Wooden on Leadership

is an excellent book by John Wooden and Steve Jamison (isbn 978-0-07-145339-4). As usual I'm going to quote from a few pages

I believe leadership itself is largely learned.


Effort is the ultimate measure of your success.


In the end, the choice you make makes you.


Genius is nothing but a greater aptitude for patience. (Benjamin Franklin)


Sometimes during practice he would have the guards switch positions with the forwards - have us do the other guy's job. He wanted everybody to understand the requirements of the players in the other position… I was so impressed by the control of his practice. (Gail Goodrich)


There are no big things, only an accumulation of many little things.


What happened is a good lesson in how we can limit ourselves and our organisations without even knowing it - how we can say "no" when we should be asking "how?"


Success breeds satisfaction; satisfaction breeds failure.


Lots of repetition. You can't believe the repetition. (Gary Cunningham)


Things turn out best for those who make the best of how things turn out.


I rarely assigned one player to a basket. Basketball is a team sport, and I felt it was unwise to allow players to practice by themselves. Always I wanted them to be interacting with their teammates.


How you practice is how you "play"… It's only natural for those under your leadership - perhaps even you - to focus on the end result rather than learning and doing what it takes to get there. I attempted to solve this particular problem at UCLA by occasionally removing the siren song; specifically, I made them practice and play basketball without the ball.


A good leader always seeks improvement - always.