Doc Takes On Vince Lombardi

Dear Readers:

Leadership and management are hot topics in American culture. A publishing industry has grown up producing books with weird titles like “Who Cut My Cheese” and “Allah Is My CEO.” A surprising number of authors of such work have the letter Z in their names, names like Zig and Zag.

It should be clear that the Doc reads such work with a jaundiced eye. His BS detector is on high alert. That’s why he was surprised and delighted by a book written by Donald T. Phillips, who has also written books on the leadership of Abraham Lincoln and the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.


Now Doc is a huge fan of Abraham and Martin (not so much of John), but he has always reviled Vince Lombardi, the legendary football coach whose coaching and leadership style are the subject of Phillip’s most recent book: “Run to Win.” Doc purchased it in an airport bookshop and gobbled it right up.

Doc disliked Lombardi for the coach’s bullying tactics, for his self-conscious religiosity, for his squeaky cleanness, and for the absurd notion that “winning is the only thing.” A good cognitive therapist could have helped the coach understand that good values are far more important than positive results. Bad things do happen to good people, Coach.

After reading this book, however, I feel better about the man who created a football dynasty on the “frozen tundra of Lambeau Field” in Green Bay, Wisconsin. While never iconoclastic, this study of leadership shines light into all corners of the coach’s personality, including his dark, dark side.

But first the bright side. Lombardi was one of the first coaches to espouse the theory that each player (or worker) should be treated differently. His quote on this is: “Some need a whip and others a pat on the back and others are better off when they are ignored.” This approach required him to know the strengths and weaknesses of each player. As Phillips writes: “He observed little things that other, average coaches might not notice or even care about. He knew, for instance, that Bob Skoronski had a ‘great interest in the stock market,’ that Boyd Dowler didn’t ‘swear, smoke, drink, or gamble,’ that Max McGee had a great ‘ability to relax’ because he was ‘not a perfectionist,’ and that Bart Starr was ‘tense by nature’ because he was ‘a perfectionist.'”

Treating each worker differently also required –- out of fairness -– a set of rules and standards that applied to everyone. No expressions of racial or religious prejudice would be tolerated. Players would adhere to a strict dress code and be on time for everything.

“Even Vince’s wife, Marie, was not exempt from the rules,” writes Phillips. “At an early team dinner, she politely asked the waiter if she might have a scoop of ice cream on her apple pie.” The coach was said to have jumped out of his seat, yelling at his wife: “When you travel with the team, and you eat with the team, you eat what the team eats!”

At the end of each chapter, Phillips enumerates a dozen or so “Lombardi Principles” of leadership. Most of these are worthy of emulation. Many could be easily transferred from the world of sports to the world of journalism. (“Remember that all learning is trial and error -– and that negative experiences do not inhibit but rather contribute to the learning process.”)

Even the darker side of Lombardi has an important silver lining. For whenever his temper exploded, whenever it led to words or actions that humiliated others, he was quick with an apology. It’s probably this virtue –- his willingness to admit he was wrong –- that separates Vince Lombardi from the likes of Pete Rose and Bobby Knight.

Which leads the Doc to this question for readers: When was the last time you heard an editor admit he or she was wrong and openly apologize for a mistake?