The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 674: PJ Fleck - Building Elite Culture, Nekton Mindset, Selecting >Recruiting, Intrinsic Motivation, Row The Boat, and Transformational Coaching

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Go to learningleader.com for show notes of this and all podcast episodes. Go to LearningLeader.com. Now on to the night's featured leader. PJ Fleck is the head football coach at the University of Minnesota. Before that, he transformed Western Michigan from a one-win team to 13 wins and a Cotton Bowl,

Starting point is 00:00:29 appearance. Before his coaching days, PJ was a stud receiver at Northern Illinois and was a guy that I personally played against in college. Coach Fleck has built one of college football's most distinctive culture-driven programs. And I think so much of what he does can be done also in the business world. I think you'll agree. During our conversation, PJ shares the personal tragedy behind his row the boat philosophy. You also hear why he maintains an 80-20 split. favoring high school recruiting over the transfer portal, how he runs practice with a 32 second clock to make it harder than the games, and why he sees himself as a culture driver rather than a motivational coach.

Starting point is 00:01:14 This is a conversation that was recorded with all of our coaches inside the arena. That is our mastermind group of coaches from all sports. It did not disappoint, and I want to give a huge thank you to the Goat, the Hall of Famer, Sherry Cole for making all of this happen. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy my conversation with PJ Flex. This episode is brought to you by Insight Global. I love the leadership team and the people at Insight Global. Insight Global is a staffing and professional services company dedicated to being the light to the world around them.

Starting point is 00:01:52 If you need to hire one person, hire a team of people, or transform your business through talent, or technical services, Insight Global's team of 30,000 people around the world have the hustle and grit to deliver. Hiring can be tough, but hiring the right person can be magic. Visit Insightglobal.com slash learning leader today to learn more. That's Insightglobal.com slash learning leader. I want to go back to 2003. I'm playing quarterback for the Ohio University Bobcats. We're struggling.

Starting point is 00:02:28 We go up north to Northern Illinois, and we're playing against the undefeated Northern Illinois Huskies, number 17 in the country, have a great running back named Michael the Burner Turner. We're really focused on stopping this guy, and we actually did a pretty good job. I throw a touchdown pass to Anthony Hackett to give us the lead. We're up by seven.

Starting point is 00:02:48 We go late in the game. We're going to knock off on national TV, this team that's undefeated. And this little receiver, just has the game of his life and including a 15-yard touchdown catch on fourth down to tie the game, send it into overtime and to beat us. And that guy, that receiver was PJ Fleck. And I've paid attention to your career ever since that night. I think you had, what, 14 or 15 catches, 235 yards, a touchdown?

Starting point is 00:03:16 What do you remember from that night? Oh, my goodness, your memory is unbelievable. We talked last night. You brought that up, but I could not believe you brought it up. The only person that still talks about that game is me. And I usually tell my kids or my players or my wife and they could care less, right? I actually have some gloves up that are in my office. And these are the ones you're talking about right there.

Starting point is 00:03:37 Are you serious? NU30, Ohio U23 OT, right there. Yep. So 14 catches 234 yards. So I remember that game very, very well. It was fourth down. I'm thinking we're going to beat the best team in the Mac nationally ranked us on national TV. This is amazing.

Starting point is 00:03:53 and then this dude just killed us. My dad and I have talked about PJ Fleck since that night. And so I'm like, this guy is cool to see what's happening in your coaching career. But it leads me to question, PJ, and that is, how important is it for your players to see that you were a stud yourself as an actual player and not just as a coach? Well, I'm not sure I would have recruited my own self. That's the problem is we went to Northern Illinois.

Starting point is 00:04:17 We were on like a 20-some game losing streak. But it was amazing who Joe Novak actually recruited that year. during all that, the losing piece, he got guys who really wanted to be there. And then, you know, we go in our senior year, and that's the year you're talking about, which was so memorable. And I think it's really important for players to know that. I'm a guy who loves to hire guys that have a huge, huge knowledge of the background of their position. So I love, like right now, our running back coach is the all-time leading rusher in the history of Minnesota.

Starting point is 00:04:46 Our linebacker coach played here at the University of Minnesota and was phenomenal. I think it's important for you as a coach to share what you did. I do. And some of it's used in a joking fashion. I show my highlight tape every year at some point. And it's so old. I mean, it's so gritty. But I think it's important for them to see you as a human being,

Starting point is 00:05:07 to see that you actually did it. What did it look like when you were a player? But these guys' highlight tapes are 100 times better than mine. But I do think it's important that you show yourself playing the game or doing something that they can. can relate to because I think that, you know, you're demanding so much of these young people that they're always going to be like, well, what do you know about that? And they quickly forget that, you know, I played in college, playing the National Football League. I coached in the

Starting point is 00:05:33 National Football League. And immediately when you become a head coach, now you're that parent. So what do you know? And I think it's really important for you to kind of let your hair down a little bit. I don't have any, but go ahead and let that hair down, give them a peek behind the curtain of what it was like when you were playing. And we do it in a little bit more of a little bit. fun way than being like, hey, guys, you're going to watch my highlight tape, watch a much of a stud I was. We do it in a way that's a little bit more exciting. We'll show coaches highlights, like guess that coach before a team meeting starts, and then we'll show our coaches as players and show 10 plays of their highlight tape, and then you've got to guess that coach. We call it Guess That Gopher.

Starting point is 00:06:11 So we do it with players as well. I think it's just a fun way to start the team meeting, but yeah, we show a lot of that. One of the other elements about you that I love is you're big on honoring mentors. And one of the mentors that you have is one that I've been lucky to get a chance to know really well through my younger brother. And that's Jim Tressel. You wear the tie on the sideline. Nobody really does that to honor him. And I know he's had a big impact on your life as well as Mike Nolan, who you also honor by wearing that. Can you tell me more about the importance of those guys as mentors, what you've learned from them and how you try to honor them? Yeah, Jim Tressel and Mike Nolan are two of the greatest influences of my life. Jim Tressel hired me. I got cut from the Niners. And does, story goes together because I was playing in the National Football League. It was my third year. I got hurt. Mike Nolan cuts me. The minute he cuts me, offers me a job. And I don't know if I'm still the only person in NFL history to be cut and within the same sentence be offered a coaching job. And I'm like, what kind of coaching job? He's like, I don't know. I don't have the job. I'm going to make it up for you because I think you're going to be an outstanding coach.

