Michigan Football: Coach’s Corner — Leadership — A Highly Sought Aftereffect of Modern Athletic Teams — Defining and Designing Leadership in the Modern Competitive Arena

Posted at 5:15am — 8/7/2012

Michigan Football: Coach’s Corner — Leadership — A Highly Sought Aftereffect of Modern Athletic Teams —
Defining and Designing Leadership in the Modern Competitive Arena

Part One- Defining the Construct of Leadership While Incorporating Current and Historical Culture.

Constructs are of a broad nature; they are complex and as such consist of a grouping of similar elements or overlying concepts. A construct can be hard to define and is floating in the world of academia since precise quantitative measurement is difficult, at the very best.

So it is with leadership as a subjective construct. There can never be total agreement on a precise definition or the nested concepts and elements that make up leadership. Some write about leadership as if it is best discussed as a passive trait, say the quiet or introverted type; the type people refer to as lead by example. Some narrow leadership into a box of aggressive, purposeful actions, where the leader is in charge and must always be held at least one step above the followers. And visions and schema float between the two stated poles.

Leadership can be defined through actions, plans, positions given verbally or non-verbally, philosophy, assigned function (such as responsibilities on a flow chart), and invention. There are more ways than the above certainly to define leadership but the discussion turns to actions and results.

Actions that others follow can be termed leadership. But in a pure sense leadership is most effective if those affected buy in with the leader’s vision and final plan. Leaders and those affected expect results that can be generalized as being at least moderately successful.

Football teams have always spoken of leadership. In due course other sports have jumped on the bandwagon. And so, in the 21st Century, leadership is being looked at with laser focus and increased value. That begs a couple of questions: has anything changed to cause leadership to be more valued, and is the quest for leadership more so driven by a growing knowledge base of cognitive science and sports science?

Leadership has always been present in human endeavor, and leaders that the general citizenship could agree on have been identified, even considering the impediments identified above. Some leadership has good intentions, some bad, and some leadership has as an overriding function the obtainment and keeping of power. In sports the intentions are usually well meant, with the overriding goal being efficiency that in turns enhances the chance of success (winning).

Definitions are categorized many ways; the two most common in scholarship are lexical and operational. Lexical is an accepted, precise dictionary meaning. Even with the search for precision there are dozens, if not hundreds, such attempts at obtaining a final, end-all definition. Words frequently placed within the lexical definitional context include motivation, group function, common goals, innovation, influence, control, and perhaps foremost, management.

Therefore, the second type of definition, operational, plays better to conceptualizing leadership. This type of definition is convenient in that it may be melded to the intended need of the definer. With a construct as floating and broad as leadership, this becomes a useful tool for honing to a specific need. An operational definition for business management almost certainly would differ from that placed forward for the field of sports science. Indeed, MBA programs almost certainly have differences but also can agree on basic commonalities: the same for the field of sports science.

But just issuing a few words off the tongue tip on the spur of the moment lends little validity. Constructs like leadership must be dissected into skills, processes, and basic concepts. Then from this blender can appear an eclectic but workable definition.

The skills related to leadership have been studied, identified, and placed into leadership models as the business model of the late 20th Century has evolved. This pursuit has been scientific and serious. Sports by their nature always had a need for leadership and always had leaders. Leadership involved basic survival and control processes in early sports and leadership was directly linked to winning. The psychological literature and knowledge base pertaining to learning and performance came much later. Sports science now has its own psychological and learning knowledge base and it can be stated with certainty that the venture has been successful. So much so that most modern teaching and coaching professional development programs have heavily incorporated the findings into preparation.

Leadership skills include groupings such as communication, and for certain professions some skills sets have more value, at least in theory. Skills groupings include communication, time usage, personnel management, decision-making and problem solving, the use of management models, cognitive and learning, persuasive abilities (influence), planning, vision creation and implementation, goal setting and articulation.

Each skill set can be sub-divided down to a group of very discrete, specific behaviors, many of which can be observed and accurately assessed. An example would be personnel management, where a head coach and athletic director would be responsible for nearly everything in the context of a sport regarding assistants and players. The list could be lengthy, very lengthy, when breaking skills down to a level this specific.

Sometimes there is no clear barrier between skills and processes; there may be an overlap. A skill is the ability, a proficiency that clearly has a spectrum across a population. A process is a series or progression of actions. Processes of leadership are not as discrete and involve a collection of actions based on leadership skill. The ability to create and construct a vision, implement a planning strategy, initiate the plan, and make any changes is collectively known as management. There are social processes, communication processes, cognitive and learning processes, and so on.

Taking the skills and applying them by process-oriented behavior creates the underlying concepts that make up our mental representation of leadership. Collectively all of these concepts take a seat under the broad umbrella of the overall construct of leadership. Next up is part two: Lead, follow, or get out of the way- Human Nature, Sports, and Leadership.

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Written by GBMWolverine Staff

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