At the age of 79, the legendary Duke University basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski now walks a bit gingerly thanks to his two artificial hips, two artificial knees, and an artificial ankle.
But his wit and his desire to win still drive the philosophies of leadership that he shared in remarks from a keynote stage today at supply chain software vendor Manhattan Associates’ annual user conference, held in Las Vegas.
Krzyzewski learned his values from some pretty tough teachers, such as his teachers at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and his basketball coach there, the famously gruff Bob Knight. Those concepts include an honor code (“You don’t lie, cheat, or steal. Or tolerate anyone who does.”) and the only three answers that West Point cadets were allowed to give their commanding officers (“Yes sir, no sir, or no excuse sir.”).
But Krzyzewski’s coaching style also includes a wide array of strategies that apply to business leadership as well as athletic coaching, he said.
Krzyzewski still follows a core lesson he learned from Coach Knight: “The will to prepare to win is more important than the will to win.” As head coach at Duke and national team coach for the U.S. Olympic team, Krzyzewski says he followed a version of that idea. “I prepared my teams to be worthy of winning. Now, we didn’t always win, but the other team had to beat us.”
And despite that strict background, he includes plenty of flexibility in his leadership principles: agility, adaptability, accountability, and attitude.
Likewise, over his long career, Krzyzewski says he forced himself to adapt to the ever-changing music tastes, clothing styles, and attention spans of the young players on his teams. “God played a trick on me; I kept getting older, but the kids I coached always stayed the same age. So I had to change how I communicated maybe 15 or 20 times.”
But no matter how much the world changed around him, Krzyzewski said he always followed values that he first learned from his mother Emily, a child of Polish immigrants who worked her whole life as a cleaning lady in Chicago with an eighth grade education.
Those seven values are:
- Integrity: do the right thing, and hold each other accountable.
- Respect: everyone is important, know their first names, say please and thank you.
- Courage: say or do what needs to be said or done, in that moment.
- Selfless Service: focus on the team and others before yourself.
- Loyalty: stand by your team and your people through thick and thin.
- Duty: come to work, and believe in the dignity of work.
- Trust: believe in your teammates’ intentions and abilities.
