One quality of a great coach, I'm told, is that he's a life-long learner. I imagine it's the same in any profession.
I'm finding more and more, though, that learning needs to be varied, which explains why there are no "coaching books" on the top-five list this year.
1) Made to Stick, by Chip and Dan Heath
"I can teach you the secret to running this airline in thirty seconds. This is it: We are THE low-fare airline. Once you understand that fact, you can make any decision about this company's future as well as I can." ~ Herb Kelleher, former CEO of Southwest AirlinesI should have read "Made to Stick" a long time ago.
It reveals six principles for effectively communicating ideas: Simplicity, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotions, and Stories. Southwest Airlines makes their mission very SIMPLE and CONCRETE so that anyone in the company can make decisions about its future. The book is filled with more examples like this for all the other principles.
It made me rethink the way I communicate in e-mails, papers, and sometimes even in person. It doesn't matter how good your idea is if you can't communicate it (just read most scientific journal abstracts, or most of the e-mails you get).
2) 1Q84, by Haruki Murakami
"If you can love someone with your whole heart, even one person, then there's salvation in life. Even if you can't get together with that person." ~ Haruki MurakamiGood news for the English majors: a 2013 study showed that reading fiction is a surprisingly effective way to learn empathy, social skills, and emotional intelligence. Putting yourself in another's shoes allows you to better, "make inferences about characters and be sensitive to emotional nuance and complexity."
That coaching is in large part the ability to judge emotional nuance, I try to read a decent amount of fiction. Murakami's work, as always, is golden in this respect.
3) What to do when it's your Turn, by Seth Godin
"Things get much better when we internalize two truths - 1. Nobody owes you anything (no, not even a thank you), 2. It is actually you who owes the world and it's denizens. You take up space (physical and emotional). And you better have something good to show for it."If there were one book I would hand all our players it would be this one. It's an easy-to-read book of thought-provoking quotes, with one common theme: step up and do work you care about.
4) All Marketers are Liars (Tell Stories), by Seth Godin
"People do not buy goods and services. they buy relations, stories, and magic." ~ Seth GodinOn the first day of preseason in August I asked all our players to write down why they came to Fredonia. It turns out that only one player out of 17 based her decision on factual information.
Most of the answers were things like: "I liked Coach Braun," or "I liked the girls on the team when I came to visit," or "My coach said Fredonia was a good place to play," etc., etc.
It was anecdotal evidence, right on our own team, that people don't buy things because of facts, they buy them because of how it makes them feel.
The applications of this idea are endless.
5) The Seven Storey Mountain, by Thomas Merton
"The more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt. The one who does most to avoid suffering, is in the end, the one who suffers most." ~ Thomas MertonThe first book I read in 2015, The Seven Storey Mountain, follows Thomas Merton as he evolves from an average college student to a rock star of all Western religion.
If you have any love for wisdom, beautiful writing (just the first paragraph is astounding), or both, this is a must-read.