HOW TO BE TED LASSO

I started watching Ted Lasso in 2022, when 2 seasons had already been released. It's undoubtedly a good show, but I personally feel a value beyond that. It revealed to me a leadership model that resonates with me.

I found the show at the time when I was beginning to realize that the methods I use at work to keep my team going and the way I communicate with my teammates have their problems. It seemed more like dictatorship than leadership.

Don't think I was that bad. I always loved people, I always had a tendency to make friends easily. But I controlled and led my teammates too much to get things done.

When work wouldn't get done despite these methods, I would do it myself. I would fix, rewrite, and redirect my people. Rarely did any work get done without me. I unconsciously made myself a bottleneck in the system.

I hated it all, burned out, pushed myself to keep going that way, but after a while, I started to notice that my efforts had little correlation with the results. I understood that I had to do things differently. I understood that the only way to change our trajectory was to start developing the potential of my team members, but I had no idea how. And then I found that show.

Honestly, I have never been like Ted Lasso. I feel like sometimes I still lack patience and humanity. But I want to get better.

Here are 3 tips I wrote down for myself to be more like Ted.

Be a supporting character

Be honest with yourself, you are not the center of the universe.

Everyone has their own story in their head and you are not the main character there. The main character is always the person themselves.

Just accept that and choose another role if you want to be in that person's life.

Ted was never the coolest or the smartest or even the funniest on the show (only if you are a fan of dad jokes). At least in the first season, which inspired me more than any other. He is not a classic main character. He is more of a supporting character. In classic monomyths*, you don't even notice people like him. He does not show his ego, he is always in the shadow of others. But he is still important.

He is not even a retired hero with secrets and hidden power in his pocket. He's not Dumbledor, he's not going to manipulate you and lead you to victory. He is not Eric from The Phoenix Project, who knew everything and ruled from the shadows. He is simply your friend, and all he can offer you on your journey is his constant support.

Serve instead of rule

You can't make the best decisions for other people.

Stop trying to be the smartest guy in the room. You'll be wrong too often, and you can't pay enough attention to dive deep into the context every time.

Create an environment where people feel comfortable and where nothing distracts them from doing their best.

The first thing Ted Lasso did as coach was put the complaint box in the middle of the locker room. He got the complaint about a bad shower and he fixed it.

He wasn't trying to be important, he was trying to be useful. When you dominate and command, you limit the true potential of your people. If you tell people directly what to do, they'll literally do it without thinking about improving the plan. And thank God if you really are the smartest and can rule right. But most likely you will make mistake after mistake and no one will stop you because you are too loud.

Sacrifice effectiveness, but build trust

Don't punish people for screwing up; forgive and support them, and find a way to help them learn from their mistakes. Even if punishment is more effective in the short term.

Don't prevent people from making mistakes by watching their every move. Prevent only catastrophic consequences and let other small and medium problems happen.

Help people understand how to prevent these mistakes themselves. Even if it does not seem as effective as prevention.

If people trust you, they will always tell you about upcoming problems instead of hiding them.

When people trust you and other team members, they can understand each other's half-words and get work done faster than they could on their own.

When people trust you, you can mobilize them in emergencies and chaos and give direct orders, and they will listen and do what you say because you are trustworthy.

Of course, love and trust are not enough to achieve great results. And to build trust, you may have to spend years investing in it every day, keeping yourself away from direct command. You have to be very patient, because in early stages every wrong move can ruin everything you have built.

But without trust, your team can't be more than the sum of its parts (and that's in good cases). You can't have synergy or emergence* without trust. Trust is the blood of an emergent system.

If you don't want to spend time building trust in your team, you probably don't need a team. There are other stable forms of organization, such as work groups. It's not necessary to have trust or relationships if you have this type of organization. The blood of such a group will be rules, ethics, and procedures. And of course, it can sometimes be more useful, especially in the short term, especially if you have enough money to gather the best specialists.

But remember, a team of friends will always beat a group of mercenaries in the infinite game. And only with this team you can play Total Football.