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In Others’ Words

August 22, 2014

I’ve read and heard multiple times – so I’ve come to believe it’s at least partly true – that one of the techniques that marketing departments or agencies use when developing campaigns to promote a product or service is to look at it from the consumer’s, customer’s or client’s perspective.
The point is often brought home that if management would use this technique as much as marketers, then management would be more effective and would label itself, rather than marketers, as the “creative team.” It chafes me to hear a CEO say he or she wants to know what “creative” has to say about a sponsorship initiative before the CEO will offer an opinion.
Thinking about what our customers want doesn’t require that leaders suspend their personal beliefs or reverse experience-based opinions. It merely asks that we look at things from a different and sometimes even opposite point of view. And to be truly revealing, it asks that we try to put into words where other people stand on a particular topic.
It asks us to actually try to describe what our customers see from where they stand and what they say they want. For example, in our work, it would ask administrators to think about and actually describe what coaches want, and vice versa. And it asks both coaches and administrators to think about and put into their own words what student-athletes want, and what their parents want.

This has been an ongoing part of my life, provoked I suppose by my marriage of 42 years to a woman whose political views often point 180 degrees from my own. And this approach has been especially enlightening on school sports’ most troublesome topics, some of which we are tackling at this time, like ...

  • Out-of-season coaching rules
  • Junior high/middle school programming
  • Health and safety mandates

Leadership Impressions- #2 (Plugging Holes)

June 12, 2018

Almost every issue that affects youth is an issue that parents, politicians or the public is asking schools – and especially school sports – to solve.

Already consumed with efforts to promote participant health and safety in terms of heads, heat and hearts, our association is asked also to concentrate on mental health issues.

Having already addressed risks of tobacco, alcohol and performance-enhancing drugs, our association is asked also to campaign against opioid addiction.

State high school associations do not have the luxury to hire as many experienced people as they need to focus expertly on every topic that associations are asked to address.

The effect of this “person-power” shortage is to force the association’s executive director to be a utility player – an employee who can operate competently at many different positions, bringing time and prestige to the cause du jour.

Even the most forward thinking leader must be prepared to roll up sleeves and plug these holes in the team’s roster. This requires, again, that other staff be trusted to administer their assigned tasks without commanding the leader’s ongoing attention.