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Secret 3

Ride Your Success Wheel

THE SECRET IN A FEW WORDS

Current student-athletes sometimes have trouble succeeding in both athletics and school.¹ Being a student-athlete is like having a full-time job to go along with school. The average person works forty hours in a week, and a student-athlete is putting in at least seventy-five hours of work a week in just school and sports alone. No one said it was easy, but a little help can go a long way. This chapter will provide strategies for how to succeed as a student-athlete and get set up for success in life after sports with your success wheel.

As we’ve said before, being a student-athlete is a privilege and also a choice. Student-athletes are among the hardest-working students on campus because of their dual commitments, but that doesn’t mean they are held to lower standards academically. The institution and athletic department want to be known for having great student-athletes who can succeed in both academics and athletics.

RIDE YOUR SUCCESS WHEEL

If you are a student-athlete who thinks that you don’t have time to put a 100 percent effort into both academics and athletics, you are wrong. Colby Targun, a former student-athlete at Texas State University, played both football and baseball for all four years. He now works for the NFL at the league’s headquarters in New York City, and says, “Having the proper balance between academics, athletics, and social life is imperative to being successful as a student-athlete. All this while having attention [to] detail, organization, and a drive to succeed will make for a great experience.”

Colby says he had three priorities as a student-athlete that led to his success as both a student and an athlete. He summarizes his priorities: “Having my coursework completed in time and receiving good grades, performing on the playing field, and developing myself as a person overall (working on relationships, my future, etc.).” He remembers, “I was always working to get as far ahead as possible with my coursework, therefore allowing me to focus as much as I could on football or baseball, whichever season it may be.” One of the greatest things he learned from his success was his “relationship skills in being teammates with all walks of life.” He further emphasizes that it “is important to be able to relate to anybody you meet in some way.”

Colby advises student-athletes to “have an eye on the future, but also live in the moment. Don’t worry about the next chapter so much that you miss out on your junior and senior year. Everything will work out eventually as it should if you are prepared.”

THE STUDENT-ATHLETE SUCCESS WHEEL

In writing this chapter, we reviewed previous work in the area (e.g., Comeaux and Harrison 2011),² built on our own experiences and backgrounds, brainstormed, and developed our own version of a “success wheel” that you can follow and use to track your efforts and decisions as you progress through your experiences as a student-athlete. The following graphic depicts the wheel.

The Success Wheel, shown on the previous page, highlights the top ten aspects of how to succeed as a student-athlete. Each of these aspects, or spokes on the wheel, is discussed in detail in the following paragraphs. The core idea behind the success wheel is that each aspect builds on the others to cumulatively drive your success.

Priorities: Priorities are arguably the step where the success wheel starts to turn. It is extremely important that you prioritize your time—your most important resource. Sleep is incredibly important for an athlete’s success, and you should aim to get an average of eight hours a night. That leaves, again on average, sixteen hours in a day to do everything else. Class and homework will take up a minimum of five hours a day. Training, practice, and competitions will occupy close to six hours on average daily. Eating, bio-breaks, and any other obligations get the leftover five hours maximum during the day. If you are dating someone or in a relationship, you need to make time for that person. Same with friends and social time with teammates. A social life is important, as well as any other extracurricular activities. If you want to be successful, having your priorities written out is a must. Prioritizing your time is crucial in becoming the best all-around student-athlete you can possibly be.

Relationship Building: Once you’ve set your priorities, building relationships that are key to those priorities is crucial in constructing a support system around what you are trying to focus on and achieve as a student-athlete. Aside from your family, creating relationships with coaches, teammates, professors, and friends is the minimum. Over the years, you will figure out the people you can rely on, trust, and go to for help. By building each relationship, you will gain support in the important areas of life. Developing relationships (e.g., a favorite professor becomes a mentor) that create trust in people to seek advice from is extremely important in making educated decisions on important life, career, academic, and athletic choices.

Using Resources: Universities and colleges provide multiple resources for students, and you should take advantage of them. Again, these resources should align with your priorities and relationship-building efforts. The array of resources the university provides might include a tutor, librarian, mentor, career coach, psychologist, nutritionist, athletic trainer, or anyone else who is there to help you become the best student-athlete you can possibly imagine. The extra effort and time you devote to using these resources can make a huge impact on your college experience. You won’t have all of these great “free” resources after you graduate, so why not take advantage of them now?

