trust lesson final
Thu, Jun 01, 2023 4:03PM • 16:17
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
trust, coach, team, athletes, great, teammates, high performing team, build, friends, relationships, friendship, players, interview, responsibility, people, brenda, conversations, spent, sport, volleyball coach
SPEAKERS
Emma Markwell, Andy Friend, Bas DeBruin, Brad Dubberly, Paul Barnett, Hugh McCutcheon, Tanya Oxtoby, Brenda Frese, Tracey Menzies
Paul Barnett 00:00
Welcome to the lessons from the great coaches podcast. I've learned that you don't do it alone,
00:06
you learn so many different things from so many different coaches. That's an elite learning environment.
00:13
How you deal with how to be resilient, how important it is to infuse joy in the process of learning. To be a good candidate, you've got to do more than you take.
00:24
What an interesting way it is to be a leader.
Paul Barnett 00:28
My name is Paul Barnett, and you are listening to the great coach's podcast, where we explore leadership through the lens of high performance sport, by interviewing great coaches from around the world, to try and find ideas to help all of us be better leaders. We started this podcast because we wanted to have better conversations with our families around the dinner table. In a social media world, where the goal is often to be the star of the show. We wanted to change the conversation and talk more about selflessness, leadership, and responsibility. And the people we knew who best exhibited these qualities were great sports coaches. As the podcast has grown, the great coaches we have interviewed have shared so much insight and wisdom that we decided to create episodes dedicated entirely to the lessons that have resonated with us the most. Today's episode is on the topic of trust. And it features a selection of coaches that we have interviewed over the last few years on the podcast.
01:29
The lessons from the great coaches podcast,
Paul Barnett 01:31
if we are lucky, we learn how to trust from the moment we are born. Our cries are interpreted by our caregivers. And our needs are promptly met. And from here, we begin to navigate the world with a trust first mentality. But every now and again, someone like Bernie Madoff and his $65 billion Ponzi scheme comes along and reminds us that wild crust is innate, and has helped us survive as a species. It is also flawed and open to abuse. On my walk to work lately, I've been thinking a lot about trust, how it might be impacted now that for many of us, our working life is remote and online. And in particular, how we will rebuild trust, when it inevitably becomes frayed by looming deadlines and Miss targets. I am sure that physical presence in a space like the office will still be required. But it won't be full time. And we will need to find new ways to build and maintain connections, relationships and trust when we are actually there. When the great coaches talk about trust, they describe it as the currency that makes the team work. And how it is the role of the team leader to ensure that this currency continues to have value. defining how that will happen, is now the task ahead of us. And like all things, it is the speed with which we can test and learn that will define the most successful organizations and teams. Here his gold medal winning volleyball coach, Hugh McCutcheon explaining his view on the currency of trust, and the different types of trust that exist within a high performing team.
Hugh McCutcheon 03:16
First and foremost, the athlete has to trust themselves, his skill set, they want to be able to be in those big moments and know that they've got the skills required to be able to execute those moments versus hope. And so to that end, as a coach, being able to help them to develop that fundamental mastery is a really important part of them developing trust within themselves so they can trust their game. And then second of all, I think in team sports anywhere they go to trust your teammates. And so I'm a big believer in giving the team relationships, some boundaries and some structure. So I think it's important that teammates friendly, for example, but we don't need everyone to be best friends. And in fact, the idea that we would all be best friends is probably a little at the very least naive, but we can be respectful and inclusive and direct and honest, and in all of these things that I think are really important for developing trust, because there's some authenticity in those relationships that we need. And then finally, they've got to trust you as the coach and to be a coach that I guess cultivates trust, you have to be trustworthy. So like I said, a credible source of knowledge and information about your sport. Do you have character and integrity? Are you consistent in terms of your emotional control, all that kind of stuff. And I think that right trust is the currency that makes it work. But I think you need trust in all of those realms to really make it job to really make it happen. And as the coach of course, like we said, you've got a responsibility you set the temperature in the room so you being trustworthy and you really investing in those relationships and and really caring about those in terms of as coaches, we're service providers, right, and the service that we provide is to help these people become the best they can be. Well, you've really got to take that responsibility seriously.
