John Wooden Leadership Qualities: 14 He Used For Career Development

Do you follow college basketball? If you do, you will recognize the name of John Wooden, probably the most successful college coach of all time.  For us, this achievement and learning are all about the John Wooden leadership qualities.

Coach John Wooden is best known for his 27-year legacy at UCLA, where he led the Bruins to 10 NCAA national championships . This is a record that will most likely never be repeated.

We like to read about and study people who generate this type of success. There is so much that we can learn from them.

Nothing really prepares you to be a leader. In most cases, you get the opportunity to lead by being good at something else. However, while being a strong performer gives you the credibility to lead, it says nothing about your ability to lead. Leadership is a skill in its own right and, for the most part, it’s one you learn on the job.

Check out our thoughts on team leverage

For Wooden, the ideal leader is someone whose life and character motivate people to follow. The best kind of leadership derives its capacity from the force of example, not from the power of position or personality.  Much of what passes as leadership today is nothing more than threats and rewards.

That’s not effective leadership for the long-term. Authentic leadership seeks to motivate people from the inside, by an appeal to the head and the heart, not by use of command and coercion. Wooden influenced players through the character he displayed in everything he did, from the way he recruited student-athletes to the way he taught them to put their socks on.

Here are the 15 most essential leadership qualities we derive from John Wooden that we recommend for the development of people we influence:

Agree to disagree, but don’t be disagreeable 

It is all about maintaining a positive attitude all the time. According to Wooden, “We can agree to disagree, but we don’t need to be disagreeable.”

Focus on character over reputation

Your reputation will vary.  It’s your character that counts, and it’s what you can control.  Wooden said, “If you make an effort to do the best of which you’re capable, trying to improve the situation that exists for you, I think that’s success, and I don’t think others can judge that, and I think that’s like character and reputation.  Your reputation is what you are perceived to be, and your character is what you are, and I believe the character is much more important than what you are perceived to be.”

The score is a by-product

The score is hopefully a by-product of doing the right things.  Don’t focus on the score, focus on what you’re doing and give your best.

Wooden said, “I wanted the score of a game to be a by-product of these other things, and not the end itself.”

John Wooden leadership book … the meaning of the best

The sense of being the best player is the one who gets closest to reaching their full potential.  According to Wooden, whoever gets the closest to reaching their full potential is the best.

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John Wooden leadership qualities: don’t let your limits limit you

Don’t let limits get in the way.  Wooden — “Don’t let what you cannot do, interfere with what you can do.”

A doer makes mistakes

If you’re not doing, you’re not learning.   Everybody makes mistakes.  It’s what you do with them that counts.

Everybody is unique

Wooden learned early on the importance of paying attention to each. His teaching was built on this fact.  He learned that he had to work with each a little differently and that no two are identical.

He knew that he must vary his approach to helping them unleash their best.

Continuous learning

Coach Wooden practiced life-long learning – as you would expect from a great teacher. This has continued to grow in importance in today’s environment.

John Wooden leadership qualities … balance is everything

He said this often – balance in life and balance on the court. He put balance only second to LOVE. Balance is everything. “Be quick, but don’t hurry.” This, in essence, is a balance; controlled action in all areas of life.

Little things make big things happen 

Coach Wooden was a proponent of the principle that people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. His practices were ferociously intense. There wasn’t any slack in practice where you could hang out and chat.

He found time in the beginning when players were coming onto the court to take a moment, to pull someone aside as he was ambling over to the practice and ask about how things were going.

Patience is a part of progress

Success comes slowly.  Expect change to happen slowly and to have patience along the way.  Wooden said, “Whatever you’re doing, you must have patience” and “there is no progress without change, so you must have patience.”

Lead by example

Wooden said that way back, during his early years of teaching, an accurate saying made a great impression on him – “No written word, no spoken plea, can teach our youth what they should be, nor all the books on all the shelves, it’s what the teachers are themselves.”

Failure is not fatal

Keep going.  Don’t let setbacks stop you.  Carry your lessons forward, and change your approach.  Wooden said, “Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.” Don’t fear change … it is a fact of life.

It’s the journey

It’s the getting there that’s fun.  Wooden said, “Cervantes said, ‘The journey is better than the end.’ And I like that. I think that is — it’s getting there.

Sometimes when you get there, there’s almost a letdown, but it’s the getting there that’s fun.”  Wooden would say, ““I liked our practices to be the journey, and the game would be the end … the result.”

Here is an interesting story of John Wooden that says miles about John Wooden the man:

At age 96, Wooden was back at the site of his first NCAA championship in 1964, prompting him to recall a message he had received “from above” right after the beginning of his 10-championship run at UCLA.

 “We won on a Saturday night,” Wooden said. “The next day was Easter Sunday, and I planned on going out to a church … where the Rev. Bob Maneely was the minister. I had got acquainted with him. I used to attend a Fellowship of Christian Athletes conference in Estes Park, Colo.; he was there as a speaker. I planned on going out Easter Sunday, my wife and I. Sunday morning, we were outside the Muehlebach Hotel, waiting to get a cab to take us to the church. And a pigeon hit me right on top of the head. And I felt, ‘Well, we just won the national championship, the team did, don’t let it go to your head.’ And I think the Good Lord was letting me know, ‘Don’t get carried away.’ I’ll always remember that.”

The thought from Wooden that sticks with me more than any other?

It is that something I always need to pay attention to …

before you can be a successful mentor or coach, you must create a positive learning environment.  So how did Coach Wooden go about creating this positive learning environment?   He implemented one simple strategy.  He used 4-5 positive praises for every one criticism.  Wow!  This sounds so simple, and yet as I tried to implement it in my leadership, I found out just how difficult it is.

So what is it from John Wooden’s legacy that you remember the most? Any comments or questions to add below?

The bottom line

We all have our talents, but the innate ability will only take you so far. In the final analysis, what makes transformational leadership different is its ability to transform it to suit the needs of its mission.

So what’s the conclusion? The conclusion is there is no conclusion. There is only the next step. And that next step is entirely up to you.

It’s up to you to keep improving your ability to lead. Lessons are all around you. In many situations, history may be providing the ideas and or inspiration. But the key is in knowing that it is within you already.

It’s up to you to keep improving your leadership learning  and experience from all around in your environment.

All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that struggle gets better every day you learn and apply new lessons.

When things go wrong, what’s most important is your next step.

Try. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

Are you devoting enough energy continually improving your continuous learning?

Do you have a lesson about making your learning better you can share with this community? Have any questions or comments to add in the section below?

Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change.  We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way. Call us for a free quote today. You will be amazed how reasonable we will be.

More leadership material from Digital Spark Marketing’s Library:

Leadership Characteristics that Improve Influence

Mike Schoultz is a digital marketing and customer service expert. With 48 years of business experience, he consults on and writes about topics to help improve the performance of small business. Find him on G+, Facebook, Twitter, Digital Spark Marketing, and LinkedIn.