Mentors: An example of an ideal relationship (from a prior spoke (or leg) of the success wheel) is a mentorship relationship in which you connect to a key person who will help guide you through your decisions and life steps. Not everyone has a mentor, but we strongly advise you to work to find one. If you have more than one, even better. No two people have the same type of mentor and no mentor-mentee relationship is the same. Mentors are people who have experienced what you are going through and can offer advice or help for many situations. Mentors tend to be older than you, but someone who is just a few years older may be able to provide a more recent perspective on things. Depending on how the relationship works, age doesn’t really matter. Find a mentor who cares about your personal development and long-term success.

Time Management: The previous elements all support the implementation of time management. Time management is the efficiency with which you use your time. It is important to any student in any context, but it is extremely crucial to a student-athlete. It sounds like such a simple aspect of life, but may be one of the hardest. Time management is a skill, and it can be acquired through experience. This is a skill that translates best into the working world, because it directly relates to priorities (i.e., if you know your priorities, you can allocate your time) and use of your valuable resource of time (i.e., the better your time management skills, the more efficient you can be with your efforts and the more activities you can fit into a busy schedule).

Organization: Organization may sound like a simple term (that usually gets overlooked), but it truly plays a large role in the success of a student-athlete. In the context of the wheel, once you know your priorities, relationships to build, resources available, and time plans, getting organized is a key next step. With how much goes on in one day, you must be organized in terms of where you need to be at certain times, and what is due and when. A calendar can be very useful, as well as utilizing technology for reminders and notes. Ultimately, organization helps you prioritize your activities and stay on top of what you need to achieve. A lack of organization will cause extra stress, missed deadlines, and possible tardiness. Being organized helps show responsibility and assertiveness, two important characteristics. And make sure you know what the difference is between time management and organization.

Motivation: Student-athletes must be motivated in the classroom, in the weight room, and at practice. Motivation stems from wanting to be successful, but the motivation must be for the right reasons. It comes from you, not your parents, your coach, or anyone else. The only person who can truly motivate you is yourself.

School/Sport Balance: As you build your plan for time, resources, mentors, networking, and other aspects, a balance between your dual objectives is important. Many coaches and administrators will argue about the relative importance of school and sport. However, the term “student-athlete” means that being a student takes priority over being an athlete. Today, we see a lot of “athlete-students.” Don’t be an athlete-student. Take pride in your education and understand your sport participation as a key aspect of the student experience.

However, regardless of what you think, stay balanced. Some readers may balance the two areas 50/50 and some may balance it 60/40 or 40/60. There is no “right” balance as long as you are aware of where your balance should be and where it actually is. Knowing that your high-level athletic career likely won’t continue after you graduate, why wouldn’t academics take priority?

Networking: Closely aligned with mentorship, networking is widely known to be one of the most important characteristics of success. More than ever in today’s society, it is all about who you know, not necessarily what you know. As a student-athlete, you have more opportunities to network than any other student. You are automatically connected with alumni from your sport, as well as with coaches and administrators, plus their networks. Why not leverage those opportunities and network? Find out what they really do, how they got to where they are, and what you can learn from them about different career paths.

People are more likely to hire someone they know or share a common bond with, and the more people you know, the more connected you will be. If one individual cannot directly help you, that person may know someone who can. Build your network of contacts and use LinkedIn to network as well. Networking is extremely important because it allows you to develop relationships over an extended period of time. The longer you can build a relationship with someone, the more that individual will be willing to do something good for you.

From the collective experience of the authors, we know that much of the above narrative sounds trite. If you find that many pieces of advice sound repetitive and obvious, that’s because “Trite is Right.” After many years in the sports business, we believe there is no such thing as a network that is too big. One of us recently met an Olympic swimmer who will soon graduate from college. She was interested in looking into career opportunities in sport business. Her swimming network is extensive, but her network outside of swimming is small. We spoke about how to extend her connections with the same competitive fire she brought to the pool in her swimming career. Right after our discussion, a meeting with a team executive resulted in opening up another group of contacts. However large and influential you think your network is, it isn’t as big as you will need. Digital networking tools are helpful, but face-to-face interactions pay the greatest dividends in advancing a career.

