Unlocking the Potential of Teams: The Role of Leadership in Achieving Success | The Fifth Hammer Growth Podcast - EP 1
Get ready for a captivating discussion that delves into the world of rapid company growth, leadership, and the parallels in the world of sports.
This episode starts by exploring the pitfalls of rapid growth within organizations and how mistakes can easily go unnoticed. Contrasting this, they dive into the intricacies of turnaround scenarios, where momentum needs to be built from the ground up, and mistakes must be addressed head-on.
Lacrosse takes center stage as our hosts share their personal experiences with the sport. It all started when their child, Brayden, took up lacrosse after being unable to play football. With little knowledge initially, their perspective on the game quickly changed after witnessing its intensity firsthand.
They discuss the success of their company's core values, particularly the value of extreme ownership. They recommend a book that perfectly encompasses these values, emphasizing the chapter on bad teams and leaders. Drawing inspiration from a story about Navy SEALs, they relate the importance of strong leadership to their own experiences coaching lacrosse, highlighting the transformative power of effective leadership.
Stay tuned as our hosts explore the concept of constant self-improvement, the impact of different coaches on team performance, and the role of collaboration and empowerment in achieving success. We'll also hear about their triumphant season as coaches, their unique coaching approach, and the incredible achievements of their team.
So grab your headphones and prepare for an episode filled with insights, inspiration, and a robust discussion on growth and leadership.
Transcript
I'm your host, spencer Matthews, here with co hosts Ryan Riley and Dave Huffman.
Speaker:We're excited you're here with us today as we share a story and experience
Speaker:of success in lacrosse and share the concept of no
Speaker:bad teams, only bad leaders.
Speaker:You are listening to the Fifth Hammer Growth podcast, where we help you
Speaker:find harmony in imperfection as you journey towards success
Speaker:in life and in business.
Speaker:When we were building our culture and building our company,
Speaker:we talked a lot about culture and our core values
Speaker:and what we wanted to try to
Speaker:how do we and Spencer, you did a great job of this.
Speaker:We didn't build our core values
Speaker:until like a year and a half.
Speaker:Yeah, we were operating for almost like a year and a half or two years
Speaker:before we actually documented our core values. Right. And so it was based
Speaker:on what we were already living. And that's what core values really are. That's what
Speaker:culture really is. It's not what you write on the wall. It's not what you
Speaker:put in a handbook. It's how you live and how you operate within your company.
Speaker:I think what we tried to do is just document what
Speaker:we were already doing right. In a way that could be
Speaker:scaled and modeled and repeated. And I think
Speaker:that was the success of our core values in our
Speaker:company, is because we didn't try to force anything. Like you
Speaker:said, we documented what we were living. Well, one of those core
Speaker:values that we identified was extreme
Speaker:ownership. Right? It was the entire book was our core
Speaker:values. And if
Speaker:anybody wants to read that book, I mean, everybody should read it. I think
Speaker:every teenager should read that book. I think every parent should read
Speaker:that book. That's a book that has to be on your reading
Speaker:list at least once a year. But there's
Speaker:a chapter in there that talks about there are no bad
Speaker:teams, just bad leaders. And the story behind that is
Speaker:phenomenal because they go into Hell Week with Navy Seals, and
Speaker:there's this one team that was always behind. They were always
Speaker:lagging, and there was this other team that was always winning. And they tell
Speaker:this story. It's so great. And as they were watching
Speaker:this, they decided to make one shift, one move, right.
Speaker:They took the leader of the team that sucked, and they put them with
Speaker:the leader of the team that was winning, and they swapped those two
Speaker:leaders. And then all of a sudden, something beautiful freaking happened.
Speaker:That team that was always behind said, oh, we got a leader. That's
Speaker:amazing now. And all of a sudden, they were competing for first. And that
Speaker:team that already knew how to win, they were
Speaker:continuing to drive. And so those teams became one and
Speaker:two throughout the rest of Hell Week. And it's interesting because I always
Speaker:thought what a great concept that is
Speaker:to theorize on, right? It makes sense in the book,
Speaker:and it highlights
Speaker:the concept that there are no bad teams, just bad leaders.
