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Chuck: Steve, welcome to Innovators on Tap and thank you for being here. So there is a story I read about back in the days when you were being recruited to play basketball; I believe that Coach K and Dean Smith both came to see you play at a high school soccer game. Which, one, is pretty unusual to start with. But I'm curious - just looking at you, you know if I would have met you on the street you'd look more like a soccer player to me then you were a basketball player. Did you ever seriously consider going down a path of pursuing competitive soccer in college and beyond? Or was basketball always kind of your first love?
Wojo: Well, I don't know. As a young kid, I think my first love was soccer. And it was a sport that I had a lot of success early on. And then I hit the age of 12 and 13. And I just fell in love with the game of basketball. And that became my passion. You know, if I had free time, I wanted to play basketball and tried to seek that out at every chance I could get. However, I did play two sports. In high school, I played soccer all four years, obviously played basketball for years throughout high school and in the Fall of the calendar year, in September, you're allowed to go into high schools to visit prospects. Most of the time, you're going to visit a prospect as you're doing a basketball workout. However, the Fall was soccer season. So if they wanted to come see me and visit with me, they had to come to either a soccer practice or soccer game. And it was a bit of a surreal moment. Where you know, you're playing a soccer game in the inner city of Baltimore and on one end of the soccer field is Dean Smith and Phil Ford, you know, two Hall of Famers. And on the other end was Mike Kryzyzewski and Mike Bray. I'm not sure they've ever been to a soccer game since but they were at that moment.
Chuck: One of the things I've learned both in these interviews but also some of the work I did at Cree when we were doing leadership development is that how you grow up has a tremendous impact on people, you know, really setting a foundation for their beliefs that drive them later in life. How would you describe how you're growing up helped build some of the core values and beliefs that you have today?
Wojo: You know, I tell people all the time I've been the benefactor of being on great teams my entire life. The best team I've ever been on is the world team Wojociechowski, the role that my parents played in my upbringing, whether it was watching my father, you know, go to work every day, go to the docks, hard manual labor, never complain, always show up and did his job to the best of his ability. The care and love that my mom provided in the home, you know, shuttling my brother, my sister around all the things that we were committed to doing and the love that they showed each other. The one thing I think for, for them, they always held me, my brother and sister accountable for doing the best we could do, for treating people the way we would want to be treated. And it sounds very simple. But the constant reinforcement of those two messages, if you're going to do something, then you do it to the best of your ability, and you treat people the way you want to be treated. That's the way I grew up. You know, the older you get with the ability to have hindsight. On your side, you realize that that's not necessarily how most people grow up. And so because of that foundation, I've been able to associate myself with outstanding people and have a certain degree of success.
Chuck: When we were doing our research, we found a story that was recalled and an article that said when you were about 18 months old, you were diving in or jumping in the deep end of the pool, you’d swim back, and do it over and over again. And so I think you were described as a very high energy, high intensity kid. Is there a player since you've been in coaching that has come to match your level of intensity?
Wojo: You know, I've been fortunate to be around some unbelievable competitors, you know, and I'd hate to just draw any of those guys away from the group of guys that I've gotten to coach. But there is competitiveness and a fire in every great player that I've been around. Now, that can manifest itself in different ways. I think, if you watched me play, I would be described more as a rah rah, vocal in your face type leader. I think competitive fire can be shown in different ways. The guy guys that I've coached, you know, I think in terms of competitiveness, you know, Shane Battier comes to mind. I think he has competitive greatness. But he didn't necessarily do it all the time in the same way. There were times when he was very vocal and in your face type of leader, there's times where he put his arm around guys when they needed it. He has competitive greatness. I think JJ Reddick was another guy that I marveled at his competitiveness. He had just a unique fire that allowed him to play with an edge that he needed to be, you know, one of the greatest college basketball players of all time. And you know, that we've had guys here at Marquette that have, I think, are really good competitors. I think Markus Howard has been a guy that has just a competitive skill that's allowed him to do some incredible things for a young player who, you know, probably looks more like a soccer player than a basketball player, too. So I've been very fortunate and I admire the guys that on a daily basis can bring a certain level of competitiveness and focus to their job.
