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Bob Stoops was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 2021. He was the head football coach at the University of Oklahoma from 1999 to 2016. He led the Sooners to a 191-48 record over his career. His 2000/2001 team won the national championship. He earned the National Coach of the Year award the same season. Since 2020, Stoops has been a head coach in the XFL, winning an XFL Championship in 2023 with the Arlington Renegades. He played college football at the University of Iowa, earning team MVP his senior year as a defensive back.

Notes:

• Coaches Bob has worked for: Hayden Fry at Iowa, Bill Snyder at Kansas State, and Steve Spurrier at Florida. He's worked for some amazing coaches.
  • Relationships are everything. You must connect with people. You must be authentic. Learn from other coaches, but you have to be yourself
• Sherri Coale: “One of my favorite things about him is he’s the busiest man on the planet but never appeared that way. That’s a skill and an art. That fascinates me.”
• What makes a great head coach? They relate to people. They care about them. They can motivate and influence by clearly sharing the vision of the program and inspiring others to get on board. They are decisive people. Most importantly, they know how to connect with people. All leadership is a people business. If you can’t connect with others, you’ll probably struggle.
• Creating a “coaches forest” (beyond a tree) - Mike Stoops, Mark Mangino, Mike Leach, Bo Pelini, Kevin Sumlin, Kevin Wilson, Lincoln Riley, and more. How has Bob prepared so many guys to be successful head coaches?
  • Hiring – “I always tried to hire people smarter than me.” A lot of people say this, but not all do this. Coach Stoops looked for people who had a track record of performance… And then he used his gut instincts after he spent time with him. He paid attention to how they treated his secretary, how they treated the waiter at lunch… Some call those the little things, but they were very important to Coach Stoops
• The overarching theme of the entire conversation was the simplicity of how Coach Stoops built his program. He didn’t try to overcomplicate anything. He knew he wanted coaches who were accomplished, high-character people. And he wanted tough players who loved football. Their offenses may have looked exotic but they didn’t have a ton of plays installed. They focused on what they did and then practiced it relentlessly so that they would execute better than their opponents. I think there’s something beautiful in the simplicity with how he’s built his program and the results speak for themselves.
• Great players want to be coached - Jeremiah Smith, Adrian Peterson.
• What he looked for in players: They have to LOVE football. Need to be tough and physical. Someone like Dan Cody. From Oklahoma, was skinny, and nobody on the staff wanted to give him a scholarship, but Coach Stoops did, and he turned out to be a great player. Liked to keep local guys home.
• Off-season workouts create the culture of the team. "We won because we outworked everyone."
• The attitude of the national championship team - "They were tired of being kicked around." And "I shared with them the history of Oklahoma and let them know the way it should be. When we started, they were a losing team."
• Josh Heupel - The most valuable recruit ever for Coach Stoops.
• Mike Leach was a 1 of 1. An original. He seemed relaxed and casual, but he was also very demanding that they do it right. He was also focused on just a few plays instead of trying to do everything. FOCUS. Do what we do
• Wife Carol - Impressive leader at Mary Kay. Won a pink Cadillac 16 years in a row. National Sales Director.
• Life/Career Advice - Go hard, be tough, be true to yourself, enjoy the struggle, and look forward to the fight. Nothing great happens without going through struggles first.

Go to www.LearningLeader.com for full show notes and all episodes of The Learning Leader Show

Notes:

Brad Thor best selling author of 22 thrillers...

