Being a champion teammate and supporting our children in this role - 'A conversation with John O'Sullivan'

In this episode author and founder of 'The Changing the Game Project' joins Gordon MacLelland to discuss being a champion teammate, what that actually means and how we as parents can support our children to fulfil this role.

During the conversation they discuss amongst other things:

• The importance of being a teammate in life, not just in sport
• How we all need to learn to connect, compete and lead
• Making the choice to be a 'Champion Teammate'
• Recognising the strengths and weaknesses of yourself and those around you
• 'What can I give' as opposed to 'what can I get' in a society that promotes the latter
• The challenges of technology in developing key character traits in young people
• The importance of real connection and face to face conversations
• Positive team dynamics and creating environments for this to flourish
• Being the parent and the adult in the room particularly during times of adversity

John O'Sullivan is the Founder of the Changing the Game Project and Host of the Way of Champions Podcast. He is the author of three #1 Bestselling books on parenting, coaching and team culture, and consults with sporting organisations across the globe including US Soccer, USOPC, USA Swimming, US Ski and Snowboard, Ireland Rugby, Australian Rugby League, the PGA, and numerous other schools, clubs and sporting organisations. A former collegiate and professional soccer player and a coach for three decades, his work has been featured by CNN, Outside Magazine, the Boston Globe, and his 2014 TED talk on "Changing the Game in Youth Sports" been viewed nearly 500,000 times. 

In The Champion Teammate, Jerry Lynch and John O’Sullivan share wisdom accrued from decades of consultation with well over 100 conference, national, and world championship teams and dozens of Hall of Fame coaches; interviews with hundreds of athletes, coaches, and leadership experts on their Way of Champions Podcast; and hundreds of workshops on being an exceptional teammate, leader, coach, and parent.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:13

Welcome to season five of the Parents in Sport Podcast. I am your host, Gordon Maclelland, and I'm delighted to be joined today by the founder of the Changing the Game Project and author, John O'Sullivan. John, thank you for joining us on the show.

Speaker 0:28

Thank you, Gordon. It's great to see you again. It's been a few years.

Speaker 1 0:32

Yeah, it appears to be like a few years in the wilderness, but we did have COVID. Uh as we did.

Speaker 0:39

Yeah. We did. Well, we saw each other at what was it, that future of coaching conference, and then the world turned upside down for a while and everything like that. But yeah, it's great to see you again and been following your work and enjoying it and referring to it often. So uh it's great to finally connect again.

Speaker 1 0:57

Yeah, likewise, John. I mean, it it's absolutely fantastic. And obviously, today's topic, obviously, a project um close to your heart, and and we're going to be talking about champion teammates today and what that means for us as sports parents, and what does it mean across all of sport, you know, from recreational level all the way through to the uh professional game. But before we dig into that, John, can you uh obviously I know lots about you, but can you tell our listeners um a little bit more about yourself and your background?

Speaker 1:31

Yeah, sure. So um I spent in many years, I actually grew up in New York. I'm 52 now. Um, and so uh typical of people my age, I played a lot of sports growing up. I ended up, you know, following football or you know, soccer to me, uh, to the NCA level, and then a little stint as a professional player, and then uh I had a couple bad injuries, and I decided to stick with it and get into coaching. And I coach at the NCA Division I level and then youth, and still to this day, I still coach. Uh I always keep my toe dipped in the water. So I've got a group of under 17 boys, so I can enjoy the the tactics and the human management. And then I have a group of about 50 um under nines, uh, which is why I have no hair. And so uh the combination of of those two things is awesome. Um, but um, yeah, so I've been around sport my whole life about 12 years ago now. I started changing the game project, um, which was sort of this desire to sort of reach more people. And it was really started out of I wrote my first book, Changing the Game, for parents, of like, hey, how you can you help your kids through this process? Because I'd helped a lot of kids go on to the professional level, to the university level, just to high school or wherever they wanted to go. And I saw a lot of patterns of what parents could do to help and what parents often did to hurt. Um, and then that morphed into, you know, this organization, uh, now uh three books, um, the champion teammate being the most recent. Uh, it morphed into a podcast called Way of Champions with my friend Dr. Jerry Lynch, which I think we've now managed to uh uh release episodes at this point, 350 weeks in a row, which was pretty crazy. Um, and uh yeah, I do a ton of speaking and consulting work with sport governing bodies and uh organizations, and I work with some collegiate teams on team culture and team building and leadership and being a great teammate and stuff like that. And uh yeah, and then uh I'm a dad of uh two teenagers as well, so they keep me busy.

