Daniela Zuniga 11/24/14 Leadership Essay Coach Herb Brooks was an admirable leader. When he is given a group of players with nothing in common, he transforms them into a team with one goal in mind: to beat the Soviets. His determination to beat the Soviets and win the Olympics stemmed from his past experiences. He played hockey all throughout this childhood, high school, college, and some semi-professional and professional teams. When he tried out for the U.S National Men’s Hockey Team, he was the last player to get cut from the final roster. That Olympic hockey team went on to beat the Soviets and win gold in 1960. Since then the Soviets dominated hockey and were undefeated champions for many years to come. When Brooks was given the chance …show more content…
to coach the Olympic team, he conditioned the team and pushed their abilities by using intense autocratic leadership. Coach Brooks was a strong task-oriented leader who used autocratic methods to be a successful coach and lead the U.S National Men’s Hockey Team to victory in 1980. The majority of coaches are task-oriented—meaning they set a goal and focus their efforts to achieving that goal.
Coach Brooks’ leadership style was completely centered on being a task-oriented leader. He was an efficient coach because he forced his team to train and push their physical abilities beyond what they imagined possible. Brooks trained and conditioned the team to match the physical abilities of the well-established Soviet team. He had very little interpersonal communication with the players of his team. He clearly states that he is there to coach the team, not to mingle with them and their personal lives. When the coach meets the team, he says “I won’t be your friend, if you need one of those take it up with Craig or Doc,” Although Brooks himself doesn’t form personal relationships with the players, he makes sure they know have someone to confide in. Coach Brook’s only task he wanted to achieve was to beat the Soviets and win gold with a well-trained hockey …show more content…
team. From the very beginning of Miracle, coach Brooks exhibits very autocratic leadership qualities.
He took complete control over the team by deciding the 26-man roster on his own. Originally, there was a week-long tryout scheduled to decide who would make the team. Brooks observed the players for 1 day and formed a roster that he thought would play well together. When his assistant coach Craig finds out about the roster, he protests that Brooks has only observed the athletes’ skill’s for one day. He also reminds Brooks that there is a committee of people who were prepared to analyze each player who tried out in order to pick the best players. Coach Brooks stubbornly tells him he doesn’t want the best players, he wants the players that will work with his team. Throughout the movie he trains the players by conditioning them intensely. After the loss with Norway, coach Brooks forced his team to stay on the ice after the game is over. He made them do grueling ice sprints as a punishment for their lack of performance and concentration. He repeats “again” over and over even when his assistant coach is hesitant to continue. Brooks doesn’t care about his subordinates’ opinions at this point, he had complete control over the team. In this scene, some of his leadership style disadvantages are
showed. Coach Brooks was an overall good leader and was efficient in training the U.S hockey team, although his leadership style had disadvantages. Brooks’ autocratic leadership distanced him emotionally from his team. Although this proved effective to some degree—when he did emotionally connect with them, it was extremely powerful. The speech delivered before the semifinal game with the Soviets had a strong impact on the team and it greatly motivated them. Brooks also sacrificed injured players in order to win a game. One of the “seven secrets to successful coaches” is being character based. He pushed his players to follow the sport ethic and play through pain. Despite these disadvantages, coach Brooks was very successful in many other aspects. He was very competent in hockey, he was a communicator, and he was consistent. Coach Brooks was a great leader who used intense leadership styles to beat the Soviets and win gold in the Olympics. He was a very autocratic leader who wanted complete control of the team. Although he sometimes considered the team’s opinion, he still had the final say in everything that was done. He was an efficient leader who had some disadvantages because of his strong task-oriented minset. Ultimately, his style of leadership worked very well with the U.S National Men’s Hockey Team.
A main part of this story is about picking the Olympic team and how they became as strong as they were. Before beginning the tryouts, coach Herb Brooks scouted every player that was trying out. He watched film on them, talked to old coaches, and in some cases watched them play in a game or practice. It is important that he did this because then he did not come in to the tryouts not knowing any player and it showed that he already had in mind who he wanted for his team. As tryouts approached all the players and coaches were preparing for a week long tryout. Herb Brooks sat by himself in a booth and watched the first day of tryouts and picked his team on the very first day. This stunned all the othe...