Speaker:So what's interesting is I had a personal experience of that
Speaker:in my life. I've always been
Speaker:involved with lacrosse. My kids, three of
Speaker:my four boys have played lacrosse. So I've
Speaker:coached I coached Dallin, who's a junior in
Speaker:high school since he was in third grade,
Speaker:and he's played all the way up through
Speaker:he's playing lacrosse for Centennial High School.
Speaker:Last year, the team they had and we had
Speaker:a coach that was coaching, and he was a great lacrosse player.
Speaker:This coach knew the game like nobody else. I mean, he was a
Speaker:player, he played in college,
Speaker:but he was a young professional.
Speaker:And I don't know that he had the leadership skills
Speaker:to lead that team to where we wanted as parents and as
Speaker:a board and everything them to go. And so last
Speaker:year, they had a losing season.
Speaker:There were only two seniors on that team. So two seniors
Speaker:graduated. We literally had
Speaker:the same exact team for this year. You should extend on the
Speaker:losing. No? Yeah. I mean, it was a
Speaker:disaster. Yeah.
Speaker:Brayden you're absolutely right. I think we only won like two games. It was over
Speaker:all two. And those were games that were
Speaker:that I think the other team didn't have their starting players show up. I
Speaker:mean, it was really bad. And for a long time, those were
Speaker:the seasons. Just completely disappointed. The season before that,
Speaker:we were skunked. Right. So there was no
Speaker:progression going on and we didn't see any progression. Let's make sure we send him
Speaker:this clip, too, by the way. I know I feel bad saying this because
Speaker:if he ever saw it, he knows the coach knows who this is about. Right.
Speaker:Because I actually gave him the book, extreme ownership.
Speaker:It's interesting. At the end of the season, as a board, we came together and
Speaker:said, we need to make a choice and we need to make a change. Well,
Speaker:coaches, lacrosse coaches in this valley, there's
Speaker:not a lot of them. I mean, there's really not. And most of them are
Speaker:going to be young players that are coming out of college, and that's not what
Speaker:we want. Want to stay in the sport. Yeah. So as a
Speaker:board, we decided that we need to make a move. So I sat down with
Speaker:the coach and we talked through it, and it was actually really good because he
Speaker:was kind of filling some of that and his wife was just getting ready to
Speaker:have a baby. And so we left. It mutual. Things are great. You'll
Speaker:go your way, we'll go our way. We appreciate everything you gave
Speaker:us, but now we don't have a coach
Speaker:come fall, my good friend Jason Anderson
Speaker:and I decided, you know what, because we don't have a coach, we're going to
Speaker:step in and coach, and we're we're gonna do this
Speaker:until the board finds a coach because there's challenges, right? You don't want
Speaker:parents being coaches because there's favoritism. There's all kinds of crazy drama
Speaker:that goes around with that, and we totally acknowledge that.
Speaker:But we felt comfortable. And not only that,
Speaker:I coached probably five of these kids from the very beginning
Speaker:time they ever picked up a stick, because this is Dallin's, I
Speaker:coached him, and Jason coached the other half of the team from
Speaker:the beginning of them ever playing. And so we knew these boys.
Speaker:We love these kids, right? Fall was great.
Speaker:We had a winning season. I think we went seven and three in
Speaker:fall, which was amazing. Coming back, we
Speaker:started getting into spring ball
Speaker:and this amazing team
Speaker:went undefeated in their division.
