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Sports + Life + Balance
Sports + Life + Balance
S2 E8 – “Grace That it Takes to Be Imperfect” feat. Sue Enquist
John Moffet is joined by Sue Enquist, a UCLA Hall of Fame softball player, coaching legend, educator, and sports consultant.
In today’s episode of SPORTS + LIFE + BALANCE, Sue shares her journey to 11 National Championship titles as a player and then as a coach — the most in collegiate history! You'll also learn about her "second chapter" after coaching that lead her to the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
Learn more about Sue Enquist:
http://www.sueenquist.com/
Thanks to our episode sponsor, Roka! Use code "SLB" for 20% off your purchase at Roka.
https://www.roka.com/
Welcome to Sports life balance hosted by John Moffet. For those listeners out there that are parents stop cheering about winning and start cheering about the person that's executing the process. So when they get in those big moments, they're just gonna go for it because they know they're being loved as a young boy or young girl or young woman or a young man, we have put so much value on on my daughter's playing softball at UCLA or my son is playing USA Volleyball. And these athletes grow up, and they only identify as a volleyball player. So if I don't win the championship, I'm not worthy because my parents had been bragging about me for the last 10 years. I've got to win the gold medal. And what I constantly try to remind these athletes is it's okay not to be okay.
JOHN MOFFET:Hello, I'm John Moffet, and today on Sports Life Balance. We're joined by Sue Enquist, UCLA Hall of Fame softball player, coaching legend, educator, and sports consultant. Growing up in the Southern California beach town of San Clemente. Sue was the first softball player to attend UCLA on a scholarship. She was UCLA Softball's First all American Hall of Famer and national champion, Sue went on to win 11 National Championships, first as a player, and then a coach. It's the most in collegiate history. But after Sue's retirement from coaching, what she calls her second chapter, her innovation accelerated, focusing now on creating balanced athletes and teams, a journey that led her to the Tokyo Games. And it all ended with a celebration of Olympic gold in women's volleyball. So Sue, it is so nice to virtually meet you. And thanks for spending some time with me today on Sports Life Balance.
Sue Enquist:Well, thank you for having me. And I want to congratulate you on your career. Tremendous, so great to be here.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, I think congratulations is in order for you to and all of the reinvention and to stay vital and stay stay important within the sport within sports.
Sue Enquist:I don't know about important, I think the bigger quest is really to remain relevant. And as we get older, we just the discipline that has to drive us as we get into our second chapter beyond is to be discipline to continue to be curious.
JOHN MOFFET:Yeah, right. Right. And I will take relevant as well. So anyway, so I love doing this podcast. And I just because I just love athletes, and when I got to do some research all about your story and listen to your title to speak and hear your wisdom. And all that you've accomplished. I had this this funny revelation yesterday. And that was that I was not only learning a lot, but I was having a heck of a lot of fun.
Sue Enquist:Yeah, well, that's good. I love that. I hope. I can always put a little bit of a hop in people's step, especially during this time that we're in.
JOHN MOFFET:Yeah, yeah, we certainly need hops in our steps. And, look, I mean, I think that carries over to probably your training as a coach, right? I mean, isn't, isn't it sometimes your job to sort of get the athletes going? And if they're in a unhappy spot, or in a funk to get them kind of back in the swing of things?
Sue Enquist:Well, I think, yeah, definitely. And I think what's, um, you know, for context for your listeners is, I really try to share contextually what's relevant. When I was coaching, you know, I've been out of the game for 15 years, and I never want to be that coach that says, hey, this is what I did 20 years ago. But I do like to reaffirm the principles that have been able to sustain time and where it becomes, I think, really interesting in this day and age is how we go about doing it differently. And going from a transactional model as a leader, where it's very authoritative, very vertical on the boss, you're the student Shut up, put up. I was very comfortable in that system. I grew up in that system, and loved it. But I saw through my career, that society was changing sport was becoming a business and the athlete coming in was fearful, tired, and not really well, ready to commit because there was so much at stake. And so now in my chapter two, I want to be that person that just hopefully, shakes people that have been doing it for decades to constantly check yourself. When was the last time I asked the Team what they thought and become more transformative where the teacher and the student are learning together. And they value the information that comes from that.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, we'll talk about your chapter two. But I also want to talk about the beginning of your chapter one and find out a little bit about how you grew up because I, I'm always interested to kind of like, gives you insight, what makes people tick. How did you grow up? And what was the circumstances? And how did you find sports?
Sue Enquist:Well, I'm, I'm a daughter of a military father and a mother that was a nurse. And in summary, I got the best of both worlds. My father was an engineer. And so everything was really black and white. Everything was driven by effort, and your attitude and approach towards that. And then the efficiency around failure recovery. And then my mother was that person that just would catch all of us. I'm the youngest of a brother, that's the middle child and my older sister, my mother would catch us doing it right. Every day. She was the fun zone. She knew everybody in town. And everybody kept an eye on us because I was raised at a time where you didn't have to worry about safety. You didn't worry about crime and growing up in a little sleepy town in San Clemente. I had lots of moms and dads keeping an eye on me throughout the day. So I had this amazing balance of accountability, but also inspiration and self belief that was just dripped by my siblings and dripped by my parents, and then I had some key stakeholders in my life at a time when it wasn't popular. So I'm 64. I am a beneficiary of Title Nine. So when I was a young child, they didn't have the opportunities that we see today. But I had key stakeholders around me that looked at who I was valued, how I did things, and gave me opportunities at a time when people didn't really give girls opportunities. The San Clemente Junior Lifeguard program didn't really care if you were a girl. We're going to teach you how to swim because the ocean doesn't care if you're a boy or girl. And the lifeguards had great value in anybody that was a lover of the ocean. And I had my brother's little league coach, John Springman, who told Little Susie Enquist, Susie, you can be our official shagger it's a very important role. And in return, I'll give you BP at the end of every practice. And so at a very young age at a time when there was incredible discrimination and incredible profiling. I lived in this really special bubble and throughout my whole life through high school. You know, Title Nine was enacted when I was in high school had an opportunity to play boys baseball, played for Coach Clootie, who said doesn't matter if you're a girl, can you hit the curveball? And so right there, gave me the entree to UCLA and went to a school that had an incredible academic reputation, but their softball program was behind. We wore the men's track team practice T shirts as game uniforms. Oh, you're kidding me. I was there at the very beginning when we were just becoming an intercollegiate sport. And so I have a very unique perspective that I didn't jump into winning programs. I was there before winning happen. So I knew what went in the cement to build the foundation. And I know and have very strong opinions about what holds up the structure of championship programs.