Career Focus, Macro and Micro: Having an idea of what you want to do after college is something you may not think about until your junior or senior year. At that point, it is often too late. Later in the book we will explain why you should be thinking about this in your sophomore year. You should develop a macro career focus in the field of study you desire, and this will help you pick a major, and create a broad career path.

Within your macro focus, you also require a micro focus, a specific part of the industry or field that you want to drill down on. This may change as your experiences help shape this focus. An example of a micro focus would be wanting to work in financial planning within the business field. Another example would be wanting to work in event operations, but focusing on customer service.

If you can see the end at the beginning, you aren’t going to get off to a very good start. This one is all about multitasking. The most valuable athletes are those who can play the most positions or at least know what everyone’s responsibilities are. Same goes for the professional world. If you have a marketing focus, learn finance. If you are thinking about player personnel, gain experience in sales. If you have a desire to work in a particular career, it is always important not to develop tunnel vision. Never get so micro that you can’t keep your eye on the big picture. The 360-degree view is the best.

SECRET: RIDE YOUR SUCCESS WHEEL

Your success wheel will be different than that of your teammates, and your wheel is always customizable to the success you desire. This is one of those occasions where it really is about you. Consider your wheel your guide and road map to live by while in college. Most of the aspects in your wheel will apply to life as well, which is why it is even more important to develop your wheel early, to update it often and—most important—to follow it closely.

Bill Shumard, a former Division I Athletic Director, and now CEO of Special Olympics Southern California, provides a unique perspective on what parts of the success wheel he thinks are most important. He notes “having served as Director of Athletics at two NCAA Division 1 universities, I believe the student-athletes’ ‘success wheel’ is indicative of the key components making up the life of a student-athlete.” Shumard’s perspective provided considerable input into the success wheel we present here. The following box provides his view on the three most important aspects (in his view) of the wheel of success.

. . .

BILL SHUMARD

(CEO of Special Olympics Southern California)

Mentors

As I look back upon my career that has spanned more than four decades in collegiate, professional, and amateur sports, my ability to select and emulate strong mentors has been a key ingredient to any success I may have enjoyed. Fred Miller was the Athletics Director at Long Beach State when I was an undergrad student working in the Sports Information Office. I admired Fred’s leadership style and his ability to be the “face and voice” of the university’s athletics program. He was clearly the one who first inspired me to pursue a career path to become an AD.

When I moved to the Los Angeles Dodgers, I was part of a front office team that was included among “America’s Top 100 Companies” because of our strong ethics and impeccable business practices. I reported to Executive Vice-President Fred Claire, who was chiefly responsible for the Dodgers’ uniquely successful organizational culture. I patterned many of the habits and disciplines I practice after Fred’s leadership. When I moved to the collegiate level, I reported to Mike McGee, the AD at USC. Mike was a former football player and coach, with a doctoral degree in business & organizational leadership. Mike’s sense of loyalty and unwavering financial acumen made a strong impression on me and patterned my own success as an AD.

When I became AD at my alma mater, Long Beach State, my president—Bob Maxson—had a strong background AND a keen interest in intercollegiate athletics and how it should be positioned/prioritized on a college campus. Dr. Maxson epitomized the power of encouragement, and brought a great sense of pride and tradition to a relatively young university. My leadership style is largely part-and-parcel of the leadership habits of Claire, McGee, and Maxson. I recognized each of them as a strong, admirable leader and would regularly pick their respective brains on a multitude of topics. I was fortunate that they took the time and thought enough of me to invest in my future. I will be eternally grateful.

Networking

A student-athlete has an incredible opportunity to meet and connect with a multitude of diverse people—including university administrators and faculty; coaches and support staff; boosters and volunteers; other student-athletes; the campus; and the community at large. While the student-athlete has many competing priorities during their time in college, connecting and establishing relationships with like-minded people at various stages of life and career is invaluable.