Speaker:I mean, the same kids that we had last year, except for two seniors,
Speaker:went undefeated in their division last night. We were
Speaker:in semifinals. We beat in semifinals 15 to
Speaker:four was the final score in semifinals. They had
Speaker:all star elections come out like the division and league, like
Speaker:all state, first team, second team. Ten
Speaker:players on that team became all I'm getting
Speaker:chills for tears, man. Ten
Speaker:players were all state. First team, second
Speaker:team, only two. We had two that were second team, the rest were all state
Speaker:and first team, ten. Last year, we didn't have any. I love
Speaker:it. It's the concept of I mean, it's
Speaker:a huge success story, but it emphasizes the fact that
Speaker:there are no bad teams out there, only bad leaders.
Speaker:And it's difficult because how do you know you're going to be a good leader
Speaker:or not? And when do you identify that you are that good leader or you're
Speaker:that leader that needs to be step
Speaker:aside so that other leaders could come in? As you're leading an organization,
Speaker:as you're looking at your team, man, what a
Speaker:challenge that is. I think the moment you call
Speaker:yourself a good leader, you're not a good leader. I
Speaker:think you believe that you can lead people,
Speaker:and your passion for that and your belief that
Speaker:you can do that is what makes you a good leader, because you're
Speaker:constantly refining and becoming a better it's the law of the lid.
Speaker:A whole book could be written about this. The first time I recognized this
Speaker:was in high school. There was a team in our league that went like one
Speaker:in 20 or one in 22 or something like that. And I was
Speaker:always blown away because there were some talented guys on that team. They
Speaker:had a coach who was terrible. The next year, they got
Speaker:even a decent coach. They went like 21 and went to the regional
Speaker:the regional tournament. Wow. And then I think this is why I love Ted Lasso
Speaker:so much, is it's this personified? If you can work with
Speaker:people and you can communicate and you have the humility
Speaker:to understand that.
Speaker:You'Re not a. Great leader, it's kind of like, somebody told me one time, if
Speaker:you ever meet a guy that says he's good at golf, he's probably an asshole,
Speaker:because nobody says they're good at golf. It's just
Speaker:something that you're working on for the rest of your life.
Speaker:So, anyways, when you were going through your season, I remember
Speaker:seeing it like, hearing about the record in the fall and thinking, oh, my
Speaker:God, this is a story. This is exactly what
Speaker:we talked about at Microbe. This is exactly the story in the book. Now, in
Speaker:sports, I think there can be bad teams. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:It's not like holding a boat over your head. It's, like, way more complex than
Speaker:that. Which makes it even more impressive, I think. Well, I think it presents an
Speaker:interesting dichotomy because I totally believe in that principle of
Speaker:no bad team is only good leaders. But I also believe in almost a reverse
Speaker:principle, that if you're part of a team, as a
Speaker:sports player, I did see that I performed well
Speaker:for certain coaches and terrible for other coaches, but I didn't recognize that in the
Speaker:moment. That was hindsight. I think we've all had experiences, especially,
Speaker:like, in youth, where there's some subjects we like more,
Speaker:and it's not actually because of the subject, it's really because of the teacher. Sure.
Speaker:Right. Or a class is engaging, or a presentation at a
Speaker:seminar at a conference is our favorite because they were
Speaker:a great speaker. It may not actually have been, like, the content that really hit
Speaker:us the most. Right. And so there is that concept of
Speaker:another one for you, like parents. If you look at parents as a leader
Speaker:and the family as a team. Right.
Speaker:There's so many dynamics where leadership sets the
Speaker:tone, but at the end of the day, if the team is taking
Speaker:extreme ownership, it's actually all on them. Right.
Speaker:So you want the team to take ownership. That know, I have the
Speaker:ability to choose for myself.
Speaker:And my story is my journey because of my choices,
Speaker:and I'm responsible for that. And the concept of no
Speaker:bad teams, only bad leaders, allows people to throw a rock at a leader anytime
Speaker:they want. And so it's a
Speaker:dichotomy right. Where I see both as
Speaker:truth and it's interesting. I love the story.
