How I Train Chief Reminding Officers: Part II — Feedback and Calling Timeout
The NBA’s greatest coach teaches you the art of selective interruption.
NOTE: This article is part of my series on the “Chief Reminding Officer,” a concept inspired by Pat Lencioni’s ideas in The Advantage. To read the series from the beginning, just click here.
The NBA’s Best Coach Loves the Early Timeout
It didn’t take long for the San Antonio Spurs to make their first mistake.
It’s January 28, 2019, and the Spurs have just tipped off a home game against the Washington Wizards. After winning the opening tip, the Wizards’ Bradley Beal runs off a screen and dishes to center Thomas Bryant. The Spurs’ defense steps up to challenge Bryant. But they move slowly. Too slowly.
Bryant capitalizes, slamming home a barely-contested dunk. He flexes at his bench as he runs back up the floor. The San Antonio home crowd falls silent, and the Spurs let the ball bounce a few times before picking it up for the inbound, clearly embarrassed at their early miscue. Whoops.
Then the whistle blows. The players look around, confused. The teams glance towards the ref, then towards their coaches, wondering why the game has stopped. Finally, it’s clear. Gregg Popovich, head coach of the Spurs, walks purposefully onto the floor, clipboard in hand, ready to address his team.
Coach Popovich has called timeout.
A few of the Wizards players chuckle as they walk to their bench.
16 seconds have elapsed in the game. A timeout? This early? Is this guy nuts?
While the sudden timeout raised a few eyebrows, those who know “Coach Pop” weren’t surprised. Popovich calls more timeouts in games’ opening minutes than any other NBA coach — 5x more than the next closest during the 2018 season. His behavior might seem impulsive, even petty, to the casual basketball fan. Why burn a valuable timeout just to yell at your team in the first minute of a game? When asked to explain his habit, here’s what Coach Pop said:
“If I see something that’s particularly egregious based on what our game plan was supposed to be, then I try to do something to get them focused a little bit quicker. It mostly depends on the level of execution deficit, I suppose.”
Paraphrasing slightly, here’s my version of Coach Pop’s philosophy on timeouts. “If we’re falling behind or not doing what we’re supposed to — not matter when that happens — I’m not afraid to stop the action and help the team regroup.”
His approach works. Coach Pop’s track record is astonishing. He is the winningest coach in NBA history, and the longest-tenured active head coach in any major professional sport. He is a three-time NBA Coach of the Year, he has claimed five NBA championships over three decades, all while working with ever-changing rosters and a wide range of player personalities. The man is a master of getting the most out of his team.
How does he do it? Well, for one, he is uncommonly willing to stop the action whenever he needs to — even if it’s a little early or a little awkward — to reorient his team, deliver some focused coaching, and get them back on track.
Gregg Popovich is one of the best coaches on the planet.
Gregg Popovich is not afraid to call timeout.
Maybe those two things are connected.
The Art of Being Selectively Interruptive
Coach Pop has it easier than many of us. He gets an allotted number of timeouts and is encouraged to use them. Everyone on and around the court — players, referees, and fans — expects him to call timeout a handful of times each game. It would be weird if he didn’t. Timeouts are built into how the game of basketball is played. Even how it makes money.
Things are different for businesspeople. The rules for when to stop the action aren’t taught in any MBA curriculum. There’s no allotted number of timeouts to keep track of, and no universal rules for how to use them. But you can’t hang back, hope for the best, and just let things play out. You need to intervene and offer feedback to keep your team on track. People need reminding, even with a great game-plan in place.
There’s an art to this. The art of being selectively interruptive. Constantly critique your team and they’ll stop listening. But pick your spots in advance and get consistent with what you coach — and what you don’t — and you’ll be saying something important. This is what matters. This is how we win.
Selective interruption might be a little uncomfortable at first. But you can do it well by following two simple steps.
Step 1 — Decide on Your Non-Negotiables
The best Chief Reminding Officers focus their feedback and coaching on a short list of non-negotiables: The few, authentic standards they live by and expect their people to live up to. Your non-negotiables are behavioral bars you feel strongly about — so strongly that you’re willing to call timeout and offer feedback right then when they aren’t met.
When I help leaders brainstorm their non-negotiables, two distinct buckets quickly emerge:
- Operational: How you expect your team to do their work
- Cultural: How you want your people to “show up”
The key is staying balanced. 1–2 operational non-negotiables and 1–2 cultural non-negotiables are usually all you need.