JOHN MOFFET:Wow. Yeah, it's quite a quite a gift that you have many, many gifts that you had, and a lot of blessings that you had leading up to and through college. Because we all know that there is a lot of luck, circumstance, opportunity that not everybody gets and and sounds like you had a great deal of that. And were able to then work hard and dedicate yourself so that you were able to take advantage of those opportunities when they came up.
INTRO:Yes, and then also that I want to share with you what I'm not I wasn't picked first I read from the special books in elementary school. And school didn't come easy for me. But my father said, you know, at the end of the day, you know excellence doesn't care who you are, how smart you are, how dumb you are. Excellence doesn't care here is what you need to do to be your best every day. And so that language was embedded in the Enquist family, we had Enquist standards. We didn't have family rules. We just had the Enquist standard. And now I look back, they were rules there were boundaries. And I lived an imperfect life. I mean, I'm the person that, you know, got caught looking at the shirts in the other dugout, lost a game we never should last became consolation winners, and threw the trophy in the trash can. So usually people Google me, and they'll Google Enquist softball, and just all this wonderful stuff comes in. But oh man, if you add trash can to that, watch what comes up. So Enquist trophy, and trash and you get a whole nother side as to inputs.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, I mean, I think it's really easy to look at somebody who has had a career and the level of success that you have had. And it's easy to look at just the W's, and just the w column. But in order to do these big things, these excellent things, it takes a lot of work, constant work. And dealing with how to rebound from from obstacles and failures.
Sue Enquist:Yeah, and I think what is troublesome for me today is because we value winning as Americans, and most human beings value it. And we are short sighted on valuing and measuring the process to get it, we will always be sending the children, the young student athletes of today, the wrong message. And everywhere you look in coaching, we have it backwards. And as much as I have so much respect for our collegiate environment. I'm saddened by the fact that we can't put our money where our mouth is where we talk about our coach welfare, our student athlete, welfare means everything to us, really. I don't know if it was ever in my contract that having fun, I was going to get a bonus, or having wonderful process, I was going to get a bonus. And well, actually, I I've been out of it so long, we didn't have bonuses. But today, we can't create change with our coaches. Until we send a message to the coaches, these things are so important that we want to measure your culture. And we want to reward your culture. We're asking coaches right now, today, this is what is on a collegiate coaches docket right now, we want you, of course, to win. And if you could win the championship, that'd be perfect. We want you to make sure everybody graduates we've impacted with as many women athletes as we can on your team, because we're trying to stay in compliance with Title Nine. And we also want to make sure nobody transfers, and they have to have a blast being on your team where most teams, more than half the people are sitting the bench, but in your contract, we're not compensating the coach around great culture. And so for me, when I got out of coaching, I knew I was so interested in closing this information gap around great teams, what do they do? How do they do it? And then more importantly, how are we creating value for teams to be great teams, from the parents perspective, from the coaches perspective, and from the administrators perspective, because right now, the administrators aren't building in. Most schools don't have culture scores. But we now have that we now have that science, we can go ahead and, and score your culture, on your relationships and on your performance. And so I just hope coaching can become more updated. Like we see in corporate America, corporate America is doing a great job of measuring cultures. And now it's hard because you're dealing with 10s of 1000s of employees. But gosh, imagine athletic director, you're dealing with 700, that's a lot easier than, you know, 700,000 of these 100 companies,
JOHN MOFFET:I'm going to really relate a little bit of my experience in in college and our team, especially when we were the success when we were successful when we actually won the national championships our culture was we trusted each other. We we didn't ridicule each other. We didn't make fun of each other behind our backs. There wasn't jealousy. My question for you is isn't isn't that culture and chemistry kind of endemic to the most successful teams? Or do you sometimes have you found that sometimes teams that are very successful have really rough culture interpersonally?
