Press Mute: Leadership Beyond the Noise

As an outsider to sports management, it took me a while to understand winning and losing games during a season.

Regardless of our performance, the outcome of the game dictated our response—reflect and learn from losses or rejoice and celebrate wins.

The problem, of course, is that winning and losing, certainly in a finite ecosystem such as a league or game environment, is a poor indicator because it is comparative.

In other words, it doesn’t matter how badly you play; if you were better than the opposition, even marginally, you won. Sometimes that margin could be a point, a free throw, a bad referee decision, or just plain luck.

This mindset can be limiting – narrowing ones focus to transactional tactics rather than aspirational, purpose-driven cultures. But more on that later…

All the coaches I worked with usually paid particular attention to the game tape after a loss. The version we received post-game by our video coach was always edited to remove breaks, timeouts, and audio.

It was fasc…