Speaker:No, I think there has to be a balance. And it was interesting because I
Speaker:was going over moments this year last night,
Speaker:as I was thinking about the success of this team and them going into the
Speaker:championship game on Saturday. And I remember there are certain things that stood
Speaker:out and trying to identify
Speaker:how do you empower your team to step
Speaker:up to be those players? Right. And I
Speaker:remember specifically there was this one moment catcher is our
Speaker:goalie. He's a junior in high school. I was hoping you'd tell this. Yeah,
Speaker:he's not our best goalie. In fact, Izzy Martin went
Speaker:86% save rate. That dude
Speaker:has been a wall. And I taught Izzy how to freaking
Speaker:hold a stick when he was in third grade, and he
Speaker:seriously is one of the best goalies that I've ever seen at
Speaker:this level. Right. But catcher was
Speaker:in on this game, and it was at a tournament. We're
Speaker:playing out of state teams, and there's always this stigma of playing out of state
Speaker:teams. These guys just come in and destroy. In the
Speaker:past, when we played this tournament with these same out of state teams,
Speaker:we never beat these guys, never beat them
Speaker:in the first quarter. In the first five minutes of the game, we went down
Speaker:30 instant 30, and
Speaker:I pulled catcher, and he came off
Speaker:hot. Like, he came off saying, what the hell? You're taking me out already?
Speaker:And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, settle down. What are you seeing? And he
Speaker:was like, what? I was like, what are you seeing out there? Something you're seeing
Speaker:something that I'm not. What can we change? What are you seeing? He's
Speaker:like, you're not taking me out. I'm like, no, I want to talk to you
Speaker:about what's going on. And he's like, oh. He's like, okay, well, if
Speaker:we did this and this and this is what's happening, and this is why. And
Speaker:I was like, awesome. I called timeout. I brought the defense
Speaker:together, and we talked through what they were seeing
Speaker:with what catcher was seeing, and we came together as a team. They went back
Speaker:in, and we won the game. And
Speaker:catcher was so blown away that I wasn't going to yell at him, I wasn't
Speaker:going to take him out. I wasn't mad at him. I was just
Speaker:frustrated because I wasn't seeing what they were seeing. Something was happening on the
Speaker:field, and that is a critical I think that's a critical part about building
Speaker:culture and being a leader, is that you have to acknowledge
Speaker:that you don't have all the answers. You're not going to see it all. You're
Speaker:not going to see it, all. Right? And it comes down to the point where
Speaker:you have to be able to empower your players to be able to see. And
Speaker:so from that point on, every time we come off for a break
Speaker:or time out or anything, I bring my team together and, okay, what are you
Speaker:guys seeing? And we talk through it. Yeah. And I think people miss this part
Speaker:of extreme ownership because it's not necessarily about, oh, it's
Speaker:my fault, my fault, my fault. Like, it's not
Speaker:about that. It's about collaborating all the way up and down the
Speaker:chain so people feel like they own the
Speaker:plan. Right. And that's what you did. That's what I love about that story, is
Speaker:you pulled him out, you asked him what he was
Speaker:seeing, which a lot of coaches will do, but then
Speaker:you allowed what he was seeing to
Speaker:impact the game. And the decisions made. The decisions made came from what
Speaker:he was seeing. So you collaborated with him in real time on
Speaker:the plan. They went out and executed against what he was seeing. You know what
Speaker:I mean? So he was able to sort of make the decision,
Speaker:which is always going to fire up a team more than the coach telling them
Speaker:what to do. That's why truth experience is more impactful than truth told. That's
Speaker:why that's so powerful. Well, yeah, you give people a voice, right, and you allow
Speaker:them to be part of the input that affects the output. And whether
Speaker:it's sports or it's family or it's business,
Speaker:it's the same, right? Yeah,
Speaker:it was really cool. But you think about what we did as we were building
Speaker:Microbe, right? And as we were building our company,
Speaker:how many times did you hear me tell anybody, go figure it
Speaker:out. What do you think? Right? And it's that idea
Speaker:of and it got to the point
Speaker:where they hated me saying, like, especially because
Speaker:we had such a young age wise company employees, our
Speaker:employees were really young. A lot of them were just out of
Speaker:college. Some of them were in the middle of college. Some of them were.
