From middle school principal to college basketball coach, Coach Tim Taylor’s experiences shape how he leads the women’s basketball program at the US Naval Academy.
Coach Taylor brings key lessons that have shaped his approach to leadership and discusses the importance of focusing on the process rather than just the results.
Coach Taylor also addresses the challenges of coaching at the Naval Academy, including the strict military culture and the need to educate others about the academy’s unique opportunities.
Episode Outline
- 01:14 – The importance of process over results
- 02:50 – Letting experts do what they do
- 04:15 – Being for others
- 06:11 – Relationships and Fit
- 07:45 – Impact of COVID and Rule Changes
- 09:16 – NIL and Salary Cap
- 11:35 – The impact of relationships in college coaching
- 12:59 – The importance of influence in leadership
- 15:51 – Challenges in recruiting and building successful programs at the Naval Academy
- 17:58 – The challenges of rebuilding
- 18:48 – Creating a fun and comfortable environment
- 21:06 – Breaking down hierarchy and changing culture
- 23:26 – The benefits of attending the US Naval Academy
- 24:09 – Preparing students for challenges at the academy
- 24:51 – Impact and leadership at the academy
- 29:43 – The importance of inclusive leadership
- 30:01 – The impact of custodians in leadership
- 31:26 – The challenge of having honest conversations in leadership
Quotes
- “It’s not the result, it’s the process.”
- “You don’t really find out what a true leader is until they’ve hit rock bottom.”
Follow Coach Taylor and Navy Women’s Basketball
Full Transcript – Episode 45
Announcer (00:00:00) – New generation leader.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:00:01) – Coach Tim Taylor has had an incredibly prolific career working for some of the top women’s college basketball coaches. Yet one of my favorite examples that Coach Taylor uses in this interview is not about coaching. It’s actually from his time as a middle school principal. We’re going to dive into leadership coaching women’s college basketball in this nil era conference realignment and how all of that impact and doesn’t impact his work as the head women’s basketball coach at the US Naval Academy. Let’s dive into today’s episode with Coach Tim Taylor. Welcome to the New Generation Leader podcast. We’re giving you the tools you need to lead in the digital world ready to reach your true potential. This is the New Generation Leader podcast. So Coach, throughout your career, you’ve led in a number of institutions. You’ve worked with a number of other head coaches. As you look back through your career. What’s one of the key lessons or insights that you took from one of those other leaders that helped you kick start your time at Navy as head coach?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:01:10) – It goes back honestly, even as far back as high school, it may not even be.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:01:14) – You know, we played for a legendary coach and think one of the things that always stood out to me and actually it’s kind of what I’ve tried to lead lead through in a lot of ways. I remember we had a running back, I won’t mention his name, but we threw a quick pitch. It was supposed to go right. He drops the ball. All of a sudden he turns around, goes left, ends up scoring from 68 yards. And he was getting blessed out the entire time that he was coming across. Most coaches that I would see would be high fiving and pop out and touchdown. Oh, you made a great play. He dropped the ball and, you know, it stood out that that moment stood out to me as a junior in high school when the kid dropped the ball and he ended up scoring. And it has stuck with me that you don’t it’s not the result. It’s the process. Because ultimately he dropped the ball. He just ended up making a great play. And I think a lot of times what I took from that is that it is not about the results.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:02:02) – It’s about how you prepare, it’s how you run the play. It’s how you execute and think in life that in in business, it’s how you execute. It isn’t always the result. Sometimes the results can be failures. You can be winning and still failing. And I think that was one of the moments that really stood out to me. And I’ve kind of based my career on that. And I know that sounds really, really crazy for a 17 year old in that moment. Recognize that. But it really stood out to me that that was the key to success in a lot of things.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:02:30) – I was there. So I remember the exact moment that outcome literally, it’s it’s a similar thing not to steal any thunder, but I still do vividly remember that. Yeah, it does have an impact. So thanks for using that as an example.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:02:41) – And think you look back on think a lot of times you really take things away from every person that you work with. You know, I’ve worked with Legendary, I worked with Debby Ryan, I worked with Sherry Carter.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:02:50) – One of the moments that happened to me that also stood out that think has shaped my thought that led your experts do what your experts do. I was in my first college game. We were playing Wake Forest. So we go down 12 to 2. They’re pressing us. She calls Tom out and I’m like, Sherry, all we need to do is just reverse the ball, throw it up the sideline, hit the middle, and we’re going to end up shooting layups the rest of the night. And she’s like, Why the hell are you telling me? Go tell them. Mean literally. It’s on my first time out. First game we ever played. Go in the huddle. We end up telling them what to do and luckily we just kept pressing that night. They should have just cut it off and we ended up being at Furman. We beat them after the game. She looked at me and she said, Do you know why I told you to go in the huddle? And I’m like, No, don’t.