Duke Basketball - When Coach K Walked Away

Mike Krzyewski - "Coach K" - has built an impressive record of success over his 35 years as head coach at Duke University. Some of his most notable achievements include 5 national championships; 12 Final Four appearances; an overall career win/loss record of 1018 - 310 and 2 Olympic Gold Medals as the US team's head coach.

It wasn't all "glory" for Coach K. There was a dark moment during the 1994-95 season that some, including Coach K, believe was a turning point that became the foundation for his and his team's future success.

At that time, Coach K was still recovering from 1994 back surgery and was pushing himself; doing everything himself and not giving his back injury the proper amount of time to heal properly. He was running the Duke program like he always had - much like a driven entrepreneur - with a very strong "I'll do it all myself" mindset. But, as we have seen from time to time, the skill set that gets you to one level of success may not be the skill set to get you to the next level. Plus, when you try to do it all yourself, you are actually creating more problems as the frequency and the complexity of challenges you will face increase. This was Coach K's challenge complicated by his back injury. He continued to push himself even though he knew that something had to change. Sound familiar?

Giving to pressure from his wife and close friends, Coach K called a team meeting in January 1995 and told his team he could no longer coach them for the remainder of the season. He not only walked away, but completely isolated himself from all team activity - practices, game and even contact with his assistant coaches and players. He approached his walking away with his usual 100% "all in" mindset. He needed to take care of himself properly if he was going to be of any value to his team and the Duke Basketball Program. Besides giving himself the much needed time to heal, he was also able to take time to evaluate his coaching and leadership style to identify ways he could do it better (he questioned his status quo).

Many, including Coach K, will tell you that this time away helped him to learn a new and more effective way to manage or pace himself which became the foundation for much of his and his team's long term success.

In March, 1995 he announced that he would return to his head coach position and was committed to the following changes:

1. Instead of his "do it all myself" approach (which many of you also follow), he would be taking on more of a CEO leadership role and would surround himself with assistants he could trust and to whom he could delegate more tasks (CEO's and business owners should strive to coach their teams and not just be the boss).

2. He established parameters and systems of accountability and responsibility that his assistants could freely work within; bringing "exceptions" to his attention.

3. He would use his available time to work those things he chose to work on - the high value tasks - allowing him to work "on" the team while his assistants worked "in" the team.

There are lessons for all of us from Coach K's career journey. While "walking way" for a period of time will vary for each of us, there is value in periodically getting out of the weeds and questioning your status quo with the goal being how you can improve "your game". In fact, I would urge you to do this periodically during the course of the year. Sometimes a change in scenery and focus can result in a much needed change in how you do what you need to do. You have nothing to lose by trying a "walk away" on your own - for a half day or a full day for starters.