Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - In Remembrance: Tottenham U23 Coach Ugo Ehiogu

Episode Date: May 15, 2017

This conversation is with Ugo Ehiogu, whom I just met in Great Britain. He was a former English professional footballer. If you're in the states you would call him a soccer player. He had a long career- from 1989 to 2009 and at the time I met him he was the coach of the Tottenham Hotspur under-23 team. Ugo had this inner brilliance, this humility and thoughtfulness that was apparent right from the first interaction. It was the handshake and the eye contact that gave it away. It was the combination of the way that he carried himself with the words that he chose and maybe even more striking was the care that he took to choose the words to find the most authentic way to express what he's come to understand. Ugo and I were not able to finish this conversation and it's heartbreaking. It's for two reasons. The first made sense. He needed to run out onto the field and begin his coaching for his under-23 team. The second reason is harder to process. Ugo passed away at the age of 44 before we were able to reconnect. And I think probably a lot of people would say before they were able to reconnect with him, which is the tragic part of it. I can only imagine what it's like for his wife, his family, and his children. And so with the highest regard for the man that I briefly met and condolences to his family, I did as much reading as I possibly could to understand his life and his death. So many of the people that commented on who he is -- players and coaches and friends -- described him as a great player and a wonderful human. I feel fortunate to have had this conversation and to have had a brief interaction with him and I'm honored to be able to celebrate his genius. It did come through in the short time that we spent together. Thank you Ugo for the time that we spent sharing your insights and reminding us all of how important it is to love. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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stay present and engaged with my thinking and writing. If you wanna slow down, if you wanna work smarter, I highly encourage you to check them out. Visit remarkable.com to learn more and grab your paper pro today. Welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm Michael Gervais. This conversation is with Ugo Ekio, whom I just met in Great Britain. And he was a former English professional footballer. And if you're in the States, you would call him a soccer player in a long career from 1989 to 2009. And at the time I met him, he was the coach of the Tottenham Hotspur under-23 team.

Ugo had this inner brilliance, this humility and thoughtfulness that was apparent right from the first interaction. It was the handshake and the eye contact that gave it away. And it was the combination of the way that he carried himself, but also it was the words that he chose. And maybe even more striking was the care that he took to choose the words to find the most authentic way to express what he's come to understand. Ugo and I were not able to finish this conversation, and it's heartbreaking. And it's for two reasons. The first made sense. He needed to run out into the field and begin his coaching for his under 23 team. And the second one is harder to process. Ugo passed away at the age of 44 before we were able

to reconnect. And I think probably a lot of people would say before they were able to reconnect with him, which is the tragic part of it. I can only imagine what it's like for his wife and his family, his children. And so with the highest regard for the man that I briefly met and condolences to his family, I did as much reading as I possibly could to understand his life and his death. And so many of the people that commented on who he is, players and coaches and friends. They described him as a great player and a wonderful human. So I feel fortunate to have this conversation and to have a brief interaction with him.

And I'm honored to be able to hopefully celebrate his genius. And it does come through in the short time that we spent together. Thank you, Ugo, the short time that we spent together thank you ugo for the time that we spent sharing your insights and reminding us all of how important it is to love how are you good um anxious yeah so i i get that response a bit from people and the anxiousness for you is, where does that come from? I don't know. The unknown. What layers are going to be peeled off?

Yeah. How deep we go, how deep I go, how deep you question. Isn't that it, though? Isn't that the part where we start to really get real, is knowing that there's so many layers that we have, and am I going to go or not go? Am I going to explore or not explore? How much am I going to truthfully reveal?

Am I going to hold some back? What am I going to hold back? And how much do I want to keep private? Yeah. So let's start with the obvious. Like how did you deal with anxiousness as being a top player for a long time? I guess I didn't really feel that anxious um not in sport not really no whilst playing yeah um i felt because i worked hard i was i felt i was fitter than most so i was as quick as most um and i was probably more dedicated than most. And that gave me a superior feeling, knowing that if I prepared right, I wouldn't have too many issues.

There was never really a fear of going out and not hitting the right standard. Because no matter how good or bad I was, I'd analyze and then I'd watch back again. Were you genetically gifted from a young age that you were bigger, faster, stronger, or did you have some combination of that high work ethic with some genetic coding? Yeah, probably the latter. I was 14, 15.