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:03:30) – She said, You knew what you were talking about. All I could have done was screw it up. And to me, she said, at that point, you know, you’ve heard let the experts do what the experts do. You were passionate about it. You knew what you were going to explain. She said, I would have screwed it up and we wouldn’t have been as effective. With that being said, I’ll also learn that she had to be confident who she was and the fact that she didn’t care who got the credit. So there were multiple lessons within that. So when someone has something to say, let them say it and not try to regurgitate something, you know? So those are three really strong lessons for me that I’ve grown and try to use that through our leadership.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:04:00) – And those are incredible lessons which aren’t, unfortunately, all that common in so many leadership settings. There’s a book behind me on the shelf. The title is four. That’s one of my favorite, most powerful three letter words is four.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:04:15) – And really it comes down to who am I? Four? And so in that setting, she was for you and for the players and their best, not for herself. So am I keeping this or am I being generous and am I giving it away? And a couple of episodes. When we talked to coach Sean Regan, he said it’s all about filling the cup of the people around you. And so you lay down some of these habits and rhythms and start to build that culture where you are for other people and investing in them. And like Brian said on episode 43, are we a fountain that’s filling other people up that other people can come to us and be refreshed and rejuvenated? It’s a great privilege to be in that kind of situation and in that kind of setting and. To lay down those examples for, in your case, for your players, for your coaches, and for all those key stakeholders around you.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:05:07) – Yeah, we talk about coach when we work with our corporate clients and even church clients, pretty much anyone.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:05:13) – We have a tool called the Support Challenge Matrix and access is the four quadrant picture, and most of the tools we use are just simple pictures. They’re really easy to understand, but they tell such a heavy message. It’s called liberate, which is high support, high challenge, and liberators are what we tell ourselves, and that’s what we’re trying to develop in leadership oftentimes, though. So what she did was challenge you, Right? But challenge. Why are you telling me what the support was? Also, she believes in you enough to go tell them. So she literally if we were judging that, we would say, man, she did so much to liberate you from a support challenge standpoint that day. So really cool tool.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:05:49) – So coach, your career, you’ve had a number of stops in some incredible institutions, but the institution where you are carries a unique culture and calling. How has that shift and transition changed how you approach recruiting and coaching and developing these players you’re working with?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:06:08) – You know, I don’t know that it’s ever I’ve never changed my approach in recruiting.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:06:11) – You know, think a lot of ways it’s about relationships. It’s about being genuine, it’s fond and what are we a good fit for that particular kit. And I think that’s a lot of times, you know, a lot of people go into selling think one of the big things is when you’re like at Carolina and Virginia, you are selling an institution. They’ve got a lot of different choices. When we’re at the academy, we’re not really selling because that’s a life choice. You’re making a choice beyond basketball. You’re making a choice that really you know, I tell people, I feel like I’ve got the best opportunity in the country for a kid that can do it. So a lot of times we lay it out in those forms and we really go after top kids and we put it out there to see we want to recruit basketball players that fit the academy, that see the value in the academy. Think this is a unique place, think it’s a place where everybody wants you to succeed from top to bottom.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:06:54) – The moment you walk in here, it’s really hard. But they’re going to do everything in their power for you to succeed. I don’t know if that’s always been the case at some of the other institutions I’ve been at. If you’re successful, that’s fine. But I do think that from a recruiting standpoint, I think it’s all about relationships and about connecting with people. And ultimately, I will tell you, we lose some battles here because they don’t want to do the five years. We’ve lost more from people saying, Coach, if you were anywhere else, this is where we can’t do that. Commit to the five years. So but I still really blessed to be where I’m at because think it is an incredible opportunity and I don’t have to worry about my kids, don’t have to worry about the future when it’s all said and done.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:07:28) – So this is from a standpoint of a little bit of ignorance on how it works with the Academy in terms of two things transfer portal and then if nil is any sort of issue.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:07:38) – So if they are, talk about them a little bit, how has it impacted you? It has an impact or if they’re not an issue, say we don’t have to worry about that.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:07:45) – I think if you guys look at and this was when they first came out in the Covid rule and we’ll go back to Covid because think a lot of this has affected some of this as well affected what we see in the last three years, because right now you’re seeing their student athletes are here 5 or 6 years. You know, some kids have been seven years in. So you got 18 year old kids playing against 25 year old kids. And that’s you know, I call them kids, but at that point, they’re young women and young men. I think the rule really affected us. And you’re going to see significant change after next year because that no longer you’re not going to have those five years. Think you’re also going to see a change from the transfer portal because now people were transferring and having two years of institutions, whereas a lot of times they’re not going to have that number of years left over.