Your Leadership Goes Nowhere Without Them

I came across a clip of Tony La Russa reflecting on his career — 33 years managing, six pennants, three World Series titles. And the line that stuck with me wasn't about any of that. It was this: your leadership goes nowhere unless the people you're leading respond.

That reframes the whole job. It's not about you. It's about whether the people around you are actually set up to succeed.

That's most of what I do as a GM, honestly. Not the visible stuff — the planning underneath it. Figuring out what each instructor is genuinely strong at, and where they need help without making it feel like a critique. Handling the parts of the job people don't want to do, so they can focus on what they're actually good at.

Here's an example that plays out constantly: an instructor who's excellent in the lesson — great with the kid, great teaching a concept, the parents love them — but who forgets to ask for the next booking. That's not a character flaw. It's just not their skill. So instead of expecting them to suddenly become great at something that isn't natural to them, I build the follow-up into how we operate, or I do it myself. Their job is to be great in the cage. My job is to make sure the parts they're not built for don't fall through the cracks.

It shows up in smaller ways too. Floating a different drill idea when I can tell a concept isn't landing with a player. Getting someone the right piece of equipment before they even ask for it. Sometimes it's reading that an instructor needs space to run their own thing without me hovering — and other times it's knowing they need a reminder, or a nudge, or someone to just take a task off their plate so they can breathe.

None of that shows up in a win-loss record. But it's the actual job. You can have all the vision in the world for what your team could be — if the people doing the work every day aren't set up to succeed, that vision goes nowhere. La Russa managed 5,000 games and won at the highest level there is, and the lesson he chose to leave people with wasn't about strategy. It was about them.