I was skinny. Lanky would be the word that most people would use. Skinny, long long arms long legs and i left left home at about 15 16 that'd be and then i got into a professional club and i ate loads i trained loads and it was it was a it was an opportunity i had i'd never expected in my dreams okay so in in soccer in in what we'll call football, but American soccer, you were not part of an academy program? No. No. So you got spotted at a relatively old age.

Yeah. So I was 15, which is quite late. So let's go way back. What was happening early on what was family structure like and then give me a sense of that so it gives some context nigerian parents born in nigeria but came to england probably when my dad was 24 my mom was 18 or something. Okay. Set up a little community in Nigeria where a few of fellow Nigerians could meet up and reflect and chat and socialize.

And I got some pictures of my dad in kipper suits and I had no idea my dad was that trendy. So that was interesting. Why did they leave? For opportunity. So my dad was an electrical engineer um he was on a get this right i believe he was on a course um like a what do you call it like a yts scheme no i don't know what that okay so he applied for this job um like an apprenticeship okay but in nigeria and with i think it was a siemens the big german company and an opportunity came up in in london and because he'd impressed so well in nigeria they offered him the job which he took

and he then um was able to make a home, a base in London. Okay. So dad was 24. Mom was younger. Yeah. And was Nigeria, were they, did they struggle with middle class? Were they in the upper tiers? Like what was the economic structure for your family?

It would have been working class. Working class. Educated. Educated, working class. Okay. family been working class working educated educating working class okay and then some sort of risk taking to to leave Nigeria and come to London or was that the path I think that I think that was the path that the opportunities of okay of of someone in engineering or even although be it electrical um seemed to open up more opportunities for my dad.

Now, I don't know this, but I'm curious. When I think of electrical engineering, I think of analytical, logical, sequential thinking, that type of brain and mind. No, I don't know. I don't know if, because when I was young, when my dad first came over, I was quite young. I'm not even sure I was born at the time, but I wasn't born at the time. My recollection of my dad's was fixing TVs. We'd always have 10, 12 TVs stacked up in the hallway.

And my dad would periodically fix every TV. And then we would have the TVs, because we didn't have tvs at the time we would have the tvs and watch them for maybe a week or so then they would have to go back to once they were repaired um so we would have that's a clever way for pops to have tv at the house yeah like and then i think eventually we got one in our bedroom me and my brother uh black and white little push button um probably had to wait four or five years for that okay that was always the sense of growing up so we couldn't afford what my friends had but eventually i'd get it so my dad so that almost kind of thinking back that kind of was a if you can't afford to have something you

don't go beyond your means but they'll work to get it for you eventually okay so so the family structure had work ethic yeah some ingenuity some sort of cleverness if you will and then hope of the future like it's going to work out so is it fair to say optimistic? Um, you could say that but my dad was always Big on education. I think you find generally Nigerians as a race are quite big on education get your education, right? and that was always message my dad always say would be make sure you can You can say would be make sure you can you can um you can be around any conversation so you can you can

discuss whether it's politics whether it's sport whether it's business um make sure you can contribute okay and and did you do traditional school yes Yes. You did. So I have three brothers, one sister. All of us grew up in Hackney, North London. You said North. North. Yeah, I know. That slang is so like, yeah. It's mellowed in time.

Yeah. Yeah, so we were quite a close family. We'd have birthday cakes and we'd look after each other and look out for each other. So I've got an older brother, older sister. I'm in the middle. So I've got a younger brother, two younger brothers. So I was kind of – I got to see some of the good stuff and bad stuff.

So my sister was a solicitor. She was always studying. My brother was a little bit in and out of trouble. So he was a bit of a bad boy, but a popular boy. So I got to see that. I got to see both sides. So in essence, I did reasonably well at school without being, um, teacher's pet. Okay.

So you didn't cross either line. I probably danced over either line and came back and found some sort of middle ground. And then, so I've never asked this question, but you're conjuring up something really cool for me right now, which is Nigerian family, high value in education so that you can communicate in any group of people, right? And then you've got this model of brothers. Who were you trying to fit in with? And that's a loaded question because maybe you weren't trying to fit in, but I've never asked that question.

