As the two weeks of Super Bowl mania reached a mind-numbing crescendo, it was hard for even the most ardent football fan to deny that perhaps sports does, indeed, play too large a role in our society. Among the many examples of hyperbole and manufactured drama you heard was the portrayal of the head coaches as men of great social consequence, vaunted generals leading their men into battle.
As inappropriate as that may be — and I certainly think it is — when it comes to the intellectual, emotional and physical demands of the job, being a head coach in the National Football League is more challenging than any CEO job I’ve seen. This is based on getting to know a number of coaches in the league and watching what their work entails.
Above all else, the scrutiny endured by a head coach is unmatched in corporate America. How many CEOs have so many of their decisions, large and small, second-guessed and analyzed by so many? From newspaper reporters who have never coached or played the game, to former head coaches who get paid to make outlandish and critical statements on television, to angry fans calling radio stations to question the wisdom of going for it on fourth down instead of kicking a field goal, there is no other job more closely observed and discussed. Coaches have no sense of obscurity or privacy.
The same cannot be said of CEOs. Most employees, journalists and shareholders have little or no visibility into the daily decisions made by their leaders. Privacy and secrecy are a given in business. And even if they could call in to a radio station and have their say, outsiders wouldn’t have much to talk about because so much time elapses between the moment a big corporate decision is made and the impact it has on the bottom line of a company that few outside the executive suite would be able to trace it back accurately.
In the NFL, a coach often has only a few minutes before he is called on to explain a decision, leaving no time to craft a response and have it reviewed by lawyers and PR people. One coach I know made a questionable decision during a game, but his team won anyway. As I was driving out of the parking lot less than 15 minutes after the contest was over, I heard him on the radio being grilled by an announcer who demanded an explanation.
No CEO in America faces as much scrutiny, job
insecurity and responsibility as an NFL coach.
And then there is the timing of the scrutiny — and feedback — that coaches receive, namely, that they get so much of it while they are doing their jobs. Fans let their opinions, especially the unfavorable ones, be known in no uncertain terms during games. Whether it is a slightly intoxicated fan screaming obscenities from the field level seats, or a chorus of boos raining down from the upper deck, a coach has nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. A few months ago I saw an angry woman attempt to spit on the car of a head coach after the home team lost a close game.
There is no comparison to this when it comes to running a corporation, where decisions are made and executives are sequestered behind closed doors. Imagine an executive team holding a staff meeting while a group of employees, faces painted and alcohol running through their veins, shout their suggestions and opinions from bleachers inside the conference room. And if that weren’t enough, they have access to instant replay when they want to make sure that they didn’t miss something.
The fact is, CEOs and their teams are buffered from their constituents almost completely. Even chief executives who embezzle money from their companies or make strategic errors that result in the loss of thousands of jobs are shielded from the direct and harsh criticism of their employees and shareholders.
But perhaps the most difficult and frustrating source of scrutiny that head coaches must endure is that of their ultimate boss, the team owner. No board chair can compare to the modern NFL owner, who is one of the last vestiges of royalty in America. I don’t know any CEOs who require their employees to address them formally, but you’ll find most NFL owners referred to as Mr. Owner instead of just Bob.
That is just one example of how the egos of so many team owners make most board chairs look like puppies. Keep in mind that many of these owners purchased their teams as a hobby after already having made a pile of money running a real business. Their teams are their high-profile toys, sources of attention more than anything else. Because there is no real accountability for an owner (none have ever fired themselves), they look externally when it comes to assigning blame for failure, especially when they’re getting pressure from those journalists, announcers and fans I mentioned before. Which is why they abandon so many of their coaches in shame relatively soon after having hired them with great praise.
This year we have seen a massive but increasingly expected churn of coaches in the league. When you compare the average tenure of a coach, just over 2 1/2 years, with that of Fortune 500 CEOs, more than seven years, you get a sense of how precarious an NFL job can be. And remember that when a head coach is fired, there are only 31 other lateral job opportunities available for him.
As if the scrutiny and job insecurity were not enough, the day-to-day responsibilities of an NFL head coach are beyond anything I see in business. No CEO in America has so much direct responsibility for personnel management, strategy, tactics and public relations, and with so many assistant coaches, players and staff to manage, an NFL coach has more potential management challenges than any executive I’ve seen in the corporate world.
It is a wonder that anyone wants to be an NFL coach.
Patrick Lencioni was recently named by Fortune magazine as one of the “Top Ten Gurus You Should Know.” He is the author of eight best-selling books including The Wall Street Journal business best-seller, “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.” For more information contact www.tablegroup.com