Sue Enquist:Well, any time you try to make blanket statements, we know there's going to be outliers of teams that hate each other and one, but if we talk about programs that have sustained success had been in the conversation all the way up until the end, decade, after decade, you're going to find some interesting patterns. And those patterns do have to do with the gift of trust,
JOHN MOFFET:trust,
Sue Enquist:confidence, our results words, kind of, I am always the individual that says when coaches say, gosh, I just want my players to trust each other more. That's actually like saying, Gosh, I just want my team to win more. So I have to say, Well, what does that look like to your team? And more times than not, they never ask, you never ask the team, because they're living in a very authoritative, here's our vision, here are the values of the program. Athletes are, are shuffled in, very rarely are athletes asked about what they value in 2021. Right. So what's nuanced right now what's changing right now with relevant culture is, to me the most relevant thing to say, as a leader of a program, here are our pillars. This is the cement of our house. And you'll notice that it's rigid, there's a lot of sturdiness to it. Also in, it's not very flexible. But I want you to stand on this knowing when you're unstable, you will have a history of how we did it to fall back on. Now, having said that, I want you to come in and do the interior design. In 2021. I want you and your teammates, to build the warmth and the color. And this ability to come to a place to escape to every day. That's different. Because before it happened naturally, today, because of the pressure. Our our coaches have to work even harder to create that. Players you take charge of the interior design of our house. That's very new language very uncomfortable. I have coaches say to me all the time, oh, my players are so immature. They couldn't do that. Well, whatever you think you're right. So if you believe they're not capable, they're not going to be capable. But I have learned in chapter two, going around the country talking to 12 year olds to 32 year olds, they all are saying similar stuff. I wish somebody would ask me what I think. And they don't, not consistently not when it comes to building out what it should look like the accountability system. There are not very many player led cultures as there should be. I think cultures should be liked by the the student athletes, I don't think the coaches should be mandating the culture, I think the players should, because in today's age, we've limited the amount of time and what the coach the coaching staff can do. So in a way, it may sound like I'm Coach heyting, I'm actually a person that is advocating for the coaches to say, empower your student athletes, to be in charge of what it looks like, what it doesn't look like how you're going to hold each other accountable beyond just sharing the legacy of the values that have upheld this program for decades. Because then when you can become relevant to a student athlete, they're going to buy in, because they're going to first say, Hmm, he or she were listening. And I'm open to trusting somebody that's willing to listen.
JOHN MOFFET:So correct me if my math is off, but you entered UCLA in 1976? Correct.
Sue Enquist:75. I graduated from Yeah, graduated from high school and entered UCLA in the same year in in the spring quarter. So it gets a little confusing.
JOHN MOFFET:Oh, okay. And so in essence, you spent 30 years with the program as an athlete, as assistant coach, you went right into it, I believe, as assistant coach, then as a co head coach, with your coach, that Who was your coach when you were an athlete, and then you took it over yourself? What was the arc of Sue Enquist and her coaching style from being the assistant and then being the CO head and then being the head what was just give me a 30,000 foot view of that
Sue Enquist:Yeah, I think what was interesting is not so much the arc from player to assistant coach relatively easy, Dude, I got your back all explaining to Sharon, that was easy. The arc from assistant coach to COVID coach that was simply to be able to give me a raise within the public school system that was substantial enough, I had to have my role changed. And the Cisco deployed coach, my day to day didn't change that was relatively easy and not very interesting, okay. Where it got interesting was when I went from a co head coach to a sole head coach, and could feel the sport becoming more competitive and went from being a transformative leader to more of a transactional leader and lowering the boom because we weren't winning enough. And we weren't dedicated enough. And I was just the person measuring the gaps and checking boxes, versus checking in and literally had the tipping point in my career when I ended up trashing the trophy. And that's when I realized, wow, you need to do a little recalibration here, coach. And it was really the last third of my head coaching, which I felt like, it really started to come together on all levels. I my blood runs hot. I'm super intense. I'm super passionate. But what was fun was to make the connection between valuing the process just as much as winning the championship. It doesn't make losing easier. I'm always going to be a sore loser. I just have to protect the world, from my temper, so to speak.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, listen, I I can I can relate. And I just spoke to one of my coaches when I was younger, a few weeks ago, and she would remark about how upset I would get in practice. When I wasn't able to achieve what I wanted to achieve. And I I've had to turn off that switch. Because I think a lot of us athletes or retired athletes, we have that switch in there, which which we do run hot.
Sue Enquist:Yeah. And I think also, it's part switch. And part kind of like just a redirect. Because the passion that I have, I feel grateful every day, because that helps me with staying active and being in the water every day and having this wonderful life integration with my work that allows me to wake up every day. And I just love what I do I love you know, people say, Oh, you It must be so nice to be retired all that pressure. I never, I never felt pressure from anybody other than my own pressure might administration. What at UCLA was the most supportive? I had an amazing boss and Betsy Stevenson, and Dan Guerrero, PATRINA. Along these were amazing leaders, they kind of just let us do what we needed to do up there. Because our players were graduating, and we were winning. It's a wonderful combination, where I have regret. And I think I am the person that says, fascinated by my colleagues, you know, the retiring like, No, I don't have any regrets. I really have no regrets. I have like 1000, I have 1000 regrets. And but I think the one big regret was understanding that transactional coaching doesn't work anymore. And it has to become transformational for the student athlete, the student athlete has to know, this is a safe space emotionally. You can have joy and high standards at the same time, right? But you don't have to have this huge identity tension, that while you're a bad person, if you can't get it done, but you can still have high standards and have fun. And it wasn't until the end, that I felt like that all started to come together in a seamless way. That's good. That's my passion intact, which is something I'm really proud of did John
JOHN MOFFET:wouldn't have anything to do with your kind of transformation as a coach from throwing the trophy in the trash can to and being less transactional and more transformational.
