694: Clark Lea - LIVE! At The 2026 Learning Leader Growth Summit: The Mission Is Winning, Checking the Cabinets, Leading as an Introvert, Alabama Week, Decoupling Worth From Outcomes, and Building a Championship Culture

26:53I think we're going to be down 50 to nothing at halftime. I think they're going to actually, BK is going to call me out of the box, like the walk of shame down the stands onto the field and actually send me to the locker room, fire me on the spot. I think on the way to the locker room in the tunnel are going to be all the Notre Dame greats, Jerome Bettis, you name them, Rocket Ishmael, and they're going to be yelling at me and telling me how I'm not worth the whatever. You guys understand what I'm saying. And she listens to all this, and she goes, okay. And she said, but why don't you trust your players?

27:25You just think this is all about you? You don't think this is important to them? Like they haven't worked hard for this? It's interesting to hear you talk about this because it's all about you. So where do they fit in this? And it was like this epiphany for me. Oh my God, I'm not alone in this. Actually, I really need to be good in my job, not for me, but for them, because they're the ones that have invested in this. They're the ones that have bled for this. And now let me do this in service to them, not in service to myself. That switch is a powerful switch. So with leadership and captains, it's important to have as many as I feel like doesn't exclude people.

28:01But I don't want to do it in a way that's inauthentic. So what we do is we take a vote and I just draw lines. and wherever that line falls if i feel like let's say 60 votes is the line because after it's 60 there's 30 if you guys understand what i'm saying 60 is going to be the line however many people are above that we're going to take on if there's a bigger discrepancy if there are fewer people voted for then that you know we're going to have fewer people a captain this year i forget i think we had eight i believe after or before the utah state game i added a center who like was undoubtedly a locker room leader for us.

28:39He deserved to be a captain on our football team. And so I wanted to honor that. The players will see through anything that's fake. So if I'm trying to anoint someone that doesn't deserve it, or I'm playing favorites, I take myself out of it. All I'm responsible for is drawing the line. They vote, the whole program votes. That's how we determine who's out there.

28:58Ryan Hawk:You talked about the first three years. So you come in and it wasn't this beautiful turnaround immediately. After the 2023 season, you have seven starters going to the transfer portal. But after the 2024 season, you had one. What was the biggest difference between 2023 and what you did, what the team did, what your staff did, the players did from 2024 to have seven starters leave, which is wild, to then only having one? I'm embarrassed. I'm learning a lot about my program from your research. I appreciate that. In 2023, so what we had done was we had, there was kind of two things converging. All right.

29:36We had demonstrated progress, two and 10, five and seven. That five and seven season, mind you, we lost to three teams, a combined like 155 to three. That was Alabama on the road, Georgia on the road, Tennessee at home. So, I mean, there was a still a huge gap between us and the top of our league, but But I, in my mind, saw progress and thought double down on everything. So I didn't evolve systems. There's a great lesson in that. I think our scrutiny can't be strictly about results. We have to have the ability to see down the road and see what amplifying a system or retaining a system does in time.

30:12I was wrong in doing that. I thought because we were at five wins, we'd get to six wins. We didn't have an NIL program, and we didn't have a plan for portal. And you may say, like, I don't know what you say to that, but that was just the world we were living in. We went from a really clean learning environment where repetition is mastery to the book Range talks about a wicked learning environment where every day the rules change. And so we didn't have a blueprint for this. And, you know, Vanderbilt's a great school, and there are a lot of great business people that are alums of this school. And, you know, those great business people aren't really interested in funding a college football roster, as it turns out.

30:52So we had some work to do to create vision for how this was going to help everyone involved. So year one, we lose our best offensive lineman transfer to Alabama. Year two, we lose our thousand yard rushing running back transfer to Kentucky. I had an undrafted free agent graded linebacker who was a captain for us and a great leader who was a great counterbalance in a locker room that was still toxic. Because my thing was retain, retain, retain. And that's because that was the blueprint. And also because I was serving the wrong master. To me, retention was about my players affirming my value, if that makes sense to you.

