be a good listener, all these things, but how would you like to be seen? So take three to five key words, write those down. And that's a great way to self reflect at the end of the day, for example, if you're working, that's how you want to be perceived as How did I do? How did I do here? How did I do here, for example, so you know, that's a that's a great way to improve your leadership.[PB5]
Paul Barnett 28:14
Fantastic idea, Alistair, as always, it's great talking to you. I look forward to reading the next book. And going going deep with you on yet another topic connected to leadership. So thank you again for for joining us, Alistair.
Allistair McCaw 28:30
Absolute pleasure. Thanks for having me, Paul.