Sue Enquist:i Yes. But he came into my life very intimately right when I became a sole head coach, and I felt like for the first time, I could speak to him as a true colleague. Because up until that point, I went all the way up into the gym, I I was so enamored by him. And to the point where I could be comfortable. I'm like, I'm just an assistant. I'm not gonna bug him with questions. But when I became this online coach, I knew I wanted to interview Use the pyramid into our program more. So when you think about the processes and the principles that Papa had instilled in all of us, that was very easy, because that very linear, and very black and white. And so I love that, where I know he helped me was when I started to demonstrate behavior. That said, I'm going too far on the X's and O's side, I had two really stopping points with my student athletes. One was when one of my best players and one of my most gifted student athletes sat me down and said, it's really interesting that you reference us as they, when we lose. And we notice in the articles you talk about, they don't get it, they don't understand what it takes. If they want to go to the next level, they need to do this. But then when we when you say us, and I am telling you, that was a kick in the stomach, I can barely even talk about it because I had such blind spots. That was number one. And then number two, was, when I had two brilliant specialists, these are people that maybe run the bases, or they're a pinch hitter or pinch. You know, they're a pinch runner. Both of them, Julie Hoshizaki. And Amanda Simpson are two incredible people that sat me down and said, clearly, you have created two societies of starters, and non starters. And we notice it even in how you lay out practice. Because when it comes to all the little things around bass running and pinch, hitting, you've put no energy in your discipline, that, that hit me in the heart, because I took great pride in my attention to detail. And those two points, made me go to coach and say, I need to talk about this. And he says, you haven't figured out how to love the game, on your best days and your worst days. And on your best days, you're probably giving everybody the attention. But on your worst day, you're becoming the worst version of yourself. And you have to learn, I'll never forget the day he said this, you have to learn to love the game unconditionally. And I just flipped the switch right there. I said, I'm going out. I'm going to love these kids. And I'm going to love this game. Whether we're winning, or we're losing, and I know they were the beneficiary of a better experience.
JOHN MOFFET:I said it at the beginning that your life has been filled with so many blessings and gifts. But it seems they've continued all through your coaching career with being in a place like UCLA and everything that UCLA has. And then John Wooden on top of it, it must be something that you look back upon with great fondness now that you're in chapter two.
Sue Enquist:Well, I when I talk about UCLA, it is the gift that keeps on giving. I was afforded a scholarship because of UCLA. I graduated from an institution that taught me the important principles around social justice and serving others. In a time before it was even popular, or a controversy. And I grew up, I never went without I am a white woman of privilege grew up in South Orange County, little sleepy town. But I went to UCLA and I saw a completely different world. I saw people from all over the world, all different colors, all different backgrounds, all different attitudes. And UCLA has this incredible ability to make curiosity, the most valued thing, and to be a good listener. And there was never this, identifying the gaps of our differences. As much as UCLA did a great job of saying, Ooh, we share some amazing things. Because we all made it here. And this idea of ruins constantly trying to represent excellence, but also to have humility that we stand on the shoulders of others. And our job is now to advocate and advance others that don't have the access of people like Sue Enquist. And so then I go into chapter two. And now I'm back on campus as an instructor in our Graduate School of Education because we've started a master's program in transformational coaching and leadership. And so once again, UCLA is giving suing was, again, another opportunity to be in a platform to learn and to also instruct alongside our students.
JOHN MOFFET:That's amazing. So how long have you been in that? role as a as an instructor teacher at UCLA,
Sue Enquist:I'm going into my third, I still use the coaching vernacular, I'm going into my third season. I teaching two quarters, winter quarter where UCLA is in the quarters. Yeah. And it's a master's program. And I co instruct with one of the finest individuals I've ever met in Dr. Anna Marie Francoise. And we construct principles of coaching and leading in winter and spring quarter.
JOHN MOFFET:I want to attend.
INTRO:You're welcome. Anytime I'll slip me in the back door.
JOHN MOFFET:I love that. In your time coaching, you came up with a couple of different? I don't know what exactly to call it. But you have you have an idea where you call it the 33%? Rule? Isn't that what you call it? What in what what is that?
Sue Enquist:Well, first of all, I am in alignment with all coaches were stealer of ideas. And I can remember early on in my career, I had heard this concept and it was probably the single, strongest, most valuable concept I used every day, if you can remember to have the awareness of the 33% rule. It can apply in your workplace, it can apply in your personal life with your friends in your family. But it's pretty simple. It goes like this, it's you got a third of the people in your life in your workplace that literally never got the memo, to put a filter on it, that life is a team sport, that it's not about you. So there's a third of the people in this world that will just suck the life out of you. Like literally, they come to work, and all they're doing is barfing out. Oh my gosh, my oh my gosh, the rain. Oh my gosh, my shoes, oh my gosh, my co worker, oh, my gosh, the third quarter report, and they're just barfing barfing. Barfi not having the awareness that most of the time if we know that on that doorknob on the other side, it's either me or it's weed during the day 99%. It's about we. And so to have the awareness that everybody has struggles, everybody has challenges, I'm either going to bring or take energy from the room. And if we can always be aware of the bottom third, the middle third, we have lots of people like this, it's the belly of the bell shaped curve, right? That's the largest percentage of people, they're actually pretty high performers. When things are great. Everything has to line up, they have to be in the role that like not working too hard. Don't put too much pressure on me. middle thirds love life when life is lovely. But the minute things go south, someone takes away some of your credit, someone's going to ask you to do something that's not in your lane, you become the bottom third. So you kind of blow in the wind, middle. Third, I always challenge people to reflect, are you a middle third person, I challenge you to just show up every day and give 100% of what you have. I'm not a big, oh, give 110% really no such thing. It's very difficult to even give 100% 100% Because life kick kicks us in the stomach. But you can show up every day with your friends with your family and with your work to say you know what, I'm at 90% today, and I'm going to give you 100% of my 90. I'm going to be here and I'm going to put in the work. I know that my finances are shaky, my marriage might be shaky, but I'm going to come here and be in this moment be where my feet are, and give you everything I have. middle third cannot do that full time because all the scenarios have to be in alignment for them to be strong. But last is that top third I challenge everybody's capable of being top there. And you just have to have the awareness that it's hard. And let's not be afraid of hard you're going to be a separator. If you're the one that volunteers you're the one that raises your hand. You're the one that comes early and stays late. People often ask me how do I separate myself in an interview, I say talk about two things. Talk about what it looks like to come early and stay late because you're going to separate yourself because most people come late leave early. And number two be able to articulate your failure recovery system to prove to your potential boss you know how to own things, move on, not carry grudges, and be present in the next challenge because we know life is full of Back to Back challenges. So in the end, just be aware of bottom thirds don't let them permeate you don't fall victim to be in middle third because that's so average everybody's there the view is crappy and go out every single day when your toes hit the floor. Just say I'm going to give 100% of what I have today. This morning, this afternoon. And this evening we only have to get 1% better today that's pretty manageable and if we keep it that simple, life is pretty fun.
