In this conversation, Rob and Dustin explore the difference between clean and dirty motivation—why both forms drive behavior, why one is healthier, and how they show up in coaching, leadership, and athlete development. The discussion draws from a story on The Knowledge Project podcast and connects it to real experiences inside locker rooms, practice environments, and the broader youth-sport ecosystem.

The episode challenges coaches to examine what fuels them, how that fuel shapes their leadership, and how to help athletes move from external validation to internal clarity, purpose, and ownership.

Key Themes

1. Clean vs. Dirty Motivation

• Clean motivation: mission-driven, value-aligned, sustainable

• Dirty motivation: chip-on-the-shoulder, prove-them-wrong, short-term adrenaline

• Dirty fuel can win games—but rarely builds lasting joy, culture, or impact

2. How Dirty Motivation Shows Up

• Creating imaginary critics or “haters” to spark emotion

• Heightened volatility in decision-making and relationships

• Misalignment with what today’s athletes actually respond to

• Athletes quickly see through inauthentic motivational tactics

3. How Clean Motivation Shows Up

• Strengthens trust, relationships, and identity beyond sport

• Better aligned with holistic coaching and the whole-person model

• Requires intentionality because it lacks the emotional spike dirty fuel brings

4. Athlete Identity, Family Pressure, and Motivation Drift

• ICP research shows family is a top motivator for college athletes

• When athletes detach identity from outcome, performance can improve—or decline

• Many athletes discover they were competing more for their parents than themselves

5. The Coach’s Role

• Authenticity is mandatory—modern athletes sense inconsistency immediately

• Coaches shape whether athletes use their motivation in healthy ways

• Clear roles, communication, and purpose are essential to sustaining clean fuel

• Winning doesn’t automatically convert motivation—it often amplifies pressure

Featured Quotes

• “Dirty motivation works—until it doesn’t.”

• “If you’re manufacturing haters, you’re building on sand.”

• “Clean fuel builds people. Dirty fuel burns them.”

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Coaching and Leading the 21st Century Athlete

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Athletic Department Leadership and Developing Coaches

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In Part 1 of Rob’s conversation with Shaun Reid, they diagnose what’s gone sideways in youth sports. Shaun—originally from Wales and a longtime soccer coach—breaks down why the youth sports “system” has drifted from child-centered development toward a pay-to-play business model. Rob and Shaun discuss dropout rates, parent pressure, over-trusting underqualified coaches, and the way “selling a dream” can hijack the purpose of youth sports. Part 2 will focus on solutions.

• Shaun’s background and why he sees youth sports differently
• Why youth sports has become a “system” with predictable outcomes
• The integrity gap: when the business model replaces the kid as the priority
• The impact of parent identity, comparison culture, and social media
• How young coaches can become “experts” to parents—and spread bad information
• The “selling the dream” problem: promises that don’t match reality
• Why Rob believes it’s not just individual coaches—it’s the structure around them
• Why this conversation is split into two parts, and what’s coming next

If youth sports is producing rising dropout rates and decreasing participation, it’s not an accident. It’s the result of incentives and expectations that put adults—often unintentionally—ahead of the child.

Rob and Shaun shift from diagnosis to solutions: practical guidance for parents, realistic development for coaches, and ways to reduce harm inside a pay-to-play reality.

This Best of 2025 episode brings together the most listened-to and most shared conversations from Beyond Coaching this year.

Each segment tackles a reality coaches deal with every day:

how to build culture when not everyone plays, how to develop leaders through failure, and how to handle stress without trying to eliminate it.

You’ll hear from Brent Hobson, Jim McNeal, and Mitch Hull—three coaches and leaders working in very different environments, but wrestling with the same leadership challenges.

Different settings. Same issues.

Leadership, pressure, failure, and building programs that last.

Not everyone plays—but everyone still shapes the culture.

Brent Hobson, longtime head coach of Friends University Women’s Soccer, explains how he intentionally builds value for athletes who may never see the field, including why the only award in his office has nothing to do with wins or goals. This is what team-first culture looks like in practice.

Topics include:

• Building value beyond the lineup
• The Garland Award and why it matters
• Coaching honesty without lowering standards
• What’s actually changed—and hasn’t—with today’s athletes

Jim McNeal, retired Navy Reserve Rear Admiral and leadership mentor at the U.S. Naval Academy, explains why the Academy is intentionally designed to make high achievers fail—and why that matters.