Speaker:And they would come with a question. Ryan, Ryan, Ryan, Ryan,
Speaker:Ryan. And if I sat there and answered everybody's question, I would be like,
Speaker:I couldn't get anything done. So the easy response
Speaker:to empower them was, what do you think? And if they
Speaker:didn't have an answer, go figure it out and trust the fact
Speaker:that and here's the challenge, right? Because sometimes they came back and I was like,
Speaker:I totally don't agree with that. That's a dumb freaking answer right
Speaker:there. But you trust the fact that it's going to get them 80%
Speaker:there. Yeah. Right. And then you massage it a little bit. You work with them.
Speaker:What about this? What about this? And now they're maybe 85% or
Speaker:87%, and then they go do it, and it's their idea and it's their
Speaker:plan. Right. And I think that was the power
Speaker:of what we tried to do, is just let these kids know on this
Speaker:team that we could win together. So I have a
Speaker:question. Obviously, like, the coaching leadership changed you and
Speaker:your friend, what leadership dynamics changed in
Speaker:the team and the players, were there any new captains?
Speaker:Did they start acting in a different manner? I'm curious if you
Speaker:observed or thought about that at all, too, of
Speaker:if you saw any changes in them. Yeah, I think that one of the things
Speaker:that we really tried to do as
Speaker:coaches is we allowed our players
Speaker:to talk to us. Right.
Speaker:I think when you get young leaders and there are
Speaker:situations where they believe that if they're not giving
Speaker:the answers or providing the answers that they don't. Then they're not
Speaker:leading. Yeah. You know what I mean? Then they're not really leading. Or if they're
Speaker:challenged my
Speaker:players, challenged me because I'll admit those kids have been playing a lot longer than
Speaker:I never played in college. I never played in high school. I didn't even know
Speaker:lacrosse until Brayden picked up a stick. And it's funny, he started playing
Speaker:lacrosse because my wife was like, you're not playing football. And so he's like, well,
Speaker:then I'll play lacrosse. And we're like, cool. Lacrosse is we don't even know what
Speaker:lacrosse is. Even worse. And then we went and saw the first game. We were
Speaker:like, oh, my hell, dude, this is freaking ball with weapons. He
Speaker:pivoted to something more violent.
Speaker:If you don't have bruises up and down your arms, you're not playing. Right?
Speaker:So I didn't know anything about the game. And some of these
Speaker:kids have been playing a lot more than me. And so I have to acknowledge
Speaker:the fact that as a leader, I'm here to curate the conversation, to
Speaker:put in the system and to establish the way that I
Speaker:would like to see the game. And
Speaker:but at times, they come off. They're like, dad, backer's not working. Dallon
Speaker:specifically, dad backer's not working. They're getting through our zone
Speaker:defense. We need to switch to man. I'm like, what do you guys think? Okay,
Speaker:let's do it. We switch to man. And we dominate instantly because I had full
Speaker:faith in my four Horsemen, my four defensive
Speaker:players, who, by the way, were the only team because I'm the
Speaker:defensive coach. We're the only team who had all four
Speaker:defensive starters elected to allstate
Speaker:first team or second. A, we should reach
Speaker:out to the Idaho Statesmen or whatever and get a modern day Ted
Speaker:Lasso write up. That would be cool. So here's the other
Speaker:thing that I did with this four. So we have a captain
Speaker:for attack, we have a captain for our midis, and we have a captain for
Speaker:our defenders, and then we have a team captain, right? So we created four captain
Speaker:spots, right? You see where this is going, right? And then once a week,
Speaker:we have the fifth hammer. Literally,
Speaker:it's that fifth hammer that leads us out and sets the tone
Speaker:and the cheer. And they're identified, based on their effort in the
Speaker:previous week, who's the fifth hammer this week?