JOHN MOFFET:I love that because it's so applicable obviously to sports because that's where it came from. But it is so applicable to life and the everyday that all have us live, whether it comes to our family to, you know, to our, you know, our creative endeavors to our, you know, to our sport. Another thing that you've spoken up quite a bit is your voice, your, your weak voice and your strong voice. Tell me a little bit about the weak voice and the strong voice. Well,
Sue Enquist:I mean, first of all, we now know science has done so much amazing research on this. So this isn't rainbows and unicorns, and some random woman that's making up these concepts. This is all backed by science, we know that brain is just a tape recorder, you don't necessarily get rid of bad habits or bad thoughts, simply covering them up with more affirmation. And in general, when I'm dealing with corporate individuals on one v one consultation, or I'm dealing with teams, we're not building an awareness around our strong and weak voice, because you never get rid of that. And so I'm the person that goes around the country and says, Listen, I have won. Individually, I've won as teams, in softball in other sports. in corporate America, I know what works, if you're willing to put in the work. Without getting the result right away, I guarantee you, in the long run, you're going to walk away from whatever you're doing with more peace of mind, because we know ultimately peace of mind, is the new valued asset, not so much the trophy, you talk to the student athletes today? Yeah, that trophy is nice. But Oh, could you give me some peace of mind, because I don't feel really that great about myself. And so I spent a lot of time having student athletes having corporate employees, you know, and it feels at first very elementary to them. To take out a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle, and on the left side, put 10 on the weak lot. On the bright side, put weak voice. Now I want you to go ahead and write out your mantras. What do you feel good about? What do you not feel good about regarding yourself. The weak column is filled chock full of all their mantras of what they're not, they're not capable, not smart enough, not big enough, not strong enough. And then they'll strong voice has maybe one or two. And it's because it's easier to measure the gaps every single day of what you're not versus reminding yourself of the inventory of the things you continue to accomplish to get to this point, today. And those that win over time. They actually have mastered this, because there's two things that they do extremely well, high performers, I don't care if you're dealing with a fortune 100 company, or you're dealing with an Olympic athlete, there's two things they do really well. They know how to be in the moment. Because if I can be in the moment, I have very little asks where it's overwhelming, is in, in these moments of what people define as pressure, I call them opportunities. The average thinker will go, oh, my gosh, we are in the finals of the Olympics in Tokyo. Look what's on the line, our sport has never won. That's average thinking, because you're going to the past we'd never won. And you're projecting future failure. What if we don't win it? Those that are highly trained have the ability to say, what is the game asking me of this moment? Oh, stay wide athletic, let your eyes do the work. Perfect. Because your body's already putting in all the investments. You don't even have to tell your body what to do. It's on automatic. And once you learn how to manage that, literally that mindset of being present in the moment you've you've tackled 50% of the challenge.
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Sue Enquist:And once you learn how to manage that, literally that mindset of being present in the moment, you've, you've tackled 50% of the challenge. The second thing, they do extremely well, when they fail in the moment, they move through through it quicker, better than anybody I've ever met. Whether it be flipping a company, or winning a gold medal in Tokyo, they move through here with more efficiency, their failure recovery system is more efficient than anybody else around them. So where we're sending can sideways, we're saying, Oh, look at the greatest softball player ever. Lisa Fernandez, look at the greatest volleyball player, Jordan Larson. They're so fearless. No, they're not. They have a lot of fear. But we want to teach you how to hold hands with fear. Because fear is just energy that doesn't know where to go. Once we teach you where to put that energy, where your feet are, you can go ahead and let your eyes just trust what your body needs to do, and let it go on automatic. And I know I'm simplifying it, but it takes great discipline to keep big moments, simplified,
JOHN MOFFET:that's mastery to be able to do that. One of the keynotes that I saw of you used an example of this, of the weak voice, and it was you had some actual no quotes from your players. Things like emotionally, I'm not strong, I can't make another mistake, I want to quit, you see that. And it's it's very cut and dry kind of all those poor athletes. But then you overlay the fact that these were some of the finest players that you've ever had. These are some of the finest players, national champions Olympians. And it was not only profound, but it was moving to me. And it was like such a great lesson. That just because you are a great athlete, doesn't mean that you're not fighting through, well fear and failure and, and struggling in the moment because you do and have to pull yourself back.
