Leadership at a Championship Level! (Part 3) with Brian Agler

Are you a leader? Are you a good leader? Are you leading at a championship level? If you have a desire to increase your knowledge and understanding of how to lead, this is the episode for you!

Please join Brian Agler, a two-time WNBA championship coach for multiple WNBA teams. He is also a Division III championship winning basketball player as well. If there is anyone who has the knowledge and understanding of how to increase your leadership, it's Brian. 

Listen in as Brian shares his personal stories surrounding his successes and failures. He gives in-depth details about what traits and characteristics he used during his championship seasons and how other people have made a huge impact in his life as well. 

You will surely grab some additional bullet points to add to your leadership tool box in this episode. 

Thanks and enjoy!

Transcript

SPEAKER_05 0:00

Are you looking to get an edge in life but haven't been able to figure it out? Welcome to 10 to win, the podcast posted by Kevin's title and do it in column. Give us 10 minutes of your time and we'll show you how to create a winning mindset.

SPEAKER_02 0:23

Welcome back to 10 to win the podcast, a podcast focusing on how to create a winning mindset in 10 minutes. This is part three of our Take Your Leadership to a Championship level series. If you are just tuning in for the first time, this is the interview portion. And today we have a very special guest. Kevin, tell the listeners who's here with us today.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

Joining us today, Jason, is Brian Agler. Brian is currently the athletic director at Wittenberg University. But before Brian served in that position, he was the head coach for multiple WNBA franchises and has won two WNBA championships. One with the Seattle Storm and one with the Los Angeles Sparks. He was also the starting point guard on a men's NCAA national championship team. Welcome to the show, Brian. How's it going?

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Good Kevin, good Jason. How are you guys doing? We're fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:18

Yeah, thank you so much for coming on. Looking forward to this one.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Well, we have time to talk about how Kevin and I connected at Wittenberg at some point.

SPEAKER_02 1:26

Let's do it. Let's start it off right now. Well, Kevin.

SPEAKER_00 1:29

You want to go first?

SPEAKER_01 1:31

He's an instructor at Wittenberg, and he reached out uh because we have a concession stand in the lobby there of our uh athletic facility. Maybe at one time they they for his entrepreneur club, they really try to build a business, get experience running a business, you know, the day-to-day type operational stuff, which I think is a really good concept. And he contacted me and I talked to the president. President gave us a thumbs up, so we gave it a shot. It's a good experience for those people that are that are doing the day-to-day because it gives them a firsthand look and feel what something like that would be in real life.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

No, it really does. It's it's it's a really good, it's a really good program for those kids, and we've got some big ideas on how to grow it, and that was really the first stepping stone. And you know, that's actually really fitting that you brought bring it up, Brian, because we're we're gonna be talking about leadership, and I gotta say, you know, I tried to get that program going for four years before Brian became the athletic director, and I couldn't get anyone on board with this idea. So that shows how how good I am at a sales pitch or as a leader, and and I took about 30 seconds meeting with Brian, and he was like, This is a great idea. Like, I'll just go talk to the president about it. And about maybe 24 hours later, it was a done deal, and we were ready to we're buying smoothie blenders and freezers and everything, man. So he that was all that's all you, buddy.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

I'm I'm a uh I'm a consistent consumer of that concession stand too. It's right down right down the hallway for me, so it's good location.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

You and me both. I uh anybody that comes to visit me on campus, I'm like, let's go get a smoothie. Let me tell you all about this place. And so I'm I'm over there at least three days a week as well.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

So great story. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

So it's this is good. So we're already talking about Wittenberg. We'll just jump right in here. I want to start with the with a fun fact about Brian, and and I think it pertains to leadership in a big way. So, Brian, you played on on an NCAA men's national championship basketball team at Wittenberg. You were the starting point guard, but this championship team that you were on, you were a freshman. And so obviously, you went on to become a great leader and and led other teams to championships as a coach. But I would I would assume as a freshman at Wittenberg playing basketball that you weren't the captain, you weren't the leader of the team. I mean, what sort of things did you witness as a freshman playing on such a high-level championship caliber team?