• Excellence as a leader… What has Brad seen from the military leaders he’s studied: Empathy - Understand what it’s like from their perspective. LISTEN - Care for your people. Actually LISTEN to them and be there. Creativity. Innovate, and think of new creative ways to solve problems.
• Effective storytelling - Don’t start with the weather. Leave out the parts people skip. Don’t be boring. This same advice is useful for leaders when communicating with your team. Put yourself in their shoes. How can you most effectively share your message without being boring. The more entertaining it is, the more likely they’ll remember it.
  • Effective storytellers - Plotters (outlines, Dan Brown), Pantsers (write by the seat of your pants). Brad is a pantser.
  • Take the first 4 ideas and throw them out. You need the element of surprise. Create surprise.
  • Be comfortable breaking the rules.
  • Loves Ray Donavon and Billions for the element of surprise
  • "No joy in the writer, no joy in the reader."
  • "No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader."
• Brad has served as a member of the Department of Homeland Security’s Analytic Red Cell Unit.
• Excellence as a leader (McChrystal) - Empathy, Listen, Creativity.
• PBL - Problem-Based Learning. John Bettis (country singer). How do you recharge your battery? International travel. Immerse yourself in another culture.
• Loves politics. Ran for President.
• Advice for writers – “Gotta Keep Writing” Mary Higgins Clark did it for 2 hours each morning before her family woke up. Whatever it is we want to be great at, we have to get the reps. Consistency beats intensity.

00:53 The Art of Storytelling

04:13 Elements of Effective Storytelling

08:26 The Importance of Surprise in Storytelling

11:33 Writing Process and Challenges

20:43 Research and Realism in Writing

27:04 Leadership Lessons from Writing

30:59 The Importance of Open-Mindedness

32:01 Pre-Publishing Feedback Process

35:09 Homeland Security and the Red Cell Unit

39:05 Maintaining Creative Energy

42:38 Political Ambitions and Leadership

50:57 Advice for Aspiring Writers

54:36 The Benefits of Reading Fiction for Leaders

56:43 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Go to www.LearningLeader.com for full show notes. The Learning Leader Show with Ryan Hawk

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Notes:

• The Pete and Leona story - What will people say about you at your funeral?
  • "They changed my life and the lives of my entire family."
  • Tough love out of 100% care for you.
  • Be tough AND supportive.
  • Don't lower your standards.
  • High standards. High support.
• 10 to 25 - Find the right trigger for motivation. Find out what they care about. They need meaning and significance. They want status and earned respect.
• Are children less afraid of their parents now than they used to be? Dan Gilbert calls this the "illusion of moral decline." It's been happening for 75 years.
• The Parental Nagging Study - A common tactic adults use to get teens to “pay attention.” Research shows that nagging triggers the emotional part of a teen’s brain, shutting down their ability to think logically. They’re not ignoring you on purpose—they’re simply wired to tune out. A better way? Speak calmly and neutrally to engage the part of their brain that handles planning and decision-making. This opens the door to real conversation.
• Satya Nadella’s Model, Coach, Care philosophy at Microsoft. This is the opposite of Jack Welch’s rank and yank style at GE. Remember, the stack ranking methodology limited innovation and stopped people from taking any type of risk. We want to model the right behavior, coach others, and ensure they know we care for them so they feel the support they need to take risks, sometimes fail, get back up, and work to innovate.
  • Theory X = Rank and yank. It stifled innovation for fear of failure and getting fired.
  • Theory Y = No stack rankings. Built on connecting leaders with their people. Still high standards and demanding. Followed the "Model, Coach, Care" methodology. This is what's happening today at Microsoft. Be a place where people want to work.
• The Mentor's Dilemma - Stef Okamoto - honest, direct, and supportive.
  • The "mentor's dilemma" refers to the challenge of balancing honest, critical feedback to young people while still maintaining their motivation and self-esteem, as this age group can be particularly sensitive to perceived criticism and may easily feel discouraged or disrespected if not approached carefully; essentially, it's the struggle between pushing someone to improve and potentially damaging their confidence by being too harsh.
• The mentor mindset: A mentor mindset can be adopted by using practices such as validating young people's perspectives, asking them questions, and holding them to high standards.
• Questioning – Kate, a mom of two who lives in Chicago, whose oldest son was a sophomore came home one night from a party drunk and high. Kate responded with a combination of yelling and prosecuting… She instigated an interrogation and not a two-way conversation. Instead of interrogating, get curious. They had a reason for what they did. Figure out why. What's your plan?
  • Ask questions to get them to own their thinking and share it with you.
• Advice - Don’t accept some perceived path. Be reliable, show up, do the work, and ask for more work. Add surplus value. Whatever you’re being paid, focus on delivering 10x more value. Find a way to do that and your employer will beg to give you a raise and promote you.