31:31When you leave, you're telling me that I'm not good enough for you. In my mind, that's a problem. I've had to work through that to get to a point where I understand that that's actually a healthy part of what we're doing. But we didn't have systems of retention. We didn't have systems of transaction. And so we kind of flushed out the productive part of our roster. We lost important leadership pieces. We had this young group that had come in that was not yet ready to take the reins. And we had retained productive players who were toxic in the locker room. And that set the course for this 2023 season, where when you look at that year, we actually played tighter in games we won two games we lost a heartbreaker on the road at unlv and lost a sloppy game at wake force but what i saw in that season was like this team doesn't play the game the way that i want a team to play connected so all the things i said earlier connected competitive all that stuff so to answer this question we pivot on systems i hire a new strength coach I hire a new offense coordinator I take over the defense and I'm going to be honest it would be way cooler if I could tell you and I got rid of a bunch of guys and you know that was the right thing but the truth is I didn't want anybody to leave I was still in this mode of like please you know tell me I'm good enough for you and so I think every player that came in maybe sans one or two I'm trying to convince that oh hang in there we're going to get there We lost those starters because the program needed to move on.

33:09And I wasn't able to do that for myself. And so the universe did it for me. That's how I see it. The universe doesn't ever make a mistake. I couldn't purge the program because I had my own identity wrapped up in it. So the universe did it for me. And what we did in place of that was we went out and found people that aligned with our culture, environment, attitude, mentality. that put on the field the program that we wanted to represent Vanderbilt football and also set a course for those young players to come along and to be a part of something that actually had identity and substance. So retention is both about strengthening our resources, which we did from year one to year two, but also about winning having to be a part of your culture.

33:58There's no culture without winning. That sounds like all results. All I'm telling you is when I talk to my team, the mission is winning. The mission is winning. That is about Saturdays in the fall, but it is about every other day too. What does winning look like today? How does winning impact every dollar we spend, every person we retain, every coach we hire? Everything that we do needs to work through this mantra, this lens of the mission's winning. and through that simplification, right? That's what that is to me. I mean, we had a mission statement that was like the most eloquent, beautiful thing you'd ever read.

34:38And yet it was unclear. Our mission is winning is pretty clear. Now my job is to measure everything against that mission. And that actually is what ripples into results.

34:51Ryan Hawk:Was it contentious going through the change through NIL, Transfer Portal, where you didn't have the resources, you didn't have the money. And so I think that could be relatable for people if they're not the person because you're in charge of the football program, but you're you have bosses, too. Sure. So you had to kind of advocate for yourself, for your coaches, for your players and literally get the money. What was that process like? You're stewarding partnerships. So I think there are plenty of coaches that just go and pound the table. You know, this was always long term for me, the vision.

35:25I wanted to be somewhere and stay somewhere because I always have wanted to be a part of something that feels like community. And I didn't draw a line in the sand with Candice or AD or certainly the chancellor. But I did communicate what I needed. And I told Candice in the winter of 23. So as we had lost a running back and lost players that we wanted to retain, I said, listen, if we don't have$3 million by December of 23, we won't have a program. Now, to say$3 million now is like, oh, my God. But in one week,$3 million became$6 million. That was the week of December where we were trying to figure out a path through.

36:09And so this is just how I operate. It's like I'm recruiting people into the vision. I'm stewarding partnerships. I want this to feel collaborative. When I was at my worst, Candice was at her best. You know, she didn't come down and say, you better figure this out. She was just a resource, a mentor in those moments where I was trying to find the path through. And so that's my angle. That's my approach, which means I'm going to concede losses sometimes in that partnership. I'm not going to get everything I want, you know. And I think that approach has helped us. Obviously, I think it's gotten us to a point where we're starting to look like our peers.

36:49I think it's failed me at times because I haven't been clear enough. And I think my job is to be really clear on what it's going to take. But what I've appreciated is as the results have shifted and as everyone's seeing the benefit of what a high-level football program can do, there's less conflict that goes in. I mean, there's more shared awareness of what this needs to be. And the initial shock of like adding$3 million, adding$6 million to a budget line, obviously now we have$20 million that's rev share plus on top of that. I think we're all kind of adjusting to the temperature of the water together.

37:26Ryan Hawk:You mentioned Candice, arguably the most effective athletic director in college sports. If you look at all of the sports here at Vanderbilt, basketball, baseball, I mean, it's incredible what she's done. Why do you think she chose to hire you? I don't think she wanted to hire me. I think she, I shouldn't say it that way. I don't know that she set out to hire the defensive coordinator from Notre Dame. We crossed paths at Vanderbilt only a short time. So it wasn't like a deep held connection. I think she wanted to hire a winner. I think ideally that winner would be someone who'd been a head coach before.

