Tyler Summitt, son of legendary coach Pat Summitt, as well as the Co-Founder of Pat Summitt Leadership Group, shares the group’s mission, the story of Pat’s humble beginnings, the art of mastering full executive decision making in 90 second or less, the "secret sauce" to Pat’s leadership, what she definitely didn’t understand about, but learned from, a 5-year-old’s soccer game, how to visualize winning in a (very, very) highly detailed way, the key component that gets you to over a 90% success rate, and the answer to the mystery of just who is “Trish”?

Mentioned in this episode:

This episode is brought to you by Pat Summitt Leadership Group.

Pat Summitt Leadership Group

Hey, Tyler, how are you?

Good, how you doing?

I'm good. It's super nice to meet you.

Absolutely likewise. Thanks for having me

on.

So I'm not from Tennessee. I don't know anything

about basketball. I know your mom is ridiculously respected. I

know enough to know that.

You know what's awesome. I love that. You know

why I love that? Because I love talking to people that have not

heard of mom. Because a lot of times, if people have heard of

Mom, it's like, oh yeah, I've heard that. I've heard that

story. But when we do things for the past summit foundation or

the past summit leadership group, and people don't hear

about mom, a lot of times, they their their life is just changed

in a way where, if they'd heard about mom over time, it's like,

okay, but when somebody gets smacked in the face with some

Pat Summit it's pretty cool. What happens? Heck, we just, we

just got a testimonial. I'm it's on my desk right now. I didn't

go and start like this. How cool is this? This is a testimonial

for the past summit leadership group and the online program.

It's this program. It's like an eight hour course on the

definite dozen. And my mom, you get certified in my mom's

definite dozen, her 12 principles for success. This is

from the financial industry. This is an IT. Listen to this

testimonial, testimony says I was not from Tennessee. I didn't

really follow sports. Okay, sound familiar? I was a little

skeptical when this past summit online leadership program was

introduced, thinking, How is a basketball coach going to teach

me an IT leader? I wasn't sure I would connect with her, but I

was sorely mistaken. I found that the way she loved and

invested in her people was exactly how I felt a leader

should be, and I found myself wanting to be more like her and

to see the impact that she had on her people, even decades

after they're gone from Tennessee, basketball cemented

for me that how you treat people and lead people for the good or

the bad will follow them for the rest of their lives. It makes me

strive every, every day, to be the type of leader that impacts

my team in a positive way, and I am more careful in the choices I

make daily. There you go.

Awesome. Okay. With that being said, I want you

to start from scratch, start at the beginning.

Yeah, absolutely. My mom was just a winner. I

don't know how to put it. She was a winner. And it wasn't just

on the court, it was off the court. I mean, she literally

retired as the winningest coach in the industry, and so retire

with more wins than anybody, men or women. She was labeled the

coach of the century. That one always gets me still like Coach

of the century, like for whoever's listening to this,

take your title and put of the century out of it. Maybe you're

the salesperson. What if you're the salesperson of the century?

You know? Maybe you're the stay at home. Mom, what if you're a

stay at home? Mom, of the century. Is that not crazy? I

mean, of the century. And she got the Presidential Medal of

Freedom, highest civilian honor that you can possibly get. She

was top 50 female leaders in the country, like leader, not

sports. For those of you that aren't sports people, this ain't

about sports. It's about life, you know, and my mom got every

accolade you can imagine, gave keynotes, did so much for

women's sports, yes, but women in general, and honestly,

leadership and so it really, really proud of her. It started

when she was on a dairy farm. You know, she was so shy, like,

if you had met my mom back then, I'm told that you would not

think this was gonna be somebody that went on to become a

celebrity. You know, one story that she liked to tell about how

shy she was is when she was playing in the Olympics, and so

my mom is the head coach at Tennessee, but playing in the

Olympics, there's no WNBA, there's no professional women's

professional basketball. They'd take college players and a head

coach to go play in the Olympics for the 1976 How crazy is that

my mom ended up becoming the first American to win an Olympic

medal as both a player and a coach. And so she's playing in

the Olympics. And again, this is going to tell you who my mom was

back in the day, first game with her teammates, first team with

her coaches, and her dad comes to watch. He was a six foot five

tobacco farmer. I mean, this guy is scary. This guy is, like,

legit, and he's in the first. Front row, and he's up there and

he's yelling, rebound. Trish. Trish, rebound. My mom's full

name is Patricia, and her family called her Trish, not Pat.

