025: Leading BETTER Teams: Managing Emotions, Addressing Drama and Building Trust with Kevin DeShazo

This week, the Fearless Warrior Podcast welcomes mental performance coach, Kevin DeShazo to the Pod! Kevin is the co-founder of Better, a system that helps coaches improve their teams from the inside out through better mindset, leadership, and performance.  We talk about how coaches can effectively manage athletes’ emotions for peak performance.
 
Episode Highlights

• Strategies for channeling emotions
• The difference between venting and complaining
• What we can learn from "Chopping Wood"
• Strategies that make teams successful

Connect with Kevin
X: https://twitter.com/KevinDeShazo
Instagram: @kevindeshazo
                         @bebetterleaders

More ways to work with Fearless Fastpitch

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlessfastpitchmentaltraining
• Instagram @fearlessfastpitch
• Twitter @CoachAB_

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to the Fearless Warrior podcast, a place for athletes, coaches and parents who know the value of a strong mindset. I'm your host, coach AB, a mental performance coach on a mission, former softball coach, wife and mom of three. Each episode we will dive deep into all things mental performance, mindset tools and how to rewire the brain for success. So if your goal is to gain the mental edge and learn the secrets of mental performance, you're in the right place. Let's tune in to today's episode.

Speaker 1: 0:37

Kevin D'Shaizzo is a mental performance coach and co-founder of Better, a system that helps coaches improve their teams from the inside out through better mindset, leadership and performance. He is a bestselling author of Keep Chopping Wood, a sought-after speaker, having presented on over 300 campuses, consulting with some of the top ADs, coaches and teams in sports, and has worked alongside numerous championship teams. He has been quoted on ESPNcom, the New York Times, usa Today, forbes, bleacher Report, sports Business Journal and so many more. I brought him on this podcast because of his expertise in leadership and culture. He shares some incredible insights that top Division One programs are focusing on, and I cannot wait for you to implement some of these things with your own teams. So with that, let's tune in to today's episode. Kevin, welcome to the Fearless Warrior podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:35

Thank you so much for having me Excited to be here.

Speaker 1: 1:37

This is going to be a great conversation and I am so excited to have you share about your knowledge and how you're working with teams but, more specifically, leadership culture. Let's just dig right in. What is the day in the life Like? What does that look like for you right now? You know, at the time of recording we are kind of buttoning up January.

Speaker 2: 1:58

Yeah, which is crazy. You know the whole cliche like time just doesn't slow down and it doesn't we're almost done with January. A day in the life. That's a great question. It varies per season In season. Right now we do a lot of stuff. So I'm in Oklahoma City and we do a lot with the University of Oklahoma. We're with the football team several times a week to travel to a lot of their away games, where they're with them on game day. So that takes up a lot of my fall. Once spring gets in, gets more traveling. So I've got a retreat this weekend coming up with Florida State football. I've got several events I'll be speaking at over the next few months. It looks like coaching coaches. It looks like coaching athletic directors. It looks like creating content. It looks like working on new systems that we're building out to help coaches. So right now the spring season tends to be my busier season in terms of out in the world type of stuff.

Speaker 1: 2:47

Yeah, and when you're watching sports on TV, does it ruin you? You're looking at it from a completely different lens, because A if you're watching the teams you work with, it's a different aspect from the sidelines. But even watching other teams that you don't work with, like what is that conversation in your head when you're watching other teams compete?

Speaker 2: 3:08

Yeah, it's really fascinating. So I've been around the college sports space for 12, 13 years now. The beautiful part of that is that now I get to watch a lot of games and I know so many people and coaches, as you know, and administrators, as you like. They're always moving from location to location, school to school, and so I know people at so many schools that I can pull up a random game and I'm probably going to know somebody which makes it interesting. So that makes games a lot more fun.

Speaker 2: 3:33

But when it's teams that you work with, whether you're on the sideline or you're watching on TV, the stress level I don't sit, I just, I just pace around the living room all the time. I don't have a whole lot of conversations like I'm just locked in because I care, I want them to perform well, because I know, as you know, like the work that goes into performing, the work that goes into game be like it's an insane amount of work, and so you want the people that you know, that you care about, to actually have success based on all the work they put in.

Speaker 1: 4:03

Absolutely. It's like you're a coach. You're invested, it's an extension of the team. It makes complete sense. So let's take it back to if you were working with a new team. I know you mentioned some of the teams that you're working with. What's kind of step one when we're looking at you know, how do you identify and maybe this is more for coaches who are listening saying, ok, that's great, we're not a college team. What's kind of step one when you start working with a new organization? What is that conversation?

Speaker 2: 4:32

Yeah, I think for me, the first thing I want to do is sit down. So let's, let's say it's a team I want us to get with that coach. They will. What are your values? How healthy are you? Because, as a coach, you know, coaches tend to look at everything but themselves. They want to look at their players, their staff, their resources, their facilities, all this other stuff as to potentially why they're not performing.

Speaker 2: 4:51

And I'll say, yeah, let's start with you. How healthy are you? How good of a communicator are you? What's your influence like in the team? Do you even know what your influence is like? Do you have enough awareness to realize whether you have good or bad influence? What are your blind spots? Do you know your values? Are you living those? Are you just talking about them? What's your system for you to be, to be healthy? And so that's not always a fun place for coaches to start because like, hey, come in, I need to work on this and this and this, and like, well, maybe, but we probably need to start here because you're driving everything, so if we can get you know, kind of.

Speaker 2: 5:22

My belief is that a healthy leader leads a healthy team, and so the better the leader gets, the better everyone can get. And so we can start there, because one of our main beliefs is that leadership multiplies and the best leaders are multiplying the best leadership. And so if that leader isn't healthy, they can't give what they don't possess. And so they don't know themselves if they're not great communicators, if they're not connected to their staff. And I and I've found Bernie coach who's like maybe feeling some pain as I'm saying those things what I've found I don't want to say a hundred percent of the time, but 99.9% of the time is coaches want those things. Right, I've.