Sue Enquist:Yeah, and if I can just for those listeners out there that are parents stop cheering about winning, and start cheering about the person that's executing the process. So when they get in those big moments, they're just going to go for it because they know, everyone's going to love them. Because they they're being loved as a young boy, or young girl or young woman or a young man, we have put so much value on on my daughter's playing softball at UCLA, or my son is playing USA volleyball. And these athletes grow up. And they only identify as a volleyball player. So if I don't win the championship, I'm not worthy. Because my parents had been bragging about me for the last 10 years, I've got to win the gold medal. And what I constantly try to remind these athletes is it's okay not to be okay. And what can we do to out you, I want to out your fear, I want to get your fear out of the closet. Because we all come to these high performance environments. Everyone's coming in all your four time Olympian, your four time NCAA Player of the Year, and then we all come in to this Olympic environment, and everyone's got their armor on, I'm all that I just call bullshit. Because high performers, they have a frequency that's a little bit higher than everybody else's. And they're bringing in stimuli all the time. They're constantly got to fight. You're not good enough, you're not moving fast enough. Are you the fastest in the world, they have to fight that with the inventory that they're doing every day. I imagine if we made it a standard that we celebrate, when you make it to your NGB you find that national governing body that every sport has a national governing body for our listeners, they pick the Olympic team. What if we said you this is the top of the mountain, there is nothing bigger than putting a flag on your uniform. There is nothing bigger than putting a flag on your uniform. So we're gonna celebrate you got here. Not now we got to go the next level. You never win that when we go to that two week road trip every four years you better win a model, or you're not worthy. What if we flip the script and said, No first thing we're gonna do when you come into this high performance, we're gonna celebrate that you made it. And the rest of this time. We're on house money. So let's go for it. Because you already made it. Because right now in our country GB environments, and I've dealt with many GBS, that's not the mindset, it's more about, like wringing out a little bit more, because the margin for error is even smaller. So you need to be even more perfect. I'm saying, let's celebrate, go for it, we're gonna build the support system around you to have your back because the person that's right behind you is almost as good as you anyway. And to me that gets into the team concepts and the team dynamics around how you balance individual greatness with Team mastery.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, you mentioned earlier that you retired when you retired in 2006, as head coach that you retired with your passion intact? What did you do after you completed your coaching career? Because you've also mentioned that you retired, I'm doing air quotes. But you weren't really retired? Were you? What, what were what were those next passion projects that you started?
Sue Enquist:Well, I coached at UCLA for 27 years, I was there as a player total 31 and then got into administration and now an instructor. But when I retired in Oh, six, I was really curious about, could I help close the gap between the sport family and the college coach, because the rules preclude the college coach from being transparent with the parents, because all the contact rules, I want to go ahead and spend the first three years traversing the country and finding out what the parent player and coach, what their pain points are. And then I'm going to go to all my colleagues that I know and say, will you answer these questions? Because you trusted voice in the space, you've sustained success over time, I'm going to close the gap. And so I went on this amazingly wonderful journey to create one softball, which is a free website, one softball.com. One is spelled out o ne, Once all.com is a content site for parents, players and coaches around character development, technical development and a path to college. And it was a it's a passion project for me, and proud of the fact that we've designed and developed 11 102 minute videos for our parents, primarily in our coaches. But we have great videos in there, speaking our Olympians, speaking to our student athletes around managing fear and failure, and how to go out and do the right thing and environment or sometimes it's not. And so right out of coaching, that's what I did, and then obviously built a consulting business around competitive excellence and team cohesion. And so I had Bruin enterprises, which is my consulting company, and then one softball.com. And so both of those, I have kept me pretty busy here in retirement.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, but the one softball calm is also its universals for any athlete aspiring athlete to enter college. I mean, it's not just softball, right?
Sue Enquist:Well, it that content, technically, is all softball people talking about universal themes. So if you're looking, if you're a parent, and you're looking for the straight scoop on path to college, we've got it for you in one sample. com. It's just you're not going to know the people if you're a parent of a soccer player, you're not going to know icon Mike Kendrick, or icon Kelly in a way Perez or Patty gasso. But the content will resonate with you.
JOHN MOFFET:That's great. You know, you I heard a kind of a staggering statistic from you. And that is that 67% of girls, they quit sports by the age of 13. Why is that?
Sue Enquist:There's too. Our research shows there's two main reasons Number one, it's not fun anymore, because what happened is from day one, he and she said, I play because I want to have fun. So we stopped listening to that. That's number one. She leaves the game and sodas he he leaves the game because it's no longer fun. And then number two is the lack of knowledgeable coaching. Lack of instruction quality instruction is another reason parents pull their children out of sport.
JOHN MOFFET:I don't know about you, but when I started swimming, I it was it was my it was my bliss. It was my space. It was where I would go, and even even our daughter we have a daughter that plays sports in division one and you just see her stress melt away when she enters the court. Is that something that's also interrupted by not having fun, or by having coaches that are not well trained?