SPEAKER_01 4:15

First of all, I think and a tribute any success I had at Wittenberg or beyond that is to the things that sort of I learned there going playing in that basketball program. We had some tremendous coaches. And it's interesting that you talked about the leadership because when people ask me about that team, one of the first things that I say is we had three really good senior leaders. Um and it's also interesting as I have gone through my career and been involved in athletics, a lot of times uh your success is built off of a series of failures or shortcomings. And the reason I say that is not that back in those days Wittenberg had many of those shortcomings, but the year before they lost in the national championship game. So they came up one game short. And those seniors were hungry to get back there. And uh we're not gonna let that happen again. You know, you get those opportunities you maybe once in your life, and you let it slip through your fingertips. You're you know, if you get another opportunity or another season, you really are hungry for that. But we had great coaches, and those three senior leaders were just tremendous players and uh people and and and leaders on that team.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

What sort of stuff makes a really good senior leader on a college basketball program? And what sort of things were they doing where where you recognize this, right? You come in, you're 17, you're 18 years old, and and you I mean you get thrown right into the fire. They're like, hey, here's this guy from Prospect Ohio. We think he's pretty good. We're gonna make him the starting point guard of our national championship runner-up team. You know, how I mean what stuff were they doing that made them such good leaders?

SPEAKER_01 6:08

Well, first of all, prospect, when I grew up, had a thousand people on it in the town, and that still has only a thousand people in the town. So it's those guys and the coaches both. Okay. I wanna I have to group those people in. Yeah. Um, one reason I wanted to go to Wittenberg is because when I was recruited there, they had a clear message that they wanted to be the best team in the country. They weren't afraid to say that was their goal or their mission. That's what they were shooting for. Not only did they say that, and it's not something they talked about all the time, but their work ethic was built that way. So anything that they would say or talk, they obviously would walk the walk as well. And in in the practice setting, the coaches were just as hard on the seniors as they were anybody else. So there was no slack given to those people. So they were encouraged and coached hard to to lead and and to make big plays and and demonstrate, you know, how how tough and physical and resilient you have to be to to play and to have high success in college basketball. And that was on a daily basis. That wasn't a once-a-week thing. That was like every single day.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Was Coach Hunter the the head coach then?

SPEAKER_01 7:24

He was. That was his first his first year as a head coach. So he won a national championship his very first year as a head coach, although he was the assistant there for a series of years before that.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

I'll give you a little connection. So I went to Ohio U, and he was the men's basketball coach at OU when I was a student at OU. And he had a brother, and his I was in a fraternity, and his brother was in our fraternity, and he was a chat, he was our chapter advisor. He was a local businessman, he was a lawyer in town, really successful guy, and he was kind of like our, you know, always looking out for us. And so um so we got to know both of him and his brother, the basketball coach, really well. And then when Larry was the bat as the basketball coach, he always had these graduate assistant coaches and they needed a place to live. And our fraternity house, we were supposed to have it they called him a proctor, but it was like a house dad. It was supposed to be somebody who was an adult who lived in this house with us. I mean, we lived in a fraternity house with like 80 guys under one roof, and so these these assistant basketball coaches, they lived in the front of the house and kind of like their own separate house, but they kind of kept an eye on us as well. So we had really close ties with the basketball team, and they were really, really good uh then and and they went to the NCAA tournament, and it was it was awesome. And so we I got to know him pretty well. Um, and I didn't know anything about his Wittenberg story until I started teaching at Wittenberg, and then I saw it in the program, and I was like, oh, that's guy that's either the weirdest coincidence ever, or this is the same guy, and it turns out it was the same guy, right? So he was he was a great, great guy.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

There's not many people that don't that have known Coach Hunter that don't really respect him. You know what I mean? He's a professional guy, and I can guarantee you he wasn't over to any fraternity parties while he was coaching in.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

But his brother But his brother was I got to know his brother a lot better than him because like you said, he he didn't come around the house, but um and his brother was just a again uh just a very respectable, great leader, and really, you know, like you you talked about with coach and the team, like he had to do some of that stuff with our whole fraternity. Hey, you can't be doing that, and hey, in and you had to be hard on the seniors because you knew the seniors then would be hard on the freshmen and they wouldn't damage the house and they wouldn't do stuff they weren't supposed to do, and all that stuff, right?