Nobody knows that my mom's name, I mean, they all think this is

Pat. You know, they use Pat. So it's like, Who's this guy

yelling at? So my mom's playing hard, but she said one of her

teammates that game had like 30 rebounds. For those who don't

know basketball, 30 rebounds, it's crazy. And so my mom said

this teammate of hers had like 30 rebounds. That teammates name

was Trish Roberts. Trish Roberts thought this scary six foot five

tobacco farmer was gonna kill her if she didn't rebound.

Right? I tell that story because it shows who my mom was, this

shy farm girl, to be honest with you, that was too shy to correct

people at age 18, and she was too shy to do that, and now we

all know her as Pat Summitt, and I think that's just a message to

anybody listening. I don't know what you're going through in

life, but I know that my mom's story can help you, because she

has gone through so many things that we're going to talk about,

you know, on this podcast, that it just shows you if you can do

things the right way, if you can make winning an attitude, if you

can be it's a mindset you can control. It's in your control.

It's just a testament to what you can accomplish in life. My

mom went on to do all those things, but she had to go

through the wall of being shy. She had to attack that head on.

And so that gives you a kind of like, where did she come from,

and then who did she become, and how did she do it? So maybe that

was a good place to start.

Fantastic place to start. Okay, so incredible

icon. What's this Pat Summit Leadership Group, PSLG?

Yeah, that's a great question. It is an

organization that I co founded so that people did not miss out

on knowing who my mom was, but more importantly, on learning

from her and helping themselves in their own life. You know, I

think there's certain figures that that can just impact

people. They're almost like, you know, you hear their story and

you see what they've done, it's like, oh my gosh, you just

believe and my mom was just one of those people. And so, you

know, as an only child, I wanted to make sure people continued to

be successful, and it's happening. Listen, I read you

that testimonial from the financial industry. I mean,

we've got entertainment industry. Dollywood's gone

through, finance industry, restaurant groups, construction

companies, healthcare, stay at home, parents, you name it.

Every industry is going through the trainings and listening to

keynotes and going through in person workshops and going

through online programs and all the above. We're reading books.

My mom is still impacting people right now, today, we're all over

the place, and we're helping people in every industry. So

it's, it's so cool. What's happening? It's my mom's

definite dozen the book she wrote back in the 90s is 12

principles for success. Everything's based off of that,

and that's what she attributes her success to. And it's

applying that to, okay, and your company. How does that apply?

And again, it's changing lives for the better. And as you can

imagine, as the only child, I mean, I just enjoy, I thoroughly

enjoy seeing people improve through my mom's legacy.

Ok, so drill down with me. So you're saying,

hey, it's these 12 principles. Where did these come from? What

are the real life applications, what are some of the takeaways

that you have seen be so meaningful and impactful for

folks?

Absolutely. So my mom had a recipe for success.

It's that definite dozen. Now, when she wrote it, actually sat

down and wrote the book, she had already won three national

championships. She ended up winning five more. And so the

definite doesn't. It's not like my mom reinvented the wheel for

leadership. You know? It's things like communication,

respect, teamwork, hard work, things like that. And so there's

these skills, though, that it seems like we're losing in

today's day and age, right? Because of cell phones, because

all the noise and emails and the news and all this stuff the

past. Summit leadership group uses a variety of different

methods, in person, training online, to come and say, Okay,

here's the right way to do things. Here's how you can treat

people the right way. Here's how you win in life with people. So

again, what are the real life applications? Well, the first

thing that's really taken off is when you go through our online

programs, and we have multiple we have one that's just overall

leadership definite does, and we have one that's a power of teen.

We have one that's specific for women's leadership. So no matter

who you are, what industry you're in, there's one for you.

And what we've seen is, is when people go through that and they

spread it out over six months or a year, habits are formed,

right? And it's great to say, here are my goals, but let me

just watch you for a day, and I'll tell you who you are. Let

me watch your habits. Let me watch what you do do. I don't

need you to tell me about you know what you plan to do and

what you're thinking about, and what you tweeted you were going

to do, and what you told your friend you were going to do, and

what your New Year's resolution. I don't know any of that. I need

to see what you do with your habits, and then I'll tell you

who you are and what you're going to accomplish, and if

you're going to accomplish the goals or not. And so that's what

the online program does. Our online programs, you can go the

website and look them all up. It'll take you through over

time, self paced, bite sized learning, and you learn, okay,

this is how I build habits, and so great place to start is right

there, with the website going checking out those online

programs.

