Why Team Talks Don't Change Culture with JP Nerbun

And once you can see that behavioral issue as just a window into the person, then you can start to get really curious and find the solutions. How have I supported this standard? Have we come back to it? Just sitting down at the beginning of the year and telling your team a standard or co-creating those standards in some sort of team meeting doesn't mean it's going to be followed, right?

You have to support it. You have to remind, you have to come back to your values. You have to Make those an everyday thing. How can you create the conditions for good things to happen? That comes back to intentionality.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Transforming Basketball Podcast. On today's episode, we have JP Nerbun. JP is an executive coach, facilitator, and consultant. He serves leaders and their teams across sports, education, healthcare, and business. JP leads a specialized coaching and consulting firm, TOC, which focuses on helping leaders grow themselves and develop high-performing teams.

So JP, welcome to the show.

George, been looking forward to this all weekend, so glad to be here.

So JP was actually one of my coaches back in 2012, I want to say, when I lived in Ireland, played for the Limerick Lakers. That was a special time for me personally, and I think a really special team to be a part of.

JP, and I think that credit to you. I don't know how you did it, but hopefully we can learn about how you did it with our conversation today.

It's kind of funny because I look back at that and I would say the way that I would coach or the way that I would really maybe promote in coaching, I think so much has changed. And yet there's obviously something to your point that there was a special team.

There was the right ingredients in that situation. I did a few things right to create the conditions for some good things to happen.

Yeah. And in terms of creating those conditions, creating that environment for us to be successful. And I remember my first game and I made a mistake, like as soon as I got subbed into the game. And my first reaction was look at the bench and just see like what's going to happen.

But what everyone, not just from you, but with everyone was like, keep going. It's almost like keep risking and making mistakes. But I felt really free from the first game.

Well, that's probably because you were such a good player. Maybe you weren't so good. Maybe you would have been like, Stop trying to keep doing stuff, you know? Like, you were really, really talented, really skilled. And we were really grateful that you kind of joined a group that had been together for so many years.

And you kind of came in and you could play like you could really ball. So like everyone was just really grateful to have you there. So you were on a long leash, man. You could have made a lot of mistakes and we would have been okay on the sideline.

I appreciate that. But how do you deal with those situations where maybe you have a player that's maybe difficult to deal with, but then you have another player that is maybe you want to give them a longer leash? How do you kind of deal with that while still keeping the team culture in mind and treating everyone fairly?

That's a really great question. So what I'm hearing there is you've got some guys that are on a bit of a longer leash, other guys that maybe you have on a shorter leash because maybe they're not as talented. Is that what the question was?

Yeah, maybe they're just a bit more disruptive, they're more argumentative, whatever the case may be.

Yeah, well, I mean, I think there's kind of maybe then there's 2 questions in that. I think one question is around player that have a lot of upside, that they're really talented and they're on a longer leash. And then the other players, maybe they can be disruptive in their play.

They're not going to have a huge upside. They're not going to be able to give you 20 points or X amount of rebounds. They're coming in there, they have a real defined role, and they may struggle to buy into that role. They also feel like, oh man, I make 1 or 2 mistakes and I'm getting pulled, right?

Well, the way that we always try to help coaches frame this with their players is helping them understand the kind of what I would call the player value equation, how your potential to help the team, your potential to maybe hurt the team, And so certain players are going to have maybe more glaring weaknesses.

They maybe 3 turnovers in a game, 4 turnovers in a game. They turn the ball over. You don't pull them right away because they're doing so much good on the other side and helping players understand that's just the reality of competition, right? Is understanding that aspect of when it comes to performance and competition, we're not talking about in development.

We're talking about competitive pathways that players can grasp that concept because I think that's a frustration a lot of players go through, which is I can't make mistakes like so-and-so. When it comes to the disruptive player from a cultural element, when they're not buying in, that could be a talented player, middle of your pack or bottom of your pack.

Just they're not buying in, they're argumentative, they're not coachable. I would just go back to relationships, right? And I would go back to the quality of the conversations you're having with that individual. And so often we try to commit those withdrawals from that relationship account, but we haven't built a connection with that individual.

So every behavior, rather than seeing it as a problem, oh, they're not buying in, they have an attitude, they're not coachable. Instead of seeing that behavior as a problem, instead of using that behavior to label them as uncoachable, use that behavior as a window.

It's a window into that person, what's going on with that person. So I think the solution in those situations is a conversation, and that could go a lot of different ways to really understand what's going on for that person. What's the issues that they're facing?