Speaker 1 3:49

Yeah, I mean it it's an incredible journey, John. I think I heard you first speak, probably about 12 years ago, just after Changing the Game project was was launched in Oxford, and uh it's been a phenomenal, phenomenal journey. And as you say, you know, you've you've written a number of books, and it it it's the latest one that that we're going to dig into uh today, the the champion teammate. Now, where did you get the idea from, John? I mean, you work across sports, there's so many different topics we could uh possibly write about, but what what why was this one so important to you?

Speaker 4:25

I'd say two things. Like, number one, I so I'd done a book, Changing the Game for Parents. And then in 2019, I did Every Moment Matters, which was really focused on coaches. Um, and uh, you know, Jerry and I, uh Jerry and I wrote this book together, and we had talked about, you know, in in our work with these university teams, and Jerry has worked with a bunch of professional teams and stuff like that. A lot of times the teams in offseason will read a book together. And so there'd been some great books that we'd recommended to teams, and you know, and we said, you know what, like we should do one. Why don't we do one that our teams can use because it's the principles that we're teaching and reinforcing anyway. And so it's actually a funny story, Gordon. So we were like, we're like, okay, let's do this. And we probably mapped out in the beginning maybe 20 topics, right? And we wanted to write a book that, you know, middle schoolers or high schools could read, you know, three-page chapters, short idea, and then discussion questions at the end. So if you're coaching a rugby team, it's like, hey, we're gonna read this, and then we're gonna talk about well, what are we doing so we can connect better? What are you doing so you could lead better, or whatever. And so and so we mapped out like 20 topics, and uh, and then we said, great. And we Jerry took 10 and I took 10. And then I took about 10 days off, just kind of futzing around, doing my own work or whatever. And then all of a sudden, my teammate Jerry sent me 50 pages. He's like, Send me what you got, and I had zero. And so I was like, Oh man, I gotta get work on this book. And so it actually probably we probably put the book together in about a month by being great teammates, and uh, you know how it sort of morphed into these three parts of the book, you know, that, you know, I mean, the basic idea, right, is that, you know, great teammates are always in demand, and you're gonna be part of teams your whole life, right? Whether it's a work team, church, your community, your family is a team. Um, and if you know the basic principles of how to be a great teammate, how to give, how to be selfless, um, and all these sort of things, you'll always be in demand. And so um it's sort of morphed into sort of three parts of the book. You know, how do we connect, right? And then how do we compete? Because this is the element of it, and then how do we lead, right? Because we're all asked to be a leader at different times and a follower at other times. And so, yeah, that's how that this topic came up. And uh it's been great, you know, it came out in the end of May 2022, and we've had so many like you know, top universities buy the book for the whole team, and coaches are like, this is what we're looking for. Here's our off season. And it's been cool because when we're recording this, we've been getting like all the pictures of the teams at the end of the year, our first state championship, our first conference title in 10 years, and so we see that sort of result in the win-loss column. But forever is just saying, what a great team culture! You know, that was the most fun season I've had coaching in a long time. So it's been super fun.