So you said something super keen, and we've

talked a lot about this in the podcast, is there is, without a

doubt, there's so much conversation and content around

developing leadership skills and developing leaders. And I think

this is part of what makes your mom's story so unique. She was

on that cutting edge where a lot of leadership was really

management. They didn't call people leaders. So I would

imagine just simply the fact that she approached what she did

and how she did what she did from a leadership mentality

really made her stand out, because even coaches, they were

managers back in the day, that's how you led, is through managing

people, telling them what to do. It was very different. Well,

then we had this tremendous growth of folks like your mom,

that really took management and transitioned it into true

leadership. It's inspiring. It's the Stephen Covey's the Pat

Summit. It is really looking at things and learning different

what to me, is so interesting. It's like over the last several

years that has fallen to the wayside, because exactly what

you said, the distractions of technology and we are really

seeing this thirst and desire and avoid in this next

generation of leadership that truly they know the term, they

know how to describe leadership, but they haven't experienced it,

and they certainly don't know how to implement it. What I'm

hearing from you is this is an opportunity in an organization

that's committed to bringing that back and showing folks this

is how you develop, because leadership, it's this absolute

science, and I think that's what I'm hearing from you, is your

mom figured that out and is able to translate that to the masses.

No, you couldn't be more right. I mean, we every

day, and that's why I love the past and leadership, we attack,

we absolutely attack the things that technology is trying to do

to us, that negative news is trying to do, that all the noise

is trying to bring on us that, you know, everybody's trying to

play the game. Look at me. Look at me. Look at your competing

and keeping up with the Joneses. And it's just like, ah, there's

so much noise we all know. Honestly, I think we all know

what we need to do. But are you doing it? You know, are you

doing it for the people around you? And yes, people we're

seeing with, with companies that bring us in and like, hey, we

need help on loyalty and retention. And it's like, okay,

well, they're not leaving your company. They're leaving your

leaders. They're not being led. They're not being invested in.

They're not improving. They don't see a future here. And mom

was so magical at this. Strategy is a word that we throw around a

lot. Let's do a SWOT analysis, and let's do all this

complicated stuff. Hold on a second. Let's boil strategy

down. Because my mom was magical at this. She was she was a

master at this. She had to do this over and over again. In

games, she'd have 90 seconds. In a basketball game, there's a

time out. It lasts 90 seconds, Max, some of them 30 seconds.

And she'd have to bring everybody in. She'd have to

listen to assistant coaches real quick, her staff, her C suite,

then she'd have to go into a huddle again. All this in 90

seconds, get everybody organized. Say, Okay, here's

what we're going to do, here's how we're going to do it, and

here's why we're going to do it. Here's why it's going to work.

It made them believe in it. And then she'd say, Okay, now let's

go. And then she'd have to do it again. She have to do it and

again. In the game. And then in her career, you gotta think, and

a college team, you lose 25% of your seniors, they leave. So you

25% of your team every year, and they're like your leaders.

You're not losing front line. So she's losing 25% every year and

bringing in 25% which are rookies, fresh out of high

school. So every year she had to go through strategy, what, how

and why. And I think we're talking about leadership. I

think we're losing sight of making sure everybody has the

why, and we've, you know, we've heard TED Talks and we've read

it, but I don't know your why. But do you do it like I'm

challenging the people listen to this? Do you do that in every

area of life. Do you do it in your faith? I don't care what

your faith is. Mom is a Christian, I'm a Christian, but

whatever that is for you. Do you have that like you have a

strategy for your faith? We all have mission statements at work.

Do you have a position statement for your life? What about your

family? You have kids? Your kids know why they're here. Do they

know how to be successful? They know what they're trying to do.

What about your significant other. Do you know what you're

trying to accomplish? Do you know why you have that

relationship? Do you have a joint statement where it's like,

this is what we're trying to do? My mom did it over and over and

over again. It was so simple, but everybody bought in because

she was a leader. And here's the secret sauce, she would help

them with the what, the how and the why. Okay, before a season

even. Started the what, let's start with the what. She would

say, okay, the what was usually a national championship. And she

got eight of them, which is a lot. So she would take them

through sometimes different things before a season, before a

game even started, she always say, okay, what are we trying to

accomplish? National Championship? All right, let's

go through the National Championship celebration. They

haven't even played a game yet, and she says, We're going to

celebrate this year's national championship that they haven't

won yet. And she goes, Okay, we're all going to walk in a

line like this. All right. Now you're going to sit in this

order. But okay, good. The band is on the left. Imagine them

there. The all the fans are on the right. Okay, now, here's

what, here's the speech. I'll talk first, you're captain. You

talk second, the banner is going up right here. Hey, tomorrow,

does everybody have a suit and a dress? We're going to the White

House to meet the President tomorrow, because we won the

national championship. She's literally doing daily

affirmations. I mean, this is in the 80s and 90s, so before our

time, she's literally taking them through daily affirmations.