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:08:26) – They’re not going to be able to go to the five years. The transfer portal does affect us because our application process closes very early, like we’ll close down in January, February, somewhere in there because there’s so many things that they have to do to be able to get into the academy. It’s not a typical application, but can we still get transfers in? Yeah, we were actually able to get a kid in from Colorado this year that we had recruited, and that was kind of an anomaly, just to be honest with you, Ron and Aaron, it’s more of an anomaly than it is going to be something that you can do because here is a 47 month program. If you come in as a senior, you still have to do 47 months regardless of how many years you have left. So if you have one year left, you actually literally have to go through summer. So now what I will tell you, there are a lot what they call us, priors. There are some kids that actually enlist in the Navy and they become a prior they’ve had service, but they will come to the academy to do four years there.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:09:16) – So whatever time you come in, it’s 47 months. Now, when we talk about the nil, does the nil affect us? Yes, because everybody asks about it. The one thing about the academy, they do get paid. They’ve always been able to get paid, but they they get money back. They have to pay for certain things as well because everybody there is on scholarship. Whereas what we really use the nil is, okay, you can use your nil right now in the women’s game and you’re going to get 2 or 300,000 if you come to the Naval Academy and all on the back end, you’re going to make way more money than you ever make on nil on the front end. You know, that’s kind of how we use it. What I will tell you, though, a lot of my five buddies are saying that this nil. It’s crazy. We’ve got a kid with six points from a really good player in the Big East. I’m not going to name the school six points from all time leading scorer.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:09:58) – She’s five foot. An SEC school offers $100,000 and she goes there and because she’s got a fifth year, it’s really affecting the game. I’ve been telling everybody down here, I think at some point I think we need to look at a salary cap because there haves and have nots in this thing. And if we go with a salary cap, you can’t say that’s illegal because they do it in all the other professional sports.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:10:16) – Some of the coaches we’ve talked to who are figuring out now either for the first time or just trying to perfect it, if you will, which I definitely use air quotes for the word perfect are more have concerns about relationships among the players that may end up having especially with if you’re using money to recruit this person who’s never done anything for you you think has potential. But you’ve got this third year, for example, or second year who’s consistently double digits for you, does everything you ask. I mean, it’s just consummate team player, coach on the court, everything else, but there’s nothing for that person.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:10:48) – So and we have some coaches who just want to go, you know what? I just want to use it for retention as much as recruiting. Do you have given everything you just talked about with your discussion? Do you ever have any of those concerns or have you had those types of conversations with players?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:11:02) – No. I think the biggest thing for us, a little different when you’re looking at the Naval Academy, is that when kids make this choice, they have the first two years. So a lot of people don’t realize they have that first two years to decide, okay, and they can leave in the first year of their second year at any time. There’s no repercussions once they sign for their junior year. They call it two for seven. They are now signing on for five year commitment beyond once they graduate. About 94% of the kids do that. So it’s mean. We graduate 94% of our kids in four years, which is a high. You know, it’s number two in the country, may even be number one right now.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:11:35) – So to that point, Ryan, here, we’re going to usually get our kids for four years. So that’s why in the situation that we were in and rebuilding this, we knew that it was going to take three recruiting classes at least before we could start having sustained success. Whereas what I think what Sean and Kenny at Virginia Tech think, what you’re seeing is there’s no longer relationships as much it’s two years almost feel like we’re in a two year college JuCo situation where, okay, power fives don’t want to recruit high school kids unless there’s a top 50. What they want is for us to develop and then they’re going to come in and get them. Why would they want a high school kid when they’ve got a kid that has spent two years at the college level and has shown that they can be successful? And so right now it seems like a lot of the power five coaches I’m talking to, they feel like they’re general managers, not coaches. So I think we’re losing is what you’re talking about is relationship building.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:12:24) – Whereas here at Navy, I get the relationship and I’m going to have 90% of my roster for four years, so I get to make an impact over four years. Think a lot of times we turn college coaching into a transactional business.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:12:35) – Yeah, that’s exactly what some of the things that we hear now is. It’s for a lot of those schools and a lot of those coaches, it’s gone from being I love building programs to now I have to do this differently.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:12:46) – So I think the thing like, Aaron, you’ve written on this a little bit, I think one of the biggest things in your estimation and your expertise in this, how do you feel you never hear transactional as a word that fits in with leadership mean? Wouldn’t you guys agree with that?
