NICK SABAN

Question
Nick Saban has lots of energy and puts in long hours as head football coach for the
University of Alabama. He used to spend so much time traveling to evaluate high school
players that the NCAA came up with the "Saban rule," which prevents college coaches
from traveling to high schools in the spring to watch players. Saban is also known for
what people in Tuscaloosa call "the process."
How Does "The Process" Work? A Fortune reporter stated that Saban "defines
expectations for his players athletically, academically, and personally." He also "sets
expectations so that everyone understands what he wants, and then he can pull back."
For example, he wants to know players' workout routines for each day, including the
amount of weight they can bench-press. "If a lineman is above his target body-fat
percentage, Saban wants to know what the staff is doing to fix it."
Saban also is very supportive of his coaching staff. Once they make a game plan, he
leaves its execution to them. He also takes ownership for mistakes or losses. Former
defensive coordinator Kirby Smart told the Fortune reporter that Saban "has always
taken the blame and never pointed at a coach or a person or a kid. And I think that
helps the whole organization. It gives you confidence before the game that 'Hey, we've
got a plan. We've outworked everybody at this point. Let's go execute it and do it."
Saban has hired trainers to coach him and the staff. He believes you get better only by
focusing on the small things that make a difference on game day. For example, he
brought in a martial arts expert because he thought it would help players gain leverage
when blocking. He also added Pilates to the team's workout after he experienced its
benefits himself.
YOUR THOUGHTS?
1. Do you think Saban's "process" goes too far in its demands on college football
players?
2. What aspects of Saban's approach do you see as most applicable in a business
organization?
3. What aspects would you rather see modified or abandoned in a business
organization?
4 What did you learn from Coach Saban about leadership behaviors or styles that you
could implement in your organization? Saban has been quoted as saying: "mediocre
people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people."
Evaluate the extent to which you believe this is true and what this means for leadership
approaches. A common source of frustration for coaches is when they see a lack of
progress in an athlete. How should leaders deal with this type of frustration with
employees who don't seem to be succeeding?

Step-by-step answer
Leadership
Explanation:
Hi
To address the questions, please remember that case study questions are not meant to
be Yes or No and a discussion is expected. It is also very important to note that there is
no prescription for managerial work and as such it is a question of interpretation and
judgement - no right or wrong answer expected but one that is closer to reality.

Q1
I think that the Saban's process is absolutely fine as it defines objectives and
expectations in a SMART manner - specific, measurable, achievable, reward based and
time bound. He and his trainees are clear about what is expected and what results are
to be achieved over time. For example, a trainee is bound to show measurable progress
if he or she follows the instructions and do everything they can towards improvement as
exemplified by the lineman example and follow up with what actions are being taken go
achieve target sets.

Q2
Saban's approach applies quite well to organisations as well. He executes the functions
of planning, leading, organising and controlling just as what managerial functions in
organisation out to be. Organisations do have a planing functions that define in a
SMART manner what is to be achieved (planning), what resources are required to
achieve them (sustained training in his case and organising or allocating resources in
organisations), motivate or lead his players to be productive and result oriented
(leading function in organisations - motivate employees to achieve organisational
objectives) and evaluate and control to ensure that results are positive for the players
(controlling in organisations - monitoring activities and taking corrective actions to
ensure organisational objectives are met).
He also leads by examples and whenever required he also tries to exemplify on what
ought to be done by bringing in experts to coach the players.

Q3
From Q2, we note that Saban's actions and processes resemble very closely what they
ought to be in an organisation as both aim for results (success of teams in Saban's case
and profitability in the case of organisations). However there are some functions that
are very important in organisations such as marketing (communicating to create
satisfaction, attract customers and keep them loyal, targeting the markets etc.),
financial management, production or manufacturing processes that require skills and
machines, storage space, quality raw materials etc. For these special skills are required
and these ought to be modified.

Q4
Saban's exemplifies a good model of transformational leadership style whereby he
trains others to be leaders in their areas, he is supportive and considerate, he is humble
and does not hesitate to delegate expert tasks to others. He is honest and transparent
to his players and all these are very important leadership qualities that an organisation
requires.

I think good leaders do not look down on level of achievement and on the contrary they
are more motivated to transform low achievers with the right attitude and will power to
progress and succeed - their personal source of satisfaction we may say, just like the
case is in teaching. A good teacher acknowledges that a student is learning and will
make mistakes initially but as they learn they become better and better. So this is the
same in the case of Saban as he does not seem to look down on any of his players and
in fact he tries to cultivate the team spirit to strengthen the team instead.

I am sure you will be able to add your own thoughts, research and judgement to finalise
the assignment.
Best wishes.
m