Speaker 1 7:39

Yeah, and I mean, look, having having read it, you can see how it it generates that that interest in a room, you know, you're looking at the tasks and you're thinking, God, that's a really good task. I would love to have somebody to have a chat with about that. You know, obviously I was reading it on my own and had no one to talk about it, but I was thinking, oh, yeah, if I had somebody to talk about, that would be really cool. Um, what were the what were the biggest learnings from the book? I mean, obviously, you had your own ideas, and certainly Jerry would have had his ideas about what made a champion teammate, but obviously you bring in lots of different stories from different environments, different teams. Um, what were your biggest learnings? Or did you change your mind on anything as you were writing, or slightly change your perspective at all, or were you were they pretty much lined up from the get-go?

Speaker 8:30

It's a great question. I I wouldn't say there was anything that we started writing in this direction and then said, Oh my god, we're completely wrong. You know, because there's a lot of hours of practical work with teams and stuff. And and, you know, every every team's different, every person's different and stuff like that. But um, you know, just as it came together, this understanding of, you know, first of all, you know, like what's a champion? And and as Jerry likes to say, like, you know, I've worked with lots of champion teams and champion teammates who didn't have a medal around their neck at the end of the year, but they still had a phenomenal season, right? And then this other idea that a champion is not something that you become. It's a choice that you make, and then it's a behavior from that moment, right? So, so a champion is a way of being, not a not a way of doing. So it's this choice that I'm gonna do all the things that champions do from this moment forward. Um, and at the end of the year, it might work out that we win, we lift the lift the trophy, or it might not, but I'm still doing the right things. And so I think that was sort of those were sort of these ideas that really clarified as we put the book together of convincing people that you know being a champion is not something that you sort of, okay, I'm gonna do these things, and then maybe I'll be a champion in two months. It's like, no, it's this choice I make today. How do I sleep? How do I eat? How do I treat people? Right. Uh, you know, Bill Walsh is a famous American football coach, and he has this great quote we have in the book. It's like champions act like champions before they become champions, right? So you got to train and practice and eat and compete in a certain way with no guarantee that at the end it's all going to work out, but you do it anyway. And that's really what the book's about.

Speaker 1 10:32

Yeah, and it's, I mean, it's one of the most difficult, you know, that's what everybody's looking for, isn't it? Creating that that synergy in teams between potentially totally different backgrounds, perspectives, cultures, you know, because you could suddenly all arrive in one place, but having had many different experiences, and actually one person isn't going to be able to bring everybody together. Everybody, as you say there, everybody's got a role to play in that, haven't they?

Speaker 11:01

Yeah. And you know, there's so much diversity in in teams in any room, right? And you, you know, you have, I mean, you can call diversity not just religious or cultural or socioeconomic, which makes you all sort of come from a different place. Um, you also have um diversity in terms of, you know, personality, right? Introverts and extroverts, people who work really fast and people who need time to process, people who just wing it and people who just who want details, you know. And so the strength of teams is is drawing upon all those great things. Uh, you know, just like the strength of a coaching staff is not hiring a bunch of assistants who are just like you. You know, we had the Golden State Warriors have this legendary assistant coach named Ron Adams, and he goes, his quote is great assistant coaches cement the cracks. You know, what are the things? What are the cracks? And that's where they fill in. And I think great teams, you know, great teammates learn how do we cement the cracks? What does my team need from me in this moment? Um, you know, in my actions, in my words, and how I train and how I accept a role that maybe is not my favorite. Um, and so uh yeah, I I think that's one of the biggest things. And like one of the like distinctions and that I've been talking about lately with teams, like a lot of teams use this word, like we're a family, right? Um, but what does family mean? You know, everyone's definition of family is different, right? So I talk about my teams, I say, you know, when I say we're a family, like what does that mean? Like some of you might have grown up in a household where, you know, there's a toxic relationship or there's abuse or there's alcoholism and there's a fight every night, and then the next morning no one talks about it, right? That's a family, someone's definition of family, but that's not a healthy team, right? So would then we spend a lot of time to well, what is a healthy team? That we we have standards and we hold people to them and we hold ourselves accountable to them and all that sort of stuff. And um, and we're not afraid to call people out on them either, right? And I seek to be respected more than liked, you know, that's the type of family that we're defining that we want to be. And for some people, they've never been that type of family, and that's a kind of a diversity thing that really affects a locker room as well.