Aaron Lee – Host (00:12:59) – Absolutely. It’s one of the tools we teach. It’s transactional. And yes, I expect transaction when I have trust with the grocery store that they’re going to give me great food. But in terms of a relationship, if we can take that transaction to an influential level, well, that’s just opened up a whole new world and I don’t have that kind of relationship with the grocery store.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:13:20) – But if I’m going to lead someone here in the 21st century, I’d probably need to work more towards influence than purely transactional and expecting them to produce an output and get work done.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:13:32) – Well, and I think that’s the thing that I got into coaching because of course I’m competitive. Brian knows that like I hate to lose probably worse than anybody, but think you get into this because you’ve got an opportunity to. I tell people, you get an opportunity as a coach. Very few people get to do this. You have an opportunity to change the world for two hours every day because the way that you treat your kids, the way you treat people around you, the managers, they’re going to pay that forward. They’re watching you. And you know, the year that we went through this year, you don’t really find out what a true leader is until they’ve hit rock bottom. How do they respond at rock bottom? And when you’re at the top of the world? And that’s what getting me with this power five And Brian, what you’re talking about with nil people are buying teams, they’ve got the money, they’re able to spend the money.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:14:12) – There was a kid right now that was at a school that I know she loves. And I can’t say there’s another school that came in. This kid’s like transferred within two days. She’s got $175,000 in two days. You’re telling me someone didn’t tamper with that? That’s the thing that’s really tough.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:14:27) – And that sport, I mean, that’s potentially more money than you’re going to make in a couple of years to go pro. So that’s tough. That’s one of the reasons that we like having these conversations because it does change the landscape for you as a coach. And so it has to also impact in some way, I would imagine, although with you, you’ve always had you always had the type of player you want to bring into your program. I think you probably recruited the same way at UVA, at North Carolina, at Furman, wherever you’ve been. But at Navy there is still a different mindset of a potential recruit that’s going to have to be there. I just. I’ve also been recruited to come play baseball at VMI and sort of the mindset of you have to love this.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:15:04) – You can’t just like it. So I think.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:15:06) – The biggest thing we try to do here is think in order for a kid to be successful here, first of all, they’ve got to be able to see beyond the basketball floor. And they also got to have parents that are locked into it. And that’s another battle that we are fighting right now. I’m sure you guys are hearing it. The parents are of the parents and the nil and the transfer. One of the things that we do when we’re recruiting a kid, we have a conversation and we feel like, okay, this kid is because I try to scare them away. Like literally the first conversation, you know, Virginia, you’re trying to tell them all about Carolina. Carolina is a different beast, yo. That’s a whole different animal. You call it Carolina. They’re like, We’re ready. We’re coming. No, but here at the academy, I literally try to scare them away. Then we start talking to the parents. If you got both on board, think that’s the one thing that would be different is you got to have both parents on board to be successful here at the academy.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:15:51) – And like I said, we’re on two recruiting class and we got a really good third class coming in. So think we’re laying the bricks at this point. We’re laying the bricks.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:15:58) – Well, that’s the key with building trust towards influence takes one brick at a time. You can knock the whole thing down real fast, but it takes time to build one brick at a time.