Starting point is 00:07:12 And at the time, I have an elementary education degree. I was going to go teach sixth grade social studies. Of course, I thought I was his star player, so I'm like, how dare you cut me? Like, I'm going to keep playing. I'm 5, 9, 185 pounds. I'm desirable for the National Football League, okay? So I went to the Bears next week, failed the physical, came back to him, said, hey, look, I think this is going to be really good. Just give me another day to think about it. Well, the day I'm thinking about it, Jim Trussell calls me out of nowhere and offers me an offensive graduate assistant job. There were two GA jobs back then. Now there's a billion, but there was only two, one on offense, one on defense. And he had never met me, but his fraternity brother

Starting point is 00:07:48 was one of my coaches in college, Mike Sabok. And that's why it's amazing that I feel like I'm indebted to so many people because I've got to help pay it forward for a lot of my former players and the people who I think are going to be outstanding coaches and serve them. So anyway, Jim Tressel calls me, and I thought it was a joke. I thought it was when my buddy's calling me, playing a prank on me that he's acting, calling from Columbus, Ohio, and saying he's Jim Tressel. Jim Hire hired me on the spot, didn't meet me. me, never met me. He just wanted somebody to get into school and trusted his fraternity brother. So it was about how I played and how I prepared and all the things that I did as a player

Starting point is 00:08:22 for our special team's coordinator to one day get a call and I need to be the first one on the tip of his tongue. And it's just pretty ironic that it worked out that way. So I went with Jim Tressel, went to the national championship my first year in coaching and I'm like, this stuff's really easy. I mean, kind of show up with Teddy Ginn, you know, Troy Smith, Brian Hartline, Anthony Gonzalez and, you know, Marcus Freeman, you're like, this isn't that hard. You know, you've got to show up, they win. I mean, this is this college thing. I got this thing down, I think.

Starting point is 00:08:48 Long story short, we lose in the national title. But those two men, I wear a tie because they both wore a tie. And I wouldn't be where I am without them. And I think it's very, very hard for us to kind of step back because we didn't get here alone. Sometimes when you go up the ladder, you're like, here's how I did it. This is what I did. This is what I made of myself.

Starting point is 00:09:06 I have nothing to do with really me. If it wasn't for those two men, I wouldn't be where I'm at or even have the opportunity to be where I'm at. So I love to, you know, I'm a sixth grade social studies teacher at heart, and I'd probably be doing that if it wasn't for them. So every single game day, that's how I honor those two men. Jim Trussell taught me how to care about the entire team. His office was right next to the locker room and the team meeting room,

Starting point is 00:09:28 which mine is designed that way. I do not have a secretary. I do not have an assistant. My players can walk in my office at any moment, and I'm right by the team meeting where you have to pass my office to go into the team meeting room. So I want that fluidity of players feeling okay to walk in there. And Jim Tressel never stopped me or somebody stopped me from walking in his office

Starting point is 00:09:47 when I was this bottom of the totem pole GA. And I never wanted that feeling in my building. So he taught me how to care for the entire organization. I mean, the entire organization. He knows everybody's name. He still sends me a text every week, every single week without fail. And I was a GA for him. Imagine if you were an All-American or an Offensive Coordinator for him.

Starting point is 00:10:09 It's just unbelievable how much he has done for my life. And then Mike Nolan taught me how to be incredibly transparent and very honest. There were so many times as a head football coach, you have to just give people what they need to hear, not what they want to hear. And I had to learn that. I had to learn that from someone. And Mike Nolan taught me that because he did it with such grace. There's a way to do everything, even though you have to deliver really hard information. And I think Mike Nolan is really, really good at the art of that.

Starting point is 00:10:37 So I think those are the two things I learned the most from those guys. I'm going to talk about rock bottom, 2013. You'd had some unimaginable tragedy in your personal life leading up to that moment. Then you get a head coaching job. You're at Western Michigan, 2013, and you go one and 11 that first year. Can you take me back to that time and what was going on in your head? How are you dealing with it? How did you respond to the combination?

Starting point is 00:11:07 of this really, really tough, this tragic things in your personal life, in your professional life, yes, you get the head coaching job, but you guys just get destroyed pretty much every week. What was that like? Well, I think perspective really comes from tragedy and adversity. And if you don't have any of that, you probably have a real poor perspective of life, of sport, of challenges, of changes. There's been a few things that have shaped my life forever. February 9, 2011, my second son died of a heart condition.

Starting point is 00:11:33 And I was the last one to hold him before he passed away. and that changes your life. And I think you go one of two directions. One, you never want to talk about it again. You put it out of your mind. It's between you and a higher power, and you never talk about it. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Starting point is 00:11:46 There's a lot of people who go through really hard things and don't ever want to talk about it again. I'm not here to judge those people. And then there's the other side where you take it. And, of course, it changes you and shapes you, but then you want to use it for really for good. And you want to share it. The hard part about sharing is when a minute you bring anything public,

Starting point is 00:12:03 it's going to get criticized, scrutinized, it's going to get torn apart. People are going to throw darts at it, arrows. And you've got to be comfortable enough to handle all of that if you share anything. So don't get mad when people blast you for very personal things if you put something personal out there. And that's where Ro the Boat came from. And Roe the Boat just means never give up. But it's really his life.

Starting point is 00:12:22 We're the only college football program whose slogan is directly tied to charity. And I think that's really, really important for our program of serving and giving, you know, our philanthropy side. And then I was 32 years old. I was the youngest head football coach in the country. and I'm coming straight from the National Football League as a wide receiver coach for the 10 big Buccaneers. And, oh, man, I'm full of pissing vinegar and let's do this. And I'm 32 years old. How hard could this head coaching thing be?

Starting point is 00:12:45 I just watch all these great head coaches do it. And then you go one in 11. And not only go one in 11, I got divorced that year. So now my personal life is in shambles. You know, I lost my son a few years ago. I got this row-the-boat thing. It didn't work. I'm the worst guy in town.

Starting point is 00:13:00 Every rumor is about me that known to man. My professional life, personal life all fell apart. And so everybody used to ask me, they're sitting there going, so what are we going to do now? Roll the boat didn't work. So we're going to mow the grass, you know, we're going to turn the wrench. Like, what are we doing? I said, no, this is what roll the boat's all about. And I think this is the greatest lesson is because the authenticity and the realness of our program showed in the hardest moments and was tested so fast.

Starting point is 00:13:25 I think every head coach and every coach should go 111 to start. I think that should be a prerequisite because I think that at that point, like you really identify what is very real in what isn't, what you need and what you don't need. It's like throwing away all the car parts that you don't really need and what are we and who are we? And it really makes you feel, do you truly believe in what you believe in? I think that tests everybody. And so then we get to the second year and we turn it around and all of a sudden went from 1 in 11 to almost being fired, starting one and four the next year.

Starting point is 00:13:56 And then we're coach of the year. And then boom, then we go 13 and 0, two years later and take them to the Cotton Bowl. Same group of kids. And I think it's just ironic that, you know, 14 years later, here we are. still doing the same road-the-boat culture and had so many ups and downs and highs and lows, and the line of success is never straight. And I think that's what people's expectations are, that you're going to start here and you're going to end here.

Starting point is 00:14:16 And anything that gets you off that line is awful. In fact, it's there to teach you all the things you need and the armor you need as you continue to move forward. So don't be afraid of all those things that are going on in your life that aren't going necessarily well. If everything that wasn't good in my life didn't happen exactly the way it happened, the exact moment it happened, I wouldn't be where I am. But that's perspective when you go back and look at all those things.

Starting point is 00:14:41 And I think that really helped you moving forward. You were the hot name and coaching after the turnaround of what you did at Western Michigan. What made you choose Minnesota? I have to imagine there were other options. What's made you not only pick Minnesota, but then stay at Minnesota? This is a question really for my wife, Heather, because she's responsible for both of them. We have a question in our family before we kind of do something. and take on a new challenge, she always asked me, does it scare you?