38:04And ideally it'd be someone who had some offensive experience. I went through the process of Zoom meetings, you know, and a couple of those and then in person with her and the chancellor. And I think there was just such synergy there. I remember sitting with her in the interview. We probably could have spent the whole day just talking philosophy and talking about what we wanted this to look like and what Vanderbilt needed. And I think she she was moved by that connection the same way I was moved by that connection. She is the best human emotional leader I've ever encountered. And like I said, when I'm at my worst, she's at her best.

38:43And so she took a bet on somebody that she believed in time would be the kind of leader that could win at Vanderbilt. And keep in mind, too, she was like a year ahead of me in her journey as athletic director. So I think there was a trust built in the relationship. And I think there was this awareness that like she was learning her job. I was going to have to learn mine, but that we were going to really create strength and partnership together to navigate. You know, what was the heart? I mean, this has been the toughest challenge in the country is getting this program turned around. But she deserves.

39:17We don't talk enough about how great Candice Lee is. And when it came time to renegotiate contract and go through this process in the fall, which was excruciating. I mean, excruciating. I did not undervalue that relationship. I think I get to work for someone who I believe in without hesitation and who supports me in ways that I can't imagine what that looks like at other campuses. And so she deserves all the credit.

39:48Ryan Hawk:I'm going to ask another one, but then I'll open it up because I know there's probably some questions. So just start thinking. Take me to your playing. You come off these tough years, right? You have this mission. You have this vision of how to do it. eventually you beat the number one team in the country your students carry the goalposts and whatever dump it in the water whatever they did it was crazy can you take me into that week the prep the execution of the plan the locker room after i mean that's those are the greatest moment i mean i get emotional just thinking about some of those moments as a player what was that week like so 24 so we go through this wholesale change staff overhaul the seven starters we lost plus i think around 25 total players thereabouts.

40:31We go out, we hire Tim Beck from New Mexico State. I bring Jerry Kill in as a consultant. And then as it turns out, we also harvested some of that roster. It's where D.A. Pavia came from, Eli Stowers, M.K. Young, and others. And then we got to work and I was reconnecting with being a play caller and being a coordinator, also realizing that I hadn't really done the head coaching job very well. So I can't lose growth and development there. there was just so much unknown and we get through the summer our first games against Virginia Tech and we we had belief the first time I talked to Diego do you guys know who Diego is am I talking to a room that okay first time I talked to Diego on the phone he said to me at the end of the conversation coach I look forward to coming to Vanderbilt and helping you win championships and he like hesitated before he said it it was so genuine it was like the first time that I had talk to someone like especially in a recruiting sense where I wasn't having to convince them of what we could do at Vanderbilt like that meant the world to me and yet here's a guy that two years later is a Heisman finalist and I told him hey you're not guaranteed the starting job you're gonna have to compete and earn it to have a chance to play at Vanderbilt so that's how much I knew about Diego we get to the Virginia Tech game there's a lot of hope and we take a 17 to 3 lead in that game and like we are like beating them and it feels great and yet we don't you know i mean to say we didn't know how to win is like an understatement you know and so everything unravels in the second half and i'm talking about the full catastrophe of things you lose the lead we got emotion on the sideline we got guys arguing with each other there's players crying i mean it is a circus, okay, which is kind of anti-Clark Lee, but at this point, I mean, the wheels are off.

42:24So we find a way to get it back together. Diego drives down, scores, we tie the game, and we go to overtime. We win it in overtime. I mean, I'll never forget that feeling. And I don't think it could have happened any other way. We needed that catastrophe. We needed doubt to creep end of the equation because it gave us a chance to reject all the demons that had haunted us in the past first game as coach we're playing east tennessee state they take a lead like in the third quarter something like that and i looked turned around and looked on the sideline i mean the level of defeat on that sideline was like i thought oh my god i'm i'm alone and so to be able to battle back and to exercise some of those demons i think was really important for us we turn around the next week and we we beat Alcorn State at home and then we go on the road and we play Georgia State a team that we beat somewhere in the ballpark of 70 to like 20 this year I forget the final score we go down to Atlanta we get beat by Georgia State and then it's embarrassing and it's a credit to them but we did not show up to play so there's this inability to understand what it takes week in week out to win i think the minute you start forecasting you're done and i think our guys thought because we had beat virginia tech and won game two that we were it was inevitable and we needed to be humbled and we were we turn around the next week and we lose a double overtime game on the road against missouri that was obviously super tight.

