In the midst of March madness emerges a story to teach us about our true self and the important role that sincere and caring leadership plays in our lives. Ever heard of Nolan Smith? For all those who watched the NCAA basketball championship game this past Monday, you know that Nolan is the point guard for the winning Duke Blue Devils. My first introduction to Nolan was 5 days ago as I was working out and listening to ESPN cover a story on Nolan and his father. To understand how Nolan teaches us about leadership, you first have to get a sense of his history. These are the take aways I had as I left the gym that day. ( hopefully I remembered these with a high degree of accuracy)
· Nolan’s father Derek played on the championship team for Louisville in 1980.
· Derek went on to play for 9 seasons in the NBA
· Derek retired, when Nolan was 2, in part due to a knee injury, but his primary motive was spend time with his son and daughter.
· Derek was asked to be the assistant for the Washington Wizards team.
· Derek initially hesitated as time with his family was important to him.
· Derek accepted the assistant position and Nolan was able to hang around the team and be present in practice and at games.
· When Nolan was 8, the family went on a cruise. The story featured a key moment in Nolan’s young life. He was upset with something that happened in a pick-up game and threw the basket ball overboard. His father pulled Nolan aside and told him, if he was going to play the game, he needed to have the right attitude.
· On that cruise Derek had an apparent heart attack and died.
· The players of the Wizards took young Nolan under their wings and made every effort to keep him focused in a positive direction.
· One team mate of Derek – Johnny Dawkins – became Uncle Johnny to Nolan and played a key role in his development as person and player.
· Johnny went on to coach at Duke and kept track of Nolan
· After high school- Nolan opted to play at Duke
· Johnny left Duke to take a head coaching position, which left speculation of Nolan following suit. From what I gathered, Nolan had still not come into his own as a player and with Johnny gone, there was concern.
· KEY POINT – Nolan had to make a decision of whether to stay or go and had to wrestle with the question: WHO IS GOING TO HELP ME NOW?
· HIS ANSWER: HE WAS GOING TO HELP HIMSELF!
At this point, Nolan had all he needed in his life to strive for and reach his true potential. He decided to take full and complete ownership of who he was, his talents, skills, and abilities. He had to reach down deep and come to the realization that no-one could offer up any more guidance in terms of him realizing he had an amazing skill set and abilities that had been nurtured and encouraged by his father, his family, his father’s former team mates, Uncle Johnny, and all the others coaches and supporters along his journey. He now had to BELIEVE in himself, in his purpose, in his goals and dreams, and make them come to reality. Well obviously this past Monday, was a capstone of one of his journeys in life. I’m sure he will have many more, especially, since he has fully taken ownership of Nolan Smith!
So what does Nolan’s story reveal about leadership?
I used to work for a man that talked about Skill versus Will. As a leader you have an obligation to your subordinates to provide them with the tools and abilities – SKILL – to get the job done, as well as creating the vision, motivating, inspiring, encouraging, coaching, removing obstacles, and constantly surveying the landscape for potential road blocks or pitfalls. But what you can’t do for your people is give them the – WILL - to perform to the best of their abilities on a consistent basis. You can’t force anyone to live up to their full potential. We can however, be candid and clear about our expectations and whether our subordinates are meeting them, as well as pointing out based on your experience and expertise, that they have a greater amount of potential than is being displayed. To that end, we must have regular sincere and meaningful dialogue that gets to the heart of them being true to their talents, skills and abilities, and ultimately, themselves. Because quite frankly, that is why you brought them onto your team, to fill a need in the organization has, which they should be able to perform in excess of your expectations, assuming they are fully engaged and willing to give their best effort. Bottom line – we need to have the discussion that makes it clear, you believe in their skills, talents, and abilities. You commit to doing your part, but ultimately they have to decide, choose, and commit to doing their part – Be a Nolan Smith!
From an individual point of view – the story resonates from the perspective of owning self. Being true to who you are, tapping into your purpose, your core beliefs, and values. The reality is the best parent, friend, support system, boss, leader, can only take you so far in life; they can encourage, support, motivate, inspire, coach, and articulate their vision for your potential, but only you can manifest your true potential based on what you know and believe about yourself. For Nolan, this realization hit him, when his mentor, coach, and uncle made a choice to move on and at that moment, when he decided to own his true self, he marked the beginning of a fabulous future.
So leaders, you are often in the role of having to bring this fact to light for your followers and in doing so, you go beyond helping a follower to excel and often times ignite the spark necessary to develop a future leader.
On a special note – I want to say; Mom and Sister were amazing figures in this story and the love the family had for each other was tremendously heart- warming.
Paul Martinez - President - Dynamic Solutions