Starting point is 00:15:09 And the other jobs didn't really scare me. And she said when Minnesota came about, we were getting ready to sign a new contract at Western Michigan. Because first and foremost, I was coaching in the Cotton Bowl. Anybody had asked me, are you willing to come out here? No, I'm not willing to come out there. I'm coaching in the Cotton Bowl. You can get me after the Cotton Bowl, but I'm coaching in the Cotton Bowl. I have no idea when I'm going to get back to the Cotton Bowl.

Starting point is 00:15:29 I'm going to enjoy the moment and memory because that's what life's about. Life experiences, moments and memories. And when you think you're better than the moment memory and life experience and you pass that up, that's when regret happens. The pain of discipline to stay in that moment versus the pain of regret. So long story short, Heather Ask me, doesn't scare me. I'm like, hell yeah, it scares me. It actually freaks me out. She goes, we're going.

Starting point is 00:15:49 Because that's what drives you. If it's scary enough, it means it's big enough for you. And the challenge is going to fulfill that drive that you have because I'm constantly driven. I have the disease of whatever people call success, but I have the disease of it. Whatever was yesterday is not good enough today. And if you're not taking a moment to stop and celebrate those great moments or stop or reflect on the really hard moments of what they mean, life's just going to be like mashed potatoes to you. And then you're going to look back when you're 55 and regret so many things that you didn't stop

Starting point is 00:16:22 and either smell the roses or stop and pick up and recycle the crap and get it better. So that was what she asked me. And then we stay in Minnesota because we have a great life here. There's a difference in coaching between, I think, having a great life and making a great living. There's a massive difference between those two. And a lot of them have to do with moments, memories, life experiences, as I said, and then being able to do it your way. My boss is the same boss that hired me 10 years ago.

Starting point is 00:16:50 We're the longest standing Big Ten AD head coach combination in the Big Ten. We're top five in the country when it comes to that relationship. and I know how good I have it. But some people know how good they have it, but they want it better. That's okay. But that doesn't mean it's always better. And it doesn't mean I'll stay here forever. I don't know that.

Starting point is 00:17:11 But I know what I have, and it's going to have to take something incredibly special, special to take me out of the life that we've created here. Football is a piece of our life from our players to our relationships, to our social life, to our friends, to the community. like we've been a part of the community for a long time, and I take value in that. So the life versus living, I think the living is just a salary and money and what you have and what your contract says, but the life, I think there's so much to do here. And it's such an amazing place that we love living here and love what we've built and want to continue to see where we can take it.

Starting point is 00:17:48 The Big Ten has become the place that wins the national championships, right? The past three years, they've done it. It looks like that's going to continue. How is it for you guys at Minnesota? Because it seems like you just need a ton of money. You need a lot of donors, NIL support. That's a tough place to compete when it seems like the national champ is going to come from the Big Ten every year. I'm a fan of the Big Ten. How is that for you at Minnesota when you see Indiana, Michigan, Ohio State, I mean, USC, all these teams now?

Starting point is 00:18:17 Yeah, I think that one thing is from an expectation standpoint, I think your expectations should always match a reason. resources. But I think this expectation in reality are where people really get confused is there's a saying we have in our program, expectation and realities here, right? And then that gap in between, if those don't align and they're not really close, the gap gets bigger and it's always filled with frustration. And those are fan bases, right? They have an expectation, but the reality of the resources are here. And so the frustration's massive. I think when those things get closer, I think there's less frustration and more of the ability that we can all get that thing done. And whatever that is, players, resources, money, billionaires.

Starting point is 00:18:58 I mean, that's what this thing is coming down to a little bit. Feels like more Major League Baseball. People talk about it's like NFL. It's not like the NFL. The NFL is a very, very, very meticulous, clean, detailed run business in the world. It's one of the most iconic logos and businesses in the world that it's very cut and dry. Here's what we do. Here's how we do it.

Starting point is 00:19:16 Period. There's rules. There's regulations. You do this. Here's the consequence. College football is the Wild Wild West. And it's a soap opera. That's really what it is.

Starting point is 00:19:25 You've got to tune in next week and look at the Dr. Pepper commercials. It's all drama, whether it's the hot seat. That's what sells in college football. The ratings of the CFP are through the roof again. So people wanting all this regulation and all these rules and what are we going to do with college football, the people that are making the money and going to like, what's wrong with it? I mean, it is just the Wild West. And what's wrong with that?

Starting point is 00:19:46 I do think there's a lot wrong with it when it comes down to that. But I think that because it's coming from the Big Ten, three years in a row, you see a team like Indiana. If the investment's there, the backings there, the resources there, anybody can go do it. And I think that's why I stay at Minnesota because I truly, truly believe that we can go do that. We have the right people. We just need to be able to do it more regularly and we need to be able to do it more consistently and we need more people to see the vision of that. But it gives you hope saying, okay, this isn't just some far-fetched dream.

Starting point is 00:20:15 It's hard to obtain. It's really hard to obtain. I mean, there's two people left in the NFL right now, fight for the Super Bowl, and then there's, you know, there's one college football national champion. So it's very limited, but you can if you do it the right way. And I think that we're on our way to hopefully continue to pour into that and getting that done. When we talked last night, you said you guys are an 80-20 team. 80% of your recruiting as high school kids, 20% are transfer portal guys,

Starting point is 00:20:42 which is probably different for Indiana and some other teams that are winning. So I'd love to hear kind of your overall philosophy on that 80-20 high school to transfer portal and why you've chosen to do it that way. Well, a few things. One, I was hired 10 years ago here. And you're in this rhythm, right, where I can be in that rhythm where I don't lose many starters. I mean, we have one of the highest retention rates in the country, even at Minnesota. We don't pay our players the most. But we're doing that in the selection and fit part of the program, which means we don't recruit.

Starting point is 00:21:12 We find selection and fit. I shouldn't have to convince a kid to come here. when you're doing that, it's based on value system. What do you truly value? And I'm not saying, asking a 17-year-old, what do you value, and then having the kid lied through his teeth and tell you money is not important. It's all about the money, or it's not about the money until it's about the money. Don't ever forget that. Like, it's, it's, it can say it's not about the money, and then it comes down to the money at some point. But our kids value certain things in front of the money. And I think that's really important when you're talking about the retention. We've been

Starting point is 00:21:42 able to have our freshman become sophomores. Sophomores become juniors. Junior becomes seniors. One, because we stay here. And I think that's really important. But two, because I think our players really enjoy the experience they get as a college collegiate athlete. Because I don't know how much that still exists. And I think that's really important. I tell parents right here in my office, and I'm kind of like a dinosaur, but I'm a cool dinosaur. I'm like a T-Rex. So, but we are kind of dinosaurs because nobody's really doing it the way that we're doing it. We've adapted to what we've done. We've become a little transactional within this transformational program, but it's a piece of it. It's not the whole thing where a lot of people are just throwing their hands up and saying,

Starting point is 00:22:19 you know, I'm just being completely transactional, and that's all we're going to do. The head coach is separating from the players, the GM separating them for the players. Players do your job. You're getting paid or you're going to get cut and fired. We're still that developmental program, academically, athletically, socially, spiritually, mentally, physically, and emotionally. And I take a lot of pride in that. But that's my upbringing. I'm a sixth grade social studies teacher at heart. My mom taught special education. I've seen education at the simplest form.