Chuck: So basketball was invented in 1891. And the first college game was in 1896, between the University of Chicago and some students from the University of Iowa. As you think about the history of the game and where it's at today, what are some of the changes that you've observed? I think the game has changed, even from when I was playing
Wojo: I think the game has changed, even from when I was playing, drastically. The game has always and will always be about people and getting people to maximize their own individual talents and then bringing them to the group to maximize the group's ability. The tools that we have at our disposal to get to know people and make decisions on people and on teams are much more sophisticated than they were when I was playing. And that sophistication is across all levels. You know, you talk about sports performance. The tools that we have now to measure guys in terms of where their body is the toll that we're putting on their body, you know how much they sleep, you know, what they're putting in their body is incredible. And then, you know, the analytics to, you know, how you study players, how you study teams, you know, usually, when I first started coaching, and certainly when I was playing, it was all about feel and the test, you know, and you could you had a feel for ways to defend guys, you had a feel for player tendencies, you had a feel for a team tendencies, but you didn't really have the data necessarily to back it up. Now, this is a data driven profession, where you use analytics to study the people you're recruiting. You know, you can watch a kid and see him hit five threes in a game and say, “Man, he's a great shooter!” But then you look at his stats over the course of the summer and he’s shooting 31% from three, that game you saw when he's on fire is not indicative of who that kid is, you know, over the course of a spring and summer of summer basketball. It allows us to figure out for our own team, are we playing the way we want to play, you know, we're able to have at our fingertips at a moment's notice. And we do it every day. It's much more sophisticated than it's ever been. And, you know, I think the analytics field has grown immensely, especially in pro-basketball. And like most things, it has seeped down to college basketball, and I'm a believer in it. You know, I think it's an important tool in your toolbox. But it's not the only tool. I'm glad you brought up analytics because, you know, I know that the game is kind of described as a game about three pointers, free throws, and layups. And I looked at Kareem, Wilt Chamberlain, and Shaq and none of them were three point shooters and other than Kareem, the other two can't shoot a free throw. So you have your opportunity to coach a team today. And you've got those three guys. Would they be relevant in today's game? Yes, and the reason being is that, you know, they're unicorns. You know, I mean, they're outliers. I think when you talk about Shaq and Kareem, and those guys and Wilt, Bill Russell, they would still have a place in the game, and they were so good at what they did, that you would adjust your system based on their talents. However, most guys aren't Kareem, Shaq, and Wilt Chamberlain. And so as you say, the game has gotten to a point where the numbers say layups, free throws, & threes, and that's what you want. And they say statistically, the worst shot you can take in basketball is a contested post up. That being said, there's still places that works, because it doesn't take into account necessarily getting fouled. And that's not only the guy in the post, but it gets you one 10th closer to the bonus. And if you're a good free throw shooting team, and analytics prove this, that's an advantage. So, you know, I think if you have a guy who can score on the low post, there is still a place for that, I think especially, and more so in college basketball, you know, so I don't necessarily agree with that. Totally. However, your offense needs to be built on the things that are going to give you the greatest return.
Chuck: And I was also reading an article about the Sacramento Kings owner who supposedly recommended to his coach, he said, I want you to basically play four on five on defense and leave a guy back down on the offensive end and then just cherry pick. And the assumption was, I think we're going to end up getting more than we're going to give up by playing four on five. What do you think about that idea?
Wojo: Not a fan. You know, again, I think new ideas are great, right? I mean, at least in especially ideas that are very unconventional because it tests, you know, why, why don't you like it? And I think those things are good as well. You know, I don't believe that a defense of four players over the course of a 48 minute NBA game can stop five NBA players from scoring.
Chuck: Do you think in college where you don't always have five elite offensive players? It might apply more.