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Jay Smack – Voice of the Podcast (00:16:56) – As a listener of the show, Better is offering a unique opportunity for your college program or high school team. Better starts with you. Learn more at new generation leader.fm/better.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:17:08) – How is the environment different in terms of the support and challenge you get from your external stakeholders related to how they value your success in wins and losses and investing in your players?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:17:24) – Well, I think the biggest thing is I think they do invest in the players. I think this job and for our kids and call it a job because they come in and plead summer, they have a six week summer. They are taught how to become military and it’s really hard. And the first year is really hard. Here. They challenge you because like the leadership at the academy said, they want to see how you operate in chaos and adversity because you’re going to be leading because this is one of the preeminent leadership institutions in the entire world that we’re talking about. Their training leaders here, they’re not really training midshipmen or fighters or things like that. They’re training leaders.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:17:58) – When they come out, they’re going to be officers. And think here, to your point, is unbelievable. And his support, he told me this was going to be a total rebuild. Okay. Financially, they put in resources. He’s given me the things that we needed. We knew that this was going to probably be a five year rebuild. You know, last year we thought we would be able to get to the middle ground of it and then steadily move it up. But with all the injuries that we had at that point, now we’re being tested. Our leadership was being tested because, you know, we lost eight kids and we’re playing with three walk ons, you know, toward the end of the year. So it’s it was challenging. But the one thing I will say is I think what we did really well at the end of the year, we gave the kids a day off and told them that they didn’t have to be in the gym, but if they wanted to be and with what we went through, you would say, Hey, nobody’s showing up in the gym.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:18:43) – Every kid showed up for an extra workout on their own. So I felt like our staff did a really good job on that and we can build on that.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:18:48) – What’s different for you in this role in terms of training, discipline, culture, what you have to lay down in addition to what else they’re picking up in everything else that the Academy is teaching them.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:19:01) – I’ll tell you, I think the hardest part, though, this was like when I first got there, we walked into practice the first day and literally I’m talking to everybody and they’re standing at attention. They’re looking at you. I’m like, okay. It was almost I don’t want to say it was inhumane, but it was not personal, you know what I’m saying? It wasn’t like it wasn’t we weren’t having fun. They showed up. They didn’t know how to react and don’t know how the other coaching staff was with them. I have no idea. But finally, I’m like, Guys, this is supposed to be fun. You come to basketball and this is supposed to be a fun activity.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:19:27) – It was. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I’m like, okay, we not that don’t want the respect, but in order to be it goes back to your point, being able to have influence. They’ve got to be comfortable. They’ve got to be themselves. They can’t be a robot. And I do think at the academy you’re trained to please at times and sometimes that’s not a good thing. Like, I think our team last year wanted to please me so much that it was actually a problem, if that makes sense, because they’re looking to the bench and like what? How is he reacting? And I think because it was a young team and we weren’t having success, so they were looking for that and. I just don’t think that’s a recipe for sustained success, if that makes sense.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:20:03) – I think one of the things that we work with Coach with a lot of our clients, is on the idea of becoming the leader that others want to follow as opposed to have to follow. And so it sounds like maybe there was a little bit of a what you encountered was they were used to following somebody that they had to follow.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:20:17) – Right? Maybe that was the reason for that reaction to where. I know just knowing you personally, I know that’s not how you operate anyhow, your relationship based guy. So the idea of actually for us is sort of getting the leader to break themselves down. So you can also help that employee or that athlete also be able to think a little bit on their own within guidelines and not just take it over and not listen to you anymore. But So how do you again, with my thought with the Academy training and a lot of the early on training is I think and this may just be I read too many books and seen too many movies, so tell me. But it’s breaking down a lot of the bad habits you had to get to these good habits. And so you’re early on during that six weeks or first year. I think their minds can be so full of, did I do that right? Did I do that wrong? What’s my next step? So I do see that. I imagine that’s got to be a challenge with the younger players for you.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:21:06) – Absolutely. Well, think what you look at in the military. We’re trying to change a culture, too. And here at the academy, I think a lot of people don’t realize when you’re in the brigade. So there’s you’ve got the brigade, you’ve got 30 companies, you got 150 kids per company. There’s a hierarchy. You’re okay, you are a youngster, then you are to see, then you are first. So the pleads the fourth year, you know, the youngster, you know, you go through all of this and there’s a hierarchy of, okay, I’m a first, now I’m a senior, I’m that person. I’m the top dog. I should not have to listen to a freshman. Well, when you get on a basketball court and you’re bringing in more talented players, okay, as a freshman and they’re more talented, a lot of times some of the seniors are like, wait a minute, it’s my turn now. Well, no, it doesn’t work that way. Now, here comes the reality of the world outside of the military.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:21:51) – And I think that’s some of the things that, you know, those are some challenges that you run into because we had a really talented point guard this year. And unfortunately, she went down in the first game and I’m sure there was people that were like, wow, why is she getting the ball? You know, we were starting four freshmen to start the year. So think those are some of the challenges that you run into. And talking about the Academy think that hierarchy sometimes doesn’t always work on what I would say successful teams.