The student-athlete must begin to establish a reputation of integrity, trustworthiness, and loyalty to everyone in their respective universe. This will set the student-athlete apart from others and will lead to initial opportunities in establishing a career while building life-long relationships. I would also note that the student-athlete should establish themselves as a “giver” and not a “taker.” In other words, always be willing to help others in need instead of just asking for favors and advantages. This is an important part of character development.

Time Management

It is a safe assumption that a student-athlete’s weekly schedule, in the midst of a competitive season, is in the neighborhood of 70–80 hours a week. When you factor in class time, study hall, practice, physical training, training room, and travel, the student-athlete’s time demands are incredible. When I was an AD, I would tell our student-athletes that, if they were successful in managing their collegiate career and obtained a degree, time management of their actual career would be relatively easy in comparison. Being a collegiate student-athlete prepares one for a successful personal and professional life that can be rich and full. As one matures and moves through life after college—establishing a career; perhaps getting married and starting a family; and becoming a productive member of society—having mastered time management as a student-athlete in college will be a key ingredient in that success.

. . .

The success wheel as developed and outlined above is a useful tool for student-athletes. So, where do you start? Let us provide a few straightforward steps to follow.

Step 1: Create Your Own Success Wheel

Review the ten aspects of the success wheel explained above and create your own “wheel” with each aspect defined specifically for your situation and reality.

Step 2: Follow Your Success Wheel and Revisit It Frequently

It is one thing to just create your success wheel, but another thing to follow it. Revisit your wheel at least once a month and track your progress against each aspect of your wheel. Importantly, while tracking your progress, make sure you hold yourself accountable. It is easy to get caught up in everything going on around you and forget your wheel. Don’t be that slacker!

. . .

Author Viewpoint—JAKE HIRSHMAN

I graduated with my undergraduate degree in three years while also being a student-athlete, and I couldn’t have done it without my success wheel. Of course there are other aspects outside of the wheel that are important, but we thought these were the most important and overlapping.

I prioritized my academics over athletics because I knew my chances of going pro were slim, especially with the mix of injuries I had. I was driven to reach my goals and succeed in baseball, but it was more important to get good grades and gain experiences to build up my resume.

My relationship-building started in my sophomore year as I started to have classes for my major. I created relationships with my professors, coaches, teammates, and other administrators around campus. Looking back, this helped open doors for opportunities during the following year of school.

At the University of Redlands, I took advantage of the career development office because I was able to receive help on interview preparation for graduate schools. I was able to get my resume reviewed and other key skills sharpened.

Obtaining multiple mentors while I was in college was one of the best things I could have done. Bill Shumard, Fred Claire, Tony Miller, and John Lombardo are just a few of many who served as mentors for me throughout my time as a student-athlete. Their help, advice, and ability to seek out opportunities for me was invaluable in my success. Without them, I don’t know where I would be today.

Time management for me was most important as I aimed to graduate in three years. Due to an injury, I had to continue my rehab and practice while I was taking twenty-three credits in the fall semester, and working three different internships all at the same time. Without quality time management and efficiency, there would have been no way I could have done all of that. As a sophomore, I even interned at the Inland Empire 66ers (A-league ball for the Angels) while I was in season. This was extremely difficult with practice times, but was attainable through supreme time management and a flexible coach.

With everything that I had on a daily schedule, organization was a skill that I developed and improved upon very quickly. Organization skills helped me with my time management, and paid off in the classroom. I kept a very detailed schedule of every day of every week to help me stay on top of everything.

Motivation was never an issue for me because I was never the best. I was always motivated to get better every day in every aspect of my life. All my life, I was told I couldn’t do things or I wasn’t good enough, and that served as fuel for me to prove people wrong. I wasn’t the best athlete on the field, and I wasn’t the smartest in every class, but through motivation and dedication, I always worked the hardest of anyone.

Well-balancing my academics and baseball was the single most important thing that helped me succeed in both. I was able to balance my time and put 100 percent effort into both responsibilities.