And once you can see that behavioral issue as just a window into the person, then you could start to get really curious and find the solutions.

And ask more intentional questions about what you want to see. What I heard there was transformational coaching, right? And I think having those conversations maybe before practice to focus on the relationship before what even happens on the court. So that's one way that you can kind of approach that and build that relationship and transform that athlete, right?

What are some other practical examples that you can do with any player, not just the troublesome player, but any player, just to improve and transform Their play, their off the court, all of it.

Yeah, I really think, you know, what you referenced there is the conversations for that conversation. Like coaches want the tools for, well, what do you say when a coach, when a player gets defensive? What do you do when a player gets emotionally dysregulated and blows up?

It's like, actually, have you laid the groundwork? And even at this point, whether it's a player that's really bought in or not bought in, right? End of the day, what I would want to be doing is having one-on-ones with every player in my program at some point early in the year.

And I would really want to understand and ask what is important to them. Like, what are their aspirations? What are their goals for the team? Like, what are their individual goals? And maybe— but I would really start with very vague questions, right? Well, hey, what's most important to you about playing for this team?

And what you're going to do is by asking vague questions, you might go, oh, okay, they are more individual focused. They are more focused on what they can get out of it, which is what it is, right? You're just learning about the person.

Maybe they want a great team experience. Maybe they want— they see this as a springboard to something else. But you want to learn about what's most important. And understand their aspirations when it comes to their goals, their experience they want, what they wanna individually achieve and achieve as a team.

And from there, you may actually start to be able to build in belief into them. And you might just start to say, hey, this is what I see in you. I think you could achieve this. I think you could help us as a team.

You'll be really, really impactful with your leadership or whatever. So the first part is really understand is this vision, these goals, these aspirations, and kind of co-creating something that speaks to belief around who they can become, what they can achieve, what we can achieve.

That's the first part. The next part is to ground that in reality. So where do you think you're in relation to all those things? What is the current experience? What is it like to play on this team? What do you enjoy? What do you not enjoy?

Where do you think you are in relation to your own individual goals? Where team goals, where do we think we are? Then after you get their perspective, then you can maybe filter in or fill in some of the gaps that they're missing, the lack of awareness maybe they have around how they influence the team with their leadership, how they are as a teammate or their work ethic.

But oftentimes guys will actually have a pretty good sense of where they are when you ask good questions. And then the last piece, I'll go with step 3. How do we go from where we are to where we want to be? How do you go from where you are to where you want to be?

How do you go from who you are to who you want to become? Who I see you could become as a teammate, as a leader, as a person, as a player. And so giving them this path to this new identity, giving them this path to their goals, giving this path to how they can help the team to contribute to that, but asking them questions around What do you need to do?

What are you willing to do? What support do you need from me? These are 3 big questions I'd be asking them to help close the gap from where they are to where they want to be.

Amazing. I remember one very powerful exercise we did at the end of practice. And it was at the end of practice, I think I got this from Don Showalter. And at the end of practice, you would just get in a circle like you do after your, you know, post-practice ritual, we would ask each player, so we'll start with one player and the person next to them, tell them one good thing that they did today at practice.

And I think what this did, and what this does is build a role, like you said. So like, I think a lot of the times maybe it's a bit scary for us as coaches. Like, I have to come up with roles for 12 of my players.

This player is not going to be playing any minutes during the season. So what kind of role can I come up with? So maybe it's a little bit daunting for some coaches. But what I found this exercise did was that it allowed the players themselves to create roles for each other.

And I thought it was very powerful. It was something that we used after practice. And then it helped me as a coach to understand, okay, this player thinks that this player is a relentless rebounder during practice. All right. So I need to look out a little bit more for that and see if they're buying into that identity.

And I think that was very powerful.

Yeah, no, I like that it not just comes from you, the coach, but it's also coming from the other players in the team.

Yeah. And are these 3 questions that you asked, are these from your book? So coaches, again, this is a resource coaches can look into if they want to get more information about that.

Yeah. I talk about it extensively at different points within my book, in The Culture System. There's chapters on how to lay out and have those onboarding conversations, as well as some really cool stories of coaches that have done that at different levels, whether it's high school, youth, collegiate.

And there's some great stuff in there as far as how to actually even sometimes document that. We do personal player development plans or personal development plans, PDPs. And by documenting that or having the athlete document that, I mean, I've got high school coaches that do that.