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:22:15) – That’s a really interesting thought. One of the reasons I wanted to get you on this too much was because of that, because that’s a whole different mindset. Yes, I think then other locations that don’t have that hierarchy piece in mind and even mean back to the 70s and 80s and we were coming through hierarchy and other programs was still a thing as well.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:22:33) – Well, we went through O’Brien I mean, you think about it mean when we came through in the 80s, I mean, our high school program was really good.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:22:39) – And if you made the varsity basketball team as a sophomore, you’re really good then would even think about letting the freshmen, even though they should have been. You look back on it and there were some freshmen should have been playing, but there was a mindset that we don’t allow freshmen to play varsity. So I think we’ve broken that down through the years.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:22:54) – Do you face situations with external voices, with the voices, not just the parents, but the coaches, things like that? Are you having to fight that voice?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:23:02) – Yeah, I had to fight my wife all the time.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:23:06) – She goes, You team. Well, I’ve met your mother. I’ve met your wife.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:23:11) – You know, the biggest thing that we struggle with and I actually tell some of the kids, like when they commit to Navy, one of the things that we have to struggle with with our kids, I’m like, look, you’re going to have to struggle with your friends. I said, as soon as you commit the Navy, people are going to say, Why are you doing that? Why would you want to go to war? They’re not educated on it.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:23:26) – They don’t understand the benefits of it. And we even struggle with coaches. When we talked about Navy coach, I don’t know if they want to do military, I’m like, Well, how about we explain this to you? So what we ended up doing and I could even send it to you guys at some point we have a brochure that literally broke down like the basketball piece to it, the military piece to it, the career piece to it. And it was a photo. It was a truffle. We sent it out to over 200. College coaches mean high school coaches sent them out. And we had people call us coach. We didn’t know you could do this and this and this. They have no idea now. Everybody was all on board when a maverick was flying around that. But think really trying to educate you, coaches and people, understanding what the Academy is about. It’s not just that they’re going to be on a ship. We have kids that are flying. We have kids that are in cyber security.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:24:09) – We have kids going to NSA. So there is a lot of noise that we have to fight through that a lot of other people don’t. And then our kids, when they come in, they have to fight through with this social media craze that we’re dealing with. And people are like, why would you do that Now, Aaron and Brian and Tim, when we see a kid commit to the academy, like, oh my gosh, that’s going to be a phenomenal, great career. But their classmates are brutal to it in a lot of cases. So we try to warn our kids about, hey, when you commit, this is what’s going to happen.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:24:34) – I mean, getting that don’t want to use the word brutal, but getting that very, very transparent honesty has always got to be one of those things that leaves you feeling just good about yourself. You’re never going to look back and go, I did the wrong thing here, or I feel bad about telling them the truth. So well.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:24:48) – I think it goes back to what Aaron talks about in some of the leadership.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:24:51) – Think how do you have influence? How can Brian Barry have influence with me? Brian Barry has influenced me because I trust Brian Barry grew up with Brian Barry I know. I’m very you know what I’m saying? So how do you build that? And we talk about impact here from a leadership standpoint and that’s inspire, mentor, prepare, accountability, care. And then we use teach and trust as the T there. So when you’re using that type of having an impact on kids, you look at our Twitter, that’s what we talk about. Because what’s our job? Our job is to impact people. Our job is to impact coaching or my job is to impact coaches, impact everybody that we come within and think, if you do those five things, okay, six things right there, you’re probably going to have a positive impact on kids lives and other people’s lives.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:25:30) – Yeah, that’s awesome.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:25:31) – So, Coach, in your time at the Academy, you mentioned some of the flair, the Hollywood appeal of Maverick and people seeing the Navy in all its form.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:25:41) – What’s one of your top experiences that you’ve had as a coach, as part of the Navy community that you. It was kind of one of those pinch me moments that just got you.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:25:51) – Honestly, when we played Army at West Point Non-covid, I mean, it was just that environment because I’d heard all about it. You know, I’ve been mean, seriously. I’ve been part of a lot of rivalries. Duke, Carolina, NC State sold out, Virginia Tech, you know, place is sold out even on the men’s and women’s side and just the electricity of those arenas. I’ve never been in anything like that. Like literally the electricity. When the cadets are coming on the floor, they’re standing there. The pomp and circumstance of you’ve got our superintendent of West Point, the pride that everybody has during that moment and is flaring up. And it was so loud in there, literally was turning around and looking at it. I literally looked at our team, look at coaches. Isn’t this fun? Like this is what college athletics is supposed to be like.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:26:32) – Not many people get to be in that type of environment and especially at the Patriot League think those are things that stood out to me. And of course, you know, the other things, the Blue Angels being able to see the Blue Angels in this show. I think the other thing that really stood out to me was I went to graduation for the first time to take in the graduation of the academy. And it dawned on me why there’s so much pride in the academies, because every kid there, as I listen to the speeches of the class, president of the brigade commander, everybody there, you realize then that all 1100 of our student athletes or midshipmen, not student athletes, but midshipmen, they had been through the same thing. They had a very life experience. They had been through struggles together. Whereas at Carolina in Virginia, our kids had way different experiences. All of these kids had done the exact same thing they’d been through, lack of a better word. They’ve been through hell at times.