Speaker 2: 5:59

We coaches, leaders get such a bad rap these days. We just decide leaders are bad, they don't care, they're, they're chaotic. I'm like I've I've yet to meet a leader or a coach who wakes up, says how can I create chaos for my team? How can I just not connect with people? How can I create confusion? How can I make life more difficult? I've yet to meet someone who wakes up and wants to do that. The problem is they don't wake up and choose to not do that and so accidentally, unintentionally, they create those things. And so for leaders hearing this, it's not a you're doing things wrong on purpose. It's like I want to get better. I just don't know what better even looks like. I don't even know where to start, and so we can start with the leader, which is, again, it's not fun, but if we can start with a leader, everything else is going to get better.

Speaker 1: 6:39

Well, I think the first step in anything mental performance is that awareness, and so the fact that if you're a coach listening to this right now, you're there, you're here, you're in step one, which is awareness, which is awesome, so let's get into. I love your work on managing emotions and you just posted about this recently and that's kind of something that we've touched a lot on in our individual program and with parents, and so how does that apply to coaches? Emotions you just touched on that. Leaders have to lead themselves first. What's kind of this pendulum swing that you've been talking about?

Speaker 2: 7:15

We go for a while on this because it's such a necessary thing and it goes a variety of different directions and start this getting loud. A train is getting ready to go by our office, so, and we have a podcast studio, but my business partner is doing a podcast in there. It's like, well, I'll go in here. We just moved offices, so we're testing it out, we'll see how it goes. Is that super loud, by the way?

Speaker 1: 7:36

No, you're good Okay great.

Speaker 2: 7:39

So I think, with coaches and emotions because you know, coaches, again, we have to. We have to practice what we preach, or really preach what we practice. I think, and if we're living, you know, chaotic emotions, right, if we're riding the wave of a game, and I get it like we're passionate about the game, we're passionate about the results and getting better and winning and seeing people perform, like I understand all that side of it. But how many times does the coach say to a player you've got to control your emotions. Hey, you've got to forget the last play and play the next play. While you're on them about the last play for the next three minutes, like, coach, I can't play the, I can't play the next play because you're still talking about the last play. And so I think, or you know again, not to not to shame anybody, but when you've got coaches that have get back coaches, it's like you're not controlling your emotions. You're having someone on staff saying, hey, I'm going to lose my mind, you pulled me back when I do. Well, you've got to be healthier than that, you have to be more mentally resilient than that. And so to say, emotions are part of life, they're certainly a part of sport. So I don't buy into the stoic mindset of like you just need to be calm and you know, a great play happens like good, next play Like no, there's there's. There's emotion, there's excitement, there's frustration. There's that, that's okay, it's. How do you, how do you have that emotion but not let that emotion drive you. You have that excitement, but then you can get right back into calling the next play or making the next move, whatever it may be, as opposed to that emotion then driving you for the next two or three minutes.

Speaker 2: 9:09

And so I think one of these we work on a lot, both with athletes and with coaches, is this, this concept, and it's it's simple, but it's also difficult. It's number one and we talked about it already is recognize, recognize that that emotion exists and it's threatening to take over. I mean, I had this conversation with my 12 year old son before his basketball game on on this past weekend, because he tends to get like he's a competitor and so he tends to get emotional and say, hey, I love it, but you can't let them take over. So you've got to recognize when that frustration is building, when that anger is building, when that disappointment is building, and you've got to do something to release it. So I don't know if that's clapped twice, if that's like you're shooting free throws and you're reading the words on a ball you know my kids all play baseball, so, like it may be, like reading the name on the bat, it may be stepping out of the plate and out of the box and tapping the bat on the ground a couple times. But, whatever, do something to release it and then have a phrase to reengage Right, I've got it, let's go, and you step back in and so you recognize that you release it and then you reengage and that way you're still living.

Speaker 2: 10:11

You're choosing how you show up, you're choosing how you're perform, you're not letting those emotions take over for you, because I think we've had this conversation over the last 15, 20 years, and I think we've had this conversation over the last 15, 20 years. We've just now started to acknowledge emotion and that people have feelings and that people are people. This is in sport, this is in business, because forever it was look my facts, don't care about your feelings, just do the job, get it done. And it was stoic, it was kind of dominating styles of leadership, shutting people down. And you can win that way, you can perform that way for a season, but ultimately it burns people out. People get used and abused and all sorts of things.

Speaker 2: 10:50

So over the last 15, 20 years, like, wait, wait, emotions are real, like we're people, we're going to care, we're going to be excited, we're going to be disappointed, and the problem is like we overcorrected, as we tend to do, and so the pendulum swung all the way over here Like, no, your emotions are true and good, and you know, let them, let them take control, just live that emotion. It's like, well, it's, and I think Brené Brown is unbelievable, but it's like the extreme Brené Brownification of stuff, Like she wouldn't even go that far. She's like, no, your emotions are real, but like they can, they can ruin your day real quick, Like you've got to understand. And so I think this idea of self-regulation of like I have emotions, but I've got to get back to this centerpiece of like but I'm not my emotions, I get to, I get to choose how I act. So it's not being stoic, but it's also not being erratic.

Speaker 1: 11:35

So good and it relates to parenting too Is this wave of gentle parenting, and so people that are listening are thinking well, I wasn't raised in a gentle parent household and now I'm trying to be a gentle parent. This isn't working. And so, yeah, you're absolutely right. This pendulum of well, this doesn't work. This really doesn't work. Where's this normalcy and where do we get to find our spot? Some people are going to choose different points on that pendulum, and so I love, I love the recognized and every player is different to your point.