I've got Olympic coaches in some of the sports I work with that do that, and college coaches where players are just documenting, they're tracking their progress, they're writing down their goals. So you as a coach are more facilitating their ownership and taking ownership of their growth and what's important to them.

Yeah, amazing. And so let's pivot now. We're in a basketball context and I'm taking over a new team and I've come into this new environment and it's a bit disorganized. They don't really have a strong culture. What is one or maybe a few things I can do right away in the first 30 days to kind of start building that culture up?

That's a great question. I think one thing that I've learned from someone I've been fortunate to spend some time with, Monty Williams, when he took over at Phoenix, Monty, thing, thing I think he did that was really important, not just in what he did, but in his mindset, was that he recognized that good things already existed here.

And some might have said, well, Phoenix, that's a tough job. Culture's bad. He went and found the good. He said, there are good people. There are good things here. And he really tried to identify the good. So no matter how bad of a situation you think you're walking into, you better find the good.

Not everybody can walk into a Warriors situation like Steve Kerr did. But even there, it's like Steve was like very quick to go, you're actually doing really, really good. My goal here is just to take you to the next level when he took that job.

Right. So As a coach, go find the good. And it's about cultivating the good. Now you have to do some weeding. I think culture, we think of more like building a house, but it's actually probably more like garden. And you go in there, you're probably not going to just absolutely till everything up and just like, there's just, you can't, right?

In most situations, you can't clean complete house, get a whole new team bringing all that in. You don't need to, like there actually is good stuff in there. So it's about cultivating the good, weeding out the bad. That stuff has to happen sometimes in some situations, depending on your context.

You can do that in the first 30 days. Some people may have to wait a year to be able to start removing some of the negative influencers. And then really honestly, can you really fully know, right? If you actually start to come in with the right mindset, a lot of times those individuals that others say are culture killers actually aren't culture problems.

It was more of just poor leadership in the previous situation. I would sit down with every player in the first 30 days. I tell a story in my book of a Navy ship captain, Captain Mike Ebershoff. Who in the first 60 days, he met with 316 sailors.

So when coaches go, oh, I gotta meet with every player in the first 30 days, just 15 to 30 minutes, sit down with them, get to know the person and ask 3 questions. What do you enjoy about being on this team? What do you not enjoy?

And what's one thing you would change if you were me? And that's what Captain Ebersholt did when he took over the Benfold in 1999. He took it from the worst US ship in the US Navy to the best ship in just under a year and a half.

And he did that because he asked questions and then he listened to their suggestions and implemented those suggestions radically. And the ship got turned around. The sailors took ownership for that change. It's the same in a team. A lot of times people, even in a bad culture, they will know what needs to change.

They will want that change. So by asking great questions, you empower them.

And I guess it's like allowing them to not only ask those questions, but be present in those conversations. It's a lot of the times in those situations, Players don't get a chance to speak their mind. And the story you alluded to, like having them co-design the culture is powerful.

So what are some things that you see in negative cultures and how do you go about— because you said you talked about leveraging what's good. What about when you see, oh, this is really bad, this needs to change, like we have to do something about this.

How would you go about fixing that problem?

Be the change that you want to see. Like, I think so often as coaches, we're all positive, we're upbeat, we have a good attitude until our players start having a bad attitude or parents in the program start having a bad attitude or fans start having a bad attitude.

Like, if you want players to stay positive and upbeat and show up there with an attitude of like, we get to be here, we don't have to be here, then you need to be that. I really think it really starts with us as a leader.

I think so often. We see a negative culture problem and we look at that as something that you have to get your hands in and fix. And yes, absolutely. There are ways to do that from an accountability and a discipline standpoint. I write about that extensively.

Part 4 of my whole book, The Culture System, is all about how to hold accountable, how to hold individuals accountable in a way that creates lasting change, that fosters intrinsic motivation, that doesn't extinguish it, right? It's not fear-based. And that sometimes you have to actually have to remove certain players.

But I really think when there's a problem, look in the mirror. If your players have a bad attitude, if they're showing up, they don't want to be here. How much do you show up and you give the feeling that you want to really be there, that this is the best part of your day, that you get to be there?

And so I think it goes back to that whole thing of behavior is a window. When your players don't show up and their energy is not great, or when there's an attitude issue, or they're not buying around their roles or playing time, it's just a go into what's really going on here.

And that first starts with like, how am I maybe potentially contributing to the situation that's in our team, whether it's negative attitudes? And maybe you're not the key contributing factor, but now you are responsible to your point. And so you have to step in and you have to start looking at, did we clearly establish a standard in this area?

