I have lived with a basic philosophy about life and anything I have done whether in my coaching career or in my new venture of corporate and sports team speaking. It goes like this: Success lies in the simplicity. Confusion lives in the sophistication.
I love sharing thoughts with others on social media. When I recently posted this philosophy on my twitter I got a reply from Eddie Carvalho @GiganticoBiz, a former pro soccer coach. He retweeted my Simplicity tweet and added this:
Great point @kevineastman. The value of making a decision, execute & get ready for next one starts with proper mindset. In soccer we focus on "play what you see" Next level players see it before it happens making decision even simpler. An art for sure but undervalued by highlight reel.
Having been with Doc Rivers for my entire NBA coaching career, I have come to appreciate and believe in the art of simplicity. We strongly feel that simplifying things helps us in two important areas: (1) it makes us more decisive and (2) it makes us more aggressive.
It makes us more decisive because we will know right away what needs to be done and how it needs to be done. We eliminate the thinking and immediately get into the executing. The simpler the plan, the more quickly we were able to make the decision we needed at that time. As former University of Texas coaching legend Darrell Royal used to say, "A hesitant athlete is a non-athlete".
Because we knew what to do, we were able to play free. We did not hesitate. The byproduct was that we instinctively played with a greater confidence and most importantly, we played "fear free." When you play fear free and confident, aggressiveness almost always becomes a part of your play!