The recent passing of legendary basketball Coach John Wooden had me thinking about what made him so great? And he was indeed great – just look at a few statistics:

• Overall coaching record of 664-162 (810 pct)
• 10 NCAA Championships in 12 years at UCLA
• Inducted into Basketball Hall of Fame as both a player and coach
• And most important, developing leadership & life skills to thousands of young men and women who crossed his path over 99 years - either directly or indirectly

I believe what made him great were similar characteristics and beliefs found in other great leaders. He taught and instilled fundamentals based on simple messages, timeless values, virutes and principles. His approach wasn’t “out of the box” but based on simple fundamentals that provided his teams with the foundation to be the “best of the best” despite the pressures and adversity that faced them. Yes, he was a master in the fundamentals of basketball. But more importantly he was a master in the fundamentals of life. And he believed that the lessons learned on the basketball court would transition into the “real world”, of life. This is why so many of his players graduated and went on to lead successful lives after college and beyond – and why he is so beloved be nearly all of them.

It also left me thinking, why don’t other coaches and leaders follow the lead of Coach Wooden? In today’s age of what seems like a lack of leadership in our world, you’d think many people would “reach out” to learn about Coach Wooden’s approach, philosophy and implement it. So many coaches and leaders today are trying to reinvent the wheel when there are already proven lessons and examples at their disposal. In fact if you look at any successful sports team, those that are always winning seem to master the fundamentals of the respective sport and have teams that act like teams, not individuals. These successful teams more often than not exemplify the principles developed and taught by Coach Wooden.

With that said, I wanted to share his vision on both leadership and success. You can understand his view on the Pyramid of Success grid and 12 Lessons in Leadership. I listed both for your review – you can view a printable version of both by simply clicking on the icon to the right. This information can provide the formula anyone can use for success in their lives – both personally and professionally. I hope you enjoy and use these principles set by Coach Wooden so you can enjoy the same success he and his teams had during his tenure as coach and beyond the basketball court - and more importantly it is the best way to keep his spirit alive, through all of us and those with whom we interact with on a daily basis.

Enjoy,

Steve

I believe that one of the most important topics of this day and age is leadership. What is leadership? What characteristics make a good leader? Who is considered a good leader, and why?

Despite many great books written about leadership there still remains a great deal of outstanding questions yet to be answered. Personally I enjoy reading about great leaders and then come to my conclusions about what made them great – one of my all time favorite leaders is Winston Churchill. I would urge anyone who does not know about Churchill and his accomplishment’s to pick up two outstanding books written about him. The first is called The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill: Alone 1932-1940, by William Manchester and the second called Churchill: A Life, written by Martin Gilbert .

In these books you will see the true greatness of Churchill’s leadership style…his ability to communicate, encourage others in the face of great adversity, to be a forward thinker, to be able to learn from history and most importantly his past mistakes…For anyone interested in true leadership I highly recommend reading about Winston Churchill.

On another note, with my interest on the topic of leadership, I have been publishing a monthly newsletter on leadership called the Leader Insights Newsletter. Over the past 2-1/2 years I have had the opportunity to interview a variety of leaders across many job related fields. Basically the newsletter is a seven Q&A format which answers such questions as; What motivates them? What is their leadership style? Who do they consider as good leaders, How do they lead during times of adversity?  What do they read to become better leaders and etc.

The information gathered in the newsletter has been helpful, insightful and encouraging! The insights have been so robust and full of gems of valuable information that I created an ebook which captured all of my interviews. So with that said, I wanted to share the Wisdom of Leaders ebook with you.

This eBook is a recap of 28 leaders I have interviewed. You will see first hand in this eBook what exactly makes these “everyday” leaders tick! And also helps you realize that leadership is an art that can be learned and leveraged by anyone and anytime…and not solely by a Winston Churchill in times of adversity.

This eBook is free so just “click” on the book to download…upon reading it, please feel free to provide your thoughts and comments as well. 

I hope you enjoy and if you care to subscribe to the monthly Leader Insights Review newsletter, then just simply click here: http://www.gavatorta.com/newsletter.htm