SPEAKER_02 10:10

So well, Brian, I'm gonna kind of stay on the same path that Kevin started here. You know, we have all sorts of listeners that in reality, you know, our our our our fan base, I don't know if that's the right one, hopefully it is, has grown um over the last six months. And and we started this leadership thing a couple of weeks ago. And let's get down to the X's and O's, if you will, and what do you think the core things are that you need to have in order to be successful as a leader?

SPEAKER_01 10:38

Yeah, I you know, when I you think about leadership, there's so many different leadership possibilities in the world, you know. I I sort of my life's been around athletics, so it has a lot to do with team dynamics. But I also relate to some of the people that I've been around that have been quality leaders and some of the st the traits that they had and and that I've tried to make a part of how I operate. I think one really important trait is to really have a clear message. You know, don't make things complicated. Set your standards, have high standards, have reachable standards, but have high standards and don't waver. And then you sort of have to be a salesperson, you know, because usually leadership has to do with you're dealing with something that's over a long period of time. It could be a season, it could be a series of years, it could be building a business, it could be a variety of things. So we're dealing with human beings, and you know, not everybody is always on their A game every day. So you have to at times really continually sell the message of the importance of the moment to keep you on the path to success, if that makes any sense. It's also very important that you get your team or your group of people that you're working with to understand that they sort of have to stay in that moment as well. You know, you can't necessarily worry about what happened yesterday. You know where you want to go, but the only way you can get there is to do the very best that you possibly can at the in the moment. And so I think those have been some really quality traits. Um most most great leaders have a really good work ethic. You know, they they understand the grind that it takes. And like I said before, they don't even they don't necessarily talk about it. Their actions a lot of times speak louder than their words. So they show the way. They don't necessarily tell you where to go, they sort of show you where to go. And those are the types of people that are seemed to be easier to follow when they're like that.

SPEAKER_02 12:37

No, that's good. I I uh I know Kevin mentioned before we got started that I've been in the fire service for about 20 years now. And in our line of work, we relate, at least I do, with the guys that that work with me, I relate a lot about sports, okay. Our job is similar in in in a lot of ways as sports. And and let me ask you this as a follow-up here. You said and you talked about high standards, okay, and creating a message and you know, trying to elevate everyone's play to some extent. And if they're not, you know, w where do you draw the line on this? You know, in athletics, you could honestly just say, okay, you're just not good enough to be on the team, okay? Come back next year and give it a better shot. But how do you think that that message is relayed in the job world? Okay. I mean, you could sit here and say it's very easy to fire somebody, but in reality it's it's not. You know, you're taking someone's job away, you're taking, you know, their their ability to make income for their family away if you're just going to say, no, you're done. So how do you put the pressure on the people that are within your job and try and elevate them to the standard that you have set within the organization based on the message that you've created without making them feel lesser of themselves to a point where they want to quit themselves?

SPEAKER_01 13:52

Yeah, I I I would look at that just like that you would in a team setting, um, where you have to show each individual their value to the operation and help them understand, you know, if if you if you if we can count on you and you can do your job at a at a certain rate or within a certain standard, then our whole our entire operation is gonna really do well. And obviously, you know, in a business, there has to be some some sort of um prize at the end. You know, there has to be, okay, if if my goal is this, if if our team is gonna do this, then I'm gonna receive this in the end. Like if we prepare for this game and we do well, we're gonna feel have the great feeling of winning at the end. So I all I always think that there has to be goals out there that are set and you're sort of striving for those goals on a on a daily basis. If if someone goes to work and it becomes um monotonous and there's really no end inside, it's just a continual same thing over and over and over again, and people are going to become complacent. And so to me, you sort of have to set an objective or a goal and strive that way and then measure it along the way. Okay. So, you know, you might have something that you want to you have some uh a goal set for yourself six months down the road. Well, maybe every two weeks, every month, you know, you have a gathering and you show the progress that you've made, and then you highlight certain people uh within your organization uh doing great jobs. And a lot of times that motivates others. Hey, I'd I'd like to I'd like to be that person sometime, you know. So I'm gonna really do my job well.

