University of Kansas Head Coach Turner Gill Defines the ABC's of Leadership
Posted by Gregory Hill
on Feb 25, 2011
It’s hard to dispute the value of knowledge, hard work and attitude. But for Turner Gill, Head Coach of the University of Kansas football team, those words have deep meaning within them.
Coach Gill was the speaker at the weekly Topeka Rotary Club meeting on Thursday at the Ramada Inn.
“I’m here today talking to the Rotary club because we are connected as people who are trying to help our state become better,” Gill said, beginning his presentation. Rather than focusing on Jayhawk football, Gill spoke mostly on a leadership philosophy that begins with those three words.
“I like using acronyms and for me, I try and define value and purpose with the phrase ‘catch u c’,” he said. He explained the phrase as character, attitude, teachability, communication, humility and then unity and commitment.
“Those are the things that are most important when I talk about knowledge. Those are the kind of things you have to know to have the knowledge to move forward,” said Gill. He then explained that when the letter-number correspondence for the letters in the word “Knowledge” are added, the equal 96. “I look at it more as 96 percent, but we are striving to the goal of reaching 100 percent.”
Gill then defined hard work and when he added up the value of those letters it equaled 98.
“One of the things we do as a team is have everyone stand up and have them tell the rest of the team who is the most influential person in their life and why,” Gill said. “Every person did this last year and what we find is that by knowing more about each other as human beings, it brings us closer together as a team. They find they have more in common than they have differences.”
Finally, he talked about attitude and set the importance of it as people strive to reach 100-percent of their ability.
“I don’t think it’s by coincidence that when you add up the letters in the word ‘attitude’ that it equals 100. The most important decision that we have to make when we wake up in the morning is whether I am going to be positive or have a negative attitude. You have a choice.”
Gill wrapped up his presentation by taking a few questions from the audience, including his preference for the BCS system which he said allows sixteen or seventeen teams to finish the season as winners.