Okay. If we look at 4 things, first off, am I modeling the right behaviors in the situation? Okay, check. I am. Now we move to, did I establish, did we establish, did we co-create a standard potentially in this area, or is the standard clear?

If that is correct, if you have done that through whatever type of process you have in your team to set standards, then you go to, how have I supported this standard? Have we come back to it? Just sitting down at the beginning of the year and telling your team a standard or co-creating those standards at some sort of team meeting doesn't mean it's going to be followed, right?

You have to support it. You have to remind, you have to come back to your values. You have to make those an everyday thing. And then the 4th thing is, okay, now how do I enforce? We've established— I'm modeling the right behavior. I've established it, the standard.

We've supported that. We've been coming back to it. We've been offering reminders. We've been offering encouragement. But now how do I enforce?

Hi, Coach. A brief interruption from the podcast to remind you of the Transforming Basketball Summer Camp taking place by the beachside in Roseto, Italy. This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for players and coaches alike. The boys' week will run from the 27th of July to the 2nd of August, with the girls' week from the 3rd to the 10th of August.

As a coach, you'll be able to spend a week with Alex Sarama and other Transforming clinicians, observing up to 6 hours of camp practices each day. Each evening, coach development workshops will take place to consolidate what you learnt in the day. For just €850, your participation in the camp, as well as 6 nights accommodation and 3 meals per day at a 4-star hotel, will be covered.

The hotel is right on the beach, allowing you to combine an incredible basketball experience along with your summer holiday. Head to our website and click the events tab to learn more. Coaches go completely free if they send 4 players or more to the camp.

Now, back to the rest of the podcast.

Those are great. Thank you for sharing that. I remember back in 2012, I think it was, us playing for the Limerick Lakers, and we had some characters on the team. So how did you enforce during that time when you were trying to get me to stop taking so many 3s, or you were trying to make Kian— I think he was like our 4 at the time— to maybe playmake a little bit more for his teammates?

So how did you get us to buy into our roles, but also how did you tell us the truth about when we weren't living up to what we agreed to?

I got away with so much that I would not advocate today because I probably just was quick to just get on guys and yell at guys. But yet I had done an incredible amount of work to create a unique experience. So like for guys in Ireland to go on 2 trips to the States, we took 2 trips.

I know you missed out on those opportunities, but we took them when they were under-16s, a lot of the guys, and we took them when they were under-18s 2 years later. Trips to the States to play basketball there, which they got that experience and that really bonded us and brought us close together.

It was one thing. And then also the ones that I could push the hardest actually have great relationships with their families. Right. So like, I mean, I could push a guy like Akeem, who was one of our better players, a forward. I was often at his house for dinner on Sundays.

We had that relationship so they could get away with what I would say is less effective coaching. Right. And which At the end of the day, I probably relied a little bit on the carrot and the stick too much. And right now I would advocate more for a much different approach, which is having a really clear standard on what are good shots and what are bad shots.

Us all agreeing to those, helping to support that in a training environment, right? At a certain point in the season, you move to enforcing that, right? Maybe not early in it, but eventually you get really great clarity on what are good shots, what are bad shots.

And then just saying, hey, when you choose to shoot that shot, you're coming out. At the same time, go shoot as many of these shots as you want, because these are great shots for us. And I think that's where I started to evolve later in my coaching career.

I really haven't coached basketball. I did a bit of Super League in 2020 during COVID but I haven't really coached a team per se since 2017 directly. I've been the head coach of, but I really landed in this place of like getting real clarity on not just of the shots we don't want you to shoot, but these are all the shots we do want you to take.

And we want you to go shoot as many of those as you can. And really putting more emphasis on the shots we want you to take. I think the same goes with behaviors. Rather than focusing on all things, don't do this, don't do that.

It's more like, hey, these are all the things, these are our behaviors, these are our team values. These are the standards we have. Go celebrate those values every day, catch them doing it right. Reinforce that type of play, reinforce those types of attitudes, celebrate that.

And sometimes you can actually ignore those negative behaviors. Those negative things a little bit, not necessarily ignore it, but you can let it go because you're putting your attention on the positive. And you just, you're nurturing the good and you get more of that.

And it becomes a bit more affirming. But then when they still have those negative behaviors, they take that shot, they don't, they show up late, or they have an attitude issue. It's just like, hey, if you're not going to work hard today, just step off and let me know when you're ready to get in there and start working hard.

