These notes came from the archives of the Xavier Men’s newsletter. They Came from Pete Carroll’s book “Win Forever.” If you are interested in seeing the archives or in subscrbing to their newsletter, click on this link:
Xavier Newsletter
Below are notes from Pete Carroll’s “Win Forever”. This book was one of six selected for our staff fall reading project. We cannot stress enough how amazing of a book this is from a coaching point of view.
As you prepare for your upcoming season, this book will provide some amazing ideas for every area of your program.
The following notes come from the “Coach Your Coaches” section.
• “All the principles we use with players apply to our coaches and other staff members as well.
• “Our success depends on ensuring that everyone is completely engaged, commited, and in a relentless persuit of a competitive edge. A big part of my job is creating an environment where this will happen.”
• “If I want (assistants) to coach to their full potential. I have to not only allow them to be authentically themselves, but insist upon it.”
• It hurts the whole organization when assistants are: “Coaching outside their personalities. It will weaken them in the long run.”
The Following notes came from the “Coach Your Coaches” section.
• Coaches need to: “Teach from inside themselves, because that was what would make them the most authentic and effective coach possible.
• Assistants need to: “Develop their own personal coaching style.”
• “A diversity of styles and approaches makes the whole team stronger.”
• When making a hire: “The first thing I look at is a person’s competiveness and work ethic.”
• “Hire young and promote from within
• Look for someone that is: “Open-minded and full of competitive fire, even if it comes at the expense of a certain amount of experience.”
• “The most powerful weapon in the Win Forever philosophy is the drive to contstanty be looking for ways to improve.’
• “When everyone gets to contribute his maximum effort it is transformative for the whole organization.”
• “You want to compete with people you can trust to lead.”
• “Our efforts to win are based on our ability to control every aspect of our team’s environment, from energy to focus to comaradery. When the team’s natural chemistry takes the form we want, that’s an added advantage we’re happy to have, but we cannot afford to hang our success on the hope that this will happen.”
• “A player, however talented, may have a bad day. Leadership the team can depend on must be constant and stable to be most effective. The only leadership I can rely on is that which comes from my coaching staff. I have chosen to rely on my staff first and foremost.”
• “We’re only going to Win Forever if we can build a staff of people who are constantly competing to reach their full potential.”
• “A Win Forever organization is a very tight community.”
NO WHINING, NO COMPLAINING, NO EXCUSES
• This rule surrounds team language, or as Carroll calls it, ‘self talk”.
You can read a sample from the book on Amazon by clicking on the image of the cover at the left.
• A negative mentality creates negative thoughts.
• A positive approach creates the power of possibilities.
• “If a player had a direct problem with me or how I was coaching, I not only wanted to hear about it, I felt I needed to.”
• if a player had a problem with playing time, I wanted him to talk to his coaches before he complained to his teammates.”
• By encouraging our players to communicate in such ways, we developed a positive mentality for the entire team.”