Networking has been my most valuable tool as I have started my career post graduate school. My early objective from networking was to find out everything possible about what people did in their jobs to provide a perspective on whether I would potentially be interested in what they did in the future. From talking to hundreds of people, I was able to rule out certain industries or jobs in order to narrow my career focus.

Networking has opened doors for me that nothing else could have. Every internship or job I have had was because I knew someone and had developed a relationship with that person. The more people you know and can impress, the more you can help put yourself in a position to get lucky at the right time.

. . .

Step 3: Be Very Strategic with Your Success Wheel

Many struggle with the difference between strategy and tactics. Tactics are individual acts and capabilities that, when used in a coherent long-term plan, become a strategy. Tactics are usually short-term with immediate results; strategies create long-term systemic success. Be both strategic and tactical with each aspect of your success wheel.

To provide you with relevant advice on strategies and tactics around a success wheel, we sought the input of a successful student-athlete and interviewed Alexis Pinson, a collegiate volleyball player at Arizona State University and Ohio University. She graduated with her masters in sports administration degree during her last year of playing at Ohio and now works for the San Francisco 49ers as a sales and service coordinator. Alexis provides some great insight on how to ride your success wheel and succeed as a student-athlete.

. . .

ALEXIS PINSON (former volleyball student-athlete at ASU and Ohio University)

1. What were your top three priorities as a student-athlete?

My first priority as a student-athlete was school. That was drilled into me since I was a kid just starting to play sports and it always remained my main focus. My parents always preached to me that sports are great but your body will only hold up for so long. You could get injured at any time and lose your athleticism but you can never lose your education. In fact, it was my emphasis on education that allowed me to graduate early from ASU and enter the MSA program at OU.

My second priority was of course volleyball. Volleyball was (and still is) one of my passions in life. If I wasn’t in class or doing homework, I was either practicing, training, watching film, or doing something else related to volleyball. My roommates at ASU were some of my teammates as well, so they shared the same passion for the sport as me. They also never complained when I would fill our entire DVR with volleyball matches. It’s probably one of the many reasons we got along so well.

My third priority was making time for my family and friends. One of the reasons that I decided to attend an undergrad school so close to my hometown was to be make it easy to still see my family as often as I could. After each of my home matches at ASU, a big group of people including my family, friends, teammates, and their families would all go out to dinner—whether we won or lost. These are some of my most cherished memories because it always put the matches into perspective. I was extremely lucky because my parents were able to carry on the tradition when I played at OU as they never missed a home game in Athens either. I was happy to prioritize my family when they would travel across the country several times over the span of a few months just to support me.

2. Did you have any resources that you used that helped you with your academics?

The one resource that I used the most when it came to my academics was the tutoring program we had at ASU. Our academic coaches would set us up with a tutor if we needed some extra help in a certain class. We could even just ask for help in studying for an exam. This was a resource that I found to be very valuable because not only were the tutors very knowledgeable in their respective fields, but many times they were familiar with a specific professor and provided you with special tips and pointers for those classes.

3. How important was networking for you, and how did you take advantage of being a student-athlete?

Networking was a crucial tool for me to get to where I’m at today, and being a student-athlete was the main channel that I networked through. I found that the easiest people to network with were former student-athletes themselves. There’s a common understanding and respect between student-athletes that I discovered while networking. They know you can handle the challenges and stressors of that life and can translate that to being a successful employee. It’s why employers always comment that student-athletes are great hires, and many of those employer-employee relationships are forged by networking with other current and former student-athletes.

4. What was the most important part of your success wheel and why?

The part of the wheel that contributed the most to my success as a student-athlete was motivation. Something (besides my alarm) had to get me up for 6 a.m. workouts every day. That same thing had to encourage me to study my notes again and again when all I wanted to do was sleep. Without motivation to get my degree and to make it to the NCAA tournament each year, I would’ve failed. That motivation to be able to say “I did the best I could” is what kept me going and led to my achievements.

5. What relationships did you build as a student-athlete that were most important to your success as both a student and an athlete?