SPEAKER_02 15:46

I think that's such good information because I was just having a conversation with someone not too long ago about the job setting and the idea that I can't really hold a trophy up at the end like I can in sports. You know, if I make it to the championship team or if I make it to the championship game and I win, I get to hold this trophy up and I'm I'm forever recognized for something that I accomplished. And there's some recognition and accomplishments within the job world, but there's no trophy to really be had. And so sometimes I do wonder if people are like, what's the end game here? And and to your point, I think there's a lot of recognition that needs to go along the way, okay, for these people to stay focused in gear and still, you know, moving ahead.

SPEAKER_01 16:28

And motivated, you know, that's a big thing. Yes, right. And you can do little things like free lunch, get off work early one day, get a day off, you know, get a raise, get a bonus. You know, all those things are great enticements for and great motivators for people in the workplace. Of course, yes, it's good stuff.

SPEAKER_00 16:49

So I think this goes this is something that we've been talking about this week, Brian, on the other episodes. Um, the the thought of personal leadership. And so I think what you just kind of said leads into a question that I have for you. So when you can't hold that trophy up, or or let's, you know, uh uh I think most of the listeners' athletic careers are over at this point, right? So we are listening to this, we are in the middle of jobs or starting businesses or whatever it is that we're doing. And what what do you do when your boss is not a a very good leader or your company isn't culminating an environment that that is thriving on leadership, like what you just described, even just free lunch or get the day off early on Friday or whatever that is, like those things aren't options. But instead of becoming stagnant with it, I I feel very strongly that people have to lead themselves to their goals. And so they have to say, listen, if I do this really well for six more months, that is gonna be a bullet point on my resume, and then I'm gonna be able to apply for that next job, and that is gonna lead me to have enough money to do the next thing that I want to do, right? And so there's there's a level of like personal leadership. What do you think about that topic? Personal leadership, leading yourself.

SPEAKER_01 18:19

You know, everybody sort of has to be that for for themselves, no matter if you're in a real competitive situation or not. Um I thought, Kevin, you made some good points there because I would I would imagine that there are many people that are in environments of what you explained, that the administration or an administrator is not a highly motivated person and sort of content where they're at, so then they don't motivate the people that they're overseeing. You know, I I I'm a firm believer that pride should kick in to do a really good job, but if you do a good job at an extremely high level for a period of time, you're gonna be recognized at some point. And then you're gonna be ready, you're gonna be ready to get that promotion, or you're gonna be ready to accomplish something within your setting there that is gonna be a big and important part of your resume where you might not go somewhere else to get that next position. And people are always watching and noticing. And so, you know, to get promotions, to get in other jobs, you need recommendations and people saying good things about you. And so that's on a daily basis, being a professional, working with integrity, being a team player. Um, I've always noticed sometimes the the best leaders aren't necessarily the best players. You know, they you might not be the the main person in an organization, but you surely can be a great leader and help the people that are working you're working with. And yeah, that that really makes the work environment um enjoyable.

SPEAKER_00 19:52

We had a Hall of Fame hockey coach on a couple of weeks ago, and he said that about um the high school hockey teams that he coaches, you know, mentioned that you know, I think when he was in a uh as a younger coach, he was making the captains like the best players every time. And then he realized that that just wasn't necessarily a recipe for success. Sometimes the teams had the the best player was also the best leader, but then there were other teams where it was like, uh no, these guys are really good leaders, and and you know, they're okay players, sort of a thing.

SPEAKER_02 20:27

So uh the captain doesn't have to be the the most skilled and talented person, the captain's the leader.

SPEAKER_01 20:34

Yeah, right. The captain has a way to bring the best out of others and to help team play at a high level.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

Yeah. It it's one of the things that I talk about in the classroom, Brian, because you hit it on the head. I think there are a lot of people that are stuck in organizations where there's just not a lot of leadership going on, or there's total is everyone's totally content. And when you strive for more than yourself, so that's what I'm talking about in my introduction to entrepreneurship class with freshmen. I'm saying things like you need even if you never want to start a business in your life, you need to be thinking like an entrepreneur because you need to treat your life or your career like it is your own business, because that is essentially exactly what it is, and you have to lead yourself through all of that stuff. No one is gonna do it for you, no one's gonna drag you over the finish line um anymore. And and and that happens. I think that that is happening in grade school and junior high and even high school for some people, where everyone's ushering you to this finish line, but at some point it's going to stop, and and you need to then lead yourself through the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

So I would agree. Let me let me move into your your very successful WMBA career, Brian. What what sort of things did you take into the WMBA? When you assumed the position of head coach that made you successful in that position?

