Lead With Love

featuring Jerry Lynch, Ph.D.,
Founder and Director of Way of Champions, a human potential and performance consulting group helping others master the relationship and culture- building games in athletics, business, and life. Jerry has published 19 books in over 10 languages. His work has impacted teams, coaches, and athletes in the NBA, Professional Lacrosse, and Major League Soccer, in addition to men's and women's basketball, lacrosse, field hockey, swimming, soccer, tennis, golf, and track & field at the universities of North Carolina, Duke, Maryland, California, Syracuse, Stanford, Harvard, and Middlebury. In the past 35 years alone, he has helped influence over 130 world, national, conference, and state championship teams.

and with John O'Sullivan,
Founder of Changing the Game Project, an organization dedicated to helping coaches, parents, schools, and youth sport organizations give sports back to our kids and put a little more "play" in "play ball." John is a former collegiate and professional soccer player and has coached for over 30 years on the youth, high school, and collegiate levels. John has written several bestselling books and has consulted with the USOC, US Soccer, USA Swimming, US Ski and Snowboard, USA Wrestling, Ireland Rugby, the National Rugby League of Australia, the PGA, and many other entities.

This is not a book to help you change the way you coach. It is a book about influencing the way you think about coaching. When this happens, you will be equipped to make your own decision about the direction you want your coaching to take.

This book provides an oasis in a desert of coaching challenges. I heard a comment that is relevant to being a great leader: "Extraordinary coaching is fierce love."

Iconic coach John Wooden, when asked why he was so successful (10 NCAA basketball championships), answered: "Guys, that's easy...I had a lot of love in my coaching." He wasn't talking about the Kumbaya, "touchy-feely" kind of love that was popular in the culture of the 1960s. He was talking about the powerful catalyst that builds relationships, winning teams, and success in sports and all of life.

It is about leading by connecting, caring, and loving by learning to be more humane and realizing that we coach people, not a game; that the people matter more than outcomes and results. It is a love that is the source of motivation and inspiration for positive action and unlocking ultimate human potential. It is the eagerness to encourage, empower, and inspire your athletes.

By building a foundation of love, you can be demanding and ask those you lead to perform the work that will make them successful. In this safe environment, athletes feel they belong, feel important, valued, relevant, and respected.

This requires that you develop a set of competencies in addition to being able to strategize a game plan with a thorough knowledge of the X's and O's. Rest assured that all of these competencies will be unpacked within the pages of this book, guiding you to LEAD WITH LOVE.

Customer Review: 5 Out of 5 Stars!
"This book is outstanding! The authors are passionate about the subject and it clearly shows. Lead with Love is not about touchy-feely moments, it's about building relationships. As a coach who has returned to actively coaching after a brief respite, I was told how the kids are 'different' and how challenging it is to work with them. And they are, on both counts. But in my opinion, coaching has always been challenging and every year was different. I feel this concept has helped me tremendously when navigating these waters. As the authors explain, a coach can be demanding and compassionate. And when a coach comes from a place of love, the responses from the athletes can be awesome and wonderful things can happen. I highly recommend this book to young and old coaches alike!"

271 pages. 2025.

It takes a number of critical factors to win an NBA championship...talent, creativity, intelligence, toughness, and luck. But if a team doesn't have the most important ingredient-LOVE-none of those factors matter.
-Phil Jackson, 11X NBA World Champion Coach of Bulls and Lakers

This is not a book to help you change the way you coach. It is a book about influencing the way you think about coaching. When this happens, you will be equipped to make your own decision about the direction you want your coaching to take. I heard a comment the other day that is relevant to being a great leader: "Extraordinary Coaching is Fierce Love". It reminded me of the words spoken by the iconic coach, John Wooden, when his answer to why he was so successful (10 NCAA basketball championships) was simple yet profound: "Guys, that's easy...I had a lot of love in my coaching."

Wooden wasn't talking about the "touchy-feely" kind of love that was popular in the culture of the 1960s. The love he was talking about is the powerful catalyst that forges relationships and drives winning and success in sports and all of life. It is about leading by connecting, caring and loving, by learning to be more humane and realize that we coach people not a game, that the people matter more than outcomes and results. It is the source of motivation and inspiration for positive action and unlocking ultimate human potential.

This love is the eagerness to encourage, empower, and inspire your athletes. It is the willingness to build strong, positive connections with others under your guidance. By demonstrating love for others, you build a foundation where you can push, provoke and demand from athletes in a safe environment where they feel that they belong and feel important, valued, relevant and respected. This requires that a leader develop a set of competencies in addition to being able to strategize and organize a game plan with a thorough knowledge of the X's and O's. Rest assured, that all of these competencies will be unpacked within the content of this book.

LEAD WITH LOVE is a lesson in humanity at a time when we need to coach people, not just the game. More than ever, we must have a lot of love in our coaching. He has put together another amazing piece of work that captures perfectly the coaching revolution that is blossoming in the sports world today.
-Steve Kerr, Head Coach, 4X World Champion NBA Warriors