And that's a powerful move. It's probably the most powerful thing I changed in my coaching. George, back in 2015, 2016, 2017, was I stopped yelling at kids. I stopped putting kids in a line. I was just like, dude, you don't want to work hard?

Just step off and let me know when you're ready to get back in the drill. And all of a sudden, things became a we get to do this, which then I got— it's not a got to. And guys started to be on the sideline being like, I'm actually missing out.

I'm missing out on getting better. I'm missing out on the scrimmages. I'm missing out on the fun we're having because we have a fun practice environment. We get out there, we compete, we have a competitive culture, we have all these things in there to make it a place that they would want to be, right?

And so by making that right environment, And then actually making behaviors as the requirement to be a part of that environment, then that really helps to nurture the intrinsic motivation as well.

Absolutely. I think practice should be the best part of a player or a kid's day. They should be going home like super excited about themselves. And I think a lot of the times, unfortunately, we see kids go home really sad or they weren't good enough in that environment.

And I think as far as like getting the best out of these athletes, on and off the court, that may not be the best solution going forward. We want to make sure that they're— like you said, you give them an ultimatum. Do you want to be here?

Do you not want to be here? But then after that, they're going to have to make the decision. Yes, I want to be here. So you've decided. So you have to do things by our rules and our standards. And now they get to be— they get to actually have fun and go home and tell their parents about it versus going home in such a bad mood.

And I just think it's terrible to be in those environments.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think it comes back to being in a place where the coach looks like that they want to be there. That's the best part of their day. And then the coach also cares about them. And you obviously, from your feedback there, you felt a little bit of that.

Like you felt like in some ways that maybe I wanted to be there and maybe you felt that I cared about you. There was that care. I think that's a key component.

Yeah. And healthy conflict. So what does that look like? What does it not look like? Because I remember, yeah, I distinctly remember you yelling at us, but you had a— you've built up enough mileage. Our relationship was at a point where we could all respect that from you and we would, okay, no, that's fine.

And maybe it would motivate us extrinsically for the moment. So maybe talk about that, like the positive confrontation and the negative confrontation and the difference that you get between intrinsic, extrinsic motivation, if that makes sense.

Yeah, I mean, I think the yelling thing is a big thing and it's like a much debated thing. I think I've moved farther away from that type of coaching, though I don't think it's always negative. I think when it comes to yelling at your players, first off, like, am I doing this with intentionality?

And I think everything about coaching comes back to intentionality. Like, what is my purpose as a coach? Why do I coach? And what is our objective, not just today but long term, right? Do I— okay, if I yell at my players right now, am I building the character, the skills long term for them to be able to self-assess and self-correct?

No.

So a lot— I would probably go in and ask more questions, be Just team, where do we feel our effort is right now? Okay, it's not great. Okay, what do we need to do to raise our effort? Right? That's me now. I'm not yelling.

I'm just asking questions to get them to recognize. I just simply go, fellas, I know and you all know this is not our standard. What do we need to do right now to meet the standard? Right? That just simply challenged them. What are we going to do?

How are we going to respond? So I think there's a really— that's conflict, right? It's just getting there and directly challenging them, reminding them they're not the standard. That we set for ourselves. So I think there's so many more tools that I have in my tool belt now that I really wouldn't need to rely on yelling.

And yelling oftentimes would just be more my frustration or anger at the situation, at them or myself, for like not having like another solution that would work better. It doesn't mean that it would always be a negative. I just think some players, they want you to yell at them, even say, and I would say a lot of times I might challenge, hey, coach, you yelled at us more.

And a lot of my coaches I work with, they get that. But their response is like, you're going to leave my team and you're going to go and you're going to be in the workplace someday and your boss ain't going to yell at you.

That just doesn't happen in work environments today or else they get fired. Right. And so we're trying to build individuals for later in life that can get beyond the yelling. We're also trying to build, like, we know that yelling, the more we use that extrinsic, the less you're creating an intrinsic environment.

And so people go, when can you yell? When can you not? I'm like, you can yell whenever you want, really, honestly. I mean, you go ahead. Like, most people aren't going to get fired over it, right? You may not lose your players. They may appreciate it in that moment.

But the more you use the carrot and the stick, the less intrinsic of an environment you create, right? And so if you want to create the conditions for intrinsic motivation to flourish, right, when those moments of conflict come up, I would be leaning in heavily to trying to get them to be reflective, to self-assess, and to self-correct.

Like, if it helped them to drive awareness— where are we right now, fellas?