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Continual learning. You know, Kevin sort of said that on an email. I don't know, Jason, if you were on that email that he sent me or not, but he mentioned one thing about yeah, I coached some championship teams, but I also coached some teams that weren't very good, and I'd been fired a couple times. You know, in professional sports, it's you don't have a lot of wiggle room, you know.

SPEAKER_00 22:26

Sure. Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

Most important.

SPEAKER_00 22:28

What have you done for me lately?

SPEAKER_01 22:29

Yeah. Yeah. Most important thing, someone that's highly successful is is somebody that's that's learned how to deal with adversity very well because everybody deals with it. And some people deal with it much better than others. And it's not just dealing with it, it's accepting this is a learning moment for yourself. Can you self-analyze what didn't go right? Can you sit, can you look in the mirror and say, okay, yeah, this person was this and this person is this, but I did have control over this, this, and this. And if I had could have done it again, I would have maybe approached things a little bit differently. And so the next time, if I get a next time, this is how I'm going to be better. And I literally had those conversations with myself on a couple occasions. And it's really, it really, it really helped me because when I got in similar moments later on, then I was prepared for it. And I was, I was, I knew how to handle situations and um or to how to build a team or whatever it might be. There's just there's so many factors that go into to that. But I think knowing how to handle adversity, and when I say handle it, knowing how to learn from it is critical to someone being successful because you know, us three here, we've had our share of adversity in our life, one way or the other. And you have to be able to bounce back from that. And I think that people that have that ability, that have that talent, are the ones that have the chance to be very, very successful. And and also can help lead people in tough situations as well.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

Let me let me ask you this real quick, because you obviously had your fair share of success. And I think along the way, you were able to do something with your team that created this mindset within your players that they were going to listen to you, follow your direction, follow your guidance. But that had to have been in some levels a respect that you got that was earned from your players, not given to you. And just want to hit very quickly on this idea of respect and whether it's earned or given. What's your take on how to earn someone's respect, particularly maybe if you're a boss, how to get the the respect of your subordinates, or if you're a coach, how to get the respect of your players?

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Best way to get respect is show respect. If you are a respectful person, then it's hard not to respect you back. Let's talk about the number one factor of people being successful when when we're talking, we're now we're back to professional sports, okay?

SPEAKER_02 25:05

I love this. Let's dive into it.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

You have to have talent. You have to have talent. You you don't necessarily have to have to have the best talent, but you have to have really, really good talent.

SPEAKER_02 25:16

And I agree. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

That I can tell you that I was really fortunate to coach some great, great players. And so that's the number one ingredient. If you don't have that, you're not going to have success. But that's also a you carry that over into the real world, is when you're trying to build a business or you're you're hiring people, you want to go out and hire talent. You you have to be able to recognize what talent looks like and what talent can do for you. And sometimes it's not going out and hiring a friend of a friend, you know, doing somebody a favor. You have to, you have now if they are talented, okay. But you have to, you have to find talent and and then you have to find a way to bring the best out of that talent and keep that talent. Getting back to the respect thing, I think that's a you have to get people to buy into the message. You think the message has to be clear. It can't be complicated. It has to be clear, it has to come across in a direct way where they can relate to it and understand. And then you maintain the and you develop the work ethic where if they'll if they'll stay on message and stay on point, that then they don't see the results from that. If that makes sense.

SPEAKER_02 26:37

You can't just it does. I think results are very important.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

Yeah, you just can't throw something out there and sort of let it go and say, well, it's out there if we want it bad enough. No, you have to work, you have to put a series of things in place to work to get and achieve that. And then when that happens, then all of a sudden people sort of gain confidence in you, you know. You have to have confidence in yourself without being sort of abrasive or boastful. And then those people, when they understand and go through a series of success with you, then they're going to have confidence in you as well. And it just grows from there to me.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