Wojo: It depends on who you're playing. And I think in preparation, you have to prepare to beat the best teams on your schedule. And so is that a style that would allow you to beat the best team when on your schedule, and usually the best team on your schedule has five if not more, really good players, and so on. Know that it would be something that we would, you know, take time to work on.
Chuck: So last year, the team made great progress on defense. But more importantly, it was once again elite offensively. And that's been for several years now. But you know, you were in college probably more known as your defense for your defense. In fact, I think you were national Defensive Player of the Year as a senior at Duke. Does being a defensive minded player, make it better at thinking about offense creatively.
Wojo: I think the perspective of somebody who hung his hat on defense and not necessarily offense, as a college player, is helpful. You know, I had to run an offense in college even though I wasn't a primary scorer. So I think my experiences as a player have helped me as a coach, because I know the things that a defense did to make me as an offensive player uncomfortable, our team uncomfortable, that disrupted the game. And then having to defend different things that were hard for a really good player to defend. And, you know, that's I think those lessons, that time period, helped shape some of who I am as a coach.
Chuck: So when you got here, you obviously didn't have the same level of talent. But since then, obviously, I know you've brought in some talented offensive players, is there an innovation or something you've uncovered during this time, that's kind of made it work for you?
Wojo: All offense always looks better with good players. So we've tried to recruit really good players, but then we've given our guys, for the most part, the the freedom to play within concepts to where everything we do on the offensive end does not have to be a play that I called, or a set that we run to get good stuff, although there's times in games that we do that, you know, out of bounds situations, one of those times after timeouts, one of those times and we were number one in the country in that area, but over the course of the game, I give my guys a lot of freedom. And instead of teaching them to run a play, we try to teach them how to play. So that it's not necessarily guys playing like robots on the floor. They're playing like basketball players.
Chuck: You know, your description of “we teach people how to play instead of what plays the run” That's a very Jesuit concept. In fact, about a decade ago, Marquette came out with something to try to describe what it meant to be Jesuit, and it was called Jesuit 2.0. And what Jesuit 2.0 basically said is - we don't teach you what to think we teach you how to think.
Wojo: I do think it's really important to teach guys how to play the game. I don't think it's done a lot. You know, I was very fortunate in my basketball career. Obviously, I'm most recognized for my time at Duke. But my basketball career obviously started well before that. And it was rooted in the fundamental teachings of the coaches that I had up through high school. And they taught me how to play. And that was very valuable for me as a player. And hopefully our guys would say the same thing.
Chuck: So you talked about how basketball is about people. And when I first interviewed for my job at Cree, my initial interview included playing lunchtime basketball. And I survived it and I ended up getting the job. But we then did that for several years. And I didn't appreciate it in the beginning, but it was probably the best way to get to know someone before we hired them. Because what happens in that moment on a basketball court is who you really are comes out. You're forced to react. So for us, it was a great way to essentially not interview people for their basketball skill, but could they be a part of our team? I mean, you're a professional recruiter of people. When you look at how someone's playing. What do you think you can tell from someone - whether you're watching them play or you're playing with them?
Wojo: You know, as a recruiter of people, we get to see people in a competitive environment all the time. Playing with somebody, as you said, that is the best way to get to know someone in any environment, basketball, business, whatever. It's competitive, it's wildly competitive. And when you put people in the pressure cooker of a competitive environment, who they are comes out. When we're recruiting an athlete, you look at both the tangible and intangible and the tangible is easy to see like, Is he a great athlete? How tall he is? Does he have skill? Does he have feel for the game? Things that you have a pretty good feel just watching. The intangible things you learn in a competitive environment is - what kind of teammate someone is? Do they look their coach in the eye when he's trying to teach and coach them? How do they treat their teammates? And, you know, in the business world, obviously you can look at somebody's resume, and you can talk to them and get a great feel. If you do have lunchtime hoops? I mean, I think that's a great opportunity to see like, Okay, do who we think he is, is that who he is when he's put in a competitive environment? And if he or she is, that's a great thing for you to know somebody who's recruiting them or hiring.
