Editor’s note: This cover story appeared in our July 2009 issue.
By Mike Drummond
If you’re seeking inspiration when it comes to innovation, pointers on leadership, tips on teambuilding, or life-lessons on how to improve
yourself as a human being, then look no farther than Joe Gibbs.
For those who know their sports, Joe Gibbs is a familiar name. He coached the NFL’s Washington Redskins to three Super Bowls- tied for second with Bill Belicheck of the New England Patriots and the late Bill Walsh of the San Francisco 49ers and. Only Chuck Knoll formerly of the Pittsburgh Steelers had more titles with four.
Gibbs invented new defensive and offensive strategies and helped shape how modern professional football is played. As the offensive coordinator for the San Diego Chargers in 1979-80, Gibbs introduced a high-powered passing attack since imitated by others. The Chargers set multiple offensive records during Gibbs’ two seasons there, becoming the first team to average more than 400 yards of offense per game.
Gibbs, who retired from the NFL in 2008, also heads Joe Gibbs Racing, a Nascar team that owns three top-level Sprint Cup cars. The team, founded in 1992, has 145 overall wins, three Nascar Cup Series championships, and last year won its first Nascar Nationwide Series owners’ championship.
With Nascar increasingly cracking down on the use of technology to cut costs, his team is among those experimenting with motor oils using synthetic lubricants, new polymers and cutting-edge molecules – the last frontier where teams can innovate without restraint.
Oh, he’s also an author of Game Plan For Life, a theological motivational book that blends God and gridiron analogy. Due July 21, it’s billed as an “average Joe’s guide to what the Bible has to say about finances, relationships, living a life of purpose, finding the right vocation, and physical, emotional, and spiritual health.”
Yes, Joe’s a busy guy. But we were able to catch up with him recently to plumb his thoughts on leadership, innovation, success and the human condition.
ID: Let’s talk about your philosophy of success. So many of us hinge the meaning of success on a dollar figure. You obviously are well off financially. But what have you found to be the keystones to a successful, meaningful life?
JG: When you’ve won Super Bowls and Nascar championships, people often ask you how you lead a successful life. It comes down to three things for me. Should my occupation be first? I don’t think it should be. It should be God and my relationship with Him that comes first. Second should be your family and the influence you have on others. So where does that leave your occupation? To me the third thing in your life should be your occupation. Putting that third in your life is a huge deal, and I’ve had trouble with that at some points in my life.
ID: How so?
JG: At different times coaching the Redskins I was gone a lot. I think a lot about some of the mistakes, and it was mostly the time I spent away from home, away from my family and my boys. I have eight grandkids now, and great-granddaughters-in-law. I made a commitment I don’t want to have that happen again. I try to spend time each day with my granddaughters.
I missed some of the most important times in my life, which was being with my boys and my wife. You have to make sure you have the right priorities going forward. In know that’s one of the things I second guess in my life.
ID: What lessons from your experiences as a leader in the NFL have you applied to your ownership role in Nascar?
JG: The two sports are almost exactly the same. They’re both team sports. And the most important thing in both those sports is our people. If I pick the right players, chances are they’re going to make me look good. You win or lose with your people. As coaches and leaders of organizations, we need to spend our time working with people.
ID: I’m a San Diego native and longtime Chargers fan. Hated to see you go to the Redskins, even though that move worked out for you. What are some of the most important aspects of being a leader?
JG: Pro sports change roughly 30 percent a year. If you’re sitting still, you’re falling behind. One thing that does not change is human nature. Yes, sports and different aspects of them may change, but not human nature. The same things motivate and discourage us.
We come into the world self-centered. As leaders, what we have to do is pick people willing to sacrifice their own goals for the good of the team. That’s tough and some can’t do it.
At the Washington Redskins we learned a lot of things about selecting people. You don’t do it based on a resume. We went all the way back to junior high schools, asking coaches and teachers, ‘Was he an achiever? Did he follow through and finish things? Was he successful?’
By going back that far, you have a 10-year history of that person. The best way to pick people is looking at their past. Their past influences their future. So the first thing for me is always: Does he have integrity and character. That’s always first. Second is smarts. And then, the third thing is talent. That’s a little different approach than what others may have done.
ID: I wonder if the NFL and other professional sports took that approach, we might see fewer Michael Vick and Plaxico Burress incidents.
JG: I have 450 people working here at Joe Gibbs Racing and I’m always cautious. Obviously, something embarrassing could happen to us. So that’s why in drafting players and picking people for the race team, we always try to determine if they have the right moral standards. If not, you have a good chance of them getting in trouble.
Many times, if you think about human nature, all of us have some sort of drama in our lives and we can make bad choices. You have to understand teams are made up of people. You can have disappointments dealing with people.
ID: We find Nascar to be both thrilling and frustrating. Thrilling for all the obvious reasons – high-speed competition, team work, the element of danger. But frustrating in regard to the tight limitations imposed on the machines. There’s little room for engine innovation. We’d like you to comment on this and what, if anything, you’d like to see change.
JG: We’ve got a great sport that’s extremely well run. I see the best years of our sport still in front of it. We don’t have a track in the Northwest, but looking forward to seeing that happen. It’s a 10-month sport and I still think it’s growing. As for our team, we’re family owned. We had 16 people here to start. Seventeen years later we now have 450. We have a developmental program and a diversity program. The growth has been unbelievable. What would I change? I can’t think of anything.
ID: Talk about the resources Job Gibbs Racing puts into research and development of its own branded oil?
JG: We’re working with our technical partner to improve the oil. We came up with something we think will make a big difference. We’re killing to squeeze out three or four more horsepower and protect the motors. We developed a high-quality oil through experimentation. It was so good, we thought about how to sell it ourselves and developed another business around it. The oil we’re selling now you can’t run in a street car – it doesn’t have all the specifications and ingredients that a street car would have to have. But it can be run at race tracks.
ID: How would fans or others go about buying the oil your labs produce?
JG: They can contact us at Joe Gibbs Racing (www.joegibbsracing.com) and we have distributors across the country.
ID: Your new book, Game Plan For Life, releases in July. How is it different from other motivational books out there?
JG: I’m extremely excited about it. A little bit of background: I found that when I give people my testimony about how I asked Christ to come into my life and then hand them a Bible, some people are put off by that. The Book has this old strange language, written 2,000 years ago and some think it can’t be relevant today. And with the Bible, it’s hard to find something about a specific subject – you have to hunt and peck.
I thought it would be neat to put out something that could address those areas. We had a research group fan out across the nation and ask a cross-section of Americans what they believed would be the most relevant lessons they would need to lead a successful life.
What came back was 11 subjects. Health, success, heaven and so on and we went down that list and had a biblical scholar talk about each of these topics. My testimony weaves through there. When I followed these principles in my life, it’s led to success. And when I didn’t it’s led to trouble, including financial disaster, which I detail. It’s a relevant, modern game plan that gives you the game plan for life.
ID: What did financial disaster look like for you?
JG: In 1981 when I got the job with the Redskins, I was a young coach on a short-term contract. I got offered an opportunity to invest in a simple business partnership. We agreed to co-sign on loans. It didn’t take long for that to collapse, with the other partners filing for bankruptcy on loans we couldn’t pay and me sort of holding the bag. I was able to work out something with nine banks and got through it four years later. I was a fool. I was playing a game instead of following a game plan.