Failure isn’t accidental. It’s part of the training.

Topics include:

• The Naval Academy as a leadership laboratory
• Why leaders are judged on how they lead people, not just results
• Helping high achievers learn to fail safely
• Shifting from external success to internal standards

We spend a lot of time trying to remove stress from sport. Research suggests that approach often backfires.

Mitch Hull explains why stress itself isn’t the problem, why perception matters more than pressure, and how coaches reduce stress by focusing on habits, preparation, and daily execution—not the scoreboard.

Topics include:

• Why “stress is bad” is the wrong message
• Reframing pressure as preparation
• Process-over-outcome coaching
• Helping athletes perform when it matters most

Beyond Coaching is produced by the Impactful Coaching Project, an initiative focused on helping coaches lead the whole person—not just the performer.

The Impactful Coaching Project exists to support coaches at every level as they navigate leadership, culture, pressure, and the realities of coaching today’s athletes. Through podcasts, writing, research, and coach education, ICP emphasizes practical leadership, honest conversations, and systems of care that help teams perform and people grow.

In this Beyond Coaching Podcast Short, the conversation centers on a simple but often neglected truth: care doesn’t happen by accident—it has to be planned.

The discussion explores how coaches can create intentional platforms for honest, constructive dialogue with players. When athletes are given the right setting, clear expectations, and healthy boundaries, most are fair, thoughtful, and invested in making the program better—not tearing it down.

The episode also highlights the enduring power of small, personal gestures. A handwritten note. A name written in ink. A quiet moment of affirmation without an audience. These practices still matter—and they still work.

Beyond individual actions, the conversation zooms out to culture. The stories a team tells—about gratitude, care, and looking out for one another—shape identity far more than win-loss records. What gets noticed, named, and repeated becomes who the team is.

The bottom line is clear: if care isn’t built into weekly rhythms, practice plans, and systems, it will get crowded out by scouting reports, recruiting, and schedules. Coaches who want it to last have to plan for it.

Key themes:

• Creating healthy structures for player feedback
• Why most athletes are fair when given the right environment
• The lasting impact of handwritten notes and personal affirmation
• Using stories to reinforce team values and culture
• Why care must be scheduled—or it disappears

Listen to Beyond Coaching:

• Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-coaching-an-impactful-coaching-project-podcast/id1711128150
• Spotify: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-coaching-an-impactful-coaching-project-podcast/id1711128150

Learn more about the Impactful Coaching Project at:

https://impactfulcoachingproject.com

Rob sits down with Brent Hobson, longtime Friends University women’s soccer coach. Brent became a head coach at 24 and has spent nearly a decade shaping a program built on clarity, honest feedback, and team-first culture.

They dig into what it actually takes to coach Gen Z, how to lead players who aren’t getting the role they hoped for, and why self-evaluation is one of the most underrated tools in a coach’s toolkit.

Brent sees today’s athletes as more visible, more individualized, and more influenced by social media. Instead of complaining about the shift, he explains how coaches can adapt and still build connected teams.

Brent created the Garland Award, named after a former player who rarely played but shaped the program through character and commitment. It’s the only award displayed in his office—and a reminder that contribution isn’t limited to playing time.

Whether it’s the athlete who won’t play much or the athlete upset about their role, Brent leans toward clarity over comfort. He outlines how to help players understand how they can still impact the team—and why these conversations require coaches, captains, and teammates working together.

Initially skeptical, Brent now credits the 3D framework with helping him slow down, reflect, and rethink his relationship-building as a coach. It gave him a needed “renewal” in how he leads.

Evaluations shouldn’t be a hunt for mistakes. Brent urges ADs to look at the whole athlete experience and share what’s going well—not just what needs work.