Starting point is 00:22:45 I've seen fun at the simplest form. When you're dealing in special ed and you're seeing these young people who are really going through, really, I mean, they have debilitating things that it's just so hard, but they celebrate the simplest things. And you learn everything at the simplest form. And I watched my mom do that for years. And I think that was so beneficial to me to create one of the most creative programs in the country. And I think everything we do is really creative. I think our players look forward to coming into the building every single day and seeing what we have in store for them.

Starting point is 00:23:17 And I don't lose sight of that. I never will. Even though it can be, again, expectation reality, it can be frustrating at times because there's so many more distractions from a player's perspective. They have agents. They have parents. They have people taking 15 to 20 percent of what they're making. They're having people tell them what to do, which you feel as a coach could be a bad decision.

Starting point is 00:23:37 So it's just you got all these things that you didn't have. have before, but that's why we say we're adapting, but we're not changing who we are. But I think for us having that 80-20 model, it's because we've been here for so long. If I took another job, it'd be really hard when you have 80 players leave the program when you got a new head coach. Well, now you're in this transfer cycle and you've got to win right away. It's hard to get that grip and that traction to get back to the freshmen through seniors because you've got to win really quickly in this profession. So I think it benefits us to have that model because we've been here so long. You said we don't recruit. It's about selection.

Starting point is 00:24:09 fit. Did I hear that right? Absolutely. You did. What does that mean? I'm not for everybody. I think we think just because a guy can jump high, run fast, shoot the ball, throw the ball, dunk a basketball, you know, shoot a hockey puck, kick a soccer ball that, hey, they're going to be a great player. There's so much more to fit and selection than just recruiting. I never want to convince a kid to come here. I tell people, my opening line is I am really, really difficult to play for. I'm just making this very clear to start with. I'm a high, high thinker, overachiever. I'm a 5-9, 180-pound guy who lasted two and a half years in the NFL.

Starting point is 00:24:46 I was one of the youngest position coaches in the NFL, and I didn't have a dad who coached up in a head coached now 14 years, and I'm 45 years old. Everything that I've done, I've had to do it the hard way, the blue collar way. I've had to make it happen. I've had to put myself around people who were willing to help me and had to take some risk. So absolutely, I'm not for everything.

Starting point is 00:25:06 everybody. I consider our program incredibly difficult because it challenges you to be the best version of yourself tomorrow or today, not yesterday. This is not a rear-view program. We're rowing the boat, man. You can't see where you're going. You have a vision. You set a goal. And boom, we move on. And then you just get everybody a line rowing the boat in the same direction in the present. And you look at the past, which is the only thing you can't change what you can learn from. And we need people who think that way. I can find 25 to 30 high schoolers from West Coast, East Coast, North to South. I don't care where you're from that fit that model of that overachieving love ball, love their life mindset, because you've got to love your whole life here. There are expectations academically that are

Starting point is 00:25:48 insane that I have for our players. And we get recruited against, recruited of, hey, you can sit anywhere you want in the classroom. Don't listen to Coach Fleck. He's taken away your constitutional right to sit anywhere that you want in your classroom and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, yeah. So we don't recruit, meaning we're not selling you on something that when you get there, it's not there. We are telling you everything of what it's like to be here, from the academics to the social life, to the spiritual life, to the football life, to what we do mentally, physically and emotionally. And we make sure everybody's here to watch it and see it first and experience it. And I'm just telling you, it's identical to that when they get here, because it's not about the kids that you don't get. It's about the wrong kid you get that ruins your program.

Starting point is 00:26:33 So I'm not going to chase a kid who I know doesn't fit, but boy, is he a really good player. I can find really good people who are going to make themselves really good players. And we always start with a really good person. So we've already gone past, are you good enough or not? Now it comes down to the selection of, okay, out of these 500 kids, who are the best, best young men out of these 500, give me the best people because I want the elite of the elite. I don't get the five stars. I don't get a bunch of four stars here.

Starting point is 00:27:01 So I've got to be able to go get those two, three stars who want to be that five star in their mind and know that they already are. They just don't need judgment from the outside to get there. I believe there's a difference between a chip and a crack on the shoulder. A chip that's proving to everybody else that you're good enough. You hear it all the time. We're going to prove it to who. The media is always going to find something that you're not good enough at. Once you accomplish something that the media said you're not doing, all they do is find the next thing you haven't done.

Starting point is 00:27:28 LeBron James is still proving that he's a really good basketball player. To who? The comparisons of Michael Jordan? That's why comparisons steal your joy. The crack on your shoulder-type kids that we select are the kids that are proving to themselves. They're exactly who they say they are. That's all I want. And that's when we're talking about fit, selection.

Starting point is 00:27:51 And it's a process. I want nectons, man, always attacking, never full. I want hungry dogs. I want people who love an attackter. life. Now, that doesn't mean last thing is you don't have to have my personality. It's your internal drive to be your best, not the best. The best is subjective, and it'll always be subjective. But you've got to be your best, and that's my job as a coach. And if I've got to start your motor every day, you're wrong, wrong fit. People think I'm a motivational head coach. You could be farther from the

Starting point is 00:28:21 truth. I'm a cultural driver. I already have motivated kids because I've selected motivated kids. kids. And if I have unmotivated kids, I've picked wrong. I've chosen really poorly. And that's very difficult to do. Now, in the high school levels, people don't get to pick their players. Oh, well, if you're at, you know, private schools, you probably get to recruit. But for us, we get to pick. But I make sure that who we're picking, I'm picking their how, man. I'm picking their journey, their story, how they got to where they are. I'm buying that. I'm buying people's journey because that's what I'm banking on that I'm going to get as well. So I know I threw a lot at you on that question.

Starting point is 00:28:59 Just saying, man, if I was a high school parent or kid, I'm signing up to go play for Pete Z-Fleck. I mean, just hearing you do your thing, I love it. But right, just as much as what you just said that, like, you would do that. What's great about it, too, is there are people who run like hell from me. Really? Oh, my, a minute they hear that phone. Why?

Starting point is 00:29:19 Who would run from that, though? Because lazy and complacent and fraud, like, don't work with me. And if you know that deep down, like some of you feel like that deep down passion right now, you're like, yeah, there's a lot of people who feel that and go, no, this is going to expose me. And they go, but that's what's great about our program. You mean some of these four and five star kids you see are lazy? Oh, I can see a lot of laziness in young people. This young generation, you better peel back the onion a ton on this generation because everybody's the Instagram filter. Everybody.

Starting point is 00:29:52 And I'm talking from a player to a picture to a video. It's all filtered. So you've got to assume everything that you see is filtered. And then how can I peel back this filter to get to the real DNA of what's going on? And that's my job as the head coach. And I'm not saying I'm perfect at it. I'm not saying there hasn't been complacent, lazy people walk through this building. And then you find out later on.