Paul Barnett 04:58
And the friend is A rugby union coach. And he also uses an economic analogy to describe trust. He says that your job as a coach is to build a bank account of trust with your team. And he goes about building it through spending more of his time with individuals than with the wider group, which is an idea I've taken from Andy and tried to build into my own leadership routines.
Andy Friend 05:24
I think, again, as a young coach, you want to try and solve the world, you want to try and fix everything you know, and I threw myself into every little bit of detail around a breakdown around a line out around scrum around attack, play, defense play, and I took my eye off the ball, which was you know, to me, coaching is all about relationships, it has to be, it has to be about building this, I call it the bank account of trust with your, with your coaches and with your players. But if you become a keyboard warrior, and you keep your head in the keyboard, and you don't build as relationships, you never get to the end of it. So I know the game, but I coach the individual, think about the individual keep thinking about the individual. So probably my time at the moment, probably my time at the moment, I'd be spending 70% of it with the individual. And that's every individual player and 30% of it looking at the footy and because I got other good coaches around me now that that support me in doing that. So I spend more of my time now on the individual than I do on on the game itself and the detail.
Paul Barnett 06:22
Tracy Menzies is a swimming coach, and coached one of the greatest swimmers the world has ever seen in in Thorpe. When she talked to us about trust, she used the analogy of having to find the right key to open the door that unlocks an athlete's potential.
Tracey Menzies 06:41
I sort of explained it to one of my athletes the other day, as a door, I said we had the key to the door. Some athletes might only have one door, some athletes may have multiple doors. And as a coach, you've got to find the right key that opens the right doors for them to be able to develop and to be able to pursue the best abilities. And as a coach, I think that's the thing that you've got to be able to read the person and get that trust, I think is really important.
Paul Barnett 07:18
When it comes to building trust, though, one of the best places to start is with empowerment. Here is the Olympic gold medal, wheelchair rugby coach bred doubly talking about passing control to the players, and how this impacted confidence and trust.
Brad Dubberly 07:35
So it was just the athletes could actually play what was in front of them, they knew that I back then had the confidence in him and just made it so much easier to operate and enjoy yourself. So I suppose yeah, being ahead of the curve having athletes and lineups that other teams just couldn't run with and couldn't compete with, but also having our athletes just having so much confidence, knowing that I trust them. And yeah, understanding the game plan really just made it so much easier. I guess. I think a lot of coaches really try to control too much stuff instead of putting their confidence and trust in your athletes to allow them to play within their means and and really try to take some ownership of it.
Paul Barnett 08:15
Brenda Frese is an American basketball coach, who led her team to the NCAA division one championship. And she spoke to us about a key building block of trust, being the consistency of your behaviors, as you interact with people.
Brenda Frese 08:31
But I think the trust is it's an everyday consistent pattern I always share like who you are as a person is a reflection of every single day of how you behave with your professors, how you behave in practice, do you come to practice early? Do you stay late to work on your game, and I think that's no different. When you talk about a coaching staff, those interactions that you get every single day, whether that's face to face, whether that's sending a text message, having those conversations within a season when you're working through where a player might be at that point in the season. So think it's just a daily constant consistent pattern that they know they can trust you and you can trust them just with the conversations that you've been able to have to build that trust. And
Paul Barnett 09:18
trust acts as a sort of super glue that keeps people connected and in sync with one another. And it's built through time spent together in both structured and unstructured environments where people have the chance to be vulnerable with one another. Here's Brenda Frese again, talking about how trust evolved into a sisterhood within her team.
Brenda Frese 09:42
I think it first you have to have the trust within your team and that think the leadership model, your players have to feel that trust. They have to see that trust all the way from the top down because I do think it's modeled and your players are able to see I mean when you walk into our program, you're going to see staff that Is together and a family oriented staff that really enjoys working with each other. And I think with that trust comes that sisterhood. If you looked at our team, there's a bond that our players have that can't be broken. And that's because of the trust that they've built. That's because of the time that they've spent together. It's really, really important.
Paul Barnett 10:23
Emma Markwell is a former karate World Champion, and now coach, and she builds on Brenda's thoughts on the importance of time spent together by explaining how the journey she went through with her coach helped build their trust.