• Book recommendation: Shoe Dog by Phil Knight
• Failure that shaped him: The challenging 2020 COVID season
• Definition of success: Lasting relationships with players and alumni
• Best golf score: 73 at Cherry Oaks
• New habit: Listening more—to players, colleagues, and his kids

Listen on:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-coaching-an-impactful-coaching-project-podcast/id1711128150

Spotify: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beyond-coaching-an-impactful-coaching-project-podcast/id1711128150

More resources at impactfulcoachingproject.com

Rob sits down with longtime coach and mentor Dean Jaderston to unpack the transitions that shaped his career—from Minnesota high schools to college men’s hoops, and eventually to leading women at Friends University. Dean lays out a clear contrast between coaching men and women, why the collective psyche matters on women’s teams, how to move from managing to leading, and what it takes to stay steady in a public, always-on era. Faith, patience, and the willingness to play the long game thread through the whole conversation.

Key Themes

• Transitions that grow you: High school → college; men → women; what Dean “didn’t know he didn’t know” about recruiting and preparation.
• Coachability & confidence: With men, puncturing overconfidence; with women, raising ceilings and naming their potential.
• The collective effect: Public praise/critique lands differently on women’s teams—use “we/us” language and handle most individual feedback 1:1.
• Lead, don’t just manage: Dean’s “one big rule”—you either bless people or curse people; hold to that and cut the bloated rulebook.
• Faith as framework: Total-release effort as worship; coach the whole person—spiritually, emotionally, psychologically.
• Reality of the job: Life and coaching are messy; don’t overreact, don’t take it personally, watch actions over words, and keep vision front and center.
• Listening builds buy-in: Seek first to understand; today’s athletes spot inauthenticity fast.
• Vision sustains: The Hartman Arena story—nobody believed it early; vision made the work coherent.

Notable Moments

• 00:15 – Why Rob almost changed jobs just to learn from Dean
• 01:36 – High school → college: “I didn’t know what I didn’t know” (recruiting, prep)
• 06:00 – When talent stalls: the cost of being uncoachable
• 06:33 – Men vs. women: confidence gaps and ceilings
• 08:52 – Language shift: use “we/us”; keep praise/critique mostly individual
• 10:49 – Why schemes/X&O often matter more in the women’s game
• 11:58 – Teaching bug: chasing light-bulb moments and durable confidence
• 14:35 – Faith, “audience of One,” and coaching the whole person
• 20:17 – Coaching in the information age: echo chambers and public scrutiny
• 21:18 – From rules to leadership: Dean’s single standard (“bless vs. curse”)
• 23:13 – Adapt the system to the roster you actually have
• 24:04 – Listening as strategy for buy-in
• 26:00 – Hope and vision: conditioning with the end in mind
• 30:26 – Don’t take it personal; judge actions over words
• 31:02 – Playing the long game when your job feels year-to-year
• 33:44 – Embrace the mess; prepare for age-appropriate, inappropriate moments
• 35:25 – Rapid fire: books, failures, definitions of success, habits

Rapid-Fire References

• Books mentioned: Coach K’s leadership book (annual reread); Frosty Westering’s Make the Big Time Where You Are (ethos: maximize what you have, where you are).
• Podcast: Better Questions by Matt Davis.
• Definition of success: Help people see and seize their potential—spiritually, academically, emotionally, athletically.

Practical Takeaways

• Shrink the rulebook. Hold a single, culture-defining standard and enforce it consistently.
• Reframe confidence. With men, calibrate realism; with women, remove ceilings.
• Mind the locker room dynamics. Public praise/critique has second-order effects on women’s teams—coach individuals individually.
• Lead with listening. Credibility follows curiosity and presence.
• Keep vision visible. Name the destination daily so effort has context.
• Don’t chase validation. If behavior changes, let that be the win.

Check out more of our stuff (and sign up to get a free resource) at impactfulcoachingproject.com.

In this episode, Dustin Galyon shares a real-world coaching moment involving a senior student-athlete who skipped a team workout and responded with uncharacteristic defiance. Instead of reacting with discipline alone, Dustin leaned on years of relationship-building to have a direct, honest conversation—one that ultimately deepened trust and ended with mutual respect.

The conversation explores how coaching has changed over the past decade, why relationships matter more than ever, and how today’s coaches can lead with both accountability and empathy. It’s a reminder that the best coaching happens when leaders stay connected, even in tough moments.

The Impactful Coaching Project helps coaches lead today’s athletes with a more holistic approach to leadership. ICP offers training, tools, and research-backed resources that connect mental, emotional, and physical health to strong team performance. Learn how to build healthy, competitive team cultures at impactfulcoachingproject.com.