Sue Enquist:Well, there's, there's no doubt about it. And remember, collegiate sport is very interesting. It's one of the very few industries where you need no certification in teaching or coaching. Wow, well, I could be a former great centerfielder. And I can get a job just by the sheer fact that I wore the UCLA uniform, I have no principles around teaching, I have no technical knowledge around coaching. And so our sport, and many sports are like that. Our sport industry is going through somewhat of a renaissance because our NGBs, and our coaches associations are realizing we've got to do a better job of getting these young coaches ready. So when your daughter enters eighth, a coach learning environment, they are emotionally safe. And so we need really three things we need to as a coach, we need to have technical knowledge and teaching principles. So it's one thing to know the technical part, if I don't know the principles behind teaching, and how people learn, it's critically important. Number two, is have to have emotional IQ if you don't have it, instinctually. And if you say, I'm not sure I have it, that means you don't. And last, how do I, as the creator of the practice environment, create the conditions for this to be the fun zone. So technical knowledge, emotional learning, and creating the conditions are three really important pillars that we're not standardizing for people that want to get into coaching? Because today's student athlete, no one is spending enough time saying, This generation of athletes today, first of all, they're number one influencers, the internet. So your your parenting is part of the first generation where her demographics as what where I get my information is on the internet. And so as a parent, you're constantly fighting the noise that comes into her head everywhere, whether it's through her own phone, her friend's phone, in society, they grew up at a very, very fast rate, where our country's not safe. Our government is shady, our church is questionable. So we need to cut slack for our student athletes today. When people say tiny just lack the confidence. They just don't trust. They're just so melancholy. Well, why don't you go out one day and have to document your life every minute of every day, take pictures of your food, have your friends, have your peace song, and be happy 24/7 and see how you feel after the first two weeks. It's a terrible equation that we have them under. And the last reprieve is that two hours of sport. And now we're laying it down. You got to get better every day. I challenge coaches every day. Have you implemented the zero station in 2021? What's the zero station? What is it? Zero. They just go. station seven. Today's stations are 12 minutes each, you're gonna have 12 minutes of doing nothing. If you want to roll up in a ball in the grass, and just chill you can you want to talk to your friends and giggle you can. But we're going to allow you to stop and no one's gonna judge you. No one's gonna reprimand you. And you can just exhale. coaches out there. Do you have a zero station? That's my question to our community.
JOHN MOFFET:I love that. COVID the circumstances of COVID he kind of changed the entire equation of sports over the past year and a half or so for every athlete on every level. And you were brought in to consult with the team USA women's volleyball team. I guess that was was that early 2020?
Sue Enquist:Yeah, it was because I had partnered with their USA volleyball national development program and I was supposed to attend the summit and be a speaker and COVID hit so we went on Zoom. And what that did is that afforded the some of the veterans on USA volleyball to actually be on the Zoom when I was on zoom at the same time. And I went through my principles of competitive excellence and a couple of the players literally said to the coaches, I think it would be great to have Sue speak to our national team. So I got the call, I said, Sure. And I did that. And I just, you know, always throw out my number to everybody. If you ever need anything, I'm in your back pocket, because for me giving back is the most important thing because the sport has given me so much. And I found out that, you know, the, the captain Jordan Larson called and said, Hey, would you be willing to talk to some of the women on the team? And I'm like, sure, you know, and little did I know, that was actually kind of like a little bit of an interview. And I didn't know it at the time, they had already gone Coach, Coach Kiraly was already talking about finding somebody to help around team cohesion and individual mastery areas. And yet, it was very unorthodox, right? I mean, usually, they're gonna hire a psychologist or a mental performance. You know, practitioner, and the players, we just had this wonderful conversation about what it takes to manage pressure and what it takes to think and play as a team. And the next thing you know, Karch, and I both live in San Clemente, which is fun. We're both Bruins, which is even more fun. And he said, Sue, could I meet with you? And I said, Sure. Now at that point, I'm done. I'm already moving on with my other partners. He's like, we have lunch. I'm like, Sure. So we had lunch. And he said, Would you consider working with our national team? I was like, doing what? And he says, Well, I want them to tell you, I think it should come from them. I think they are the ones that are very interested in having you. I think this is very unorthodox. He wasn't he wasn't very sure. B, mainly because at this point, people don't realize this story. At this point, the Olympics were still on. So the idea of bringing in another coach from another sport, three months before the Olympics is Whoa. And so I met with the women on the team. And they said, we just want to be able to navigate this online experience with each other. We're all over the world. And if they don't have the Olympics, we just want to get ahead of the game. And I said, Okay, well, let me see what's holding you back. And I would like to have it be probationary. That's basically to protect them to get an out if I'm not a fit, because I'm, you know, I'm like drinking out of like a firehose, right. They may go, well, we can't handle her. That's too much. Thanks, Sue. We did it 90 days, and this is too much. And so the first 90 days were kind of like probation, and I went from being a consultant to be in their greatest fan, I have never dealt with a group of higher integrity. Then I have USA volleyball. And that's a big statement. I've dealt with lots of groups, but I have never individually. And as a coaching staff, I've never dealt with a group that the coaching staff, his coaching staff, the best in the industry, zero ego on their coaching staff. They're how they mesh, share information, how he has his specialists in each area and how they work together was a masterpiece, and then taking the players and trying to get them to recalibrate how they think, just very tricky, because they didn't know who I was. Volleyball, if you said before I came into the picture, who is Sue Enquist? I would say maybe, well, I no one knows. Because she's a Bruin. But I would say maybe two people out of the 23. So that was interesting, right? So I wasn't able to use any of my cache of just walking in the room and having them say, she's one of us. But what you find out about excellence and competitive greatness, those principles, that's a language we all recognize with one another. So you and I can sit down to different worlds and go oh, yeah, I get it. And slowly but surely, that's what happened. And so what we did is we just, I took a very transformative approach to our team cohesion with the players and I said, I am going to be your consultant. And there are times that I may get into coaching by you may link over into coaching you and I want you to slap me in the forehead and not let me do that because my job is to be transformative for you and not transactional, very easy for me to come in and lecture all of you on your effort and your attitude and what it takes. And I want us to go on this journey together, and I want to facilitate you having the best conditions to be your best self. Because I got in John, I got in three months in. I knew they had it. They, they, they, they had it all. Wow.