Great, great answer.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

As a sports-to-business relation, one of the things that I I'm a I'm a huge sports fan and and uh both college and professional, and one of the things that I've taken from being a professional sports fan, which I think you'll appreciate, Brian, into the business world. So my wife and I run a very successful food service company, and we have talked about this for years, and we we try our best to act on it. That is the our managers, I treat the management positions in our company like like NFL or NBA free agency. And and the thought is this everyone anyone who's any good has a job already. And so it's my it's my job as the president of the company to go find those people and convince them that they would have a much better future or better pay or a better experience at our company than at their current company because it it isn't good enough to just hire, as you said, your you know, your your sister's friend who they know who's the who doesn't have a job, right? Why do they not have a job? Right. Um and so to me, I always think about that. I always think about when free agency season begins in any professional sport. I'm always I I think about that relationship to business. And I think people I mean uh young entrepreneurs especially don't do that, they just hire who's available instead of going out and trying to like recruit. And it's it makes being the leader so much easier when you have good people uh in other positions and key positions, and and that and the way you do that is to go out and recruit them like a professional sports team would go get that talent, right? And I mean that's what you brought up. You have to have talent, and that's no matter whether you're playing, you know, small forward in the WNBA or you're managing a company, right?

SPEAKER_01 29:21

So you know, I'm I'm glad you said that because it reminded me of a story. So there's a former classmate of mine by the name of Bill Emory, a Wittenberg classmate. Now, I didn't know him real well when we went went to school. He was an ATO. I wasn't in a fraternity, but he was in a fraternity with my brother, and he stayed connected with Wittenberg, and uh his son Ted now works there. Um but the story is this. So we've I reconnected with Bill here and we went out to to dinner. So he was one of the early investors in the Cameron Mitchell restaurants. Okay, Columbus-based insurance guy that he knew this guy was a chef, and the two or three got together and got some money together for Cameron Mitchell to open his first restaurant. Well, now you do so you know the story. And so when I was talking with him at dinner one time, I'm I'm really am intrigued about why people are successful and why obviously some aren't. And their philosophy there is they tr they want to treat their employees the best they possibly can be treated. Because they know if they treat their employees well, they'll want to work there and they're gonna be happy, and when they're happy, they're gonna treat their customers well. That's their whole philosophy. And so, pretty simple, makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_02 30:43

Yeah, it's not overly complicated, is it?

SPEAKER_00 30:46

I'm so glad you brought him up. So I spent a week in my entrepreneurship class talking about Cameron Mitchell. He uh he wrote a book about this, Brian. It's called Yes is the answer, what was the question? And it's and you think because he's a restaurateur, that that that um that phrase is for the the customers, like the almost like the customer's always right. I mean, that's a restaurant phrase, but it is not at all. It is yes is the answer to the employees, what was the question? And it is all about what can we do on a daily basis to make your life amazing so that you then make our customers' lives amazing, make their experience amazing. And it goes into this great detail. I mean, they are the first restaurant group to offer health insurance to to servers and and bartenders, and they love, you know, people wouldn't hire single mothers, and they did, and then they changed the restaurant hours around so that they could work their shifts and still get their kids at three o'clock and do all these things. I mean, it is it's an amazing book. If you haven't read it, I'll let you borrow my copy. It's so good.

SPEAKER_01 31:53

I would like to read that. My approach within our athlete department is I think they know I'm competitive. I want to I want these teams to be successful. I want the student athletes to have a great experience. Part of that experience to me is we want to position these people where they have a chance to compete for a championship. That's a great learning experience to be a part of that. But I want our best coaches, our best programs are the ones that have coaches that do the best job of recruiting. It's not necessarily the X and O's, it's the recruitment. It's getting talent.

SPEAKER_00 32:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:25

You know, and cultivating that talent.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

I've I once heard this, Brian. Go ahead, go ahead, Jason. No, I I think it's just a good point, but he's he's spoken on it. Talent sets the floor, but character sets the ceiling. And I think you've talked about that. You know, you've got to get talented people in there, but then you got to develop them, right? And that's exactly what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 32:44

And look, we all know people that have had great talent to do different things that have never flourished because they don't have other traits or characteristics that bring out even the best in themselves. We've seen that a million times, haven't we? And the discipline, the the ability to prepare. I mean, think about just the the word prepare. Like students have to prepare. If they want to do well in Kevin's class, they got to study, they got to prepare for tests, they gotta, they gotta get the work done. If athletes want to do well uh on the field or or uh or on the court, they have to prepare. They have to practice, they have to study their scattery ports, and they have to get rest and they have to eat well. So it's all those little things that preparation, uh, a lot of times it's the separator uh of people that if you have a couple of people have talent, the ones that rise to the top usually are the ones that are disciplined and prepare.

