Bill Walsh's Standard of Performance

I've just started reading Michael Lombardi's book Gridiron Genius. In it he speaks of Bill Walsh's Standard of Performance. This is "an exacting plan for constructing and maintaining the culture and organizational DNA behind the perfect football franchise. Walsh's Standard of Performance was based on 17 principles.

1. Exhibit a ferocious and intelligently applied work ethic directed at continual improvement.

2. Demonstrate respect for each person in the organization.

3. Be deeply committed to learning and teaching.

4. Be fair.

5. Demonstrate character.

6. Honor the direct connection between details and improvement; relentlessly seek the latter.

7. Show self-control, especially under pressure.

8. Demonstrate and prize loyalty.

9. Use positive language and have a positive attitude.

10. Take pride in the effort as an entity separate from the result of that effort.

11. Be willing to go the extra distance for the organization.

12. Deal appropriately with victory and defeat, adulation and humiliation.

13. Promote internal communication that is both open and substantive.

14. Seek poise in myself and those I lead.

15. Put the team's welfare and priorities ahead of my own.

16. Maintain an ongoing level of concentration and focus that is abnormally high.

17. Make sacrifice and commitment the organization's trademark.

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These 17 principles are the building blocks of the San Francisco 49ers dynasty. It's interesting that football isn't mentioned anywhere.

The 49ers success in the 1980s and the New England Patriots ridiculous success more recently inspired teams to pluck coaches from the Walsh and Bill Belichick coaching trees. The problem with that, and it's especially true with the Patriots coaches, is that the teams are bringing in a coach but they aren't adding the organizational structure. It's easy to bring a playbook into a new building. It's not so easy bringing a winning culture into a new building. Success the likes of Walsh's 49ers and Belichick's Patriots is a top to bottom thing. From the owner to the interns.

#10. "Take pride in the effort as an entity separate from the result of that effort" has resonated with me from the moment I first read it. The effort, the work, "the grind," as coaches and players routinely call it. A championship is the goal of everyone involved in football. It's easy to be blinded by that goal. It's best to stay focused on the work that it takes to get there.

#16. "Maintain an ongoing level of concentration and focus that is abnormally high." That sounds like something that Jim Harbaugh would routinely say.