Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success: Intentness

This article was originally published by Technorati on 19 June 2010 as a Simply Spirited/Sports feature. To see all my Technorati articles, click Lifestyle in the Contents listing on the sidebar.

The position of every block in Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success is significant. None more significant perhaps than the placement of the "Intentness" block directly on top of the foundational "Enthusiasm."

Intentness, Coach Wooden wrote in The Essential Wooden: A Lifetime of Lessons on Leaders and Leadership "is the ability to resist temptation and stay the course, to concentrate on your objective with determination and resolve."

He also describes what Intentness is not: "Impatience is wanting too much too soon. Intentness doesn't involve wanting something."

Friendship Foundational to Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success

This article was originally published by Technorati on 15 June 2010 as a Simply Spirited/Sports feature. To see all my Technorati articles, click Lifestyle in the Contents listing on the sidebar.

As I put pen to paper to write about Coach Wooden's views on Friendship, I find myself researching more heavily the legacy of Adolph Rupp, Hall of Fame coach of the University of Kentucky (my alma mater) from 1930 to 1972. The two coaches' styles could not have been more different. Coach Rupp was colorful, foul-mouthed, a scotch drinker. Wooden--the opposite.

Wooden's players seem to have universally loved him as a coach and as a man. Rupp--the opposite.

Industriousness and Enthusiasm Cornerstones of Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success

This article was originally published by Technorati on 11 June 2010 as a Simply Spirited/Sports feature. To see all my Technorati articles, click Lifestyle in the Contents listing on the sidebar.

"Industriousness" is the first cornerstone of Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success. Industriousness is more than just hard work, though it necessarily includes that. In Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections, Coach Wooden writes, "I call it industriousness to make very clear it involves more than just showing up and going through the motions."

There is a right amount of preparation for every endeavor, whether you're a basketball player, a writer or a plumber. The key is the quality you put into both preparation and participation. Quality effort can only come from an emphasis on the present moment, whether in the field house or on the floor for a Final Four contest. What you are doing now is alway the only true measure of success, and only if you are doing the very best you can do in that moment.

In the coach's words, "You can work without being industrious but you cannot be industrious without word." Work plus quality equals Industriousness.