Chuck: You know, you were quoted as saying that “I always wanted to win. I always had an intensity in me, a fire.” I'm not sure where it comes from. And as I've studied innovation, both at Cree and other companies, there is this will to win that gets people through those tough moments - that when they hit that wall allows them to keep going. Do you think this is something that you're born with? Or do you think it's something that you can learn or be taught?
Wojo: I think both are true. I think some guys are born or the way they were raised, have something a little extra. However, I do think you can teach competitiveness and tough mental and physical toughness. Now it takes time and some guys attach to it quicker than others. But I do think you can enhance somebody's competitiveness, you can enhance their fire, you can teach them, you know what it looks like, you can show them what it looks like. And we try to do that. And you know, there you have different levels of success with it. I mean, it's not a it's not a fail-safe proposition, but I do think you can make guys better in that area. My assumption is when you're recruiting someone that you'd like to find someone that already has a strong will to win, how do you look for it? You know, that's one area where the numbers you know, they don't categorize that. I mean, how do you put a number on that? So you have to watch and study and see kids in different environments. The very first thing is - does he play to win every time you watch them play, what level of success does this team have? You know, if you look at our guys, our guys have had a lot of success as amateur players, high school players, if you start to track and find guys where every time you turn and watch their team, they're winning, there's a pretty good chance that guy has a big impact on it. You know how a guy does that and impacts winning, everyone's different in that respect. But if across the board, he wins, then he's got those winning qualities that you can work with and, hopefully, enhance.
Chuck: Back to innovation - one of the key things that when people are innovating, they have to be able to take risk. They have to be comfortable with the idea that they're going to try some things and sometimes they might fail. You have to have a job that probably is scrutinized, closer than any other job out there. Every night you go out, you know, there's a score on the board you get - it's a win or loss - and you're fortunate enough to have many people who are confident they know how to do your job as well as you. But in the game of basketball, where it's changing, and you have to innovate, how do you deal with this need to take risks to innovate? And yet being judged really on the short term results? How do you come to grips that taking risks is a part of the job?
Wojo: You shouldn’t take a risk or not take a risk based on what you think people are going to say. You should [take a risk] because you believe in it, you think it puts your organization in the best possible position to be successful. And then you have to live with those results. I mean, that's the big boy world we live in. I'll give you an example. My third year on the job, we had to win four out of our last five games to make the NCAA tournament, and we had an older senior group, but that team hadn't necessarily won. And then we had some young guys that, you know, won a lot in high school. And so in the last part of the season, we made a decision to completely change the starting lineup. And that was a risk. That risk paid off. Would I have been comfortable with making that decision again, if it didn't turn out that way, where we finished the season strong and went to the NCAA Tournament? Yes, I [took the risk] because I believed at that moment - that's what was right. Not every decision you make is gonna work out. You have to base your decisions on your belief, your study, the people that you're working with, and then you gotta run with it.
Chuck: You know, what's interesting is I think what you're describing is what I call being unafraid of failure - the potential reward is the right thing to do, and you can live with the outcome. But when I meet people, especially in a corporate environment, so many of us grow up with these rules and boundary conditions and we're actually being taught to manage risk and trying to not make mistakes and try not to fail. So you're looking for people that frankly, are wired like you. If you were translating your skill at recruiting people and you want to apply to “Hey, I'm going to try to help recruit young people that I think, can not only play basketball, but I think have this ability to take risks and aren't afraid of failure”. How would you look for that?
Wojo: Well, I think that that goes to the relationship and really getting to know who somebody is, and are they willing to take risks? Do you have to drive in the slow lane all the time, you know, and I think you can only get an appreciation of where somebody is on that spectrum after really getting to know them. And so like you said, it doesn't, you know, the risk we're talking about it not taking a bad shot at the end of the game. The risk we're talking about [is], when push comes to shove, are you going to be willing to follow your beliefs and the things that you study and do some things that are unconventional that if they don't work, people can criticize you? Are you willing to do that? Look, the people who have achieved the most throughout sport or business, are generally people that are willing to stick their neck out.