Like, what was the guiding thought about you as a youngster trying to sort out you um it's a good it is a good question i don't ever think i i tried to be either because i remember at the time i was quite good at sports okay so that was that was part of early identity yeah but my sister was also um but then I played for teams and my brothers didn't and my sister didn't maybe I was just right at the time um when sort of team sports was more popular with kids that age um and I think I found early success so I'd won stuff as a as a youngster like how old probably 10 11 12 from that from then onwards i was always i guess i wasn't always into football i was it wasn't until about eight and one of my brother's friends took me around the local

cage where it used to be you know you'd have to dodge the bits of glass and the bits of dog shit um and you could get on the cage what is a cage it's like a metal it's a metal area where you could play football they had goals okay okay all right so what would you call that? Like in the States? Well, I'm not sure. Like glass and dog shit in a cage. I'm not sure what we call it. I'm trying to sort that out myself. Okay. So he showed, so you had early success and he was bringing you around some places. No. So this was before, sorry. So the first time I really loved football was I was about 8 years old nothing to do really so we'd play and hang out on the street and then my

brother's mate took me where all my older brother's friends were and my brother and they'd play football so this it was an area probably the size of a quarter of a pitch maybe a bit smaller but it was concrete

like a black top yeah yeah okay so and they had they had a a goal painted on the wall or on the fence which was you know yeah uh both ends and then you just played football until it got dark and and it wasn't until about then i fell in love. So that's an eight, nine in that range ages. Okay. So early success, is that something you understand? Did you live through the ups and the downs of early success? Cause there's some traps in there that I'm blown away by. Early success can be incredible for this false sense of confidence because you never have to earn confidence because everyone tells you you're special and then also a sense of entitlement can come with it so those are the two traps for early success it's i've never really looked at it i've

never never tried to um detail it okay so if we back into that yeah what was your level of confidence playing one to ten if i take it back so at school we did cross country we did hockey we did cricket we did football and i was i was fairly successful at most though so i would they'd give out medals i'd be in the top three. So to not, I wouldn't call that success. That's, I don't know, what would you call that? Yeah, I think so. Well, that's part of, but it's not like international success. No, no, it wasn't like that.

This is like local neighborhood success, right? So it was, I'd say it sounds like you were forming your identity around that you can do things physically pretty well. Yes. Right? And then people would give you some attention for that as well. Yeah. And then so you would try harder, maybe. Yeah, possibly.

Oh, okay. The rewards were trophies. And then we'd have friends around, my parents would show off their son your parents my son would yeah which is like any normal parents what was that like for you when your folks would show you show other people your trophies it was it probably started off a little bit, how would you say it? I guess the word I'm looking for is, it was probably more of a,

God, not again, mum. It was a bit cringy. Embarrassing. Yeah. So that's the word I had. I didn't have the awards you had. But I do remember being doubted on or being doted. What's the word?

Yeah, doted. Yeah, being doted on about, like, something special. I would get really embarrassed because it was never about that for me. I didn't care. I don't know if you cared. But did you care about it? I guess I wanted to win. You did.

I enjoyed the feeling of... I think I found it more that when I would... Probably didn't know it at the time, but I would probably work harder than the other one. Or I was very determined. And also, I think... I'm trying to put this into context where this happened during my childhood. It was about 9, 10, 11, 12.

Between the ages of 9 and 12, we got burgled. Burgled? Yeah. Rob? Yeah. The family? Yes, the house. Right.

So I remember being a kid because I was – might have been 11 and I got back from school the front door was open I looked and it was obviously been burgled so I didn't go in I called these were the days when you had to go to the phone box and I called the police it took them 9 hours

it took them 5 hours to turn up so are you in a bad neighborhood yeah yeah there you go it was in a city neighborhood yeah so and when they did finally turn up i think they spent probably about two minutes and i remember watching from the pavement, looking at that, and I knew then that there was an inequality about being black, about life. I think the life thing was probably the big sign, because in my head, I've always had this thing

that if that had been a slightly different neighbourhood or my next-door neighbour, who we got on really well with, would that have been different? That was always a question that came into my head as an 11 year old yeah what was the emotional part of that for you because you just gave us the the thinking part but what is the emotional part um there was an unjustness about it there was there was rage. We were left, I was left to pick up the pieces. And I think part of me almost wanted to,