Speaker 1 13:31

Yeah, I mean, that that's uh an amazing story. And I've I've never thought about it like that. I mean, even just um talking already, even the bits of language, you know, we're we're defining what champion means, aren't we? You know, what can a family mean? And I think there's so many times in sport, isn't there? And you'll be aware of this, where people use language, they try to make it a one size fits all. And the reality is that that doesn't exist. And if anybody tells you that there's one way of doing it, we should be um running as far away as as is possible. Because I think, in terms of bringing these amazing teams together, I think one of the traits you talked about there, I think that um selflessness, but I think also recognizing each other's strengths and weaknesses is one that we probably it's probably worth dwelling on, particularly with young young players as well, or parents who maybe watch uh or coaches who are watching, is that it's very easy for us to focus on a lot of people's weaknesses rather than actually looking at some of the strengths that they're bringing and recognizing that we don't want a complete team of robots who all play in exactly the same way with the same personalities.

Speaker 14:50

Yeah, uh hundred a hundred percent. And I think the art of coaching is how do you how do you make the stew? You know, how do you mix these personalities and these people together? Um and um, you know, and and I because yeah, you you don't want that robot. And certainly creativity is something that often is not coached into people, it's coached out of people. Um, and so, you know, I think all these things, you know, come together in, you know, my the most fun teams that I've coached have had these great personalities, and sometimes those personalities can drive you nuts, right? They frustrate you, they're you know, the Eric Cantinas of the world or whatever, but they're also also oftentimes the biggest difference maker as well. And I think when we're talking in the youths, youth realm, like you and I work in a lot, you know, I our job as a coach, and I think our job as a parent is to instill the right type of behaviors that over the long term do well. So we embrace that personality, but we also try to teach that if you tweak your behavior a little bit, you have a better path forward, right? Like the the the rogue unicorn Cantana or you know Ibrahimovich, that's nice. They're so good that we'll build a team around them. But if you're not good enough to have the team built around you and you're a jerk, yeah, your career is gonna be pretty short.

Speaker 1 16:28

Yeah, yeah, and yeah, decent human beings, isn't it? And I think the the bit you talked about there, I think these character traits, it's certainly something we've seen in our work and is a large part of the work we do with parents. We've got to bring these exceptional behaviors to life, we've got to be seen to be valuing these traits, we've got to be talking to our children about them because you know the reality is we all want to win, we all want to be the best, we all want to do well. There's that there's no problem with that, but actually, we can't all always do that. So, actually, what is gonna help our young people have the best chance of achieving the best outcomes the most amount of times? And you know, I always say we've got to help these young people understand why they are winning and why they are being successful, and we can only do that by reinforcing those exceptional behaviors. So, in terms of teammates, what are some of those behaviors that that you think are are absolutely vital that we want to see from people?

Speaker 17:38

Well, you you touched on a big one, this idea of selflessness, right? Or this idea we talk about in the book of you know, be someone who asks, what can I give, not what do I get? So the world that our kids grow up in now is very different than the one I did. And there was this really interesting study years ago that I, you know, cited in my first book. And so I don't remember it exactly, but it was sort of like in pop culture in the 70s and the 80s and 90s, what were the big values on the most popular TV shows? And it was things around like family and giving and love and connection and whatever, benevolence. And then in the 2000s, 2000, 2010 to today, the influencer culture is look at me, selfishness, money, greed, fame, likes, right? So we our kids grow up in this culture where the most popular influences are telling them it's what can I get? And so in a team, I get playing time, I get to play my favorite position, I get to show up and work hard when I feel like it, you know, versus what can I give? Which is, you know, I can give my best effort, I can fulfill the role that my team needs me to fulfill. I can um, you know, I can lift my teammates up with my words and my actions. Um, you know, I can pick up the cones and the bibs after practice and the trash on the bench. How how can I give? And and I think just this quality right here, Gordon, is like one of the most important things, right? Um, and and I think when when as a parent, when I signed my kids up for sport, you know, when they're five years old, right? So that's going back now 13 years with my oldest, right? You know, the you know, we looked at it and said, what is the purpose of sport in her life? And it was to develop a great human being who understood integrity and hard work and discipline and experienced adversity and worked her way through it and all these sort of things. And any accolades as an athlete were like a cherry on top, right? But it wasn't the purpose of sport. Um, and so I think a lot of parents have to get really clear well, what's the purpose of putting my kid here? Um, and I think for most people, it's you know, I just want a good person to come out of this, you know, and and life skills that will translate later on. And so being a someone who gives is a pretty darn good life skill.