43:59We missed a field goal to tie it. And so that's where we were. We had a bye week. I remember the team meeting on the bye week was like, hey guys, here's the reality. I think at the time we were like last in the country in penalties. We had not performed well on third down on offense. There was like three things. We do a well better learned after every, that's our after action review in everything. So what do we do well? What do we need to do better? What have we learned? What do we learn about ourselves? And I mean, that is applied in every system process that's executed. That's what we work through.

44:31And the better was like, we have to eliminate penalties all three phases. We have to play better on third down offensively. And too many times the ball is compromised. We had a turnover against Georgia State a couple times against Missouri who's on the ground, whatever. And the learned was like, we're this close. And yet this may be the hardest gap for us to close. Here's how we're going to do it. Correcting these mistakes, doubling down on things that have gotten us to this point, but being like really focused on our discipline, pre-snap, post-snap, really disciplined on evaluating our systems and also execution and critical points, whatever.

45:14we go through the bye week we come back on sunday to do alabama practice one and it was raining that day and we went out on the field and i'm telling you it was the best practice i've ever been a part of i had a team that believed i had a team that saw what was possible i had a team that was looking to close that gap and i told him that afterwards I said, if we can replicate this through the week, we're going to win the game on Saturday. That's going to happen. My job each week is to not tell them necessarily the challenges, but to give them the plan to win. So we approach every week as though the win's inevitable, even when we were 2-10.

45:56I remember what it was like to be 22. And when you're 22 years old, you don't want an old guy to tell you what the limitations are or what's not possible. I wanted people to tell me what we could get done and then show me how we're going to do it. So that's my job. And so in the Alabama game, that game is probably like the outlier to end all outliers. I mean, if you look at the statistics in that game, how we controlled the game offensively, how efficient we were in scoring touchdowns, it's pretty remarkable how adept we were on defense at not allowing the explosive touchdown. There were times, I mean, things you wouldn't notice, but I mean, we allow a chunk gain into red zone territory.

46:38And then we forced another like two and a half minutes off the clock because we're just forcing them to line up and snap it. When a game where you have a lead, as you're draining that clock out on defense, you're creating angst on the other side. And now I've got an offense that's executing on third down. We're not compromising the ball. We played a clean game, didn't have penalties. And at halftime, it was like I could feel the energy of the room. It was so tangible. And I'd felt it before. In fact, I felt it at Virginia Tech, to be honest with you, that first game. And what happened in the second half of that first game was it all fell apart.

47:14Because we start projecting or forecasting. And so I got them together on a knee. I got everyone this quiet. And I said to them, guys, it's right there for you. It is on a team. And we don't have to do anything special to close this out. there's nothing beyond just the focus and the execution that will deliver this it's on a platter for you go take it and that's what we did and we punched and counter-punched and we we were able to like hold off the huge momentum swing that could happen and and then the celebration and all celebrations including the students marching the goalpost down to throw in the water And that is such a special moment.

48:01People tell me like, coach, I was sitting in my green chair and that was my lucky chair. And I didn't move and I had to pee, but I didn't go to the bathroom. I'm like, well, that's not sustainable, you know. But I mean, these are moments and this is the beauty of what I get to do. outside of just the interpersonal parts, like the really special stories that emerge when you're, again, stewarding a journey for a young person and helping them navigate. Most of, we get 18, 17 to kind of 22-year-olds, and you're actually not set in stone yet, which is beautiful because all of us carry trauma from childhood.

48:44A lot of us who are high-level athletes carry trauma from the sport we played. and part of my responsibility is to help these players untangle that and to create a healthy relationship both with the people around them but also with the game that they play and they love and so that's so meaningful but i get to do something with the community on saturday now the hard part is when it doesn't go well you know there's another side to this but but to create those memories and to share those memories with people is really special and i'll I'll tell you, I haven't fully understood that game yet. I think I will in 20 years when I look back.

49:21But for me, it kind of blends into a season that was really special. And there are a number of things I can point to and say, man, I'm so proud of this program that go beyond just beating the number one team in the country. Sometimes I feel like that game gets undue attention because the narrative around beating, it's like about the opponent. It's not about Vanderbilt. And I tend to hang on to the stories that actually are about Vanderbilt. And so that's kind of how I view that game. Questions? Go ahead, Rob. Coach, Diego is a big voice in your team and kind of that identity leader. And you lost him this year, right?

