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| Jim & John Harbaugh at the University of Michigan's Coaches Clinic, March 2015 (photo courtesy of MLive) |
My wife is a human resources generalist at an automotive supplier in the Detroit area. As part of her duties, she recruits and interviews potential candidates applying for jobs at the company. Recently much of our discussions at the dinner table center upon how hard she is finding it to hire quality individuals. A minimum qualification for working at my wife's company on the production floor is a high school diploma or GED. Reflecting upon my daily conversations at home and the talks from John and Jim Harbaugh, I think a good question to ask of all job applicants is, "Did you play organized sports in high school, and in particular did you play football?" While all sports teach common values such as dedication, commitment, perseverance, hard work, etc., football does all of these things and more.
A large problem my wife's company has right now is high turnover, employees quitting after a short period of time. I have been coaching football since 2002, starting out by coaching middle school linemen. I've worked with young men (and even a few young ladies) from 7th grade through senior year, and I've seen first hand how football changes, or rather, molds young individuals. I've witnessed how those who chose not to stick with football found it easier to quit other things in their lives, too. Our Head Coach, Brendan Flaherty, always says, "the first time you quit is the hardest." His statement implies that each time thereafter it becomes easier to quit something, and he is 100% correct! Football teaches commitment and discipline. It is hard to get up at 6AM on an August morning knowing you're about to spend 8 of the next 14 hours conditioning and practicing, putting your body and mind through a battery of drills and tests of fortitude. It's even more difficult to get up at 6AM the next day to do it again! But we all did it, and our kids do it now, every year for preseason practices.
Football is also the ultimate team sport, and teaches the value of putting forth one's best effort all of the time, as well as being accountable to others. What people see on TV or on Friday nights at the locals stadium is that all 11 guys on the field have to contribute their best effort each play, because even one guy missing an assignment or giving poor effort can result in a game-changing play. What people don't see is that at practice during the week the same is true of EVERY athlete. It takes a full team effort to prepare for the opponent. If the scout team left tackle gives poor effort and doesn't execute his assignments in practice, the defensive end will play poorly on game day. Knowing that the team depends on you, needs you there every day to give your best effort every time makes you accountable to your teammates and coaches. It may be hard to get up at 6AM, but you'll do it in part because you know others are depending on you.
Football teaches delayed gratification. In today's world everything is instant. Need to know something right now, search it online and your answer appears in seconds. I also teach high school mathematics, and I fight this mentality daily when I pose problems to the class that require strategy and perseverance, because students are engrained with the notion of "I want it now" types of answers. In football, gratification only comes at the end of a game or a season. Gratification comes in the form of being able to look at a teammate in the eye and know that each gave his all on the field that night (of course, wins are also gratifying, but are not always as frequent!). Athletes have to train all winter, spring and summer and then endure rigorous practices and meetings in preseason and finally a week of specific preparation for an opponent before even getting the opportunity to play a game. Then, maybe at the end of the night an athlete can feel gratified. Imagine working for an employer where you trained for 9 months before getting your first paycheck, and you won't know exactly how much that check is for because it will depend on the outcome of your performance only on that last day.
As Jim Harbaugh said in January, "football teaches toughness." Football is hard. It's physically and mentally demanding, more so than any other sport in my opinion. In a football game things will go wrong, you'll have adversity. Your team will give up a big play, or a key athlete will get injured, or you'll turn the ball over at an inopportune time. Well, I can guarantee that everyone will face adversity in his or her life, too. Losing a job, losing a loved one, a cheating spouse, whatever. Everyone will face some adversities, sometimes on a daily basis. And while other sports can also teach perseverance, the mental and physical toughness taught by playing football equips young men with the capability to face the toughest of life's challenges.
"Isn't football primarily a sport played by the alpha males?" I hear forms of this question every year from the young men I approach to play football that aren't quite sure of it. My answer is, "Yes, it is. And don't you want to become such a person?" I think what Jim alluded to, and I will state outright, is that we need more alpha males, or, more precisely, we need to develop more tough men, with strong character, who are disciplined and can persevere through adversity, and who are reliable and accountable. These are the kinds of people we want as future leaders. These are the men my wife needs to hire at her company. This is what football is all about!
Great Stuff Coach- It's a fact that things don't always go as planned. Playing football helps develop "Grit". The ability to overcome when things don't go as planned. The ability of being comfortable being "Uncomfortable"
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