Herb Brooks was an incredible leader. He was a coach with a vision, a vision that led a group of college kids to beat Russia, considered one of the greatest sports momen...
when selecting the rowers should have taken into consideration both the psychological (personality types and traits) and the physical aspects (strength, speed, stamina, & coordination) and experimented the results of various combinations by mixing these aspects. He should have identified the growing internal conflicts and tried to look into the matter in the initial stages. Coach P from the beginning has focused on ascertaining his belief whether the Varsity team he chose is highly competent or not. Quantitatively, the members were highly competent in their individual abilities. Coach P. had several opportunities to counter this during the Atlanta Retreat. However, he failed to take actions on their failure as a team and waited to resolve it only in the end, just three days before the national games. The Army Varsity Crew is a dysfunctional group. They’ve not yet reached the Norming phase where trust among the members has largely been achieved. The coach should have made sure the structure and composition of the teams were properly made long before the seat races have started. The lack of presence of strong motivator in the Varsity team should have been met to give them a
In the Miracle speech, the coach is using pathos to get to the player’s heart and wanted them to win by saying : “ Tonight, we are the greatest team in the world. You were born to be hockey players--every one of you, and you were meant to be here tonight” . He puts pressure on them for being the best team that they can be, for them to shut down the Soviet’s team. He speaked aggressive so the players would want to push their capability of playing, and for the players to put in their head that they’re the best so that they won’t give up in the game. Moreover, the coach want to put the team in the situation that they have to beat the Soviet’s team by using pathos when he said: “ This is your time. Their time is done. It’s over. I’m sick and tired
The first personal traits that Coach Dale was forced to exhibit were his toughness and his assertiveness. On his first night in Hickory he met the men of town in the barbershop who were all willing to provide their experience and insight on the team and how to coach. Coach Dale had enough self confidence to know that none of these “insights” were going to help the Hickory team win basketball games and let them know they weren’t welcome by turning his back and walking out. Additionally, he was forced to demonstrate his toughness twice more on the first day of practice by telling the temporary coach, “Secondly, your days of coaching are over,” and then by standing up to the group of men after he dismissed Buddy from the team. These actions made no friends of the men; however, th...
In the locker room, the Spartans had just won a game, after the coaches walked out, Rake walked up to Neely and punched him in the face. Nobody knew what Rake did but they all knew something happened. It was never the same, Neely never planned to forgive Rake because he had caused him so much trouble and ruined his life and everyone knew it. So when Neely stepped up to the podium at Rake's funeral, the whole town of Messina, his fellow Spartans in their green jerseys and even Neely himself were aghast at the kind-hearted words he spoke in memory of his coach. This was a turning point for Neely Crenshaw. Long gone were the feelings hate and resentment only to be replaced with appreciation and acceptance for the man he formerly called Coach. Neely was a new person who through forgiveness found peace and renewed love for his sport that he thought he had
In an article titled, "This "Miracle on Ice" is considered to be the single most incredible moment in all of U.S. sports history. When coach Herb Brooks was made the team's coach, he spent a lot of time reviewing and searching for the right people for the team. Seeing as Brooks was the last man cut from the 1960 U.S. Olympic team, He wanted to do everything he could to win gold for his country. Once try outs started Brooks knew who he wanted on his team after one day. All of the players trying out were in college. The United States and Herb Brooks had picked their Olympic team after the first day of a week of try outs. After picking the team Herb had trained and prepared the team for the Olympics for over a year and a half. He had to prepare them for to face the Soviets. Brooks knew there was no matching them in speed, so he emphasized working on speed, conditioning, and discipline. Doing this my not make them as fast of the
Before the 1980 Winter Olympics began, the US Olympic hockey team was not expected to do as well as they did. They had many powerhouse teams to beat and the team was just a bunch of college kids who wanted to play hockey. In the end, they had performed one of the greatest upsets in the history of hockey by defeating the USSR, the whom many thought of as the greatest hockey team in the world.
At the time of 1980, a rule was in place that no professional hockey players could play in the Olympics; however, the Soviets were able to dodge this rule by claiming that their government-trained players were recruited from the amateur Central Army hockey club (Herb Brooks-Miracle Man). The American team consisted of a bunch of rag-tag college kids and amateurs while most of the players on the Soviet team had been practicing together for a decade and were coached in the finest training facilities in the world (Herb Brooks-Miracle Man). Many people are unaware of just how great the Soviet team was at this time in history (Russell). They had won eight of the past nine Olympic gold medals and five of the last seven world championships (Herb Brooks-Miracle Man). They defeated the NHL’s All-Stars, an American hockey team packed of the professional league’s star players, just the following year by a huge margin (Russell). The Soviets were even nicknamed the “Big Red Machine”, because th...