You will know that you’ve uncovered an authentic non-negotiable when you can instinctively fill out the following template:
When X (specific situation) happens, I want you to do Y (desired behavior) instead of Z (undesired behavior)
If you’ve ever trained or taught anyone to do anything, you already have operational non-negotiables to pull from. It’s how you expect you team to talk to customers, write marketing briefs, deliver presentations, prepare analyses. Operational non-negotiables are the bar you expect your work to meet.
Cultural non-negotiables are trickier, but they start by examining how your team already behaves when they’re at their best. The best CROs distill specific, video-tapeable behaviors into simple values they can emphasize day-to-day. Some examples from teams I’ve worked with are below:
- Simplify, don’t complicate — Don’t make the problem bigger than it is. Talk about options and solutions, not “why this is hard” or what led to the problem in the first place.
- Run through the finish line — We’re a small company, so we need to be scrappy. Take ownership and finish the job — whatever it is.
- Constructive candor — Don’t be afraid to ask the stupid question or speak up when something isn’t working. Debate the issue, not the person.
Once you ID your non-negotiables, run them through this three-point sanity-check:
- Do you care about them?
- Do they lead to better outcomes?
- Are you willing to jump in right away when you don’t see them happening?
If you can go 3/3 using this list, you can be sure you’ve nailed a great non-negotiable.
Step 2 — Call Timeout by Asking Permission
You probably already have time earmarked for coaching your team. Your 1:1s, your weekly check-ins, and those training sessions — they’re already on the calendar. But if you’re only coaching your team during these pre-scheduled times, you’re not doing enough. Important feedback often can’t (and shouldn’t) wait. The half-life of impactful coaching is short. It needs to be delivered in the moment — right then. Imagine if Gregg Popovich had waited until halftime to coach his team — the result would have been very different.
Here’s my advice. Keep that stuff on your calendar. But don’t wait to coach. The good news is, you can call timeout and coach your team whenever you want. The secret is asking for permission.
Here’s what that sounds like:
- “Do you mind if I share something with you that you might disagree with?”
- “Hey, I noticed something in that last meeting — OK with you if we talk about it for a second?”
- “I like how you structured that analysis — can I share a couple of potential builds with you?”
Asking for permission can feel awkward at first. But it works. Here’s why.
1 — It’s less scary. Asking for permission softens the initial “fight or flight” response we all feel when critiqued. This makes it easier for the other person to not only listen, but also hear and internalize the feedback. Asking for permission also decreases people’s propensity to dismiss the feedback or get angry, defensive, or upset.
2 — It communicates empathy and respect. You’re about to put someone through a short but uncomfortable experience. Asking if “that’s ok” waves a flag of friendliness and signals that you’re on the same side.
3 — It forms a contract. By asking for permission, you create a mutually agreed-upon space you can step into together to deliver your feedback. A space that wasn’t there before. You haven’t kicked down the door. You’ve asked to enter, and you’ve been invited in.
Final Thoughts
My favorite leadership advice all kind of sounds the same.
College football coach Mike Leach likes to say, “You’re either coaching it or allowing it to happen.” Nassim Taleb says, “If you see fraud, and don’t say fraud, you are a fraud.” Ben Horowitz wrote in What You Do Is Who You Are, “There’s a saying in the military that if you see something below standard and you do nothing, then you’ve set a new standard.”
In other words, standards are useless if you don’t enforce them. Being a good leader — and a good Chief Reminding Officer — means choosing and committing to just a handful of non-negotiable standards. After that, coaching your team to meet them becomes instinctual.
So, decide when you’ll call timeout by prioritizing your non-negotiables. Learn to create the space you need by asking for permission. Then deliver your feedback. Right then. In the moment. That’s the art of selective interruption. That’s the power of the timeout.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot.
Remember the Spurs game from the beginning of the article? The one where Gregg Popovich called timeout just 16 seconds in? Coach Pop’s team got the message. The Spurs recovered from their blunder and caught fire, scoring 39 points in the first quarter. They blew out the Wizards, winning the game 132–119, despite the early misstep.
Amazing what a single timeout can do.
→ Click here to read part III of the series
Want to steal the template I use to train Chief Reminding Officers? Click here to download the one-pager I use in my work with leadership teams.