Emma Markwell 10:40
That coach behind me is someone that I trust, and has seen me through my whole training program. Up until that point, I can't think of a time that I wouldn't trust them. And, you know, the, of course, the relationship between you and that coach has to be the most important thing with that. So if they've been there, that whole time, whilst you've been, you know, the blood, sweat and tears, then I just trust them 100%.
Paul Barnett 11:10
And important build on this idea of spending time together as a means of building trust, though comes again from volleyball coach, Hugh McCutcheon, he stresses that it isn't necessary that the trust you have for one another evolve into friendship. Instead, he points out that the bigger responsibility within a high performing team is to carry out your role.
Hugh McCutcheon 11:33
And just to take that a little bit further extension, it doesn't mean that we're not friends, it just means that we're not requiring it. And I think in a lot of teams, especially in my coaching experience with women, there's kind of this need for required friendship, or at least expressions of required friendships. So putting your arms around each other, or holding hands and timeout or something like that. And it's just like, look, we want to operate in truth, it turns out that on our teams, the connections are strong. And there's a lot of really great friendships that evolve. But being able to take the, I guess, the pressure off, or at least the expectation off that we're going to have to be a certain way with certain people that we can be good teammates, which to me is a much bigger responsibility than in the college world, you get one to four years to be a good teammate, you can be friends for the rest of your life. But honoring that commitment means you can have some of the more challenging conversations when you have to have them between teammates, like there's some accountability pieces and some commitment to excellent pieces that we might want to say that maybe if we've got our little friend hats on, we might not want to have those difficult conversations for fear of judgment or grudge or retribution or whatever.
Paul Barnett 12:38
As a leader, the investments you make in trust become visible when things are not going well. During these times, the important relationships you are built through trust will help and support you. Here is English, women's soccer coach Tanya ox to be talking about her experience with this.
Tanya Oxtoby 12:58
When I was talking about trust, it's about who's around when it's not great, because people are all your friends when you are doing well. And they all want a piece of that success. And they all want to be a part of that. But actually, when things are not going well, and you need some support, and you need people to who understand you and understand that you probably doubt yourself as well. When you need those people around. That's what I meant by trust, because you can open up to them and say, Look, I am struggling here like i, this is what I want to do. But I can't I can't even get anywhere close to that because of these factors. And I can't change some of those factors because of injuries and things like that. You can't, you don't have a magic wand, and you're doing the best that you can and it's really difficult and yet it's the trust pieces around those that are around when things are not going well. They they love you anyway, they see you for who you are anyway, your strengths and your your areas that you're not great at. And they support you through that. And I think that's really, really important.
Paul Barnett 14:02
And perhaps the last word on trust comes from Dutch national paratriathlon coach, best Bruin, Ambassador sport, he has to help people with different impairments, maneuver equipment. And so the level of trust between him and his athletes is somewhat heightened. Here is best summing up what a focus on trust gives him as a coach. So
Bas DeBruin 14:26
that maybe that's the point. If you trust other people, they trust you, you get back what you give. It's also a very everybody says it and it's elevation of the sentence if you get back what you get. But I really think that's the key and I get back what you get.
14:40
We hope you enjoyed our episode on trust and found one or two things that you can bring to your own dinner table, locker room or boardroom table for discussion. The key lessons I have taken away from our interview guests on the topic of trust are that there are three types of trust within a team For the athlete trusting themselves, the individual trusting their teammates, and the team trusting the coach. That trust is the currency that makes teams work. And the first step in establishing trust is empowering the individual. Time spent together both on and off the field of play also helps build trust within the group. Friendship does not need to evolve from trusting relationships. In fact, what is more important is that you remain consistent in your behaviors with each other and carry out your role to the best of your ability. You're a great coaches podcast were always trying to reflect and learn. So please let us know if you have any feedback. Just like Nick Grant, who after listening to our Damien Hardwick interview said, insightful and authentic interview. Well done. Thanks, Nick. The interaction with people around the world who listen gives us great energy. And so if you have any feedback or comments, please let us know. And all the details on how to connect with us are in the show notes or on our website, the great coaches podcast.com