Speaker 2: 12:04

Like some players, that passion, that emotion is a. Like Baker Mayfield, for example, like he's a, he's a passionate player. If you say, hey, shut down your emotion, you lose his gifts. Now they're like he can obviously go go too far that direction, but like he's a passionate player and so it doesn't. You know, an emotionally regulated player is going to look different for every player. Some of them are going to be quieter, some are going to be louder, like it's just, it's different.

Speaker 2: 12:31

And I think your point on parenting it's fascinating, because we keep talking about mental health and we keep making everything a mental health issue. Well, if everything's a mental health issue, then nothing is a mental health issue. And most of our kids actually aren't experiencing like they're nervous about a game. They're not suffering from anxiety. That's a different, that's a different thing. Like, no, they're nervous because they care, they got a performance coming up, that's okay. It's not, it's not clinical anxiety. But we're creating that by by. When you overpower, when you give too much power to emotions, it's overpowering for everyone. And and we've got to help young people especially learned like hey, again, you're going to have these emotions. How do we get back to center so you can be in control of how you operate.

Speaker 1: 13:11

Absolutely applicable, so good. So what would be a piece of advice for an athlete that may be struggling? And I know we're jumping from coach to parent to athlete. But if an athlete is coming to you through a program and saying, Okay, this sounds great, coach, but how you're telling me, but how? How do I release it?

Speaker 2: 13:31

Yeah, I'd say number one what's it costing you? You know what are your emotions costing you, and is it? Is it influence? Is it performance? Is it peace? You know what's what's your, what are your emotions costing you in the moment? And two, what is the healthiest version of you look like?

Speaker 2: 13:48

So do you have a vision of what you, in control, looks like, of what? Because in knowing, hey, you're going to make a bad play, you're going to make a mistake, what is the best version of you look like when you do those things? So have a vision for what, what it looks like for you to actually recover and stay focused, stay locked in, stay positive. You know, again, going back to my 12 year old basketball game, this weekend we had a player had had a couple frustrating moments and his head was down as he's running down the court and he got beat twice on defense so gave up two layups because he was mad about mad at himself over making mistakes. It's like, well, one that cost you and it hurts team. But two, what would a better response have been? So, having them actually visualize success and realizing that, having them understand that you can do that Right, you can be. That version of you may take practice. You're not going to be perfect. So also letting them know, like this, this version of you are now in the version you want to be. It's not going to be tomorrow, right. This it's a process, so you're going to mess up a lot along the way, that's okay.

Speaker 2: 14:47

The question is, are you getting better and, I think, working with each athlete to say what do you want releasing it to look like? And sometimes it may be releasing it five times. So it may. It may not be like you clap your hands Alright, I'm good, and you go. You may have to do that four or five times. So again, you're thinking baseball. But he might.

Speaker 2: 15:04

He was. He worked with the Yankees for a number of years and he kind of alerted me because if you watch baseball players, he goes this is how they. You know. There's the phrase you can't. You can't hit two pitches at once, right? So if you didn't like the last pitch, didn't like the call, you can be frustrated about it, but that next pitch is coming and so if you're still thinking about the last pitch, you can't really focus on the next pitch and it's hard enough to hit a baseball or a softball or whatever the sport is, it's like you've got to be focused on what's happening.

Speaker 2: 15:28

He said. So you'll notice, players will step out, they'll reach down, they'll grab some dirt, they'll look up at the right field foul pole, take a breath, squeeze the dirt, drop the dirt, another breath and then step back in. And that's their way of like okay, now I've released it, and once I step back in the box, I've reengaged. And so you may have to do that a couple times, right. And so to understand, hey, what is your unique process?

Speaker 2: 15:50

And then have a, then you, if you're working with an athlete, you're having a reflection time with them after the game or after the performance, could be immediately, could be the next day. Hey, let's work through, like, let's think about where did you make a mistake, what was your response? Kind of reflecting, grading yourself on did you, did you recognize it, did you release, did you reengage? Hey, let's give yourself a rating. Okay, what does it look like next time? And so that way they can start to see their progress, because they tend to focus on the negative. And so let's say, they made five mistakes in a game and three of the times they had a good response. Twice they stayed in the negative right, they didn't get locked in like they wanted to. They're going to focus on those two and it's like actually, you did it well three times. Don't don't lose sight of the fact that you, you aren't making progress.

Speaker 1: 16:34

And that feedback and that accountability is the same exact thing that we would do on the physical side.

Speaker 2: 16:38

Now we're just doing it on the mental side. That's right, yep, because it's a skill. Right, it's a skill just like anything else in sport. And for them to understand that, you know, your mind is a muscle and if you don't train it it's going to be weak, it's never going to work for you, but the more you train it and it's difficult, just like you know.

Speaker 2: 16:55

Again, pick a sport basketball, golf, baseball, football. They were all bad at the beginning, right like every one of my sons. The first time they picked up a baseball bat, look like they'd never held the bat. They're like because they hadn't right, they didn't, they don't know what they're doing. It's the same thing with, with, with the mind game, with the mental reps. It's like when you first start out it's awkward, it's confusing, but then the more you do it, the better you get, the more comfortable you get, and then you end up like JJ McCarthy of Michigan who, before the national championship, sitting there doing meditation before a game, because he's practiced it, he understands the benefits of it and it's now become part of his routine, just like his physical warm-ups.

Speaker 1: 17:30

And it doesn't matter the stage or how many cameras are pointed at that's right Not doing it social media.

