I’ll admit upfront: this post has bias. It is the story of a failing team that rose, in the space of a year, to a powerfully performing in a culture of love. And it is football. Australian Rules Football.

So let’s out my bias - the story is about the Richmond Tigers team. But before you skip this post (probably too late for some of you) I want to expose two elements that underpin any team’s success, in sport, in schools, or in business.

The backstory here is that, at the end of 2016, fans were calling for the sacking of the coach - the usual thing after a disappointing year and a big thrashing in the final round. In the model I have been using for middle leadership, the Tigers were definitely in crisis, they were in the drowning stage. The club leadership, against the historical trend, kept the coach, together they created a plan of action, with the first step being the coach working on himself.

Damien Hardwick, otherwise known as Dimma, had self-disclosed that, as a coach, he had stopped listening. He had become stuck in telling and did very little asking. After a summer break re-learning how to check in and listen, culture was his next focus - people. The team, as a group needed to know each other more, and a process of Heroes, Highlights and Hardships became a norm of team meetings. The simple act of sharing snippets of self, as a hardship, a highlight or a story or one’s thereof, each week, built a ‘knowing’ and a bond. A new culture was born in the club, and maybe even for Aussie Rules - a culture of unconditional respect, even love, for teammates.

So now we have two pieces in the puzzle: listening leadership and a culture of mutual connection. Plenty of teams have this but don’t get a lot done. To convert the potential sitting in culture, teams need a system of play, a way of working. The Tigers created a system of play that capitalized on being there for each other, with waves of committed and systematic action overwhelming opposition clubs.

The transformation was not instant, nor was it without setbacks. Yet, as the 2017 season progressed, so too did the culture and systems. As a fan, the learning journey was there to see. That the team won the premiership that year, rising from 13th (out of 18) in 2016 is not the point of the story. My intent in this story is to demonstrate the clarity of leadership learning that led to this rapid rise.

The stages are clear: a complete club in drowning mode, a leadership that takes action, a coach that works on himself, development of team through culture, and systems that leverage all of the previous. Moreover, the coach was developing himself ahead of the other changes - it is hard to lead such improvement when you are at the same level of development as ‘the troops’.

While the context, actions, culture and systems will differ, the process of evolution can be the same for you and your team. I’m using this approach in a bespoke program for new leaders of educational teams in schools - new HODs and HOYs for example. You may not be ad ‘drowning’ but the aim is to quickly lift you and your team to thriving in this strange world of ours. For more information and register interest, visit https://www.andrewmowat.com/programs

Oh, and was this approach sustainable for the Tigers, or was it a one-year wonder? While the system adapted and changed, the ‘culture of love’ remains to this day. In 2018, the team lost in the penultimate game before the Grand Final and won all the way through to win again in 2019 (in a year full of adversity).

References: https://www.afl.com.au/news/76233/hardship-highlight-hero-tigers-stripped-bare