Okay.

Or ladies, right? Okay. Now what are we going to do to correct that? And the more that you can make them aware, the more that they can take ownership. The more they take ownership themselves, the more intrinsic environment you've created.

Absolutely brilliant. We covered a host of things about creating team cultures, how to cultivate that positive culture, a culture of success. Just quickly, before I ask you our last question here, what's some resources, maybe some podcasts, some books that you listen to or that you recommend our listeners to listen to or read?

Yeah, if you really enjoyed what I was sharing today and you really like the practical things, my book The Culture System is really practical, lays out a very systematic approach to culture. It simplifies what is actually very complex, but it presents a model, a framework.

And some models are useful, all of them are flawed. There's definitely some flaws in my model, but I try to give coaches a model on that. As well as my podcast, The Coaching Culture Podcast, I think is We just unpack different culture issues and we've had some great basketball coaches on as well too, like Shaka Smart and Dusty May, who I got to work with for a couple of years as well when he was at Florida Atlantic.

So yeah, I mean, those would be my own stuff there. And then for me, I'm actually constantly looking and learning, not in the sports leadership space. I like to move into more of a corporate coaching, executive coaching, leadership coaching space. So nobody will have heard of this person, but she is probably like the GOAT of leadership coaching in the leadership world and culture world right now in Google and those type of big tech companies that are doing well.

And that her name is Jennifer Garvey Berger. So if you could pick up any book of hers, especially like Leadership Mind Traps, things like that, you would be doing yourself a huge favor when it comes to your own leadership growth because it's going to be so different anything you get from a sports context.

And I think there is in the sports leadership, team culture context. Like when you just go to coaches, when you just hear from more, you know, people in that space, you're missing a whole other dimension to this team culture and leadership aspect.

No, amazing. JP, I want to thank you not only for our time today and your honest answers, but also just for the person you are and the experience you gave me, a young man in Ireland playing, to be a part of that team and welcoming in.

And you used to drive me home, drive me to practice sometimes. I just really appreciate all that you've done for me. And I know the basketball court definitely misses you, having you as a coach.

Thanks. I appreciate it. I love coaching you. I still remember one of my last games I coached, you had that ankle injury. You didn't get to play and it was killing us there. But yeah, I do much, much appreciate the opportunity to coach you.

So thank you for allowing me to coach you.

So last question here, transformative tip. What is one key takeaway you can give coaches to apply in their practice environment or anywhere to instantly Improve their success, I guess.

Yeah, I would say it comes down to being intentional in everything that you do. And there's an asterisk to that. I'll give you the asterisk in a second. But like, I think like so many of us as coaches, probably we scour and look for the certain drill.

We want to know everything about the offense. We review film of our opponent. We review film of our team. And yet What if we took that approach, that reflective approach from other team or our own team's performance, and we looked at it within our own lens of our own performance as a leader?

What if we were as concerned with how we had that conversation, the words that we used, how we— our tone, our body language? So often I just see coaches, they get in there, we call timeout, we call huddle, we go to halftime, and we just, we just start spewing Whatever comes in our head.

And if someone was to actually be filming us, which is what I ended up doing in 2016, as I got a coach to work with me, and it was like, to be more intentional. And he had me mic myself up, record everything I said, and listen back to what I said during the game.

And that was horrifying for me. I was like, oh my gosh, look at all this crap I'm saying. It's just a bunch of nonsense, or it's just, it's not having no effect at all, or it's having a negative effect. So that level of intentionality in your leadership is huge.

And when you go down that path, You know, or any path of trying to be really reflective, then you can also sometimes be a little bit overcritical. And then you go, oh, well, I said this and it created this effect and you can beat a little bit too much.

And so I just say my asterisk is just, we are condition creators. We don't have this magic wand. We're not in complete control of our team, our players. We just create the conditions for good things to happen. Right. That's it. It's just how can you create the conditions in your practice environment, in a team meeting, In a team bus trip to a pregame, during the game, at halftime, to after the game.

How can you create the conditions for good things to happen? That comes back to intentionality. But when you ask it in that way, it's like, it's that you can't make it happen. You just create the conditions for it to potentially happen.

No, brilliant. Thank you so much, JP.

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Transforming Basketball Podcast. If you'd like to learn more about the work that we do, head to transformingbball.com to access our free resources and spread these ideas throughout the basketball world. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform.

You can also connect with us on Instagram, X, or YouTube with any questions that you have from the episode. See you next time on the Transforming Basketball Podcast.