Speaker 2: 17:34

He's doing it because it's his process and that's right which is which is a huge If people can get to that place, especially in today's era. I'm saying like, yeah, there's cameras on me, I don't care, I'm not gonna feel weird about it, I'm not trying to put on a show. This is me preparing myself for my best possible performance. So if there's zero people here, great. If there's five thousand people here, great. I'm gonna go through my prep.

Speaker 1: 17:58

Right same as we would physical. We wouldn't change our physical prep. A lot of the college coaches will talk about that. You know, when we make it to the college world series, are we gonna continue to do the same in field outfield? The you know, when we're five feet apart are we gonna do our daily dirties? It seems basic, it seems elementary, but why would we change our physical warm-up before the biggest game of our season?

Speaker 2: 18:21

Yep which is just gonna create anxiety and nervousness, was like wait a minute, why are we not doing? I always warm up this way. Why am I not doing it now? It's like you get used to that, so again, like you put that mental piece in there as well. It's just, it's just part of your pregame checklist.

Speaker 1: 18:35

I love that. So another topic that I would love to selfishly Explore with you and kind of riff on is you had another recent post about complaining versus venting. This goes back to Team culture, and so, man, we could use this from the coach's perspective, the parents perspective. Let's just kind of dive into that. What's your perspective on on that?

Speaker 2: 18:57

Yeah, I think complaining is something you do multiple times about the same thing and you don't really want a solution, right? So if you find yourself constantly bringing up this thing, you're complaining about it. You don't want it to get better, you just want to wind, you want attention, you want somebody else to get disciplined, whatever it may be venting is, and I'm just frustrated, need to get this off my chest. I wanted to stay between you and me like I'm not. I'm not mad at anyone. I just need a moment because I I can't process it myself right now. So, if I can, if you're someone, I trust it's gonna end right here and we don't need to take action on it. I just need a second to get it out and I'm good, I'll go about my day and I move on. That's venting. It's healthy, right? That way, things don't just just bottle up within us and we explode. It's getting those frustrations out in a safe place with a safe person.

Speaker 2: 19:45

Complaining is like you've brought this to me four times and you've done nothing with it. You know, do you actually want things to get better or are you just whining and complaining? And so I think, having a clear definition on a team of like we cannot have complaining on our team, like we don't complain. We take action, we do something. If you want something to change, do something about it. And we use a tool all the time called go to the source. It's not rocket science, it's if you and I have trouble have, if I have an issue with you. I can't go talk to somebody else about you and expect you to get better and fix it. I can't talk about you. I have to talk to you. So, hey, can you walk me through? You did this. I'm not sure I'm clear on why you were doing it, what you were thinking. I'm trying to believe the best, but I'm really confused. Can you explain it? Great, we can work through it and figure it out now. If we can't, I may go get somebody else, say, hey, we've had a conversation. I need you to come kind of mediate this. I don't need you to take my side, I need you to be be truly independent third-party and help us navigate this, this situation. That's totally fine, but Too often teams, we talk about people and it's like, well, nobody's gonna get better, people aren't intentionally making mistakes most of the time and we're like man, why is Jeff never gonna figure this out.

Speaker 2: 20:54

He does this every single game. Ever See it? No, he's not gonna figure it out if we don't talk to him about it. Say but you got to move over here Every game. You're in the wrong position and you have been for six weeks. Are you kidding me? Why didn't, why didn't you tell me? Well, I told, I told him about it.

Speaker 2: 21:08

Yeah, well, that person can't fix it. Like, if you go to them, they actually have a chance to make things better. And so I think, when you go to the source Not to not to complain, but to actually create change and solve something but venting is just healthy, right, it's it's we move on. And I think an easy way to To If you're on the other side of it, because some people will say, hey, I don't complain or gossip, but people gossip to me. That's not good. Don't be a person. People are comfortable complaining or gossiping too. It's just as bad. Say, when somebody comes to you and they're complaining, say, hey, are you wanting to like solve this or do you need to get this off your chest and move on? Because if you're wanting to solve it, great, let's do it. If you get off your chest, great, let's do it. If you're just complaining, I don't have time. You know I need to go talk to them if you want to want something to actually be solved.

Speaker 1: 21:55

And holding that boundary as a teammate. I had that happen in college, one of our most successful years. We had a picture out of California. Shout out to Julie Tyree. Julia, I will never forget this. Someone came up to the table and was talking, you know, and we talk about culture. Culture is all the other in between, it's the gray areas in between lifting at the cafeteria 100 and someone came up to her and said you know something?

Speaker 1: 22:19

and at this point I don't even remember and I'll never forget what she said. She said hmm, that sounds like something you need to take to Sasha or whoever it was at that time, yeah, and in that moment that was the most powerful thing she could have ever said. And what you're saying is we can train our teams to do that, we can be, intentional about that culture because you're you're forcing someone to grow up in that moment.

Speaker 2: 22:41

Yeah like because it feels like, well, because nobody does that right nobody. It sounds like you go talk to them about it. Uh well, it's not that big of a deal. It's big enough deal. You're telling me about it. So there's a big deal where it's not. You got to decide.

Speaker 2: 22:55

If it's truly not a big deal, then get over it. You know you don't need to bring it up, but if it's a big deal, you're gonna need to go talk to that person. And so you're forcing maturity, you're forcing conversation and I think that's something that that Great teams again at sport, business, whatever. We have to be helping and training young people to have those conversations, because they're not fun, they're not easy, but when you avoid it, everything just gets worse. And so to train people to have difficult conversations because the best teams have difficult conversations and I think when you do it in a way where you're respectful of the person and like hey, I'm not fighting you, I'm fighting for us to move forward. But we got to get past this thing versus, not me, versus you, we just got to have a conversation. But most young, most, most young people, just they run from those conversations because they've never been shown how to do those in a healthy way.