Starting point is 00:30:14 I'm also not saying I haven't taken a chance on a kid. But you have to keep evolving, I think, your strategy in hiring. coaches, hiring people. I have more former players on my staff than I've ever had. My staff is really young. My staff is very energetic, but they've mastered our culture. They know it inside now. And I love that former player back inside where they cut their teeth. Like, I love that type of feel inside a building because I think that brings validity. It brings this freshness to this new era of transactional football that we can still stay transformational. Do you have a set of pillars or core values to go along with your mantra of row the boat yeah because row the boat is

Starting point is 00:30:59 really it's what we do i'm going to dissect this a little bit so you got to stay with me we have what we call the hyperculture so row the boat fits in the hyperculture we name our culture go figure it's called hyper but when i was one and eleven i created this i have all this great stuff but god i'm so horrible at putting this all together where somebody can like digest this thing so i created the hyperculture in year two at Western Michigan. It's an acronym, H-Y-P-R-R, so H-Y-P-R-R. The H-I-P-R-R. The H-I-P-R-R. The H-I-P-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R-R- I told John Gordon. This is our next book, so I'm ready to go. But it's called the hyperculture for this reason. If you take H-Y-P, which you don't know what that is yet, let's just go back to when we were all kids. dad used to say that don't believe the hype i grew up in the don king era my dad loved boxing it was like

Starting point is 00:31:59 he was the ultimate hype man everything hype is before the first result that's what the hyperculture is right the hype and then you get the first r and that's the result and then the second r is response so you have to respond to that result so let's peel back the onion a little bit on the hyper the h is how this is the people of the organization every business starts with people people, but I want a certain type of person. I want people who when I put your film on, I can see how you play. Everybody plays football. Everybody plays a wide out. Everybody plays court. I want to see spitting off the film how you play. Relentless. Neckton, N-E-K-T-O-N. Navy SEALs call themselves nectons. They always attack. They're never full, right? How you do one thing is how you do

Starting point is 00:32:45 everything. You don't change in whether it's academics or social life. You're a turd off the field, but you're a good football player. I want people who have that consistency, right? That how is everything to me? Always attacking never full. So I'm looking for the overachievers in that. So that's the people I'm looking for, whether it's coaches or players. You take the right people and then you plug them into the yours. Okay, yours is the vision. But it's like you said before, it's got to be your vision. So I always tell people, we're building the house together. We have a huge house in our team meeting room. And it's a real home. But when you're building a home, you have an architect who designs the home, and then you

Starting point is 00:33:24 have a builder who builds the home. So your vision of the build this home you want has to be your vision. So it's your life. It can't be your dad's vision for you or your grandfather's vision for you or just the coach's vision for you. I'm the architect as a head coach. I create a blueprint based on what you tell me. What do you want the house to look like?

Starting point is 00:33:46 And I'll create that. Right? We just built a home. And good Lord, what I thought started to be this turned out, you know, when you give your wife the full rain, I mean, it is unbelievable how that plan changed constantly. But it was a blueprint. And then we hired a builder to build it. The players are the builders. Don't tell me you want this extravagant home. And then you're a horrible carpenter because a blueprint calls for an elite builder. So that's at your vision. And I always tell people, you know, think about vision in your life. really set it out there. Like we talk about creative vision and put it on a shelf and don't talk about it, but it's got to be your vision because if you keep sharing your vision with other, people think you're going to be crazy. I keep whatever I'm going to do, I tell the people most important to me, I put it on the shelf and that's it. But when I was a kid, I was taught stranger danger. Let me give you an example of this. Somebody took a business model and said, what a great business model. I'm going to create a multi-billion dollar industry. And we know what that is?

Starting point is 00:34:43 Good. Yes, Uber. So we get in a car with a stranger every time that we, We need a ride. We don't know this person's background. We don't know this person's driving record. We really don't. We trust Uber to put that person in front of us. And not only we do we have an Uber, we're hammered. We're drunk.

Starting point is 00:34:59 Like we're calling somebody when we're hammered to drive us from one place to the other, drop us off at our home. And as we're sitting there telling somebody our garage code because we just feel like that's the right thing to do because we had too many toddies. So like somebody took that what we were told as a horrible, horrible thing to do, took it and made a business model. a lot of it. The second thing is I always had to tell my parents, like, where I was going to spend the night, and then their parent had to call my parent to make sure they were going to be home.

Starting point is 00:35:27 Just sleep in my buddy's house next door, you know? Is his parent going to be home? Long story short, again, a lot of rules. Now we have Airbnb. Nobody knows who's under the bed, who's in the closet, why is the closet locked? You know what I mean? There's all these things when I go into a home, I'm like, there's a lot of questions being answered here, but we just trust it. Like, there's not somebody under the bed with a knife. And you bring your family in these things. Look, I use both things, so I'm not saying they're bad. But what I am saying is the stranger danger and was turned into a model. And that's why the vision is so important, right?

Starting point is 00:35:57 Talk about Amazon, same way. So the right people plugged into the crazy-ass visions, big-ass visions. I want people who want real crap in their life, like big stuff. And then you've got to put them to work. And that's how we define process as work. And that's to who, where, when, why, and how of anything. So every player can ask me who are we doing it for? What are we doing? Where are we doing it? Why are we doing it? When are we doing it? How are we doing it?

Starting point is 00:36:23 Think about that. When you give somebody instruction, can they ask you those six questions? And can you answer them. Players can walk in your anytime. Coach, why are we doing this? That's exactly right. Here's why. But you have to define those six things of your process. I'll give you an example. Are how we're nectons, always attacking never full. What do we do? We row the boat. That's what we do. Where are we headed? Success. We define success as peace of mind. When are we going to do it now? The only thing that matters right now is now. Why are we going to do it?

Starting point is 00:36:50 Because we're here to teach you responsibility, trust, and belief. So when you start to get through all those six, that's really, really important. So the who, what, where, when, why, and the how. And the who part is family. Forget about me, I love you. So we're going to respect each other as a family member and love is sacrifice. So those are the six things that we promote during the process. Okay, so that people, the vision, and the process go together to create a result.

Starting point is 00:37:19 If you don't like the result, it's just data. Then your how, your vision, and your process are screwed up. Focus on the hype. Focus on going back and fixing that piece. It's not the result fall. It's not the referees fall. It's not anything like that. And then you've got to respond.

Starting point is 00:37:33 And we teach our players how to respond. We have body language classes for our players. Our practices are some of the most unique practices in the country. Our players are taught to respond in every area of their life. academically, socially, spiritually, and we teach them what elite response is. 75% of our communication as human beings is nonverbal. So you better have a lot of body language understanding. And I think that's one thing that we do really, really well here.

Starting point is 00:37:58 So that's the hyperculture. I can speak two hours on that. It just kind of gives you a little peel back of the onion, how rode the boat fits into the process of what we do every day, getting everybody aligned in the organization. What does tough body language look like? What are the specific things you are teaching your guys on how to respond, whether it's on the football field in life? What are some of those body language tips? Well, the big thing is at practice, we have a thing called big chest, right?

Starting point is 00:38:23 So just standing up straight. So most players, I think that everybody needs to know their responsibility within the organization. So like our trainers need to know when to jump in, when not to jump in, like our athletic trainers. How can I help our athletic trainers do their job better? Well, if you can see an issue, you might be able to. to get it faster, right? Because I never want anybody in my organization, say, never saw it coming. I never want that. And I say you can't prevent everything, but I'm going to give you an example. So our players are not able to be like this or slumped over. Our players stand up and we say big

Starting point is 00:38:58 chest and they've got to be able to pick that chest out, suck all that air in. Because if you can't hold yourself up, our trainers need to run over to you. Like our trainers need to be able to say, okay, this is something, right? I'm just going to go check on this kit. There's all types of things that people have in this underlying type medical world, right? And we do so many tests, but can't prevent everything. So how can I make that better? How can I make sure that they're trained for every environment not to be defeated when they get bad news? I think that's critical. And I'm not saying taking away the emotion from people. I'm just doing everything I trained them not to be emotional. Every type of information that we get in, people love to overreact.

