Temple University Basketball Coach John Chaney (z”l), who passed at age 89, met adversity head-on, without sugar-coating the truth or blunting its sharp edges. As an educator, as well as a basketball coach, he taught his players how to meet adversity head-on as well. He ennobled, uplifted, cajoled, encouraged his players to achieve their full potential, on and off the court. Coach showed us how authentic tough love can prepare a team to compete and win in a world that isn’t fair, that demands excellence and takes no excuses for failure. He Made Courage Contagious, in his own idiosyncratic way, so his players would face the truth – with resolve to do better, not assauge their egos – and so they’d lean into trouble, rather than looking for an easy way out.
I don’t want a team that escapes from reality and escapes from the truth,” Coach said. “I don’t want people who are always escaping, who always have a story and are always conniving. An ostrich tries to escape from the truth. Isn’t an ostrich the thing that puts its head in the sand? But guess what’s sticking out when he does it? Its ass, that’s what. I don’t want a team like that – because when you have a team like that and trouble comes, that team will not face the trouble.”
What’s the truth, the trouble that Chaney ennobled his teams to face with courage? It’s the trouble that’s all too real – if your competition is better funded, better nourished or better positioned – or if the problems you have to solve are vexing and daunting. It’s the truth that your talent gets you into the game – but talent alone isn’t a superpower that equips you to win, unless you continue to learn, grow, practice and perfect. It’s the truth that the gig you love today won’t last forever, so you’d better be prepared for life beyond basketball – or life beyond your current gig. And it’s the trouble you face if the teammate to your left or right has an off-day and you depend on them to shake it off and bring you the very best they have within them to give. Because their success is your success.
“WINNING IS AN ATTITUDE” was Coach’s mantra. He took it on himself to create that attitude, every time he met with a recruit’s skeptical and suspicious parents, in every team practice, in every 1:1 heart-to-heart conversation with a player and in every interview when he shared his unique wisdom and life’s work with the rest of us. Chaney also recognized that he couldn’t build that culture as a solo act from the top down – so he encouraged his players to uplift and ennoble each other. And encouraged the wider community to support his efforts.
You can learn more about Coach’s powerful example from this ESPN tribute and from this tribute by an Inquirer reporter who was assigned to cover Coach. Our first book on Courage, co-authored with former Temple Professor Rod Napier, featured a chapter on John Chaney’s leadership, constructed from Prof Napier’s interviews with this sports legend. So did our second book on Courage, PowerUP Brilliance – because Powering UP is what Coach did.
Now Coach has called in play from the sidelines to us – one last time – to recognize talent and potential, whether it looks like us or comes from a diverse background. To open opportunity. To set the bar high. To keep our eyes on the prize – not just scoring, but winning today’s game, and not just winning this season, but winning in life. And ennoble, uplift, encourage, empower diverse colleagues in our business lives, academic lives, communities and so we win with each other, not overpowering each other.
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Merom Klein PhD, a Temple alumnus, and Louise Yochee Klein PsyD, a Temple fan, are grateful to Prof Rod Napier for his portrait of Coach in The Courage to Act and for giving us permission to include it in PowerUP Brilliance. Klein + Klein are business psychologists who equip business leaders to ennoble, uplift, empower and encourage diverse talent to face trouble, rather than run from trouble – and grapple with the truth to solve vexing problems and bring brilliant new therapies, new energies and new technologies the market. Klein + Klein invite you to see if you’re ready to pick up the torch and bring out the best in your business – with this Courage Ambitions + Readiness Test.