JOHN MOFFET:And that's just the team chemistry, the the
Sue Enquist:they had everything it takes to play as a highly efficient, high performing team. I just help them I shined a light on what they were and help them get organized. I would love to take credit, but I can't, I could talk about other things I get credit for in my life. I do not get credit for what they created. Because they had it all I was so sure I literally dropped a pushed all my partnerships, because I wanted to give 100% of this, because I knew they were going to do something special. I just knew they were and it was just a matter of them building it out. And having them value what they created more than the jewelry, more than the Tokyo jewelry. To be able to say this was really special win lose draw, we're going to celebrate this memory, this point in time, that joy became equally as important as winning a medal. And this was a very diverse group, we had people that we're traditionalists transactional, we've got to all be at 100% Perfect, or else it's not going to work judging others. And we had those that needed to breathe, and exhale and have fun and have joy. So they didn't get suffocated by expectations. And to watch them come together, get it organized, get tested, all during the tournament, a little bit of everything, and go through the quarters. The semis in the finals, they never dropped a game.
JOHN MOFFET:Crazy. It's amazing. It really Yeah. And I'm familiar with volleyball. So we of course, were, were watching it and and they mentioned your contributions to the team. And for any of the listeners that might not know, but they won the gold medal. And, you know, you you were actually shown in the live broadcast they showed you in the stands. I mean, it's it, what a wonderful tribute to the accumulation of wisdom that you've had over the years that you're able to be part of this, this team that ultimately won gold and possibly even cherishes the memory of what they did together as a team more so than as you say, the jewelry.
Sue Enquist:Yeah, there's no doubt about it. And we talked about how we all know that trophies and medals, they expire in 24 hours. And, you know, I remember saying to them, your, when you get out of that court, you're gonna do something really special because you have fallen in love with this process of taking care of one another and being great on the bench. And knowing that the game will never throw anything other than one point at a time at you. And really buying into this simplicity of the game and falling in love with the game again, like you did when you first played volleyball. And we remember those days, you know, John, you remember the first few times you just jumped in the pool without expectations. And without it was just such a high and to watch them be able to live that they're going to have this forever. And then just for them to be able to have that we were the first ones, there's only one first. And you know, that's really your ego that gets excited about that. But being the first is usually the most challenging, because you have no artifact of how to do it. And you're creating the road as you're walking on the road. And the watch this team balanced so beautifully. The grit that it takes to be great, and the grace that it takes to be imperfect. And so one thing that's really been interesting for me working with multiple teams, the last couple years is to really introduce this idea. It's hard for coaches that are transactional, but we've got to be able to have language around grace you got 20 people on your team, I guarantee you 20 are going to buy in. So those three bottom thirds, give them grace. No, it doesn't mean lower the standard, it just means let's figure out how we're going to keep them motivated. Well, that's not fair. Well, that's transactional, transactional players are going to do this constant weighing what's fair, what's not fair. Sport is perfect. Humans are imperfect. So we've got to be able to do the math who's going to do a little bit more, who's going to go ahead and do extra who's going to help them make sure they get here and there, and this to watch this team gives so much grace, and to watch the coaching staff and watch Karch, who is to me epitomizes mastery, he is such a lifelong learner, that we standardized team and ship. And we're able to do it in a way that we could communicate to the coaches, here are the things that we defined as valuable. These are the things cards we want in the teammates, that are going to get picked as Olympians. And I said to the players, I said, you guys get so organized on this, and we start walking the walk with your coaches, they're going to give you huge, huge power, even down to the finals, cart says you have earned the right to pick your teammates. And this Olympic team had a voice in the selection of the final 12. I mean, who does that? That to me that's a reflection of Karch and his ability to say, Hey, I've been there Karch Karch has been there. He knows players know more about who to trust than the coaches. And he gave those 18 people all got we, you know, I built out a questionnaire anonymous, we defined what the criteria was. And I said, Coach, you can use this either as a tiebreaker or to reaffirm what you as coaches have already done. And he says I like it. I like this, it's we've got our own interests, and how we see the game. And we value what our players are building around teammate ship. To me that's unprecedented. If Karch Kiraly can do it with the Olympic team. Surely you can do it at Spa Gogi, Illinois, you know, Little Sisters of the Poor team that's in the middle of the conference. So the moral of the story is transformation is about listening to the players learning what they know, and creating the conditions to lift them up. And I am most proud of the fact that these women who they are is what allowed them to drive their process. And it's just so wonderful that they got to reap the benefits. Because you know, you don't always get the results that you want. Even if you put in all the work. That's why it's so important to value the work because you can't control the results can't control the W.
JOHN MOFFET:So well. So well said all athletes retire. What would you hope your former student athletes or youth athletes or Olympic gold medalists? What would you hope that they remember about the time that they spent with you?
Sue Enquist:That's a good, that's a good question. I would hope that they would say she was somebody that was still in love with excellence. She was someone that created belief in processes. And she was unshakeable in our ability to get it done.
JOHN MOFFET:Well, thank you, Sue, for sharing your thoughts on athletes and coaching. And of course, we got a little bit of life in there as well. Because, you know, after all, we all know that the lessons that we learn in sports also enhanced us in many other ways. There's no doubt about it. Thank you.
Sue Enquist:Thank you for havingme.
JOHN MOFFET:Sue asked me to leave you with three final thoughts that you can apply to sports as well as life. One. Love the game on your best and worst days, too. There are only two things in the world you can control your effort, and your attitude. And finally, excellence never blinks. I'm John Moffet and thanks for joining us today for another episode of sports life balance. I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Sue Enquist and if you did, please tell a friend. Have an excellent week everyone. Thanks for listening to Sports Life Balance.