At the end of a loss with a team you are working for, what is your response? Do you feel like you are solely responsible for that outcome? Do you feel detached from that loss with no feeling of any responsibility for that outcome?
I guess this stems from what you perceive your contribution to be in the first place? Imagine after a loss you had to do a press conference and breakdown how you got beat in the 4th quarter by double digit points based on a lack of conditioning. Or maybe it was a critical 4th down and 1 yard situation where everyone knows the opposing team is going to run ‘Power’ right at you, but your team gets ‘smooshed’ backwards and gives up the 1st down.
What would you say? “Well we did all the right things in regards to conditioning throughout the off season, but some days you just don’t have it.” Or, “you know our pad level was not very good. Our defensive line coach really let us down today.” Or would you be the consummate lead from the front person, “this is all on me, I need to be better. We got great kids and great coaches that all did their jobs, I need to be better!”
Take it on a more micro level. Someone asks you to help them lose weight but does not. A couple of things to consider before we can make a claim as to our blame or credit. Did they show up? Did they do the program? Did they comply outside the program? If they did all of these things, it’s more on you, the coach. You deserve the blame. If the program was inappropriate or not built around the needs of the individual, you should take responsibility for not adequately helping that client.
A lot of this is centered around taking responsibility or blame for coming up short. I intentionally started there because a lot of defer credit as well. To me this is not a humble response, I think it is a strategic aspect to avoid blame as well. When we say, I was just doing my job and my contribution was not very big at all for success, we can say the same thing when we are not successful.
I have been at places where my skill set and knowledge were not a good match for the environment. The old adage ‘they don’t care what you know, until they know how much you care’ just screams louder at certain places than others. My perspective was that how much I knew showed how much I cared. I busted my ass to be as prepared as possible for any situation. That was the essence of showing how much I care. But that does not always translate to me being a good fit for a specific environment.
Me knowing a lot for an environment that does not need me to know a lot means I do not deserve much of the credit. My deferring within that environment is an inventory for my overall contribution. My contribution is small based on my skill set with this group. Comparatively I can say I was invaluable to other environments. My knowledge was a catalyst to performance. In that situation, I did deserve a ton of credit. But with that credit, I also have to take the blame.
That is the crux of high performance. The greater your contribution the more blame you deserve. In that situation we need to be out front in taking the credit as well. I have seen a lot of really nice people get fired from their jobs recently in S&C. You can go on any public forum and see the fans’ response to that staff change. Stemming from ‘we were constantly hurt’, to ‘we were not conditioned well enough’, to ‘we were not physical or tough enough’.
Situationally, we can say that is not the sole responsibility of the S&C coach that was let go. However, when that coach is making high 6 figures, they automatically have more perceived impact. As much as that coach is going to feel uncomfortable for taking credit for the team’s success, they will need to equally have to be able to receive the blame. Getting fired and hearing the reactions to that is symbolic of the lack of credit you were willing to receive.
My advice to you is take the credit. People are saying to you that you did a great job. Say thank you. We worked really hard and were proud of the effort. No need to gloat, but take the damn credit. Have enough confidence to say you did contribute. You didn’t just look at athletes from January to August, you developed them. They are unequivocally better off with your presence. When someone acknowledges that, you need to be willing to take that as a complement. On the other hand, you have to be willing to take responsibility when it does not go well.
In the end, taking credit and/or blame will make you better. You have more skin in the game. You will make decisions based on the key understanding that you have an impact, and you will have to account for those decisions. Taking credit is equally important as taking blame, but is based on the foundation of you believing what you do actually matters.