Starting point is 00:39:37 There's difference between reaction and response. So response and emotion, go together, in my opinion. I think you can help take that emotion and train a response culturally that can help somebody's life. I think the real world wants to see you emotional and react, where it's an outside trained behavior where we just watch and say, okay, when we lose, I'm supposed to not shake hands with the guy at midfield. I'm going to walk off the field. I'm going to get in there. We lose. I'm going to blame the refs. We don't want anybody in our organization blaming, complaining, and deflecting. Those are the BCDs that are not allowed. And I think when you have the BCDs, you have a divided culture.

Starting point is 00:40:15 I think you have a very emotional team. I think you have a very reactionary team. You have a very front running team. And I don't want any of that. So I want to train a response in every area of your life that you're more built like a Navy SEAL or a Green Beret. Or if there's something that somebody needs, they're calling upon you because it's above and beyond. I think that's where this word elite comes from, this necton mentality of how we do it. we want it done at an elite level. If you're not going to do it at an elite level, then it's not

Starting point is 00:40:44 going to work here. And again, that doesn't equal perfection. I think, though, that words have power, we have close to 150 words that our players know definitions to, and this isn't a cult. But it's a baseline definition of what words mean. Success is peace of mind, okay? That's a baseline definition. That can help you in the rest of your life. We are not saying like, hey, success is money only. You know, and that's it. And that's what we're training. We're not. We're doing everything we can to take what people are just hearing on the outside and doing everything we can to turn up the volume and let them listen inside and doing everything we can to give substance to all these filters.

Starting point is 00:41:22 And I think that's part of our job as educators, is to bring substance to the filter. And we're doing everything we can to kind of peel back that onion here. One of the things you just mentioned was how you practice. I'd like to have Garen Stokes talk for a second because I know him and Brooke Cups went and watched you for a day and got to talk to you. you guys and see you practice. And I know from what they told me it was different. Garron, can you talk with Coach Fleck here about what you saw that day? And I'd love to hear more about

Starting point is 00:41:49 his philosophy on it. Coach, spent two days up in Kalamazoo. We've went and watched a ton of people, high-level people run practices. I've never seen a better one. In 2016, the energy, the lack of wasted time. Every human had a role and like thrived in that role. It was efficient, super competitive. the kids were like super locked in and talking to each other. The feedback was constant. It was the most intentional practice we've ever seen. How'd you get that? I think it goes back to being a player.

Starting point is 00:42:19 I was the era of three and a half hour practices. They were boring, man. I got ADD, man. I need to move. I cannot do things for a long time. I need to change it up. I think every team you have to adjust to. I don't think just because you've done it in the past,

Starting point is 00:42:34 you can do it with this particular team. I think every team has their own DNA. every team has their own blueprint and fingerprint, but how you practice should be really consistent. And for us, I wanted to cut all the fat off practice. I watched coaches waste time because they were the coach and I was the player. And it was their stage to be the coach.

Starting point is 00:42:53 And I was like, this is awful. And I got bored so much of practice. And I'm like, if I ever ran a practice, man, it is going to be the most efficient, intentional practice in the world. And I got to work for Greg Shiano. And Greg runs a really good practice, too. but I even I was like, I can still cut more fat off of that. I want to make sure practice is harder than a game and truly mean that.

Starting point is 00:43:15 People are saying how practice is way harder? Is it? Or are you just saying that? Because the game's hard. Like, let's face it, the game is hard, but there's a lot of breaks in the game. There's TV timeouts. There's a two-minute warning. There's your offense, defense special teams.

Starting point is 00:43:28 I mean, you got a streaker running on the field. You got to take time. And, you know, you got all this stuff going on these days, right? But I wanted to create a practice where you were trained for everything. And the word necton is an organism that can flow freely through the water current without the water current dictating its behavior. So Navy SEALs call themselves nectons because they can fight in the air, land, and water. It doesn't matter where they go. They can kill you.

Starting point is 00:43:50 Okay. So they're going to be the most dominant in anywhere, any environment you put them in. And we don't want the circumstance to ever dictate our behavior. Right? It's like the coffee bean. So we don't want to just go somewhere or walk into something to let that conform. We want it to conform to us. And so the practice, that's how we've designed it.

Starting point is 00:44:06 We have a 32-second clock that runs constantly. So every play that we do has to be run within 32 seconds. I don't care if we're on one side of the field, we're going all the way to the other side of the field. That 32-second clock's already started. People got to get in a huddle. They got to get the play call. Coaches got to get the play call. They got to get administered.

Starting point is 00:44:22 We got to get moving to the line of scrimmage. You are always under the two-minute warning in our practice. And we're constantly creating emotional, mental strain, constant creating some type of physical strain. because I want them to be okay with a 14 play drive. I want them to be okay in the fourth quarter. I want them to be able to thrive in the two-minute drill. I want them to be able to handle all of it.

Starting point is 00:44:44 Last year we had a really, really young team, so we even had to do it to an extreme level. I usually don't practice longer than 95 minutes. And I think when people hear that, they're like, that's fantastic. And I love when recruits come to watch us practice because they're like, I love how you practice. I said, did you?

Starting point is 00:44:59 I said, because what you're going to have to do, you're going to have to do it. It's one thing to watch it. And this is really exciting. And then the first day in our warm-up, our dynamic stretch warm-up, we've got one kid pukin or two kids, it can't even make it through the stretch because it isn't just a stretch. It is a dynamic warm-up.

Starting point is 00:45:18 But everything we do, I want to be at an elite level, even the execution of it. And then the game and what you're doing eventually slows down. Because the biggest jump is the last thing I'll say of why we practice the way we practice. The biggest jump in sport, in my opinion, is high school to college. period. It isn't even close. You got 17-year-olds playing against 24-year-olds. That is a grown-ass man. That is a grown woman. Then you got kids at 17, and they're competing against each other. When you go to the NFL or the NBA, I mean, you're really good. And all you're doing is playing

Starting point is 00:45:53 against really other grown woman or grown men. And you're all grown. So it doesn't really matter if you're a rookie or if you're an older guy. It's only experience. But when you get to college from high school, it's experience, it's development, it's strength, it's the confidence, it's all of that. And we got to do everything we can to get the younger guys ready to go as quickly as possible by putting them under that strain. And same with our coaches. I never want any environment to be too big for them, any call to be too big for them. And the way you can do that is train it, but you've got to train it constantly. Anybody out there's listening, as long as you're not a badger or a Hawkeye, you are more than welcome to come by anytime and watch our spring practices,

Starting point is 00:46:34 watch the way we practice. I will say it is unique, but it is designed to be unique. And it's truly meant to be fully educational at the same time because our coaches have to coach. They don't get to manage and observe. They are coaching constantly. One of the other things you and I have talked about is that you are a learner. You're constantly looking to coaches from all sports, from people outside of sports. you're constantly trying to learn to grow to improve. I think you went to, was it Texas A&M and learn with the Green Berets? What happened down there?