I think we tied it up, the house before mum and dad got back, to a degree. So they wouldn't have seen too much of that because my mum would have, I know my mum over, even to this day over exaggerates everything every reaction i think that's just what mums do i remember thinking this is i don't want them to see this wow i don't love it so that was that a compassion i don't know what it was i think because because we always got home and they always worked fairly late

and i think mum worked maybe two or three jobs at times yeah i can't i can't remember real clearly on on the spot today but there was definitely a period where my dad would get back about six seven o'clock my mum would get back about five ish um but they'd be gone from the house before we left school how did this shape you um maybe i thought i not knowing at the time i found the resilience of sorts it that's because yeah i i know and it stays in my head that memory of of that incident that day. And the drip feeding that my dad would always say, look after the pennies, the pounds, look after themselves.

So save your money now, don't spend it all and enjoy yourself, but think about the future. Be able to have a conversation in any topic. Don't trust, live by yourself first. Don't rely on any woman or anybody. He wasn't particularly a woman. It was don't rely on anyone. And my dad would often have little conversations with us. I mean, there were times when we couldn't speak.

So when the wrestling was on, WWF, he loved wrestling. When the 6 o'clock news was on or the 9 o'clock news, you couldn't speak. But outside of that, he would have – find out what we'd done on the day. And then every now and again, it wasn't all the time, but every now and again, he would sit us down. And then he'd know – he'd just say stuff. And for some reason, I'd take it on board. Okay, so mom and dad were influential in shaping you. This experience, of all the things that you could have brought up, you brought up this experience was influential in shaping you.

You figured out some injustice, some rage, and you took that to say it actually helped build resiliency. And dad helped me kind of maybe put the sense of this together this resiliency thing together it is have you heard of post-traumatic growth no oh so you you likely have heard of post-traumatic stress disorder ptsd when people go to war or see something heavy like traumatically heavy is that it can be very very difficult to assimilate back to normal life but there is such a thing called post-traumatic growth. So you go through something very heavy, and then, but you come out the other side of it stronger. And resiliency is that, that psychological factor underneath of it. And then, so how has that played well for you,

both the, the concept of injustice, racial injustice, as well as as as well as this idea i figure things out um there was there was never any thing as i grew up there couldn't have been much of an injustice as opposed to you maybe it was more of a you need to be you need to know this and you need to be armed for it. Because there was never really like a chip, like the police are racist. I knew there was definitely an equality, but there was never really a bitterness. okay which they could which they could have been i don't know why that was but yeah because they didn't take care of you but you didn't generalize that to all white people right you said okay there's something here that i got to pay attention

to that's a pretty clever smart aware switched on kid that we're talking about. You, right? And so how many other Nigerians or would you say Africans were playing in the league when you got in? I think you were relatively early in that experience. Probably would have been. There had been Cyril Regis, Larry Cunningham at the club previously, but that was in the 80s, 70s, 80s. I've never really given it any thought, if I'm being honest. You're kidding, yeah. So maybe there was, let's say there was one or two in London clubs or at clubs. But I was away from, I was 120 miles from London. And I'd been in a, the demographic of where I was had changed quite a lot.

So London was quite multicultural. Um, whereas I came to West Bromwich in Birmingham or in the West Midlands. And it was, I was with a white family who had a dog. Um, we had cats. We never had,

I mean, not that I had anything against dogs, but they had a dog. I mean, the dog was a fucking giant. It was a great thing. Yeah. I mean, it was a had anything against dogs, but they had a dog. The way you said it's like... I mean, the dog was a fucking giant. It was a great thing. A great thing. Yeah.

I mean, it was a giant. It was a giant. How tall are you? 6'2". Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But so that wasn't ever like a thing.