Speaker 1 20:22

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And and you know what? I can I can actually tell you exactly what parents want when you put them because I asked that very question. So I've asked it to thousands of people, you know, what are you hoping your child gets from the sporting experience? Uh, I reckon probably eight and a half groups out of ten will give some of the character traits that we talked about there: good teammates, self-organized athletes, good decision makers, kids who are resilient, kids who show some commitment, kids who communicate well, you know, a lot of those building blocks that we're referring to. I think you get one group who will say, Yeah, I want professional football con. You know, one and a half groups who then say, Yeah, I would like an Olympian, I would like a professional football and whatever. And actually, to be fair, I encourage that answer because it's like three wishes in the Houdini lamp. You know, it's not like it's in because actually the I think the one thing we found is the beauty of is even if you said Gordon, I want to be, I want a professional athlete, or Gordon, actually, I want these skills. The reality is if you want to be a pro athlete, you're gonna need a lot of those skills anyway. So actually, it sets up the next slide brilliantly because it still comes down to what are you valuing as a parent? What are you bringing to life? What are you talking about? The reason I like the traits, and I think they're so important is one, they can be developed, you're not born with them. But also, two I think there's something that we've got major control over, and you know, from your expert. Experiences in sport that there's so many things that we can't control, but at least we can control turning up with some of the right behaviors and attitudes every day because we we can we can do something about that.

Speaker 22:12

Yeah, a hundred percent. And you know what's really interesting? Like I think that fits into sort of two areas, right? So I as an athlete want to focus on the things that I can control every day, right? I can't control the officials, I can't control the weather, I can't control the opponent, but I can control certain things. And one of the biggest things that I can control is doing the things, meeting the standards of the team so that I am respected by my teammates, right? That belongs to me. Now, one of the biggest things that is out of my control is being liked by my teammates. I can't make Gordon like me, no matter what I do. I will never control that, right? But I can control, I do all the things that this team asks of me and I treat people well, and I will be respected for that. And if Gordon likes me, great. And if Gordon doesn't like me, oh well, you know, but so many people seek to be liked rather than respected. And then they, you know, and so it's easy to be liked when you're the guy who cuts the corners, when you sort of cheat on the run, when you you, you know, you don't pay attention or you don't work hard, you slack off so someone, you know, laughs along with you, you know, and and and I think that's such an important thing. And and this idea, we just had uh Michael Gervais on the podcast, the sports psychologist, and you know, very, very well known for his work in the highest levels of professional and Olympic sport. And you know, he's got a new book out where sort of he calls it the first rule of mastery is stop worrying about other people's opinions of you because you don't control those. Yeah. And it is just a super interesting book and a super interesting conversation around um, you know, you you need to focus on your identity being purpose-driven, not performance-driven, and um behaving in the certain ways that garnish you respect. And if you're liked, great. And if you're not liked, oh, I'm okay with that.

Speaker 1 24:25

Yeah, and I I think you've we're touching on an awful lot of things here where I think we both will agree with this, that it's not necessarily the children's fault. Um, some of the development of these traits at the moment, it's been caused by um, and this isn't me saying this, by the way, before people jump on it, you know, perhaps poor parenting strategies of of today's generation. I hold my hand up about how we sometimes parent compared to maybe how our own parents parented. And I think there are some things that we'll be better rolling back the years a little bit on in terms of and and technology, and technology, yeah.