Speaker 1: 23:41

That's incredible. I'm fighting for us. That's a great, that's a great line and, as parents, I think we can do that same thing for athletes when they're coming to us. You know what's where's your control in this, and have you talked to your coach about this?

Speaker 2: 23:54

also a tough 100% and that's the expectation we have with our kids like, hey, if you have a frustration with a coach, I'm gonna I'm gonna have zero conversations with your coach just so you know unless it's Behavioral, like there's a, there's a character issue with the coach, that then I'll, then we'll address it.

Speaker 2: 24:09

But if you're unhappy with your playing time, if you're unhappy with a decision, great, that's between you and the coach. I don't need to be involved in that. It's time for you to have some of those conversations and most of the teams that our kids are on, the coaches, actually make them sign Contracts saying, hey, if you have a question, you will come directly to me. I'm not gonna talk to your parents about it, which is great, because now we're all in agreement. Like, if you want to have a comp, if you're really that upset about it, there's one person to talk to and so you got to decide do I care that much, or can I just put it to bed and move on? But it's, it has to be the expectation, because your parents we could go hours on on youths, parents like that Most of the issues are caused by the parents.

Speaker 2: 24:47

Like every parent thinks their kid is gonna be the all-star. Like I don't care how good you are or how good you think you are. That coach is gonna make the decisions and you've got to earn everything you get and so you don't have to like the coaches decisions. But. But my thing is with our kids, like, do you trust the coach? You don't have to agree with them, but do you trust them? Do you trust their character? Great, because this agreement is healthy. It's gonna happen all the time, but if you trust them, then you still submit to their leadership. If you don't trust them, well, I mean if you don't trust them. And then we gotta have a question like why don't you trust them? What do you see that I don't see if I don't trust the coach? Often not, my kids play for them, because I don't think you should play for or work for somebody that you don't trust. But if it's just disagreement, we gotta figure out how to live with that and operate through that as part of life.

Speaker 1: 25:31

And such a gift, yeah, for life beyond sport 100%.

Speaker 1: 25:36

I love that. Use that word trust. Look at the teams that you've worked with and you don't have to name them. But if you could think of the top teams working with them where you could kind of predict into the future, there's something really special here. Was it trust? I mean, what? What are kind of some of those things that are green flags We'll call them green flags that you're thinking, okay, this team has it. There's something special. I'm hoping for them to be in the postseason. I have a really good feeling about this team. What are those characteristics?

Speaker 2: 26:04

I think a few things and again, I think trust is certainly and that's that's all around right is player to coach. So players trust the coach, players trust each other, Coaches trust each other and coaches trust the players. I think it's ownership and which really means you have really good leadership on the team. Beyond the coaches. I think the best teams, the coaches, are developing leaders who lead when the coach isn't and not not mean the coaches isn't Isn't leading because they're not capable, but if the coaches there, if it's if it's workouts, if it's If it's at lunch, if it's when you're on campus, like when you're not in official team activities, who's taking ownership of the group, who's making sure that people are still doing things the right way, living the standard, representing the team. Do you have those people on the team? I think a Commitment when it doesn't make sense, and what I mean by that is. So I'll go back to OU football last year in 2022.

Speaker 2: 27:06

They were not good, right, brit Venables? First year they lost a ton of talent. They were. They were six and seven that team and lost a bunch of close games. That team had every reason to quit, to fight each other, to fight their coaches, to complain, to give up, and you always, even on really healthy team, you always have pockets of that right. Especially when you've got that many players and people in an organization, you're always gonna have pockets. But the people who tried didn't have enough influence, they couldn't infiltrate the circle. And so you have a few of those people, but they could never change the culture of the team because there was enough strong leadership.

Speaker 2: 27:43

So, hey, we know it sucks, it's gonna get better, and so they. They weren't fighting back against the coaches, they weren't fighting each other, they were, they were holding each other accountable. They were furious, they were hurt because you know again, if you're at a place like OU, you've never lost like that in your life. You know these guys are state champions Multiple times over, they're the elite of the elite, and now they're having a losing record, so they're having to like wrestle with like what is it what? I don't know what to do with this, but they stayed engaged, they stayed connected, and so it was fascinating to see like they had every reason to quit and they did.

Speaker 2: 28:16

And so when you have that type of commitment, that type of leadership, that type of trust and I think it was, and it was fascinating because it was year one but but so many of them trusted venables and they trusted the coaches who had come in. It's like, hey, we know this isn't going how we wanted it to go, but we know they have our best in mind and we know that ultimately we're moving the right direction. If we give up work, it's gonna be so much more difficult to actually build something so we can just build a foundation will be good moving forward, and so it was fascinating to watch that that is interesting, but also the the point of kind of the previous conversation is there will be drama, there will be frustrations, there will be trials.

Speaker 1: 28:54

It's the teams that are in denial of. If we just get through this whole season with no drama, it's impossible.

Speaker 2: 29:02

People, we're humans and as much as we want to be unselfish, everyone's gonna have selfish moments. As much as we want to be about the team, we're gonna have moments we're only about us where we do get tired, we do get emotional, and so I think if everyone can just understand like perfect doesn't exist, the perfect culture doesn't exist. It's always messy, and and no matter how good your culture was yesterday, it could all be undone today. And so I think the other piece is that teams tend to have have. It's interesting to watch when things aren't going well, teams quit because, like me, and all this work we did was for nothing. Why? Why we keep doing it? What's the point when?

Speaker 2: 29:37

When you do that, you lose ground. Right, you're already suffering and struggling, but you tend to give up right before you're about to have some form of breakthrough and then you got to go start over again, and it just creates more and more work. But you also see teams who are succeeding Get complacent Right, like hey, don't, don't rock the boat like. You know, don't like if somebody's not living up to the standard, you know, we don't want to help talk about accountability right now, like we're winning. We don't want to. We don't want to. It's like, well, if you ignore it, that little crack, it's just gonna grow and grow and grow and that pressure is gonna build and when, when it matters, that's gonna overflow. And it's like, wait, that could have been a small conversation, but you ignored it because you were afraid to rock the boat. And now the boat's thinking, simply because you were, you were afraid to have a small conversation. Now it's a much bigger conversation.

