Book of the Week: The Score Takes Care of Itself
20 Jan 2014
In anticipation of the NFC championship game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Seattle Seahawks, I read The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh with Steven Jamison and Craig Walsh. Bill Walsh died of leukemia before completing the book. There are a lot of little things in this book, so it is hard to summarize effectively. I liked it, because it provided some insight into how Bill Walsh turned around the 49ers and how Joe Montana and Jerry Rice became Hall of Famers. Bill Walsh turned around the losing 49ers as the general manager and head coach. His first task was to fix the culture and install his “Standard of Performance”. This meant getting rid of many of the existing players and staff. Culture is very important. His culture was not focused on winning, but executing things to perfection. To always get better.
“good talent with bad attitude equals bad talent” - Bill Walsh
It doesn’t matter how talented you were, if you were detrimental to the team, Bill would get rid of you.
“I sought intelligence in employees, not just for the obvious reason,s but also because a dull-witted staff member who’s aggressive creates anarchy, when have one of those who thinks he’s intelligent in your midst, look out. The bull-headed know-it-all is a destructive force on your team.” - Bill Walsh
Bill made everyone feel like they were part of the organization and they represented the organization. As such, the maintenance staff, receptionists and others were held to high expectations on conduct. Everyone had a responsibility to do their part to make the team succeed. West Coast Offense The west coast offense was created out of necessity. Since Bill lacked the talented chess pieces, he had to make do with what he had. It relied on short accurate timed passes in contrast to the bruising ground game and the long bombs that the other teams employed. When you are lacking the resources, you are forced to be innovative. “The Genius” The media call Bill, “The Genius”, but calling him a teacher would be more appropriate.
Obviously, the-physical component is huge in football, but what Bill did was make the mental component even bigger. He taught what he wanted done, and he was a great teacher. He taught players, he taught coaches, he taught staff, he taught, taught, taught.
Any criticism that Bill gave was constructive criticism on how to improve. Leadership
- Listen
- Learn
- Lead
Jerry Rice I learned why people say Jerry Rice is deceptively fast. He didn’t have a fast forty yard dash time, but you don’t win football games by having a fast forty yard dash time. You win football games by catching the ball and being fast and able to move around with the ball. It is easy to create a metric to measure everyone by, but make sure it is the right metric. You need to look at the right things. Mastery Jerry Rice became the greatest of all time, because of his worth ethic. The results of a football game are based on how well you can execute. Preparation leads to better performance. Head Coaches
Good and bad are about the same in the NFL, perhaps in corporate America too. You’re gone if good is the best you can do. Good just buys you time; great buys you a little more time. And then you’re gone. In the NFL, a head coach is on a very short string.
Head coaches seem to be a lot like CEOs. After a bad season, head coaches lose their job, but the new head coach is selected from the same pool of head coaches that lost their job at other teams. If you get the culture right, things should take care of itself.