Coach Herman Boone, who is played by Denzel Washington, is a very influential person. He is a perfect leader. While it cannot be found out for sure, Coach Boone can be classified under the trait theory of management, that “Leaders are Born”. The type of leadership he displays cannot be taught, he is able to bring together two different types of groups to act as one, to respect each other and play together. He shows power in the movie, he has a large capacity to influence others. Using his power, he gets the players to conform and forget how others think they are supposed to act towards each other. The goal specificity is also clear in the movie. Coach Boone expects his team to be ‘perfect’, he expects them to win the Virginia State Championship. Former head coach and now assistant coach Bill Yoast, played by Will Patton, is also a very influential person and good leader. He is in charge...
John W. Gardner born 1912, had a varied and productive career as an educator, public official, and political reformer. Gardner's belief in society's potential was his guiding force, but he was wary of the dangers of complacency and inaction. Perhaps best known as the founder of the lobby Common Cause, he was the author of several best-selling books on the themes of achieving personal and societal excellence.
Captains of sports teams are given the stereotype that they are the most athletic player on the team, scoring the most goals and handling the ball best. In truth, captains have a lot of work they have to do that doesn’t even involve playing the sport. Captains are the most looked at player of the game; other players, younger kids and coaches look to them to set examples. They have to set examples in every aspect of the game; athleticism might be part of their job but it is not limited to it. The captain of any sports team must set the leadership standard for commitment, confidence, intelligence, and attitude.
Throughout the book “Leading with the Heart,” I read about prime examples of the following leadership theories: transformational leadership, trait theory, behavioral theory, and situational leadership. He recommended that leaders begin with the trait theory when beginning the selection process when starting his or her organization. In chapter one and as well as chapter two, Coach K refers to coachable players. Meaning, players or members that do not mind being taught and learning; willing to take a back seat to someone else in charge. Establish right away in the first meeting the only rule for the team: “Don’t do anything that’s detrimental to yourself, because if it is detrimental to you, it will be detrimental to our program (Krzyzewski, 2000, p.4). He reiterates that leaders must be very selective in this process, because the people you select represent you as the leader, and your company. In some cases leaders must sacrifice some skill and talent for people who have outstanding character. “Character and respect will outlast talent when talent can’t see past themselves.” Krzyzewski mentions that he will sign a kid who has the character of a leader and train them to gain the skill necessary down the road. I believe that this is why the Duke Men’s basketball program is very successful because he picks
During the time the only players that were allowed to the try out were amateurs. The next Olympics USA Hockey allowed the professionals to compete and create dream teams (Hardy 944). He held tryouts in Colorado Springs in the summer before the winter games. Although the best players were there, he was not looking for them; he was looking for the players were willing to rewire the brain for his system skate hard and fit together as a team. Once the team was finalized, Brooks had to shave six more guys of the roster in order to make it meet the Olympics’ requirements. Brooks’s main concern was with strategy but break the college loyalty and hatred of other players due to rivalries. In the 1970s and 1980s hockey was not played in most places other than Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and New England. Drawing the players from the collegiate level, players had a great loyalty to their colleges of Boston University, University of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, they was bond to be heated rivalries still carried over from 1976 heated blood bath of a semifinal. Brooks was cruel to everyone no matter where each player came from. One line that stuck to players and him “I’ll be your coach I won’t be your friend”(Goldberg). The coach that was a friend to the players was soft-spoken 1967 national teammate of Brooks’s was Craig Patrick. His ways were warranted for the reasoning of the unifying the team under the hatred of
The problem with the varsity team is trust, or lack thereof. According to our text book, the definition of trust is the reciprocal faith in others’ intentions and behavior (Kinicki, 2013). In order for a team to succeed, there must be a level of trust and confidence by all members and especially the leadership of the team. The lack of trust started from the top with Coach Preczewski because he lacked leadership that the team needed. From the beginning, he made a difference between the Varsity Team and the Junior Varsity Team. Because of the difference that he made, it cause animosity between the two teams and lack of trust with the Varsity team.