Speaker 25:04

I mean, the the amount of people who can influence our kids is so much greater than the circle that influenced us when we were younger.

Speaker 1 25:13

And I think it's hard to parent, it's very hard. And I think the the parenting, I think the technology, um, I think the lack as well sometimes of and it links a little bit to the likes of real connection and real friendships as opposed to some of these fake numbers or these fake lives, uh likes that that maybe young people get, because we all know that you can probably count on a couple of hands the very closest people to you, even after a lifetime on this planet who you could really trust. And yeah, you know, you hear young people say, Oh, I've got hundreds of friends, and it's like, wow, you're you you must be doing amazingly well. But actually, out of those hundred, how many would stand in front of them when trouble's really beckoning, or how many of them would fight for them when everybody suddenly turns on them? And all those traits, we're almost having to, we know they're important, we know they're important in sport, we know they're important in teams. It's like we're having to work doubly hard now to help our young people see the value in them.

Speaker 26:21

Yeah, yeah, no, uh a hundred percent. And so again, the definition of friend has changed, the definition of you know, acquaintance has changed. And yeah, you've got a thousand friends and you're lonelier than ever, right? And and that this is the generation right now. I mean, I think I say to coaches uh all the time, and these are oftentimes university coaches working with 18 to 23-year-olds. Sometimes the greatest skill that you're gonna teach your athletes is the ability to have a difficult conversation in person, yeah, because they can just do it all electronically via text, Snapchat, whatever, whatever the it is, right? To sit down and and take criticism, to sit down and hear bad news, to sit down and advocate for yourself, yeah. Right. These are these are the life skills that that sport can teach, you know. And I mean, I the kids, the older kids that I coach when they want to have a meeting, I'm like, let's do it in person. Like, come on, advocate for yourself, right? Do it, yeah.

Speaker 1 27:32

And I agree, and look and and look people in the look people in the eyes and see people's body language and react to body language, and a lot of the things that I think younger people like you say are finding more and more challenging, not necessarily through any fault of their own. We're just gonna have to work a little bit harder to help them out, either as coaches, teachers, and parents.

Speaker 27:54

Yeah, no, a hundred percent. And I think that is um that's the role that sport can play right now. And I think it's great that you know, parents say, I want my kid to be an Olympian, or I want my kid to be, you know, to pursue his or her dream of being a professional in their sport. I think it's great as well. Yeah, but I don't think any of these qualities of like being a great teammate hold you back from that dream. No, right now, is there a level of selfishness that you're going to need to put in the work and the dedication and the time to do it? 100%. Is there a level of ruthlessness? Yes. There's character traits that professional athletes possess that you know that have gotten them to that level that might not, we might not say, oh, they always play well in the sandbox. But eventually, if you're playing for Manchester United, you're in a sandbox on that field with 11 guys or on a roster with 24. Like you got to know how to play well in that sandbox.

Speaker 1 29:02

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's yeah, that I mean, that's an amazing way of putting it, isn't it? Some of those, you know, uh, I mean, we had Rachel Vickery on the podcast. Rachel was a a New Zealand gymnast, and she talks a lot about advocating for herself. She talks about the importance of choice in in her growing up, but also her parents pointing out some of the consequences for some of the choices that that she may have may have made. Um and I think we've just got to be careful, haven't we, as well in some of the the language we see that high performance isn't for everybody. I think we've tried to merge every level of sport into different bits, haven't we? And almost make one size fit all across every strand. And the slightly different contexts for play, uh high performance. They got they're gonna look different, aren't they? And I think parents have got to be aware of different levels that that their kids are playing at.

