Football is the most popular American sport, and this weekend millions of us will be glued to our television screens for the Academy Awards of football – the 2014 NFL Super Bowl.
And even those who don’t root for either the Seattle Seahawks or the Denver Broncos have good reasons to watch the game, particularly if they want to get some real-life tips on how to lead a team.
The action on the turf at the MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. very closely mirrors the growing understanding in business and politics that what it means “to lead a team” has changed. The best leaders have adapted their tactics and approaches accordingly, and are leading the charge to build the best, most effective teams in their sphere.
Even in a traditionally hierarchical sport like football, the old-fashioned, top-down, rule-by-tyranny approach is leaving the field. The cadre of elite NFL coaches that now dominate the game do so by listening to their players, and exercising power through them, instead of over them.
The past six NFL Super Bowl-winning coaches have all embraced this new leadership style. NY Giants Coach Tom Coughlin was infamous as an old-school, military-style coach who relied on boot-camp rigidity to whip his tem into shape. In 2007, Coughlin shifted his approach to become a leader who solicits feedback from his players, and integrates that feedback into actionable plans.
This shift in leadership may have been what helped the Giants win the Super Bowl – and may have helped Coughlin keep his job.
Similarly, in Denver, Broncos head coach John Fox’s perky leadership style is legendary. In an interview with the Denver Post, Fox described his coaching style this way: “I think, first of all, there’s an environment you create. My leadership style has always been a little bit more of — you’re working with us, not for us. And that holds true whether you’re dealing with an assistant coach, equipment manager, trainer, basically the building. Including players, who are probably the most important part of the building. It’s how you motivate, how you deal with players, not so much as a dictator, but you’re working with them.”
And in Seattle, Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll has seen his signature enthusiastic cheerleading style vindicated. Once mocked as the “rah-rah” coach, Carroll’s style has gained respect and attention from fellow professionals.
“It’s amazing what Pete has done here,’’ said NFL Network analyst and Hall of Famer Michael Irvin, “This story is bigger than football. It’s an American story. When you take all that everybody else has discarded or maybe didn’t measure up, and you pull the best out of each one of them and make it the best group. That’s the story. That’s a hell of a story.”
So why are winning coaches changing their behavior? Because our world has changed, and is still changing. And leadership needs to change with it.
Football provides an excellent metaphor for the business and the boardroom. Like coaches, CEOs must transform their leadership styles to reflect the increasingly interconnected and interdependent nature of our world.
Where once a company could “out-game” their competitors – gaining a competitive edge with more and better insight and information – today’s world offers more information, faster, and in greater depth than ever before.
This means it is becoming increasingly impossible to out-perform competitors in traditional ways. Instead, leaders must create a culture that prepares their teams to withstand the twists and turns of the market, to out-run their opponents, and to maintain the impetus and focus that carries them across the goal line.
In this new environment, we are all leaders. Each of us has the capacity to inspire, to innovate, to spark a movement. We all have the capacity to contribute to a culture that cultivates collaboration and shared ownership of outcomes. And we all have the ability to connect with what is most valuable in others, catalyzing peak performance in a principled and sustainable way.
So, whether you’ll be wearing Seattle Seahawks blue and silver or Denver Broncos blue and orange, watch the leadership concepts in play on the Super Bowl field this Sunday, and consider the real-life applications for those concepts in business. In business, as in football, championship behavior is always the winner.