Now that football season is back in full swing in the U.S., there’s no better time to discuss scrimmaging. However, we’re not talking about the traditional sports term in today’s podcast. Author and Motivational Speaker, Nathan Jamail recently released “The Leadership Playbook”, a guide which discusses the importance of coaching employees versus managing them.
A common theme in the book is the importance of scrimmaging. “Scrimmaging is getting into character to prepare for an upcoming event, while roleplaying is an exercise to see what you learn and/or know. Teams scrimmage to prepare for games. If you don’t learn how to scrimmage, you’re not getting the full effect of practice,” he says.
The idea of role playing can be intimidating for many members in Corporate America. However, Nathan believes this is due to the intent. He suggests swapping out roleplaying with scrimmaging. In sports, teams use scrimmage to not only practice, but to try out new techniques prior to Game Day. “It’s the time where you get to do what you think is right and test things out. When you create a culture of scrimmage, you’ll realize that your team will actually begin to have fun doing it,” he says.
Nathan first stumbled across this philosophy as a sales rep for a pager company in the 90s. He and his co-worker would have role-playing exercises to prepare for a long day of cold calling. A few years later, his friend (now boss) began to mandate role-playing. Many employees voiced fear due to the inherent judgmental nature of role-playing. However, in a scrimmage environment, the results shift. “I noticed that in a scrimmage culture, people are truly getting better, as opposed to role-play culture,” Nathan remarks, “The biggest difference that, when sustained, it becomes a way to communicate, as opposed to an activity.”
Nathan’s first philosophy of leadership (and most recent book) asserts that managers need to approach management like coaching. “In management, we spend time with people who need the attention. In coaching, we spend time with people who deserve the attention. In sports, players thrive for the coach’s attention. If we only spend times with people who need the attention, our attention turns into a consequence of failure.
You can’t coach someone who views your involvement as a negative,” he says. His second philosophy stems from the understanding that everyone needs training more so than practice. “Practice is getting better at something you already know. Training is learning something new,” he remarks. Coaching your employees to become better rather than just gaining more experience is crucial. “I have 20 years of experience golfing and I’m just as horrible as I was 20 years ago,” he jokes.
Nathan also believes that management should embrace conflict. “In coaching, we embrace conflict because we know that’s the only way to make people better,” he says. “In management, if someone isn’t able to embrace coaching and a scrimmage mindset, they should be cut from the team.”
He concludes his case for scrimmaging by asserting that making it into a practice only helps teams grow and learn. “If you and I scrimmaged before a client meeting, there is a 100% chance we would do better at that meeting. If we didn’t scrimmage, nothing would happen. There would be no consequence. Scrimmaging only helps.”