Speaker 30:07

Yeah, and and and where you are, right? If you're you know born in sub-Saharan Africa, you're probably not gonna be a figure skater, right? And so, you know, your high performance, you know, environment where I live in the sport of soccer is not the same as it is if you grew up in Los Angeles or if you grew up in Manchester or London or Paris, right? And so, you know, sometimes it's what's in your windshield, and and it's it's always access to opportunities as well that allows you to get the thing. But, you know, I mean, I think one of the things we really miss a lot at the youngest levels is instilling love of the sport, right? And and love of the sport, you know, is what is what helps you play the long game and and go through the ups and downs. Cause I love this. You know, I had a really bad injury when I was uh just before my 18th birthday that knocked me out for a year. And that's in this moment of like, what do I want to do next? Do I want to spend a year in rehabilitation and get back? That's when I fell in love with playing football, playing soccer. And that's when the sport went from something my parents put me in to something that belonged completely to me. Um, and so I think as parents, we're we're really sort of saying, Hey, um, you know, you know, how do we instill the love? Are you having fun? You you own the experience, are you do are you intrinsically motivated? Um, and and one of the biggest things when they ask kids like what makes it fun is positive team dynamics, right? That's one of the big it's positive coaching, positive team dynamics, and uh, you know, an organized, challenging environment. That's Amanda Visic's research, right? Into fun and sport, right? So positive team dynamics, that's hey, people treat each other well. There's not bullying, there's whatever. Now, you know what? Nine-year-olds, you know, I coach nine-year-old boys. There's a lot of things that come out of their mouth that isn't very thoughtful or kind. They're not necessarily bullies, they're just mean, or they just, you know, don't have the self-awareness to realize how their actions are are hurtful. And so we spend a lot of time on um, you know, don't do that, don't say that. Like, how do you think that makes your teammate feel? Um, but it's like, you know, we wrote this book so that parents can help kids understand hey, this is how you create a great environment, which is help you fall in love, which will make you play longer, which gives you the best chance of being good at something.

Speaker 1 32:43

Yeah. And yeah, and it does a brilliant job at that. I mean, what do you think? I mean, you've talked about that, you know, the love of developing a love of what you do, um, whether that be sport or whatever it may be. But actually, we've talked a lot about behaviors and traits. What's you've been through it as a parent now? Your kids are well, you're not finishing obviously your parenting, but you're finishing the youth sport side of the parenting. What do you think parents really have got to either do or be conscious not to do that'll give them the best chance of the children growing that love, but also developing these traits?

Speaker 33:24

I think I think sport is this like push and pull of you know, understanding why your kids are in it and their goals. I think early on, like trying to help them find what they're passionate about instead of deciding that for them, right? Like that's a big thing if you have the means and the ability to do that. Um, you know, and and then guiding them and being there, like you're supposed to be the adult in the room, right? And and and so I wrote uh a blog just a couple of weeks ago that's gotten a lot of um traction. And and basically the the blog was called The Storm Has Its Purpose, but it was basically about adversity. And it was this really interesting um uh and I wrote it on the like right after my daughter played her final high school soccer game, right? So it was it was her final match, and I was just reflecting back on what at the end was a very successful final year and a leader and recognized for her achievements, but I thought about all the adversity along the way, and oftentimes, you know, uh so I I had heard this um church sermon about um in the Bible, oftentimes there's like a miracle and then there's a storm and then there's another miracle. But oftentimes we get fixated on the storm instead of saying this is just a time between two miracles. And I think that's adversity in sport, a tough coach, you get cut from a team, um, you lose your starting spot, whatever. Instead of looking at that as an end, what if we looked at that as a transitional moment where growth and and learning is going to happen? And I think that's the greatest gift as that that um parents can give to their children is the life perspective of this is just this is just uh a space between two great things if you can get through it. And um the the the preacher in the sermon had this great line. He said, Don't put a period where God put a comma. And I think for parents, don't put a period where it's just a comma, it's just a pause. And if you get through this, you're gonna see a whole new person with more confidence and belief and ability and and growth and maturity. But you just gotta be the parent and you gotta be patient and you gotta help, and you gotta realize, you know, this is a great moment if I can help them through this. And I think that's one of the things that I would say, um, you know, my kids, you know, uh mom and I have done well is is allow the adversity to happen, allow the storm to happen.