It's like it already happened. It's like they already won in

April, but it's August. And then, I mean, they're, they're

months and months and months and months from even that game. They

don't even know if they're gonna make it to that game. Everybody

knew the what now let's go the hat. Okay, she would have her

players lay down on the court and visualize what they were

gonna do in the game the next day. And listen, that was a lot

for a coach to do that, because you only got an hour for

tournament practices, which is not a lot for a practice. You

only got an hour. She would seemingly waste practice time to

have them lay on the court, close their eyes and visualize

but it worked, and they beat the competition, and they were

successful. Do you do that in your life? Are you doing that

with your team? Are you doing that with your family? Are you

doing that with your peers? Do you wake up and have a horny

routine? That's what we're trying to help people do before

you look at the phone and you look at the noise and you look

at all this stuff, you've got to take control of your life.

You've got to take control of your team before we go through

the emails and you've got to take control and say, This is

what we're doing, how we're doing let's go to the why,

because it's the most important point. Everybody knows that. But

listen to what my mom did. My mom would have one on one

meetings with everybody in the organization, everybody, and it

took some time, and everybody's like, I don't have time, trust

me, you have time for this. You have time to have one on one

meetings with the people around you. If you don't have time for

that, then come on, turn off the TV, turn off the emails, turn

off the shows, whatever you're doing, get off of Twitter and

all the social media and have a real conversation with somebody

and say, Okay, why are you doing this? Why are you at our

company? What's the goal? What do you want? Why are you here?

Like, why? Like, tell me your why. And my mom would do that

with each player. She would know that player number one wanted to

go on and play professionally. She want to go overseas. She

want to travel the world playing basketball. She'd know that

player number two just wanted to make your family proud. That's

it. She didn't want to go on and play pro. She wanted to do a

career, something else. And so what if my mom tried to do the

same speech to both of them? What if my mom tried to motivate

them the same way? What if my mom just came in like a cookie

cutter and like some managers, and said, All right, here's what

we got to do. Go and that's it. No, my mom would she still do

the what and the how? But then she go to player one, she said,

Hey, she would she whisper. She said, Hey, there's going to be

pro scouts at that game tomorrow. You've got this.

You've got this. Your dreams are coming. She go to player number

two, and she'd say, hey, hey, the game's on national TV

tomorrow, your family's going to be so proud of you. You've

earned this. It was magical that just that small little 10

seconds to each individual reinforcing their why and their

why fit under the company. Why the business? Why the

organizations? Why, if we win as a team, everybody else

accomplishes their goals and really caring about people. Mom

loved the quote, people do not care about how much you know

until they know how much you care. My mom cared. I mean, she

cared about people so much, and so I think that's a real life

example of something my mom did over and over and over every

year.

I don't want to oversimplify this. I think you

just hit something that is so clutch. People know their what,

and it's not hard for them to figure out what their what is.

They sometimes think they know their why, but it's not until

they really share it with somebody else and drill down

into the details. Does it really come to life? Which, when it

comes to life, it becomes meaningful, but that middle

piece of the how that is where I think so many folks don't know,

and what I'm really hearing is this mission this group is to

bridge that gap. You think you know what you want, you think

you know why. And we're going to expand on all that. But most

importantly, let me show you how.

Absolutely. And I think what comes into mind

when you say the how is, are you willing to sit there and do all

the, you know, analyzing, all the stuff you want to do, but

then can you simplify it? And can you say, Okay, here's what

I'm going to do every single day. Mom had certain things she

did every single day, and she was just consistent with that.

She was always trying to improve those areas. She was trying,

okay, let me, let me improve this one a little bit, let me

improve this and all. But there were certain things that she did

where she knew if I do these things, I might not win every

game. Right? My mom didn't win every game, but she was a

winner. And over time, if you're willing to do that, you're

willing to do the things that other people aren't willing to

do, you're eventually going to get things that other people

aren't willing to get. I mean, our world's competitive. I'm

just being honest. Really, it doesn't matter about other

people, you know, they're they're competitive. It matters

about yourself. Are you competing? They'd be the best

person that you can be? Are you the best version of yourself?