SPEAKER_02 33:40

No, 100% right. And that's what makes a great leader. That's how you take your leadership to a championship level. Well, listen, we're we're wrapping this thing up, Brian. This has been awesome. Before we let you go, do you have any final words or advice for our listeners uh who want it to get better? Uh I mean, this this podcast is about how to create a winning mindset, but here we are talking about taking your leadership to a championship level. Any last-minute advice for those folks?

SPEAKER_01 34:05

I mean, we've sort of touched on several things here. I do think about this a lot. I I'm intrigued by people that have success. So a couple years ago, and I've started reading this author. I'm just going to throw this out there for people that are intrigued by it or want to look at things.

SPEAKER_02 34:22

Please do. Yeah, please do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

So I was uh I read this ESPN article, and it was the article was about an author that all the MBA coaches and players were buying this book. His name's Ryan Holliday. Okay, and the book is called The Obstacle is the Way. He's a modern day stoic philosopher. So it really has to do everything about how people go through tough times. If you persevere and you know how to deal with adversity, you end up learning through that and end up on a better path after that. So it's that going through tough times makes you tougher. You learn from it and then you become better. And it it taught the he just the other thing I like about him is he gives short stories of people in history that have gone through those things as examples. Oh, that's great. So it's an easy read, and it's you can relate to it. And so um I've just been intrigued by that. Stoic philosophy is really um, I mean, I'm not a stoic philosopher, but I like reading about it because it keeps sort of keeps you grounded and it keeps you focused and uh not to ride the waves to stay consistent, you know, and how to be sort of the be your best. And I, you know, I I think that there's a lot of people that want to be successful. Okay, they say it, they they they they they want to be that, but then that's one silo, just the want-to. But then there is the the the middle silo is sort of the know-how. Do you know how to do it? I mean, right. That's why people go to college to you know learn some of that. And and then the the other silo that is the the X factor, and this is this is where where people fall short, is the will to do it, the will to keep studying, you know, the will to keep practicing, the will to to drive to do more, you know, not to let little bumps in a row distract you or get you off course. And the will is sort of the discipline, you know. The will is is the one that, okay, we were 19 and 10, but and we finished third in the conference. I want to, I want to I my goal is to win the conference championship. So I know I've got to do X, Y, and Z to do that. Do I have the will to do that? Do I have the will to keep recruiting? I we have to get better talent. I it's simple to me, but it's really difficult to perform that.

SPEAKER_02 36:58

It's great. I mean, such good advice there. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 37:01

Yeah, no, it really is. I like the three silos and good. I like a good philosophy book. I was introduced to some philosophy through a colleague, and I have been studying and and liking the things that I've been reading over the years, so I'll have to check out Ryan Holliday for sure.

SPEAKER_02 37:19

Yeah, and that'll be in my Amazon cart too.

SPEAKER_01 37:21

Yeah, he's several books now, but the first one that got the attention was called The Obstacle Is the Way.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

Well, this has been great, Brian. Thank you so much. That is it for take your leadership to a championship level. Part three, the interview portion. Again, thank you so much, Brian, for coming on and giving us your insight on how our listeners can be better leaders. And thanks for sharing all your stories of success in college basketball and the WNBA. Make sure that you subscribe to the podcast, rate and review it as it helps get it out to more listeners. And we will be back and better than ever on Monday for a brand new episode. As always, if you're impacting or influencing one person today, it is worth it. Everyone has 10 minutes to learn a winning mindset. Thanks again, Brian.

SPEAKER_01 38:08

Kevin, Jason, thanks.

SPEAKER_05 38:10

Thanks for taking the time to create a winning mindset. Remember, we'll release a new episode every Monday. So be sure to start your week off right by listening to 10 to win. Please subscribe, like, comment, and share our podcast. And remember, if you're impacting or influencing one person a day, it's worth it. Everyone has 10 minutes to create a winning mindset.