Speaker 1 36:15

That's an amazing story. I certainly need to be uh visiting to listen to that preacher. That that's that's one of the great lines. Don't put a period where there shouldn't be a comma. God, that that's uh that's one of the best, John, uh, yet to hear. Um, conscious of time. Final question, uh, then uh we've talked about some amazing stuff. Uh the book itself, uh, the champion teammate. Uh, what was your favorite chapter to write and and why? What what what's your highlight from all of that work?

Speaker 36:47

You know, there is a lot of them. And Gordon, you you've put out a few books, so you know, like some things come easy and they just pour out of you, and some, you know, you you sort of pull teeth on and whatever. Um, and uh so you know, I don't know that I have like a favorite, you know, I I have a couple, right? And you know, sort of, you know, this idea, like I I love this idea. And we tell this story in there of Abby Wombach, the American footballer, great goalscorer, who in her final World Cup, she's you never won a World Cup, gets benched, you know, and she's been the world player of the year and and decides in this moment, like, um, you know, if you're not a leader on the bench, you're not a leader on the field, right? And so, in this, in the biggest crowning moment of her career, in her greatest moment of disappointment, um, she realized she had this choice to react and be petulant and cry and be disruptive. And then she realized, or I can respond and I can be and this moment will define my career. And they go on and win a World Cup, and she gets to lift the World Cup and put the cherry on top of an unbelievable career. Um, and her teammates all talk about how that was the defining moment where she had every right to see, like, who look, look who I am. How dare you bench me? And instead, she embraced it and became this unbelievable leader off the field. And when she got in, she got in, right? And and made a difference and whatever. And so, you know, this idea of you know, this adversity and making failure your fuel, um, is it and and and leading, if you want to be a leader, you got to lead everywhere. That was one of my favorite things to write.

Speaker 1 38:46

Yeah, and an incredible story, and as you say, a really crowning moment on on her career. Um, John, where can um people find out a bit more uh about you, your work, and where can they get hold of the uh champion teammate if they'd like to have a uh a read?

Speaker 39:03

Yeah, awesome. So the the website is changing the gameproject.com. That's the mothership. Um, there's links to all social media there. I'm not a big social media fan. Um my 18-year-old has offered to take over my social media, which might make it better here soon. I actually kind of like LinkedIn. So if you look for Coach John O'Sullivan on LinkedIn, that's a great way to connect. Um, and um, you know, the book is is on Amazon, Amazon UK, wherever you're listening. That's the probably the best place to get it. Uh, there's a hard cover, there's a soft cover. And then if people are interested and want to do like bulk orders for a team, which we do a lot of, we do a nice discount, and they should just email me directly, John J O H N at changing the gameproject.com, and Jerry and I'll set that up for you and ship you the books directly and save you a bunch of money. And uh, it's just a great way to turn your season into something more than did we win at the end of it, you know.

Speaker 1 40:05

Yeah, amazing. John, it's been uh an absolute privilege uh to have you on the Parents in Sport Podcast. Thank you for being so giving of your time and and peeling back those layers and and telling us everything that that that you've learned in the last uh 50 minutes or so. But hopefully we'll um have the opportunity to do it again soon.

Speaker 40:26

Gordon, this is brilliant. Thanks, and thank you, you know, for all your amazing work that you're doing and helping families with uh working with parents in sport. I mean, it's really just uh it's awesome work. Um I'm so impressed with your books and your podcast and your guest and your newsletter. Uh so you know, we we need a village and you're doing awesome stuff. So thanks so much for having me on.

Speaker 1 40:48

Yeah, thanks, John. Thank you for listening. Check us out at parentinsport.co.uk.