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John Wooden

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Coach John Wooden, the legendary men’s college basketball coach who led UCLA to 10 national championships in the late 60’s and early 70’s, wrote “Wooden on Leadership.” He has been called the greatest coach of all time, regardless of sport, and has written several books about character habits and leadership. Some of his remarkable achievements are the 10 national championships, seven of them in a row, 88 consecutive victories, 38 straight tournament playoff wins, four perfect seasons (all but the 88 consecutive wins are still records), and in 41 years of coaching he only had one losing season which was his first. Of course with this type of success coaches and business leaders around the world wanted to know what was his secret. How did he do it? The secret, he reveals, is simple, and parallels many of the same principles of servant leadership. Coach Wooden does not simply offer up random thoughts on leadership and coaching. He graduated Purdue as an English teacher and, barring a few financial hurdles, he would have been quite satisfied to have become a teacher rather than a coach. But he had been a highly successful athlete at Purdue and was sought after as a coach for a high school program in Indiana. It was then that he began to develop an overall concept for leadership that has over the years solidified into a tangible philosophy that has been used by many leaders since then. The reader can tell that Coach Wooden took great pride in this pyramid of success (as he call it) and the building blocks of this pyramid share similar definitions with many of the sentiments that we have discussed in class. Along with his pyramid of success, Coach Wooden also promotes a very simple equation of success. 10 = C + F + U (10 national championships equal Conditioning + Fundamentals + Unity). If your players are in excellent condition to be able to perform, have the fundamental...

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