As Super Bowl LX approaches let’s connect football to leadership. Here’s the setup.
As we know, football teams have an offensive and defensive coordinator that serve under the head coach. These coordinators are subject matter experts. Their experience goes deep and they are laser focused on what takes place on the offensive or defensive side of the ball.
The way it works is the head coach delegates responsibility for all things offense and defense to these coordinators. This is analogous to the CEO’s relationship with a CFO or CMO for example. Typically, the offensive and defensive coordinators manage the practice sessions for their respective squad during the week and design the plays to be put in motion come gametime. And for many, the coordinator handles the game time play calling duties. This allows the head coach to focus on the overall team’s performance and to think strategically as the game unfolds.
We also know that in the NFL some head coaches choose to handle the play calling themselves. Most often this happens on offense. The head coach may have a prior background as an offensive coordinator and ‘steps in’ to handle the game time play calling duties. The offensive coordinator still exists, but his boss takes the reins during the game when it comes to deciding what play the team will run on each snap. All eyes are on the head coach who puts himself into the mix by personally handling a duty normally relegated to his coordinator.
What do you think of this approach?
As I see it, there are two ways to look at this dynamic.
First is, ‘Hey, the head coach (CEO) should step back and let the offensive coordinator do his job. That’s why he hired the coordinator.” The head coach needs to delegate responsibility to his executives allowing him to lead the team from a higher perch. His job is to manage the executives (coordinators), set the overall tone, focus on strategy, motivation and the collective execution of the team’s game plan. He should not be performing tasks that the coordinators were hired to perform. It’s hard to imagine a CEO stepping in to perform critical duties of the CFO or CMO. In the business world, this would rarely occur.
So, let’s call the above Option A.
Then there’s Option B.
Coaching in the NFL is an extremely results driven profession. Coaches are paid to win games. Period. The buck stops with the head coach who is often the first to go when the team is not winning to the satisfaction of the owner (shareholder). That coach was hired for his talents and has gotten where he is because he has likely demonstrated success in managing an offense or defense. So, why not take the reins and own the play calling during the game?
I’ll stop here.
So where do you stand? First, is it fair to make these football comparisons to the business world? And if so, where do you stand on this? Are you a proponent of Option A or Option B?