Starting point is 00:47:06 Yeah, there was a leadership group to kind of invited a bunch of head coach, football coaches, and some Green Berets, some Navy SEALs, and brought them in Texas A&M for about two to three-day seminar. And I thought it was exceptional. Those are the type of things I love to do, even if it's for a day. I don't have a lot of time to do a lot of them, but I'll go to one or two a year or meet with somebody outside my football world. Becky Burley is a really good friend. She used to be the National Championship Women's Soccer Coach at Florida.

Starting point is 00:47:32 Buzz Williams is now the basketball coach at Maryland. It's a very good friend of mine. There's a lot of people I like those people who know me I like to talk with. But this one in particular event was unbelievable. And it was about leadership and development and mindset. And I still remember Heather and I were sitting at dinner. And you got to sit with. So you had a coach.

Starting point is 00:47:52 And then you had an Army Ranger or a Green Beret or a Navy Seal at your table. and I'm sitting with this guy and he looks like Sean Connery. So just imagine Sean Connery, right? And he's sitting there across from Heather and I. And the guy's just kind of, he's kind of quiet. He was pretty energetic at lunch. So we were like, you know, this guy's really cool.

Starting point is 00:48:09 So we kind of hung out with him because I love Sean Connery. And at dinner, he's a little quiet. He's just kind of looking around. And I was like, hey, you okay? He's like, oh, yeah, yeah, I'm doing fine. And I still kind of scanning the room. Like, yeah, there's something's going on. And I was like, Heather's like, no, no, are you okay?

Starting point is 00:48:23 He's like, yeah, I'm fine. I'll just tell you what. I'm doing. He goes, I'm just kind of looking around the room just to kind of, you know, take everybody in and see the good in all these people. You know, rarely do you ever get to be in a room like this with so many people that are of elite status and have that elite mindset. And then, see, the other thing I'm doing is I'm getting a beat on everybody because I've got to have a plan to kill every single one of you. His face is as serious as mine was. And I was like, I didn't know whether to laugh to say. He's like, yeah, I'm going to go to the

Starting point is 00:48:53 restroom. I was like, all right, he just kind of got up and went to the restroom. But I looked at Heather, go, how's he going to kill us? Like, do we ask him, like, how do you, now you looked us up and down, how are you going to get us? You know, long story short, he never came back to the table. And one of the guys came over and were like, hey, what happened to, I won't give you his name, but what happened to, you know, Joe. And he goes, oh, he just got called for active duty. He's on his way to Afghanistan or wherever he was going. And Mission, this guy's like 50 years old.

Starting point is 00:49:19 And I was like, what a badass. And I think it gives you kind of the perspective of not only in the football world, but that dude just got called to game. and he better be ready. And he was just hanging out, sitting with us, just chilling. But that mind, it never stops. When you're a coach, and I think if you're an elite coach, one thing that makes us, it's our downfalls, we never stop thinking about how we can improve our program or our student athletes. But it's also what makes you really special. And I think same thing when you're dealing with the elite military, they're never stopping thinking about how if crap goes down, how they're going to kick in and save everybody. It's the same thing. And the elite of the elite

Starting point is 00:49:54 think that way. My wife loves it and hates it at the same time because I could never relax. If I showed you my notes right now on my phone, it was just from last night. We're watching Landman, the last episode, and I'm taking note after note after note of how I'm going to build this team eating from Landman. I mean, whether I do it or not, I just took the notes. I've watched, I don't know how many text messages I sent to my coaches watching the AFC and NFC Championship games. I don't watch anything for entertainment. I constantly watch it for education. And that's how I think I can relate to my players is whatever's going on. See, I'm not on social media.

Starting point is 00:50:26 I don't run my social media. I don't have Instagram. I don't have TikTok. I don't have my Twitter. I can dabble here and there with my GM, but I released all that when I wanted a little self-piece because I was tired of every filter. You know, you have friends out there putting out the relationship that's so good

Starting point is 00:50:41 and you know it's horrible. They just sent a tweet out yesterday or whatever, and these people are married and now they're divorced. Like, come on, just give me real. You know, and I think that that's where you've got to find cultural ways to always teach lifetime lessons to young people. That's our job as educators. And I think we do that probably better than everybody,

Starting point is 00:51:01 including reading children's books the night before a game. I mean, nobody reads to their team a children's book the night before a game. But the theme of the week, I find a children's book that has to do with it. And you can take education to the simplest form, and you will, it's unbelievable how many kids think that's the favorite part when they come back.

Starting point is 00:51:18 Like, Coach, I thought it was so corny and so stupid and so childish when you started doing that. but I get it now. For 14 years, I've done that. So those are the things I've, you can find teaching and education and everything you're doing, but that disease of success, if you're not careful, will leak into everything and nothing will ever be good enough. So how I've trumped that is I celebrate way more than I've ever celebrated.

Starting point is 00:51:40 I have a great bourbon collection. I have a great champagne selection. But I never did that in the past. And then also I never took time for the empathy to stop, pause and let the pain work its way too. So I do that more than I ever have. I love this. Coach Cole, the Hall of Famer. She's the reason this whole thing is happening. I'd love for Sherry to have the final question before we take off, coach. Nice pressure, Ryan. Thank you. And Hershon Connery, I shall be ready right here. You spoke a little bit about being a transformational coach in a transactional system now, and you spoke

Starting point is 00:52:14 about how you've adapted. And I would just like one or two or three of those specific ways in which you have adapted to try to still be that transformational coach in this transactional system. Sure, that's a great question. And thanks for our relationship. And I wouldn't be on here without you. So I'll do anything for you. And you ask me to be on it. Absolutely. I'll do anything for you. So, you know, I think the transformational piece, it has to be authentic and it has to be real. When you look at, like, how I run our program, I'm still willing to do a lot of things that I think I'm not sure a lot of people are willing to do. I think you've got to really kind of peel back the onion a little bit on like what's corny, what's not, but really what actually works within our

Starting point is 00:52:55 system and what doesn't. But the transformational piece, like we still do, okay, I'll give you an example, like we do go for for life program. Okay. So every month, we're doing a class internally. And we do a relationship course. It's called date night. Our players bring a date. We take them to a great restaurant. We might bring them into the stadium and have this like wedding. It's like a, it's a little like a wedding venue. There's a dancer. There's a band. There's a DJ. we have a dinner etiquette course that night. We get to know their girlfriends or their partners, and our wives come, and you're teaching people how to be human beings, how to date in a filtered world.