Chuck: You said something about recruiting players that have had a lot of success winning. Do you ever worry that because of all that success when they get to college and they're at a different level, and they're playing in a league like the Big East, that they're going to probably face more failure than they've ever had before. And you worry about them making that transition, because the first time you go through failures, not everyone reacts the same way. And so how do you get through that? Or how do you gauge that when you're recruiting these very successful people?
Wojo: Well, you know, that, regardless of if a kid to this point has experienced any major setbacks, failure, critiques, that it's common. I've been fortunate to be around the best of the best. And I've seen the best of the best on our worst days. So the worst days happen for everyone. And one of the fun things about coaching is to help kids deal with that, and look at failure as an opportunity instead of a destination. And that's a lesson that we have to constantly reinforce with our guys. We have guys that are high achievers, we have guys that are pleasers. And so when they don't do something to the level they're capable of, or they feel like they're not pleasing someone, the chance for them to reach a depth of being down is high. Okay, then what do we do with that? Well, you have to educate them that not doing what you think you're capable of each and every day is just part of growth. And you should welcome those days because it can teach you about your blind spots. It can show you the areas that you need to get better at and, and there's areas for all of us like that. So embracing failure, not setting out to fail, but embracing failure when it occurs. Using that opportunity to become better to become more is, I think, crucial for any player's development.
Chuck: One of the terms I've used and I've heard others use is that failure is really about learning, which I think is what you call growth. If you learn from it, there's something to be gained from it. If you just let it hit you in the head, then you know, you let it beat you, right? Do you ever have trouble leading teams? I looked at each of my players on my team, they were individuals to me, right? It was a team, but I knew they had strengths and weaknesses, and they were different at some things and were better at others. So I actually managed or led them differently. I had different boundary conditions. But what I would occasionally run into is the other members of the team would struggle, or almost look like there were different rules or boundary conditions between the players. And there were but for very good reasons. They had different capabilities and different strengths. I'm sure that has to be a tension you deal with. How do you help players understand why it's different for different players?
Wojo: I mean, I think it's a great point. It's a challenge that we all face, year to year with guys, in terms of myself and dealing with our players, you know, we treat everyone in our program fairly. That doesn't mean we treat everybody in our program the same, because certain guys have earned the right to have more rope versus other guys that are just coming in, and we're learning about them. However, in terms of the way they're treated, and the way they're coached, they're all going to be treated fairly. They're all going to be coached hard, they're all going to be held accountable. But guys, there's different levels of talents. And so, you know, it's important that when you're holding someone accountable in a way that they can hear the message, and that's different for everyone. Some guys react better to strict discipline. Some guys react better to, you know, an arm around them. So it's important to figure out what makes somebody tick, and how you can help them become the best they can be within the collective unit.
Chuck: So your players probably all come to Marquette expecting that they're going to try to play professionally, that they're here for an education, but they're also here to prepare themselves to hopefully have a career in basketball. And while you know, they all want to do that, and pretty much all of them will have that opportunity to play professionally somewhere, you also know that their basketball playing days are going to be relatively short. So what do you try to help them understand beyond basketball to kind of prepare them for life beyond the game?
