Leadership Lessons From the Diamond
How empathy and understanding can radically improve a team
“I’m going to be there for them. I’m going to have their back. I’m going to support them in every way.”
— ROB THOMSON
True leadership often comes in surprising forms and in surprising places.
For example, here’s a key — and humiliating — statistic about The Philadelphia Phillies: they were the first professional sports franchise in US sports history to lose 10,000 games. It’s an understatement to say that the team has an extremely rich history of erratic performance and epic collapses.
They do, however, have a few, glorious triumphs.
Incredibly, one of those triumphs just happened this past October in 2022. Accomplishing a feat that even their most diehard fans never thought would happen, The Phillies won the National League Championship Series and stormed into to the World Series, the crown jewel in all of baseball. The team hadn’t made it to that pinnacle since 2009.
While this was cause for celebration in the city of Philadelphia, it was not only unexpected by most sports analysts and broadcasters: it was considered a near impossibility.
That’s because the Phillies began their season in an ugly fashion. Their record was 22–29, and they looked like the same group of talented but ne’er-do-well misfits that they’d been the previous year, the year before that… and, if we’re honest, the five years before that.
But in 2022, the team did something unexpected: they fired their manager, Joe Girardi.
In his place, they promoted his longtime friend to become the team’s Interim Manager. On June 3rd, 2022, the team’s President of Operations Dave Dombrowski introduced the unassuming Rob Thomson to the press. At the end of the Q&A, a reporter asked Thomson an interesting question: What would he say to the team in his first meeting as their new skipper?
Here’s the question and Thomson’s incredible response:
Emotional and Social IQ
Thomson’s answer is a 40-second masterclass on great leadership:
- First, he says he’ll tell his players that he’s “going to be there for them… in every way”. That builds trust. Quickly. We’re always willing to work hard for leaders who make it clear that they’ve got our backs and then demonstrate it. Baseball players are no different.
- Second, Thomson says he’ll get to know his players “physically, mentally, and emotionally”. He’ll do that, he says, because he wants to “better prepare them for performing at the highest level”. Here’s a leader who understands that athletes are interested in winning AND that they are also human beings.
- Thomson concludes by revealing that the “only way” to learn about his players is by “Communicating. Talking and listening.” Thomson’s emphasizes curiosity here: talking and listening creates deeper understanding and compassion between individuals. That, in turn, allowed Thomson to inspire and motivate his players to achieve.
Of course, all this is smart to say when the cameras are pointed at you during your first-ever press conference, but what about the results? What happened to the team once Thomson had time to practice what he preached?
Well, they changed, quite literally overnight:
- They immediately won 8 games in a row, something they hadn’t done for eleven years
- They went 21–9 during Thomson’s first month of managing, a 43% win rate
- They won 40 victories in 59 games, a 68% win rate, the fastest for any manager in the Phillies’ 140-year history
- They went 65–46 to finish the season, a 58.6% win rate, and became the last team in the National League to clinch a postseason berth.
- They went 13–4 in the postseason, making it to The World Series in a decisive fashion over The Cardinals, Braves, and Padres before losing to the Houston Astros.
Somehow, as the season progressed, Thomson’s Phillies continued to win games at higher and higher percentages. That kind of remarkable turnaround isn’t only rare, it’s almost unheard of.
Thomson inherited the same crew as the previous skipper, then lost two of his best players (one of whom is one of the best baseball players in the entire sport in Bryce Harper), but — despite that — Thomson’s Phillies still performed better and kept GETTING better for nearly the rest of the 2022 season.
How is that possible? Because Thomson is a mastermind leader who uses his emotional and social intelligence.
The Selfless Principle
When was the last time you heard anyone’s boss say that he’d like to get to know you mentally and emotionally? If you answered “never”, you’re not alone: leaders who communicate with this kind of empathy, curiosity, and understanding are rare. This kind of leadership requires a selfless approach. Unfortunately, most people who seek out leadership roles do so from the desire to have more control, prestige, or money. In other words, they’re driven by ego.
This, in a word, was the problem with Joe Girardi.
Team members detect and respond to ego quickly. When leaders place their own success over the success of their team, members of the team lose interest in and respect for the leader. Thomson understands this deeply. As a result, he BEGAN his tenure by telling his team that he was going to have their backs and support them in every way. Then, he backed up that promise with results.
“As a skipper, you want everybody to respect you, and at the same point, you need to understand that you have to give that respect back to the player. We are human beings and we are grown men here. If you respect me, I’m going to respect you back. It’s something Thomson does a really good job at — communicating.”
— JEAN SEGURA, PHILLIES 2ND BASEMAN
Calm in The Storm
In business as in life, things sometimes don’t go according to plan. That can create stress and disappointment. Leaders who panic communicate that they lack faith in the people on their team. This creates chaos which, over time, takes its toll. Team members rarely stick with leaders who don’t have faith in them. Rather, they exit and find other teams.
“He’s calm, cool, and collected — he’s got a poise about him. Nothing speeds up on him and I think when you have that in the driver’s seat it kind of wears off on the rest of your club.”
— RHYS HOSKINS, PHILLIES 1ST BASEMAN
Thomson knows this and remains the steady and calm voice, even in challenging circumstances. It’s one of the reasons that he stuck with his lineup throughout nearly every game in the 2022 season. The Phils saw this. They noticed his faith in the lineup and, ultimately, delivered Thomson and the fans a National League pennant. In doing so, not only has the City of Philadelphia embraced Thomson, but so has the national press: Thomson’s leadership has been featured in The Athletic, Forbes, and the NY Times.
All of that is well and fine when you’re winning. But what happens when you lose and lose painfully? Perhaps nothing better exemplifies Thomson’s commitment to remaining respectful and kind than his statement to the press after the Phillies lost the 2022 World Series:
“They’ve accomplished a lot. It’s still disappointing. And I told them after the game, I said, ‘You guys have NOTHING to be ashamed of and you don’t need to hang your head for anybody’ … I’m just so proud of all of them. I really am.”
— ROB THOMSON, PHILLIES MANAGER
Even after losing on his sport’s biggest stage, Thomson was still full of pride for what The Phils accomplished. And after he told them so, he told the public.
The Future Looks Bright
The Phillies’ turnaround seems miraculous, but when you understand how Thomson has led this team, it isn’t, really. Although The Phils have incredible player talent, they’ve also got something equally, if not more valuable: a talented manager they respect and love.
Yes, love. The team actually made and wore t-shirts to honor how they feel about their skipper.
Be Like Rob
There is NO BETTER tool for learning and practicing the art of empathy, understanding, connecting, and healthy communication than improvisation. None. Improvisation, which is often “played” with games and exercises that involved the mind and body, requires participants to:
- Deeply listen to what’s being said
- Understand what’s being communicated non-verbally
- Connect on a human level with one another
- Agree with the context of what’s happening at the moment
If you’re a manager, director, Senior Vice President, or C-Level executive reading this — or you’d like to be at some point in your career — I urge you to learn how to communicate compassionately and humanely to become respected as a leader.
Be like Rob.
To start your journey, sign up for our “Foundations” classes, and let’s help you prepare for the kind of leadership that will inspire others.
“Thomson is the heart and soul of this team. He is the right man to lead us.”
— ALEC BOHM, PHILLIES 1ST BASEMAN
This article was originally published at Change Through Play, a training and facilitation company in Portland, Oregon that provides dynamic, memorable, and powerful leadership skills.
https://www.changethroughplay.com/blog/understanding-leadership
