Who's Carrying Your Bag?

Our last installment in The Leadership Lab explored what was once meant to be white noise for labrador retrievers and how it can also be a great classroom for exploring leadership concepts – none other than professional golf on television.    

Last time, the lessons came from a golf glove. Confidence. Trust. Dominate. And how a 21-year-old Jackson Koivun used his mindset – his self-described superpower – to hold off the world’s #1 golfer and win the 3M Open in only his third professional tour event.  As John Maxwell asks, “Who’s the most important person you talk to all day?”  Koivun’s win loudly proclaimed the correct answer:  You, yes YOU, are the most important person you talk to all day.  How we think about, treat, and talk to ourselves absolutely matters. 

In this installment, our classroom stays on the course, but the focus shifts from the conversation between our ears to the one beside our shoulder.  Our last lesson came from a golf glove.  This one comes from a caddie.  Our last lesson asked the important question, “What am I telling myself?”  This one asks, “Who am I allowing to speak into my life?” 

Until about five years ago, my knowledge of golfing with a caddie was limited to what I saw watching golf on TV.  The person who had that unenviable job of hauling a pro’s clubs on the course, cleaning those clubs, raking the sand, looking in a notebook, holding the flagstick, and throwing grass into the air to check the wind.  They walked with the pros to spare them the time and energy required of the less glamorous parts of the sport.   

And then a group of us were invited to attend a fundraiser and play at Pebble Beach Golf Links, where caddies are required – for everyone.  The ratio would be one caddie per foursome of golfers, but suddenly my feelings of intimidation and inferiority were hitting hard -- like a wave off the Pacific.  How would a professional caddie handle my struggling golf game with all of my bad habits, wonky swing, and inconsistent results?  Surely I could rake my own sand and clean my own clubs to spare some poor soul that long afternoon, right?   Is it too late to get out of this? 

I was wrong, and thankfully so.  A caddie is so much more than a sand raker and bag carrier.  In fact, upon learning of my therapy background, our very cool caddie shared with me his heart for building rapport and getting to know every golfer he caddies for –  their strengths, their preferences, their thinking and communication styles, and their hangups.  All with the goal of not only being a valuable expert on the golf course itself, but especially as being a sincere encourager, trusted advisor, and tension reliever.  Whoa.  Mind blown.   Whether it’s for the pros or very human, bumbling golfers like myself, a caddie’s focus is more on the golfer – the person – he or she is with, than on the course, the equipment, or even the rules of golf.   

Throughout our round, I watched him attend to each of us, with our own quirks and strong personalities, with exactly the recommendations and advice we needed and delivered in a way that we could best receive.  He would joke and cajole one after a bad shot, while encouraging and sometimes even teaching another.  I watched him with reverence as his people skills were every bit as impressive as his golf skills and knowledge of the course.  And as impressive as his skills were, it was his intentionality and how he applied those skills that made for an incredible – and in no way intimidating – experience for our foursome. 

After that experience, the Labradors and I watched golf a little differently.  We watched the pros, but we also watched the caddies with interest.  And here’s what we found.  A caddie has a significant – and understated -- role in a golfer’s success on the course.  In addition to carrying the bag, professional caddies: 

• Read greens. 

• Calculate yardages. 

• Understand wind. 

• Manage emotions. 

• Slow players down. 

• Remind them of the game plan. 

• Keep them from making one bad decision that becomes three. 

• Help them focus on the next shot rather than ruminating on the last one. 

In other words, the caddie doesn’t hit the shot.  They help the player hit their best shot. Furthermore, the caddie doesn’t make decisions for the golfer.  Rather, they ask questions. They offer perspective. They remind. They encourage.  But ultimately... The golfer still swings the club. 

Golfers spend most of their time looking at the course from ground level. The caddie has walked ahead. They've looked from behind the green. They've studied the slope from the opposite side. They often see things the golfer simply can't see from where they're standing.  I know in my experience, there were a few times our caddie said the ball was going to roll in the exact opposite direction I thought it would.  My mind couldn’t get my head around what he was saying vs. what my eyes were seeing.  That said, it only took one putt of me believing my eyes over him to change my mind. 

Isn't that true in life? 

Sometimes we don't need someone smarter than we are. We simply need someone standing in a different place. Every golfer eventually has to walk to the first tee alone.