49:59Moving on. Who are you excited about that might fill that leader role? We won't be able to replace Diego because there's one of him that I've met that's alive in the world. I'm worried about this, honestly. And this is in constant messaging with the team. We talk about relatedness in our program. Relatedness is our edge. How do we create community, create belonging? Like I told you, how do we live in a way that we're seen and we see others for who they are? You know, let's eliminate facades. Let's understand, let's awaken to the idea that what I do impacts the people that I love. And Diego was masterful at creating these quiet connections and if he walks in our building if you walk in behind him he is going to talk to every person it could be the new training intern it could be the seventh string kicker he doesn't care he's part of the team and for him and the profile he took on especially i think that's so speaks to the kind of environment he helped create because relatedness like we have to account for that because teams that are connected win teams that are connected i shouldn't say teams connected teams that are connected have meaningful experiences and so we'll create connection by everyone going a little further but no one's going to be able to carry the weight that he carried and so this summer will be about how we how we commit to the love and affection we have for one another independent of anything that happens in the fall and we'll have ways that we do that as a team in addition to the training that we have to do alex you talked a lot about decoupling

51:42Ryan Hawk:your worth and identity from outcomes and i can tell like personally you've out of this but you also talked about like helping your athletes kind of overcome this and i'm curious like what methods you use to like instill more in that big just winning the game yeah i mean this is like until you do work on yourself you can't understand the things that are inside of you that motivate you or that stain you in ways that steal your joy i guess for lack of a better way to put it i've had to do a lot of work and i'm going to tell you we could talk for six hours about how we quietly create the life through our thoughts, words, and actions.

52:30And we don't process what we're doing, but we're doing it every day. And just in terms of our program, maybe I'll use this as an example. And I can apply this on a personal level too, that I don't know that is right for the moment. But what you can't do is, so I took the Vanderbilt job and I'm hyper aware of the Vanderbilt past and I rejected that past at every turn even from the standpoint of like you'll see some of these teams and it's like team 132 and it's like they're celebrating this story tradition meaning this is 132nd time this football team's been assembled like I erased all that when I got there and it's like team one you know that's when I think about it it's like very arrogant but it wasn't meant to be that wasn't the point you know so So every prism, every lens through which I made a decision, what did they do before?

53:25Oh, they wore red. We're going to wear green. Oh, they went left. We're going to go right. It's like you're just constantly trying to deviate from what had defined the program in the past. But here's what I learned. And I think I've learned, not I think, I mean, I have learned this on a personal level tenfold, that when we try to go opposite what we're looking to avoid, we eventually what? Become it. We form in the mirror image. So at the end of the day, what you're doing is you're attaching your identity to that, which you're trying to avoid. And so rather than do that, instead, can we plot each day with this vision, the ideal?

54:00This is what we want to create. It may include some of the elements of the past. In fact, I just stopped paying attention to what they did in the past and just focus on, I want this to be this way. That actually gives us a chance to create something that we're proud of. I have spent a lot of time working on myself. there are things that got me to Vanderbilt. I go back to Notre Dame holding it too tight, putting the pressure on myself. I look back and that's all a blur. I can't even remember enjoying it. And I realized early on that what got me here won't keep me here. As I've grown, the program's grown.

54:38Once I understood that about myself, I could sit with the player and listen to them first, which is you know like i don't think we do that enough where we i literally like not like hey bro how's it going you know it's like hey come in here i mean they know when they come in my office like clear your schedule you know because we're going to spend time and so i started helping them by listening to them i stopped looking to them for affirmation i share with them openly about the things i battled both in my professional life but also when i was 18, 19, 20. I don't hold back. They know everything about me.