Speaker 1: 30:20

Well, it's radical responsibility and radical leadership, regardless of the situation, regardless of this, the scoreboard, the record, that's right, that's right.

Speaker 2: 30:30

You know, the coaches always say and it's cliche, but it's also real it's like we don't play to a scoreboard, we play to a standard. Well, we don't lead to a scoreboard, we don't lead to a record, we lead to a standard, and so it doesn't matter for winning or we're losing or whatever. Like the standard has to be the same. That's the only way that you can actually have a long-term success.

Speaker 1: 30:48

Incredible. So I kind of shifting the conversation. I would be doing a disservice your new book keep chopping wood. I would love to talk about that. You know the idea of leadership, the idea of Continuing. You know you kind of teed this up of the process and trusting that process. I know that term gets thrown out a lot, but what does that actually mean, right, and so I think you've done a phenomenal job of Defining that. Tell us more about you know the purpose of the book and and kind of that message.

Speaker 2: 31:19

Yeah, so it was interesting. You know, back in January, almost exactly a year ago. So look at my phone, see when. When that was, but it was, it was almost, not, not a year ago. Sorry, almost exactly three years. Three years ago. What year is it? 2024?

Speaker 1: 31:35

Almost exactly four years ago.

Speaker 2: 31:38

We're doing great. January 11th 2020. So just found it. I just fired off a tweet that said because I was, so I was sitting. It was a. It was similar to how it's been the last week here in Oklahoma it was freezing snow and ice.

Speaker 2: 31:51

At the time, we lived downtown Oklahoma City in a 105 year old house, and so my neighbor had a wood burning fireplace and old homes have very thin windows so I could smell this fireplace burning and I'm just sitting like I wonder how? Like what's the process? Like, how does fire would go from the forest to the fireplace? And it's not, you know, it's not rocket science. The government's not like hiding this process from us. I just never really thought about it.

Speaker 2: 32:18

So quick Google search and I realized like oh, they're actually chopping wood nine to twelve to 15 months before they need it, because it has it's a process called seasoning, which is the fancy word for drying out what has to dry out. And so anybody listening or if you go camping, you try to light wet firewood, it doesn't work. It has, it has to be dry. So I was like wait a minute. So that means they're out doing the work months before they need it. So they don't like they're chopping wood for January, in March or April, when it's like 1560 or something like that, and it's like 1560 degrees, like I don't need this wood today, like this isn't fun. What's the fun? I can do this tomorrow, I can wait, we've got a lot of time. Well, if they did that, then it would get to December or January. Like, oh no, I wish I would have done the work. Like now I need to fire wood, I don't have it.

Speaker 2: 33:00

So I fired off this tweet that says you don't chop wood because you need it today. You chop it today so you have it. When you need to fire tomorrow. Your team will face adversity. Do the work today to build relational trust and culture so that when adversity hits, you can overcome, make sure you have wood for the fire. And so it was this, this concept of like. If it's a skill you need, if it's mental toughness that you want in the moment, you've got to start practicing for it today. You don't practice in the moment because it's it's too late. If it's trust in the moment for your team, right because when, when, so Kobe hit four months later and you know the world shut down and every leader had the same that he just stood together. We'll get through this, you know, sit together, we'll fight, we'll get through it. And you know, just trust each other and most teams, sport or otherwise, like trust to get. What are you talking about? Like she's in it for her, he's in it for him, I'm in it for me.

Speaker 1: 33:49

Like and our world's got flipped upside down.

Speaker 2: 33:53

That's right. And so, instead of fighting a common opponent, a common enemy, teams were fighting against each other and they lost ground. Well, the best teams, same message, guys, hasty together, trust each other. We don't know what it looks like, but let's stay together, let's keep fighting, we'll find a way through it. And those things like yeah, yeah, she's in it for me and he's in it for me and I'm in it for them. And so they locked arms and like just fought, fought the common opponent and made made little progress because they had done the work to build trust, to build connection, to build relationships, so that when adversity hit, they were actually ready for that moment. And you don't build it in adversity, right, it's too late.

Speaker 2: 34:27

So the next book that I'm writing it's almost done it's about the side of the if going into the storm. Right, when adversity hits, cows run away from the storm and they endure more of it. They lose progress because of it. Buys and go into the storm and they make progress in the midst of it. They get better because of it.

Speaker 2: 34:45

And so that we have a choice, when adversity hits, of how we respond to it. But too many hope to respond well. The best have prepared themselves to respond well. And so this idea of keep chopping wood and trusting the process, like everyone wants in today's world, we want the shortcut, we want the life hack to influence, to skill development, to culture, to relationship, to mindset it's like the shortcut is just showing up every single day and doing the work and it's not fun, it's boring, it's not sexy, it's like this is just what's required, and if we do that, we're actually ready for those moments. And so I think just the phrase I always use with teams, like hey, commit to being brilliant in the basics, like the basics of communication, the basics of mindset, the basics of skill development, the basics of relationship and culture If you can do those things, you'll be ready mic drop so good.