Starting point is 00:53:30 That's transformational, in my opinion. We have a racism class that we take every month. And Minneapolis, I think it's an unbelievable place. I think it gets a really bad reputation based on media of what's going on. But I think one thing I love about our city is that when things don't go right, they're willing to put it out there. And they're taking a lot of societal issues and saying, okay, here, the buck stops here. And so, you know, when George Floyd was killed about five miles from here, our players created

Starting point is 00:53:56 what they're called the Here initiative, helping end racism through education. Because George Floyd was killed here, so helping end racism through education. Yahuir Williams, who is from the History Channel, comes in every month, and we do a racism education course for about 80 minutes. And he teaches it. And everyone in the organization is required to be there. Because I think everybody locked arms after George Floyd was killed, and everybody marched down the streets and every coach and player were together. And then what I thought happened was

Starting point is 00:54:22 racism and like COVID kind of got put in the same bracket. And boom, COVID ended. So, oh, we're not going to talk about racism anymore. That must end it too, which is farthest from the 400-year history of racism and in America. So like, I want our players to be the best version of themselves and have incredible empathy for other people. And I'm not saying that we all have to like each other, but we have to respect each other. And I think that's what's being lost in our society. And I think that as a head coach, you have to set that example. And that course, where we all take that piece.

Starting point is 00:54:56 And I think that's what makes us really, really unique in the transformational world where people don't have time to do that. I'm paying you to be a great player. Be the great player. I can care less what kind of person you are. And I'm not going to spend time and budget and finance to do that. And I'm just willing to do that. So I think part of the job as head coach is to develop your coaches.

Starting point is 00:55:14 So I do a coaching development series. I have a coach speak every Thursday in front of the team on any topic they want to hit on. My job has developed my coaches, to be head coaches, to be coordinators. I don't know how much longer I'm going to do it. I'm not saying I'm retiring tomorrow, but I don't know how much longer I'm going to do it. If I can't give 100, then I'm not going to do it at all. But I think that that kind of separates it a little bit as the speaking series from what we do. And then I would say the last thing for transformational is like our themes.

Starting point is 00:55:42 I do a purpose three for the whole year. Our number one purpose three this year is E pluribus unum, and it's written on the dollar bill, and it really means connect one, bring people together, become one, and that's what I want this team, this particular team to do. So everything has to fit within those purpose threes. Once we hit the season, we do an actual theme. And I'll give you an example.

Starting point is 00:56:07 Like this year, we did, if anybody could see that rock and row, everything has row in it and everything has how in it. That's Goldie with like a skull. But that was the logo for the theme of the year. And then we kind of go on tour, right, of all the people. And then what we do each week is we take our opponent. And remember, I got to find culture ways to teach lifetime lessons. So I'll take a rock and row band.

Starting point is 00:56:30 And then we'll study that band. That's the only thing that'll play in practice. And the whole week is studying how that opponent and this band have a lot in common of what we're walking into. And again, transformation will take a lot of thought and a lot of planning and a lot of team meetings to do that. But this is an example of like when they win, goldie dresses is Bruce Springsteen, but Bruce Howstein. See the Howe in there? The Howestein. So Howe is everywhere.

Starting point is 00:56:58 But every week is this week was rock and roll, rock and row band. And our second theme that week was Hunt. But you take that and it makes players in a small way. if you can add all those up of like fun things that they look forward to that subliminally you're doing, that they can't wait to hear what's coming up next. Can't wait to hear what the children's book is. They can't wait to see what the theme is. The greatest thing you'll see in our building is during the season on Sundays,

Starting point is 00:57:23 when we come in from the team meeting after a win, they can't wait to pick the colored shirt. It's the talk of the locker room. And they get five options. And we put them up there and they're booing, they're cheering for a pink shirt or a teal shirt. we put these wild colors out there. So I think that people are losing, in my opinion, that connection, that fun, what made elementary school different than high school was that connection with your teachers, that connection with your coaches, that connection with the people that you are around with your classmates.

Starting point is 00:57:56 And I think that that's what I think people are striving for. And maybe what made Indiana really special this year was that connection and that group of people and they became a team. And I think that's the biggest thing that I think we strive for every day, as you. leaders of this organization that we're here to transform it. And my job is to make sure everybody gets better, including coaches. And coaching the coaches is a big part of what I do, empowering them to have that ability to change other people's lives and not running this as a dictatorship. Early in my career, I was a, I ran it that way. We're going to do it because I said so.

Starting point is 00:58:28 And I went one on 11 and that was awful. I mean, I did so many things that were so wrong, so early, but thank God I did them and had people around me saying, hey, we got to be. got to get that better. Or, hey, if you're doing that, you should probably do this. And those are the mentors in my life. And like I said, that's why I think everybody should have to have to not have have success first because it teaches you so much about what's authentic, what's not, what's real, what's your responsibility, what's other people's responsibility. And last thing I'll leave you with is one of the greatest things I ever learned was a coach's job is to teach and demand, a player's job is prepare and perform. And that can be in life, that could be in football,

Starting point is 00:59:04 that can be in anything. You know, coaches, we teach, but you better teach. teaching, life, football, sport, relationships. And then there's a demanding part because we're not asking. We're demanding we get that done because that's the goal we set. And then players jobs are prepare and perform. Elite teams, players lead, average teams, coaches lead and bad teams. Nobody leads. But the elite teams players lead.

Starting point is 00:59:29 And our job is to get as many of those guys as we possibly can to the front of the bus. So, yeah, thank you very much, guys, for having me on. DJ, this is amazing. really, really appreciate it. Thanks everybody for being here. And yeah, man, I would love to continue our dialogue as we both progress and love to watch one of those practices come up to Minnesota and see it, man. You're always welcome, everybody.

Starting point is 00:59:48 Roll the boat, Skymago, go gofers. And thanks for having me on. Love it, man. Thanks, PJ. See you guys. Bye-bye. It is the end of the podcast club. Thank you for being a member of the end of the podcast club.

Starting point is 01:00:03 If you are, send me a note, Ryan, at learningleader.com. Let me know what you learned from this great conversation with PJ Fleck. takeaways from my note. Stop recruiting. Start selecting PJ does not chase the highest ranked players. He looks for fit in alignment with his values. Asked yourself, are you trying to convince people to join your team or are you selecting people who want to be a part of what you're building? And efficiency beats duration. PJ runs 95-minute practices with a 32-second play clock, always moving, always intense. The principle make practice harder than the games.

Starting point is 01:00:43 Like actually harder than the games. I love that part when he goes, really? Are they really harder? And in his case, they are? Where in your work are you confusing time spent with intensity and focus? It's not about being busy, right? It's about getting it done. And I love how PJ focuses on that.

Starting point is 01:01:00 Internal drive is more effective than external motivation. PJ calls his ideal player's neck. tons, always attacking, never satisfied. He's looking for people who prove their worth to themselves, not to others. If you need constant external motivation, you are not ready to be a part of an elite team. And then a leader must teach and demand, a player must prepare and perform. These are not opposing forces. They're two sides of the same commitment to excellence.

Starting point is 01:01:31 And I love that PJ honors his mentor, coach, Jim Tressel, by wearing a tie. And I'd asked you, who are you? honoring through your daily practices. So good. What's going to say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two. Hey, you should listen to this episode of the learning leadership with PJ Fleck. I think he'll help you become a more effective leader. And because you continue to do that and you also go to Spotify and Apple Podcasts and you subscribe to the show and you're rated, hopefully five stars and write a thoughtful review by doing all that you are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that,

Starting point is 01:02:05 I will forever be grateful. Thank you. So, So much. Talk to you soon. Can we?

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 674: PJ Fleck - Building Elite Culture, Nekton Mindset, Selecting >Recruiting, Intrinsic Motivation, Row The Boat, and Transformational Coaching

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