55:17I mean, I cry in front of them. I, you know, I mean, they know. And it's not like, it's just, I want them to see a man, a human. My kids are around all the time. That humanizes me. My wife's there. My dad's at every practice. That's how he wants to engage with me. He loves that. And it gives them a chance to see the fact that I'm a son. These are common threads. And so I have spent a ton of time with the players who have sent signals to me that they need conversation. And when I do that, I listen and I try to identify where those little like, it doesn't take long to hear someone talk to realize, oh, okay this is a dad issue i don't feel valued because i'm not playing or whatever i mean and so then you say like let me explain how i've experienced this in the past or let me and slowly but surely you you gain trust and you give them a chance to see the world without that kind of tainted liz that's the worst explanation but that is kind of what i do yeah

56:25Ryan Hawk:yeah good yeah you worked under some very distinct personalities between rickney eisel Elko and Brian Kelly, how did that shape you when you were bringing on your staff and bringing on and taking chances on people like Nick Leszczynski, who had been nothing but a GA before that, and now he's your co-coordinator? How did those experiences from your leadership help you develop this team? So are you a Notre Dame fan or a Vanderbilt fan? Notre Dame. Okay. Because I knew if you're bringing up Nick Wazinski, you got to know what you're talking about. So I will tell you one of the biggest mistakes I made in hiring is not bringing Nick here one.

57:03I felt like it was too easy, you know, and I thought I need to get out of my comfort zone. And yet what I learned quickly was I'm not actually going to be able to hire people. They're going to fight for Vanderbilt because it's easy to change logos. I need to hire people that are going to fight for Clark Lee, you know, and I mean that not in a in the egotistical sense. sense, but in a sense of like, we're going to be in this bunker together and this is going to be really hard. Well, Zinsk, as I call him affectionately, he is a bunker guy. All those personalities, there's a poem called Ulysses and Tennyson wrote it.

57:37And it starts, I am a part of all that I've met. Though much is taken, much abides. I am a part of all that I have met. Right. Though much is taken, I've lost a lot. Much abides, much lives on. And I think this is true for all of us. The things we've encountered in life deliver us to the moment and also create the lens through which we see the world. And in that way, I think we have to stop trying to determine whether these things are good or bad and just accept them for as they are, but also appreciate them for how they delivered us. So all these personalities that you speak of, I mean, they're good and bad.

58:18They're elements of we share joy. We share pain. I saw great aspects of leadership and I saw things that I didn't relate to as much. And all of that grew within me a vision for what I wanted to do for myself. There is no world where I don't know how to do this without talking to the third person, but I don't mean to be like a guy that talks in the third. But like if Clark Lee is trying to be someone else, that's going to be painful for everyone. this contract negotiation, this became so clear to me that if I allow the world to dictate what I do, I will take the form of the world. And if I am to have any impact in this world, it's going to be because I have a spiritual center that I'm operating out of.

59:09Meaning I'm not paying attention to these external things, but I'm stepping into these internal things. That's how we shape the world. Otherwise we become shaped like the world. Does that make sense? I'm saying, and also think, and this is a leadership thing. And so we talk a lot about legacy and all these kinds of things. And it's like, I struggle with this because what I know is like, we will return to the dirt and we're only a few generations away from really honestly being forgotten. And even though my eight-year-old thinks that like, he said to me the other day, like, I mean, if you guys are parents, you know, like an eight-year-old is going to ask you about death and all those things.

59:51And that's given way to some beautiful conversations about pain and joy. And this idea that our pain is joy in disguise. What we've enjoyed we mourn when we lose you know so all these great things we've experienced become the source of this emotional pain that we feel when they're gone and so you can live in this tension of like because i've loved i hurt but i don't want to ever lose that tension does that make sense okay so my eight-year-old thinks that when we die and go to heaven our family will reassemble and he'll be eight years old. You know what I'm saying? Like, and I hate to tell him, like, he's got this whole life ahead of him and he may not want to be eight, you know, shoot.

1:00:39And I may not be 44. I can tell you, I'd rather be 34 than 44, but that's another story. And so I've kind of let go of this thought of like, oh man, you know, like I'm going to leave this behind. I'm going to, I'm going to create this and it's going to be celebrated for a long time. I think so much of that is, is our egos wanting to hold on to impact. And instead, it's like, you know what, honestly, like what I want to do is enjoy the challenges that are in front of me, enjoy the people I'm around. I want to help other people navigate life successfully and create an environment where we can all appreciate one another.

