Jim Harbaugh reveals his dad gave him a phrase at 6 years old that he still lives by and uses today to stay grateful in times of adversity “Things that I thought maybe I figured out for myself, I later realized were just things that they had told me earlier that I didn’t quite hear well enough at the time.” “Attack each day with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind. I first heard that when I was six years old. My dad’s dropping myself and my brother John off at school. ‘Okay boys, grab your lunch boxes and attack this day with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind. Can’t take any wooden nickels. Okay, get going.’” “‘Dad, where’s the car?’ ‘No car today, boys. We’re walking. Grab a basketball. Get 100 with the right, 100 with the left.’ ‘Who’s got it better than us?’ ... ‘Nobody, Dad. Nobody.’” “Playing catch with us and believing in us, those are the things that stick with me the most.”

Dan Campbell says Sean Payton never let losing turn into doom and gloom because great teams diagnose the substance of a failure instead of reacting to the emotion surrounding it “Here’s the first thing I would say about Sean. Sean never got down. He never went gray or dark. He was always like, ‘Hey man, next day we’re ready to roll.’” “Everything was always positive and upbeat. It was simply, ‘Guys, this is why we didn’t do well. This is why we lost. This is why this play wasn’t successful.’” “It was never like doom and gloom and, ‘Oh my God, what are we going to do? Guys, we’re in trouble.’ It was always, ‘Hey man, let’s just look at it and face it for what it is. Let’s look at the substance in it.’” “That’s what I always call it. I tell our players, look at the substance in it. Let’s not go off the emotion of, ‘Oh no, now the fans or the media are saying what’s wrong.’ Block all that out. That doesn’t matter.” “You know what matters? Take away this penalty. Keep your hands inside when it’s third-and-six. We missed a sack. You got your hands on him. Wrap him up. Pull him down. You’re trying to do too much.” “If you just clean up about two or three plays, you win those games in the NFL. Keep the main thing the main thing and don’t let all this other stuff come into it.”

Sean McVay says one of the biggest mistakes young leaders make is trying to be liked and respected at the same time “Cooper Kupp changed my life. It’s uniquely special because my first year as a head coach coincided with his rookie year. I’m a better human, I’m a better coach, I’m a better person because of my relationship and the influence Cooper Kupp’s had on me.” “We’ve had to have some honest conversations. And here’s the reality: you have a responsibility to the collective. It doesn’t mean you’re right. I’ve been wrong before. I’ll be wrong again. It doesn’t change my love, my appreciation, my gratitude for everything that he’s meant.” “Sometimes decisions that you try to make for the collective don’t necessarily fit with people that are so special.” “You try to say it’s business, it’s personal, it all is intermixed. I don’t think you can separate it. Tough decisions have to be made.” “One of the things I’d like to think I’ve gotten better about, when I was a young coach, and I’m still a young coach, you’re so worried about being liked. Oftentimes when you have those difficult conversations, you try to be liked and respected at the same time, and then people are like, ‘What the heck did you really just say?’” “There’s no good way to deliver tough information other than with some empathy, but being direct and open and honest.”