Speaker 1: 35:34

So again, going back to that question that I asked you earlier is, kevin, this sounds amazing, this sounds incredible. But now I'm a coach on the other side of this saying how, how do I do this, where do I start? And I know you have some phenomenal resources and I'd love for you to kind of talk about that as a shameless plug, because I think we say it's I use the analogy of, you know, softball families. My daughter wants to learn how to pitch. If I'm not a pitcher, what would I do? I would seek out a pitching instructor. And so I think we kind of take that victim mentality as parents and coaches sometimes as well. If I would do this on the physical side and I know that she wants this skill, that is a natural, easy, quick decision I don't think twice about purchasing pitching lessons. And so on the mental side, I think the hurdle that we face is we have to do a lot of convincing. But for the coaches that don't need convincing and they're ready how, how coach.

Speaker 2: 36:27

It's a great question, I think, because everyone has goals. Nobody has plans right. It's like goals aren't going to get you anywhere. It's January 23rd. As we record this. 81% of people have already put their New Year's resolutions Because they don't have a plan. I'm going to lose weight, how I'm going to be a better leader, how I'm going to build a resilient mindset, how I'm going to be financially secure, how I'm going to restore this relationship, how Like goals sound great, like you can write them down all day long, but what's your plan to actually get there?

Speaker 2: 37:00

And so there's an app that I use for for fitness, for working out, because I hate going to the gym. I like being at the gym. I hate the process of like waking up and going to the gym and all the all that entails, but I love once I'm there, like I love being at the gym, love working out and I'm busy. You know, three kids, multiple businesses, life is is chaos. And so there's an app that I use called Ladder, and it's like you. You kind of pick how you like to work out, equipment you like to use where you like to work out, and so it gives you a coach and they drop in seven workouts a week. So Sunday night they drop in the workouts and they've got video tutorials. Like every morning I get up 530 and I've got basically a coach on my phone walk me through a workout. Well, their whole New Year's marketing thing was like you don't need more time, you don't need more equipment, you don't need more fitness clothing, you don't need more fitness trackers, you need a plan to get healthy. Here's your plan, right? It's like people, they'll go to the gym like I don't know what to do when I'm here, like great, we have a plan for you, and so I think it's the same for us, right? So how are you going to do it? Like, what, what, what's, because what's required for you to get from where you are to where you want to be, and are you actually what? One do you know? And two, are you willing to do it? Because most people aren't willing to do what's required. So I want to get healthy. Great, you're not entitled to be healthy. You're not going to get healthy just because you said you wanted that thing. You've got to figure out how you're going to do it and you have to go earn it, and so what we've done with coaches is figured out.

Speaker 2: 38:26

Okay, we've done this work with a lot of teams over the course of a dozen years and a lot of the content we use I mean our focus is sports, but it's being used at places like Google and Delta and the US Air Force and Chick-fil-A, and government agencies and hospitals and school systems, because people are people and teams are teams, whatever the goal is, whatever the industry is, and so we've taken the best of what we've done with working with sports teams. It's okay. How do we scale this? Because I can only work with X amount of teams. I don't have that much time. We said how can we make something? Take the best of what we know, the best of what we've done, and give it to those who need it. And so right now we have something that's called the Better System. We're about to rebrand it and relaunch it.

Speaker 2: 39:09

It's going to be called the Coaches Performance Playbook. It's a library of resources to help you do three things. Number one manager chaos. Number two develop your people. Number three improve performance. So it does that with content on leading yourself, leading your staff and leading your team. And so it starts with you. It's a process for you to actually get really clear.

Speaker 2: 39:29

What are your values? Are you living them? If you said these three things are my values, if you got to the end of today and said did I live those things? Did those things drive my decisions? What are your heroic goals? What are you actually trying to pursue? What are you running after? How healthy are you Mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually?

Speaker 2: 39:47

You can't give what you don't possess, and so an unhealthy leader is never going to create a healthy team. A negative leader is never going to create a positive team, and so we have a system for leaders to actually get healthy. We think that's the most important thing in the world. The world doesn't need more leaders, we need better leaders. We need those leaders to be really healthy. And so if we can take coaches who are there and say, yeah, I need that, because, especially in the high school spaces true, in college too, but high school coaches, there's just so much being added to their plate you add the pressure of parents these days, which are insane, and it's like they don't. There's just too much. And so, like adding another thing, like another thing, I don't have time for another meeting, another conference, another whatever said great, you're right.

Speaker 2: 40:26

So let's just create short, sweet video content, and what I would guarantee is that if you do it, it works. It's like a diet. If you do it, 100% guarantee it works. I'm not guaranteeing championships, because there's too many things right that go into the that, but if you, if you do the work, you will be a better leader. If you do the work with your staff, you'll have a better staff. If you do the work with your team, you'll have less trauma, you'll have better performance, you'll have a better culture. You'll you'll be reinvigorated to do the job that you've want to do your whole life. Like because because coaches are just like man, this isn't why I got into coaching. I got into coaching so I learned like activate people. You know like I want to see people unlock their potential. This can help you get back to that.

Speaker 2: 41:05

One of the things that we do with with Oklahoma, and so we're with the team every Thursday we do a team talk. It's like 10, 15 minutes on adversity, on mindset, on leadership, on accountability, on discipline, right pick the topic, and so we've recorded like 30 of those. It's in part of this library so you can have a talk for your team legitimately every single week of the school year, but you've got a library of content to work with your players. There's a culture playbook to use with your leaders, with exercises to actually help them start your players, start to take ownership and develop your culture. So you say we got a leadership team, what do we do with them? Book club, okay, great, did that do anything?

Speaker 2: 41:41

It's great idea and great intent, but let's actually put practical things in place, and so this becomes the system that you use. It becomes the plan that you implement plans for better meetings, right, more effective, more efficient meetings, better delegation tools to help you decrease drama, decrease gossip on your team. And so it will be ready. It's, it's 99.9% ready. You can, they can find it at be better leaders, calm, be the easiest place to go, get it.