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:27:21) – And then you start to realize that they call a 50 year link in the chain. So if you’re 20, 24 grad, you’re 50 year. Lincoln changed in 1974. Then you start thinking about, wait a minute, how many years has this been? And that connectivity? It really dawned on me at that point I had not thought about it until I went to graduation and realized then this is a really special bond. That mean get chills sitting here thinking about it right now.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:27:42) – That’s great. Well, Coach, as we head towards wrapping up, I want to ask you the question that I ask everybody on the podcast, which is the question I asked Norm that led me to write the book. What is it that you’ve learned later in your career that as you look back, you wished you had learned earlier?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:27:59) – I think one of the things that I’ve learned, I’ve always felt this way, but a lot of times I was an assistant. I wasn’t the head. In some cases, I like to call it bottom up leadership.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:28:08) – Okay. And the reason I call it bottom up leadership, because the smartest people in the room most of the time are the custodians and the secretaries. What people don’t understand is that they know all the nuances of the school, like I’m saying, school or whatever team. They understand the nuances of that build and that organization probably better than the people at the top because they’re in the grind of it every single day. We did something when I was a principal at William Wetzel Middle School. If you had an idea, okay, you couldn’t complain. Y’all probably heard this. Don’t complain unless you have a solution. Because right now what we’re doing is no one has a better solution. So it’s the best thing we know. If you have an idea, you had to run it by the custodians first. Okay? So if it affected their job negatively, we would not do it. Part of that was because now when you are making up your idea, you aren’t thinking about your world, you’re thinking about the entire impact of your decision.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:29:00) – Because every decision that we make, every decision I make as a coach, every decision as you guys make as leaders within your family, every decision you make within your organization affects every single person. And most people are only worried about their little bitty world and not about what the impact has on everyone else. So literally, I had a teacher come in to me and go, Hey, I want to do this, this and this. That’s why. Have you talked to Lucinda and Tyrone? Like, Well, no. I’m like, Well, did you not hear? So didn’t think you were serious? No, I said, I’m very serious. What That also did. What do you think happened to our custodians? They felt empowered. They felt like they had a voice. They felt like they mattered. All of a sudden, when you matter from the bottom up. Now, when that hurricane comes in and blows the school down, who’s going to be the first people there to put it back together? It’s going to be the custodians.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:29:43) – It’s not leadership at the top. And I think that was one of the things that we were able to build an inclusive environment. And probably my greatest achievement is probably at William Watson Middle School and we have 50% pass rate and within 90%, you know, we can talk about basketball all we want, but ultimately that was probably. The biggest achievement and thing I’m most proud of.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:30:01) – So, Aaron, I think all of our teacher friends and administrators, when they listen to this, they’re going to want Tim’s contact information, come at him with job offer, see if they can talk more. Maybe no, but that really is important. Tim, as an aside, like the whole idea with the custodians, this really doesn’t have a whole lot to do with leadership talk. But when I was in the hospital five years ago going through that, lots of friends, lots of pastors from around the area, they always wanted to come pray with me, which I greatly appreciated and coveted. But the ones I most appreciated and most got into were every now and then when the custodians would come in and want to pray with me, because it was always it always hits so much differently.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:30:35) – So some of those were the first that I would go back to one hospital in particular after I made it through everything to go find them, then see the looks on their faces when you just did take some time to come back to them and just give them that they appreciate the thank you so much more because you’ve made them feel empowered or impactful, which is a great thing.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:30:53) – Well, I think one of the big I mean, if you go to my office today, I have a note from a custodian at North Carolina that when I left, she had written on there, I’m going to miss you. And it’s a reminder of you got to be nice to every single person and you value every person like our custodian at the Naval Academy. We call her the real head coach. She meets every recruit coming in we call the Real H.S.. I think those are the things that really matter, and she feels really good about herself and that’s what we’re supposed to do. It goes back to what you guys said How can we fill other people’s bucket? And it’s not just your kids, it’s the people we’re surrounded with.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:31:26) – You never know the impact that you’re going to have. She may be able to do something for somebody else in those veins, and I think that’s what coaching leadership, everything is about, is go back to your point, how do we uplift everybody? You know, sometimes that’s not an easy thing to do, guys. The hardest conversation is the honest conversation. I think that’s the other thing with leadership. Having the hard, tough, honest conversation is the hardest thing in leadership that you can do. Most people nowadays want to be passive aggressive. They want to do everything with their thumbs. And I think that that’s we’ve lost some sight of that.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:31:54) – So, Tim, one last thing for me. A lot of times when we have these conversations, the idea of filling up others cups or pouring from your own comes up because it is an important part of leadership. One of the things that we teach, though, is as a leader, you can’t pour from an empty cup. What types of things do you do to keep your own cup full?
