The Roots of Hard Coaching

As Alabama defensive back Terrion Arnold jogged off the field during a recent game, he noticed Coach Nick Saban fuming on the sidelines.

“He looks mad,” Arnold thought to himself. “He’s (gonna) give it to somebody.”

To Arnold’s surprise, though, the somebody was him.

He had apparently botched the timing of a blitz, and now he was getting an earful from his seven-time National Champion coach.

But Arnold didn’t roll his eyes or tune Saban out.

Instead, he:

1. Let his coach rant
2. Asked direct questions so he knew what to improve on
3. Didn’t take his coach’s criticism personally

“You just have to not hear how he’s saying it, but you have to hear what he’s saying,” Arnold said.

“It’s hard coaching,” he added. “When you choose to come here, you never know when he can chew you out. Like people always say, you should be worried when he’s not saying something.”

It’s a critical message with some key lessons for us.

As leaders, we occasionally see our team members make costly mistakes. An employee misses an important deadline, a player forgets a play in a big moment, someone omits key data from a client presentation.

It’s easy to fly off the handle when these types of miscues take place.

But the difference between being an enraged hothead and a passionate motivator doesn’t typically lie in the words or facial expressions themselves.

Instead, it comes down to:

1. The love- and trust-based relationships we build with our team members in advance
2. The credibility we establish through our knowledge and experience

Arnold deserves great credit for his poise and perspective to realize his coach’s feedback wasn’t personal.

And Saban deserves recognition for his ability to earn his player’s trust.

As coaches, executives and managers, it’s critical for us to not merely assume that we’ll always get the same response from our team members, though.

Fiery criticism in front of 90,000 people must be backed up by a personal connection, intimate knowledge and a bond crafted with consistency over time.

And that can only be built behind the scenes — long before anyone else is watching.