Speaker 2: 42:07

But we're trying to make that easily accessible, easily affordable, where, legitimately, all you have to do is hit play for yourself or for your staff or for your team once a week and as a whole plan of like here's what to do in the off season, here's what to do in season, because those two things are time demands are obviously very different. Right, you're not going to sit down in season and have a whole, you know, hour long team discussion. You've got things to do, and so it's got off season in season plans, and so it's it's. Our goal is to is to give coaches the resources they need to actually get back to coaching and do what they love and make the impact that they set out to do.

Speaker 2: 42:43

That's right.

Speaker 2: 42:44

My job is so good and if they can do that right, like because my my big. So here's where I get excited. I don't talk about this stuff a whole lot, but like my big, my big thing is like I want to completely change the leadership culture of sports in America, maybe the whole world. But we'll start here. And I've said for a long time, like we're not going to see it in my lifetime. We can start, but like it's not going to happen in my lifetime.

Speaker 2: 43:10

With with this thing and how accessible we're making it, like for the first time, like no, we can actually make a significant dent, like we can.

Speaker 2: 43:17

This is, this is, and I've I mean some high schools are already using it, some ADs are the previous version, so they'll get the new version as well. Like, and the feedback we're getting from coaches the most consistent feedback is like I feel seen and heard for the first time in a long time, and that's our thing. It's like it's not just like I think it's cool to know what do coaches actually need? What is it solving for them? Is it actually useful? And it is. And so for me I'm like great, because if we can change, we can have coaches, especially the high school level. I care about the collegiate level, that's the sexier space, right, because like you get big brand name and whatever. But for me the high school level, like that's where you change generations, because the impact that high school coaches get to have you change communities, you change families, you change generations, you change the trajectory of not someone's life but multiple someone's lives. It's like for me that's super exciting.

Speaker 1: 44:08

And you're reaching them before they even step foot on a college campus. That's right. Some of them won't. Some of them want to play collegiate sports.

Speaker 2: 44:14

That's right, and that's the thing that the things that these kids will learn will matter, whatever they do in life. Leadership matters, whatever you do right, self awareness matters, whatever you do, mindset matters, whatever you do, communication matters, building influence matters. And then what I get excited about is you know, once we have all these high school programs using it and then you get all these college programs using it, well, the college coach is going to want to recruit from a high school like your kids already know this stuff. They're already a fit for our culture. We know they're talented, we know they got the skill. We wouldn't be looking at them, but they're all now. We know their culture fit. They already know our language came on.

Speaker 1: 44:47

And they are well rounded. If I'm going to, if I only have 15 roster spots or 20, and I'm speaking on the softball side we obviously have a smaller rosters than football.

Speaker 2: 44:56

But it matters. You got to be picky.

Speaker 1: 44:58

Yeah, you got to be picky and it's that pressure, kevin. I have so appreciated your time and thank you for pulling back the curtain on this. I actually have two questions for you. We'll do kind of a rapid fire. I know that you love coffee and you do your coffee conversations with Kevin. What's your coffee order of choice?

Speaker 2: 45:12

Just black just straight black, straight black.

Speaker 1: 45:15

Hot or iced.

Speaker 2: 45:18

Well, that's a great question. So I start today Probably four cups of coffee by noon, ish three to four, but in the morning and then about 330, I'll get a cold brew.

Speaker 1: 45:31

There you go, regardless of the weather. So this last rapid fire question is a little bit more serious, but this is the question we ask all of our podcast guests. You are a time traveler and you can go back in time and give yourself a message. What would you tell yourself?

Speaker 2: 45:52

Hmm, that's a great question. That got cut deep there for a second.

Speaker 1: 46:00

Nothing like the coffee question.

Speaker 2: 46:02

Yeah, no, it was like cool All of a sudden, like replaying life. I would go back to myself 15 years ago and say you're right, keep going. So there was a season. So when I left the corporate world, started my own company, made $0 for a year like it was not good. It was in the healthcare world, and then I had this idea of educating student athletes about social media and so I started that company. Shouldn't have that. Took that one a year making $0. And we got pregnant with our second son in that season and my wife came in the room crying, not because she was excited, but crying. I sold a bike to pay for a mortgage at one point.

Speaker 2: 47:00

And so it was like this deep, deep depression, frustration, negativity, doubt fill in the blank. Like, is this right? This felt like something. I really thought this was going to be something. I really thought there was potential. I really thought I had potential. I remember going to my business partner now was my wife's boss at the time and it was such a dumb thing to say. It sounded really prideful. But early on in my corporate career I was like I feel like I'm made for something more than this. I feel like I made something bigger than this, and not like some big fame thing, but something bigger and more significant than what I was doing. And so, like then, when you have a season where you have legitimately nothing, you're like, okay, I'm insane what is going on. And so I think I would just go back to that season and say, you're right, keep going, because it was. You know, it gets dark when you're in the cave. It gets a little dark.

Speaker 1: 47:57

And that speaks to me because I've had those seasons too but when the impact is bigger and as a mental performance coach, we talk about all the time what's your why? And I think that's the reason why we do that. That mission and that impact driven heart is there, even through the low of the lows. Thank you for sharing that Very powerful Good question Good question.

Speaker 1: 48:16

Well, this has been an amazing conversation. We'll link all of the resources that we mentioned below, but what is the best place? You know, if someone were to follow you on social channels, where are you most active? I know we'll link all of them below, but what's the best?

Speaker 2: 48:30

Yeah, probably Twitter or X, whatever you want to call it. These days where I dump most of my ideas, go there. I'm putting a video a day. Try into on on Instagram and in YouTube just short, sweet videos, but certainly most, most active on Twitter X. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 48:49

And that's where we found you. We are grateful for that. So, kevin, thank you for your time. This has been incredible.

Speaker 2: 48:55

Absolutely. Thanks for having me Appreciate it.