The relationship that was most important to me as an athlete was my strength coach. This is usually a relationship that is underrated or gets overlooked, but it can be so important. Your strength coach is the one that will actually push you to do things that you didn’t know you physically could do. Achieving those physical goals can do wonders for your mental state as an athlete. I was also fortunate enough to feel close enough to my strength coaches that I could come to them with other issues I was having outside of the gym and they’d always seem to find a way to channel those struggles into my workouts. Not only would I get a great workout, but most times I’d feel better as a person after I left the gym.

Also a word of advice when it comes to strength coaches—do not anger them. They can be a great resource and help you in so many ways but if you upset them, they can make your life a special kind of hell. I promise that if you put in a great deal of hard work, you’ll help your teammates, your coaches, and most importantly—yourself. And everyone lives in harmony.

The relationship that was most important to me as a student was my academic coach. You should really listen to them when they suggest what classes would be best for you to take with your schedule. They know what they’re doing. They are also a great resource when you feel like you need some extra help in a class. Don’t be embarrassed to go to them—even with just the slightest issue. They’re there to help you succeed.

6. At what point during school did you start to focus on your career and thinking about what you wanted to do in the future?

My future career was always on my mind since I started my collegiate education but it definitely became more focused probably a year or two before I graduated from ASU. I always knew that I wanted to work in sports but I just had to decide in which capacity. I had an idea that sports journalism and PR was something that interested me so I asked our team’s SID if I could tag along and shadow them. I ended up really enjoying it but I didn’t realize how much writing actually went into journalism and frankly, I don’t enjoy writing enough to make it a focal point of my career. My advice would be to use those who are around you every day. If you think you may be interested in a position in the medical field, ask your athletic trainer if you can shadow them and learn from them. It will probably open your eyes and give you a firsthand look at what that job is really like. It can encourage and solidify your passions or, like me, make you realize that it’s actually something that doesn’t interest you that much.

7. Looking back at your time as a student-athlete, is there anything you would have done differently?

Looking back, I think the only thing that I would’ve done differently is to reach out and get to know more of my fellow student-athletes. They know exactly what you’re going through living life as both a college student and athlete, so relating to them is a breeze. It’s easy to get comfortable in your bubble and just hang out with your teammates, but I wish I would’ve taken the time to get to know more of my peers. Plus, they’ll probably show up to your games and make you pretty cool posters.

. . .

Step 4: Prioritize within Your Success Wheel

In any strategic or tactical effort (and as emphasized in the Prioritize aspect of the success wheel), you have to make decisions about where to put your resources and focus your time. It is no different with the success wheel. In order to illustrate and provide an example, we interviewed Pim Thirati, a former student-athlete in golf from the University of Illinois. The following is an excerpt in which she offers her advice on what the most important part of her success wheel was.

. . .

PIM THIRATI

(former golf student-athlete at the University of Illinois)

The most important parts of my success wheel would be Relationship Building, Time Management, and Motivation. Being a student-athlete has definitely taught me all the aspects of the success wheel to a certain extent, but I would say these three aspects continued to be the most impactful after I have graduated.

Working closely in a team with coaches as well as the athletics department, the media, fans, and competitors has taught me how to interact and build relationships with other people, which are very crucial skills in life after college. Balancing between golf and school has taught me how to prioritize my time wisely. Working in sports can be hectic and, depending on your responsibilities, you could be working with various projects at once. Being able to manage my time is one thing I found very helpful for my career. Putting a substantial amount of time and effort into a sport you are passionate about requires a high intrinsic motivation. I believe this is something that sets student-athletes apart. I have invested in one sport for over ten years and as a result, I tend to be very self-driven and self-motivated in other aspects of my life as well.

My advice for current and future student-athletes is to try to not lose sight of other intangible skills you are learning outside of your sport. It is easy to get caught up in the wins and losses. In the end, I really don’t remember the putts I missed. I remember the friends I’ve made and the grind we went through. The wins and losses WERE a big deal but looking back, they didn’t define me and I’m glad I didn’t let it take over my life. The end result WAS a big deal but the process is what shaped me.

. . .

CHAPTER SUMMARY

This chapter provides a tool you can adopt and implement to help guide and focus your efforts over the course of your time as a student-athlete. Maybe you looked at the picture of the success wheel and skipped the words. But we hope you read this chapter and started to wonder whether now is the time to build your own success wheel.