Global Leaders Forum - Dave Brandon

I went to Toledo’s medical campus this morning to watch Dave Brandon speak on leadership; approximately 200 people were in attendance, he spoke for an hour and then took questions.  DB knocked the cover off the ball with his speech…the topic…Managing Change. Below are a couple of the examples he used in relationship to his current job. I took a couple pages of notes and spoke with him afterwards…Great Event!

"If change is constant, and change creates chaos...Chaos is more the NORM." 

Sudden Change was a concept BO instilled in him…told this story…What is the toughest challenge for the Defense? Forcing a team to punt…heading to the sidelines to rest / get a drink and the offense turns over the ball on the next play. You see the offense running off the field with their head down and sometimes the D is ANGRY at their failure. BO made his team’s practice for Sudden Change…everyone on the sidelines called it out whenever it happened, Sudden Change!…and they practiced it trying to uplift THE TEAM…Bo was tired of offenses scoring the NEXT play after a turnover…he embraced and taught about Sudden Change. Brandon talked further about mental toughness and managing change vs. reacting to change.

So where was Michigan in 2010 when DB was hired…Brandon used the words “divided house.” Michigan was ranked 26^th in the Directors Cup standings (4^th in the Big 10 alone) and renovations were sorely needed to certain athletic facilities. Schools like Florida, Texas, Ohio St. were expanding their AD and moving ahead of Michigan…Football funds 80% of the AD…”Golden Goose so to speak” and we just came off back to back losing seasons along with being notified by the NCAA for “Major Rules Violations.”

 Dave Brandon took a business approach and ran the AD office through “The Denison Model” system…the 2 lowest scores for Michigan.

1.       Team Orientation…“kind of like a pilot who gets airsick” was the phrase DB used

2.       Creating change…scored 7/100 (almost a record low score in businesses using The Denison Model)…Innovation 17/100, Creativity 5/100, etc

DB said Michigan had a culture that “liked doing what we were doing”…he hired a talent director to help out… “Sometimes you can’t change a culture without changing people.” DB pointed out that they just re-did “The Denison Model and innovation went from 17 to 86. Everybody in the AD is part of a TEAM, not staff…costs you $5 to call somebody staff…Michigan needed to create a TEAM culture.

Brandon  put up an impressive PowerPoint that showed innovative things done since 2010…The Big Chill, Night Game at Big House, Weddings on the block M with the bridal party coming out of the tunnel, etc…the whole screen was filled with 50+ bubbles of new things that had high approvals. Told a story about permanent lights and the night game…said he was getting all kinds of calls…You’re an idiot / You know how far I travel to go to games, now I will need a hotel /BO is spinning in his grave, football is played at 12 / BUM and on and on….He joked that he’s being called an idiot now because of NO night game in 2012. Stopped to tell the crowd that he has been speaking longer already than the playing time he got as a football player under Bo.

With regards to the topic on here earlier…Dave Brandon did not mention catfishing nor did he mention ND in any way when talking about the challenges that social media brings to student athletes.  He did point out that these 18-23 year old kids are under a different kind of microscope nowadays (fishbowl analogy)…some people forget these kids have rough times in schools, parents getting divorced, away from home, etc…they deal with a lot, then they mess up in a game and people curse their name…we try to be proactive in dealing with social media…used the example that people have been reading about on here today. Brandon made the point that… “You’re held to a higher standard as a student athlete at Michigan, represent the TEAM well.”

"The Athletic Department has a huge role in what people think about Michigan...What's one of the 1st things you think about when you hear Penn State?" Talked about working with the University and representing the Block M well…going to be asking for $300 million over the next 10 years for additional improvements.

Conference realignment…Nebraska, Maryland, Rutgers…more coming in this new conference landscape, staying continuous is important. Closer to travel to Maryland and Rutgers than Nebraska…talked about how unusual it is with WVU being in the B12…continuous is nice. Somebody asked about ND and he said they made their choice and seem happy where they are headed…was brief when talking about ND.

I have a lot more but I feel like I am typing a book…there’s my decent recap on some of the UM stuff he spoke on (He also had examples from P&G, Valassis, Dominos, etc).