1:01:23And rather than to think big picture or long term, I just kind to focus on that now. And it helps me, I guess, stay grounded, you know, stay present. And you didn't ask anything about that, but thanks for the opportunity to talk about it. Okay. We got five minutes. We got to go. There's one more here. I don't mean, he's, I'm okay taking it if it's okay. Go ahead. Yeah. I was just curious, you're building a standard of excellence in a program operating in an era where 17 to 22 year olds are making millions of dollars how do you balance code of conduct working with the player first that's too much for

1:02:04Ryan Hawk:what we want to do here yeah and knowing there's real pressure like you got to win games or the job's gone so uh once you've lived in a world where the job might not be there i think you let go of this idea that i'm fighting for my job i'm fighting for people i care about and my job becomes secondary. And it's not that I don't support my family. It's just like, if I live in that world, it's not going to be healthy for anybody. That's a starting point with the whole NIL era. This is the challenge. This is what keeps me up at night. If I want to make the program all about transaction, it can be.

1:02:38I think my model is so important. I think of the word modesty. These guys are being taught to not have any scaffolding for the future. Some of them will go from making millions in college to millions in the NFL and they'll go do what they want to do, you know, but I say to them all the time, no one's inspired by a 30 year old talking about their glory days, you know, like it's a lot of life to live beyond your ball. And it's not about like having a backup plan. It's like, I want these guys to be competitive for the rest of their lives. You know, that's the gift. I mean, we all experience that, you know, we have passion for what we're doing.

1:03:09So we can't create an environment. Like if I leave it on its own, our locker room will become the world, which means there'll be a million dollar club, a$500 ,000, a$30 ,000 club, and a zero dollar club, you know, and we'll have partitions between them. That doesn't sound like a very good team. So I just message that until I can't message it anymore. And I try to pull, and we have fun with it. So like, I walk into a team meeting room. I've got a Nike tech fit on. Okay. Do you guys know what Nike tech fit is? Some of you? Oh, good. Okay. I walk into the team meeting room. I got Nike tech fit on because I was cold.

1:03:44I put this jacket on. It was in my locker. Walk in and say, oh, coach, let me get that after the meeting. And I'm like, oh, man, like anytime that I'm doing something that's cool, like it, you know, I start to feel cool. You know, my walk changes a little bit. So, oh, you know, I was having a good day. Now I'm having a great day. And I was like, it struck me as this thing, like they covet this jacket. Okay. And I'm like, all right, so here's the deal. It's just like we always talk about. What you drive doesn't make a man. You know, you're not defined by your NIL value. I don't care how many Twitter followers you have.

1:04:19An asshole and a Nike tech fit still an asshole. And this is becomes kind of the fun back and forth we have just trying to constantly again, ground like we are a grounding place for them. I've got to stay committed to that or else I do believe we'll lose our identity. And this is, I think, the challenge of coaching in 2026. Awesome. This is so cool. Give it up for Coach Clark Lee.

1:04:42Ryan Hawk:Thanks.

1:04:47Ryan Hawk:It is the end of the podcast club. Thank you for being a member of the end of the podcast club. If you are, send me a note, Ryan at learning leader.com. Let me know what you learned from this great conversation with Clark Lee. A few takeaways from my notes, different ball, same problems, spend time with people in different fields who are solving similar problems. In his case, a football coach and a baseball manager or the front office, they have more in common than you'd think. I think it's worth it for us to go find our version of the Milwaukee Brewers, who is somebody who is at a similar level, maybe a completely different industry, but they're trying to solve similar problems, have conversations with them.

1:05:33Ryan Hawk:That's something Clark regularly does during his offseason. And then great coaching and great leadership to Clark comes down to a few things. Teach with passion, develop people technically, and genuinely care about them as humans. Teach with passion, develop people technically, and genuinely care about them as people. Love it. And then growth as a leader requires going to the hard places. You can't evolve the program without evolving yourself first. You know what was really cool about this one? After we finished recording, I walked Clark out, came back into the room with all of my members from my learning leader circle.

1:06:13Ryan Hawk:So many of them, including ones who have never watched a football game, commented on just how introspective and thoughtful Clark was. He was like in it, really thinking things through as we were talking. You can feel how much he cares about getting better as a leader in order to serve others. It's really, really cool to experience that with other members of my Learning Leader Circle. Once again, I want to say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two, hey, you should listen to this episode of the Learning Leader Show with Clark Lee. I think he'll help you become a more effective leader because you continue to do that and You also go to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, subscribe to the show, rate it, hopefully five stars, and write a thoughtful review by doing all of that.

1:07:02Ryan Hawk:You are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to you soon. Can't wait.