Like, well, I'm one of the only Africans playing in the sport in my town or whatever. That wasn't part of it. No. It's weird. It's weird. It's quite strange i always there was a part of me that thought i always thought growing up i was different but i i had reason to to to be a lot more negative about stuff but i chose a different method um a lot of the times i thought i could i thought it was my duty i felt it was or i think i felt i was able to

to bridge certain gaps if that makes sense no right so okay so some of my mates were black used to have issues with one of the white friends now i'd see what that issue was and i'd explain to both of them so um so you have a skill that's the gap you have a skill and is this just not just but is this primarily with people that you're able to see perspective from many angles and close those gaps um i i i think i can i try to affect something that i feel I can and I've not thought about it enough to be able to break it down and say well yeah it's this but now you've said that I think there are times when I've done that where I've bridged a sort of a sort of a gap okay I'm trying to sort out how you've been so successful in so many different clubs,

right? Which is rare. That's, that's like, that's, that's extraordinary. And what I'm, what I'm kind of filtering in the back of my mind right now is, okay, so there's, you had some brothers that kind of showed you some stuff and you learned, but you're really aware young kid, you didn't get controlled by your emotions. You move through things. You're still able to continue to grow. You had a natural talent and you worked really hard. Those are some basic frames and the resiliency is threaded throughout. And then what else? Like, what is the thing? Here's the question. Sorry to get to the question. I don't know if you can answer this and sound humble. And I get a sense that you are that, but maybe not. I don't know if you can answer this and sound humble and I get a sense that you are that but maybe not I don't know what what is it that makes you really special

special as in different to to how other people react would react in the same circumstance, then yes, I can see why you'd say that was special. I think once I commit to something, I don't like to... I like to see it through. Or I like to have done it to the best of my ability. I think that's one.

I think... I believe in right's right. So regardless of the outcome or of what's at stake, I liken it to a football game sometimes. So I can... I'll be on the line, on the verge of, but I won't cross it for absolutely anything. But then afterwards, I'll smile

and I'd like to think I wouldn't cross it or I'd like to think I would treat me how I'd like to be treated. So I guess there's some real basics in that, but then also, I don't know, there's a drive in me that sometimes can be a weakness, I think, because it doesn't almost allow me to sometimes, are there instances where you should walk away or are there instances where you say I've done all I can but I don't know I think I find

I try and find it sounds strange saying it but I think you try and find there's always a bright spark or a positive side in everything so we have some of our players can be shits, they can be arrogant

little fuckers and they can be rude and I think I try and break it down why have they done that? What's gone on through his day or through his life that has made him that way? Because at some point, he's been molded by someone else. Yes, and you're really reflective. You think a lot. Yeah.

And you don't get caught by your thoughts. You don't overanalyze. You're to put those put thoughts aside when it's time to do and execute uh yeah i still i think i need to be better at certain aspects of it yeah but i think as you know as a whole i am quite a deep thinker and so do you have a spiritual framework um i'm a i'm a god fearing i'm, I wouldn't say I'm religious. I don't necessarily go to church. I've lit candles before. I pray from time to time. I donate to charities.

So there's no, I'd call myself, I'd describe myself as a good person. And then how do you finish this thought? It all comes down to... I like your grin. I'm trying to... That's such a... terrific point that you've just laid out there. Yeah.

I'm going to say, yeah, I'm fascinated I'm fascinated where you're going to take it. Sorry, can you repeat that? It all comes down to being Ugo Echiog and what does that mean? so that's a cool question like who are you? and that's like this fundamental question

that I like to ask myself every day like Mike seriously who are you? I think I've given you I think I've given you a... I think I've described... as much as I possibly probably could have. There's still parts of me that's still moulding. That's still... I'm not sure.

But what it will have is... there will be some fun. There'll be hard work. There'll be happiness. And I'm sure there will be some fun there'll be hard work there'll be happiness and i'm sure there'll be some um some tears along the way not too many but there'll be a lot of love as well and through um for a number of avenues i have no doubt at some point I'll find, I'll find out. Okay. So this is an incredible conversation. Thank you for being honest, for being open, for sharing. There's so much more to learn from you. And then really quickly, when you look back, what is the one word that captures your professional life? Blessed. Beautiful. Thank you for sharing this time. It's been a pleasure. It's actually a

genuine shame that I actually have to go because I think I could, there's stuff that's coming out that I probably hadn't given thought of, of how it's of how I've got to it or why I've done it. Yeah, this is decoding, deconstructing like the path of mastery. And you know what maybe we'll do? Why don't we do something like this? Why don't we reconnect over Skype? I'll get back to the States. We'll reconnect over Skype and we'll do like a part A, part B.

Okay, sounds good. All right, brother. Take care. Thank you, Ugo, for the time we spent, for sharing your insights and reminding me, reminding us all now of how important it is to love. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community.

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