Speaker:So I knew that story. I was hoping that was going to be the answer
Speaker:to the question, because think about how that changes the leadership
Speaker:dynamic, right? You take the guy who probably wasn't getting a
Speaker:lot of recognition, but deserved it because he's
Speaker:working hard, maybe would. Get the most improved player, right? Or
Speaker:the most inspirational player. Yeah. Everybody wants to
Speaker:rally around that guy. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, it was really
Speaker:cool to wrap this up. Just a
Speaker:phenomenal season, amazing experience
Speaker:with these players that, like, I've known most their
Speaker:life. I love these kids and the success that
Speaker:they're having. But the key here
Speaker:is the ability to watch
Speaker:a principle that we loved and talked about and read about
Speaker:in real life work. And I think that's where
Speaker:truth told and truth experience versus truth told. Right.
Speaker:That was one of those things I think I will always remember the
Speaker:concept of there's no bad team, just bad leaders. And you're
Speaker:absolutely right, Spencer. You can point to leaders, but that's not
Speaker:anybody taking extreme ownership. Right. Leading up and down that chain of
Speaker:command, all of those principles that came into play were part of this
Speaker:team, and it was just beautiful.
Speaker:Yeah. And I think as leaders, to be a good
Speaker:leader, you have to adopt that mindset. And to be a
Speaker:leader, you're already putting yourself out there if people throw rocks at you. How
Speaker:many times did we say, everything you say is heard through a
Speaker:microphone or megaphone and everything
Speaker:you do is seen through a microscope?
Speaker:Yeah, man, I love that story. And I love that you went,
Speaker:like, undefeated, because anything over two
Speaker:wins would have validated the
Speaker:hypothesis, but you really drove it home. Yeah. In our
Speaker:division, we were undefeated. We played other teams outside of our division. We had
Speaker:really close games, but in our division, we were undefeated
Speaker:and undefeated through the tournament. We're going to the championship game on
Speaker:Saturday, and I'm just super excited about these
Speaker:guys. The other thing is, some of these
Speaker:principles are really easy to get behind
Speaker:when you have extreme winds of growth
Speaker:blowing into the sales. And what I mean is, like, top
Speaker:line growth, top line revenue can hide a lot of mistakes. So
Speaker:I've worked at companies before where it was really easy to let people go
Speaker:off and figure it out because the growth was going to cover up all the
Speaker:mistakes anyways. In a
Speaker:turnaround scenario where there is no growth,
Speaker:I think it exemplifies the point even more, because
Speaker:it's not like you're coming off of a ton
Speaker:of momentum, right. And you're just trusting that the momentum is
Speaker:going to keep you going. Like you had to get momentum. So that's cool,
Speaker:man. So you guys want to hear my Fifth Hammer experience
Speaker:this week? Yeah. So we're cat family.
Speaker:We got two kitties this week. On Monday, cats
Speaker:typically have four fingers. Our
Speaker:cats have five. Oh, shut up. What? Our cats have thumbs.
Speaker:Wait, hold on a minute. Fifth Hammers? Your cats have
Speaker:fingers? Well, yeah. Pause.
Speaker:Dude, that's so creepy. Your cats have thumbs? Yeah. They have Fifth
Speaker:Hammers. We got Fifth Hammer cats. Seriously? Two of them? What kind of cats are
Speaker:they? I don't know. Normal cats. I go over to your house and it's got,
Speaker:like, a human head. I'll bring it in for the
Speaker:pod. It's sitting there drinking coffee.
Speaker:Did you get chessire cats from Alice in Wonderland? You got mutant
Speaker:cats? My wife, man. Does your cat sit on like a
Speaker:beanbag and smoke out of a hookah like the cat from Alice in
Speaker:Wonderland? That's what we're training it to do. That'S freaking
Speaker:Rad bye.