Coach Tim Taylor (00:32:11) – You know, Brian, my wife’s chuckling about that because think that was something I didn’t do this year.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:32:16) – Through all the struggles that we had, through all the injuries, the losing, trying to fight some other battles at the academy that we were trying to fight, I was not refilling my cup. I think we come from a background and think you understand this probably more than anybody. We come from a background of, okay, put your nose down, work hard, they’re going to see your value. And I think in some ways sometimes that’s what I did this year, was that I had the ax out and I was chopping every tree down in the forest and that sometimes you need it instead of trying to chop it all down, you need to get to the top and see what was happening to the leaves, if that makes sense. And think that is something. Typically what I do is spend time with my family. I go back to Madison, try to play a little golf. I try to take some time for myself. I didn’t do a very good job of that this year. This is the first, first break that I’ve had.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:33:01) – I think it’s important because if you don’t recharge, sometimes you can burn down. Luckily, I have my mother’s energy and, you know, my mother, so I can go for a long time with that, but think it’s really important to be able to do that. Also. Aaron you’ll love this Love Leadership Books. I’m reading Winning by Clive Woodward. The English rugby didn’t realize it was going to be 470 pages. I don’t know if I’m going to finish it while I’m down here, but do you like to read about other people? Do you like to read about leadership looking at ways to be better? I think that’s a challenge.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:33:28) – In that vein of helping you fill your cup, we’re going to send you a book written by one of our founders of Giant. So gentlemen, Jeremy Kubiak. It’s a book called The Five Gears. You’ll love it. It takes the old five stick that you used to drive probably at some point.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:33:41) – In your life did that. That was my first car, man.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:33:44) – Yeah. The manual moving. Yeah.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:33:46) – It’ll help you relive some good times, but it gives a different name to each of the gears and just helps you, especially with family. Like you’re there now, you’re probably reestablishing a few relationships to get away a little bit, rekindle some of that stuff. Whereas a lot of times you’re probably with the team, you’re in fifth gear, which is just focus mode and a lot of times you miss out on other relationships if you’re always in focused mode. So it’s just a little gift if you have time to read it, great. That’s available. Audiobooks are a great thing for me, but it’s just a little thank you for coming on with us. So I’m going to say my goodbyes now and turn it over to Aaron. But it’s always good talking to you. I don’t know. We don’t get to do it nearly as much. Unfortunately, this year we have seen each other at least once more than we probably really wanted to. Wanted to. But anyhow, thanks so much for taking time out of your vacation, especially to come on here.
Bryan Berry – Co-Host (00:34:32) – I really appreciate it. Big fan of yours. Always have been. So if anything else we can do to help support you, just don’t hesitate to reach out.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:34:38) – Appreciate you. Well, thanks. Coach Tim Taylor from the women’s basketball program at the US Naval Academy. Thanks for coming on and sharing more of your leadership journey, your coaching journey, how you’re investing in the next generation, a new generation, if you will, of women’s basketball players and Naval Academy graduates. So thanks. We’re coming on cheering you on this coming season and you can get all the show notes. The tools we’ve mentioned will include links to that as well as how you can follow along with Coach Taylor and their upcoming season at New Generation Leader 4 or 5. Thanks, Coach Taylor. We appreciate.
Coach Tim Taylor (00:35:13) – It. Appreciate you guys. Thanks for having me on.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:35:15) – Thanks for listening to the New Generation Leader podcast. Subscribe today on your favorite podcasting platform, Ready to solve your leadership crisis. Download the show notes and unlock your true leadership potential at New Generation Leader Compound Cast.
Aaron Lee – Host (00:35:30) – Thanks for listening today and we look forward to seeing you next time on the New Generation Leader podcast.