Wojo: Oh, you know, obviously, we want to connect with them and their passion to play and maximize their talents and abilities. While understanding that having a career in basketball is extraordinarily difficult. And our guys are aware of that. If you look at the NBA, it's a global game. And there's 425 players, there's only 4000 men who've walked the face of the earth who've played in the NBA. So your odds aren’t very good. And we also educate them on European basketball. Like it's hard to have a career in high level Europe that’s worth it. So while we are trying to help them become the best they can be in basketball, I think educating them, you know about the realities of it, and then putting them in positions to where they may come here and basketball maybe they're only love at the time. We have to introduce them to other things that they love, whether that's giving back to the community and service - and our guys have done an incredible job of that. We won an award last year for the most service hours of any athletics team in the athletics department for the first time ever. So I was really proud of that. And so using their platform in the community, where guys learn to love that, and then you know, becoming educated men. You know going to college is not just about taking college courses. It's about learning to think critically. It's about learning to become a better decision maker. It's about learning how to interact with people from all walks of life. And those three skills, regardless of how many classes you loved, or you didn't love, critical thinking, the ability to be a good decision maker in the ability to thrive in a diverse environment. That's what you're gonna have to do if you play professional basketball, or anything else. And so for us, we talk about those things all the time, and encourage it and our guys, to their credit, have really embraced it. You know, and that doesn't mean they love basketball and less, but you can love more than one thing.
Chuck: We talked a lot about how we deal with failure and that you learn from it. Is there a failure that you've had in life that you learned a lot from that you can share with us?
Wojo: Yeah, you know, my freshman year at Duke was incredibly hard, you know, to the point where I didn't know if I was gonna be able to survive as a college player. That was the year Coach K got sick. So he was only the head coach for about a third of the season and the season went way downhill after he left. My high school coach that same year passed away. My dad was battling cancer and so all of a sudden, you know, being a freshman in college is hard enough. You throw on top of that, you know, an athletics endeavor that's as challenging as anything that I ever had encountered and was failing at it. In addition to personal stuff going on. That was a really hard year. And you know, there were times I felt like quitting. And, you know, fortunately, that wasn't an option in my parents eyes. So learn from it. And I learned the things that, you know, when I was able to step back away from it like, okay, the initial instinct for most people when something goes wrong, is to start pointing fingers. And when I became mature enough to look in the mirror and say, you know what, these are the things that I could have done, that I had complete control over, that maybe could have led to a different outcome that ended up being probably the best thing for me is going through, you know, those those hard moments because I really experienced that, you know, I was Salutorian in my high school class, I was all American high school basketball player, I was an all state soccer player, things were good. And then I worked for those things, but I didn't really ever have like a time as a young athlete, where, you know, you just got you literally got knocked to the canvas, and it makes you tougher it makes you appreciate it makes you look in the mirror and say, Okay, this is why this happened. And if I don't want to tap in anymore, these are the things that need to change.
Chuck: When we did leadership development, the hardest thing to teach someone as they were trying to develop them as a leader is that, it's really a simple concept, the moment you realize leadership is about you, and not the other person, that's the moment you start to really make progress in it. And so I think it's just a great analogy for people to keep in mind because too often people say, “I want to be a leader, why won't they follow me?” The answer is that's about you, not them.
Chuck: So just thank you for the young men you're developing and making Marquette, you know, a place that we can all be really proud of.
Wojo: Yeah, well, Marquette is a special place. And, you know, I get to be around special young men every day and certainly they were raised incredibly well. So we benefit from that, but you know, this is about more than just basketball, I was very fortunate The game has been incredibly good to me. And when I was their age, I would have said it was the big wins, or, you know, the accomplishments and all that kind of stuff. But now 20 years later, I don't think about, well, occasionally I'll think about games and moments, but I think about the relationships. The ability to use basketball as a vehicle to take you places that you otherwise wouldn't be able to go or meet people you otherwise wouldn't have the opportunity to meet. If all we're talking about is drills and offensive philosophy and defensive philosophy, and they have a firm understanding of that when they leave here, but that's all they have an understanding of, then I would have failed. And so you know, I appreciate being at a place that's so passionate about our program and winning. But I also appreciate the fact that I work with and for people that understand that, you know, it's much more than just basketball. That's what Marquette is to me, you know, Marquette is about developing the whole person. And why shouldn't our basketball program be about that too?
Chuck: Well, I think you're doing a great job. And again, we're really proud to have you here and looking forward to a great season and thanks for taking the time. Thank you.
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