And that, again, is what mom did so well, and she knew how to do

it, and then she helped other people know how to do it. You

know, it's crazy, too. You talk, you talk about teen, you know,

there's a there's research on this, and I've heard it various

different ways, but if you just have an idea, just like I kind

of want to do something you actually have a small chance of

accomplishing. It's like 10% like, where it's just, I got an

idea like this, you know, I could do this. And that's not

bad. Like, one in 10 shot, if I just think it's something, you

know, okay, if you create a SMART goal, and we all have

heard that ad, you know, specific, measurable, make sure

it's time out. If you do that, okay, it goes up. If you set a

how, like, how you're going to do it, the process, it actually

goes over 50% so that's what gets you over 50% but if you set

up weekly accountability meetings with other people and

say, hey, check in on me on this, hold me accountable to

this. And you actually attend those meetings and they're

holding you accountable, you have over a 90% success rate. So

you have the what you know your why you got the how that got you

over the hump. Make sure there's other people around you, you

know. Show me the cry, people you surround yourself with, yada

yada yada, and we all know that. But do you do it? Do your

friends know what you want to accomplish? Your friends know

your dreams. You know their dreams. Are you holding

accountable? Are you helping each other make good decisions?

Same with your family, same at work. This is every area of

life. That's what I'm trying to say the past seven leadership

group. It's about life. This is legit, and I've seen it work

because I grew up with it, and I saw one of the biggest winners

of our time, and how she had an attitude, and how it was in her

control, and how she helped others do it. And so yes, you

were exactly spot on the what, the how and the why, bridge and

the gap, and then, and then having other people to help you

accomplish it with the past, some leadership group. I've seen

it help in times when times are really, really hard. I don't

know life is this way. We're either coming out of a crisis.

We're in a crisis right now, or about to go into one. Maybe

you're in one right now, and you're trying to get a little

something, you're trying to get a little motivation, you're

trying to learn everything's been learn everything's been

good. You might be going into one, I hope it's really far from

now. The Pat Summitt leadership group, we want to help you be

ready for those situations. We want to help you in life. We

want to help you prepare for those things that you just don't

see coming when life just smash you in the face.

Meaningful. Okay, slightly off topic, did

you play sports growing up?

I did. I played a little bit of everything. You

know, actually, one of my mom's favorite stories was the story

about me playing soccer. And this story goes into it shows

who my mom is and how much she's willing to change and improve

over time. So you gotta understand, I'm playing soccer.

I'm like five, but at that point, my mom's already done a

lot of the things. Like, she's already been coaching for

decades. She's already on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

She's already known throughout the state of Tennessee. It's

like, you know, nowadays it's Pat Peyton, Dolly and Elvis.

Those are, like, the four first name people that you'd at least

heard of if you're in the state of Tennessee, right? And so

she's already that. She's already celebrity. She's already

the greatest coach, the greatest in her industry, but she comes

this five year old soccer game, and, you know, I'm out there

playing on the first half. It's her first game, my first game,

every you know, and so everything's new. So I'm out

there playing, I come over at halftime, and I say, okay, Mom,

how'd I do? And she said, You did all right. And you're, you

know, Seth, you're, you're learning my mom. Now, you know,

that's not my mom, like you're starting to learn. Like, it

doesn't sound like a past something thing to say. So I was

like, now, come on, mom. Like, how'd I do? She said, Well,

you're not being aggressive, not impacting the game. You just

stand in there. Like, do something. Go that way. Go

there, go left, go right. You know, do something. I'm like,

okay, okay, I'm gonna help my team. Okay, so I go back out

there. Second half, I'm everywhere. I am in line to in

line, sideline to sideline. I'm all over the place, and so I'm

winding I come over, I'm breathing, come back over to my

head coach, and we get in our huddle, and he was not happy

with me. He was actually really upset at what I just done in

that second half. So I'm confused. Now I walk slowly over

mom. I'm very confused as like, okay, Mom, you tell me to be

more aggressive. My coach just told me I was playing out of my

position. My mom did not realize I was the goalie in the car ride

home. I i explained that as a mom, yeah, I was, I was the

goalie, and she's, does that matter? And so, you know....

That's awesome.

It don't matter your position at basketball, or

you you're up and down, you're side to side. So clearly, coach

of the century hadn't learned soccer yet. But reason I tell

that story, the reason she told that story, is what she did

after my mom coaches. Century. Took pen and paper. She goes to

a 23 year old assistant soccer coach at Tennessee. That soccer

coach went on to be the head coach. She's a Texas now she's

the head coach of Texas, so she knew what she was talking about,

but my mom didn't know that she's 23 and so my mom goes and

sits down pen and paper, says, Hey, can you teach me soccer?

And starts taking notes. Then that tells you how much my mom

was investing in family, and she knew how to be a good mom, but

then she started taking notes on team bonding exercises, how to

build culture. See, soccer has more players than basketball, so

my mom's thinking, if it'll work for 20 people, it'll work for my

10 players. Starts taking notes. My Mom won two more national

championships after that, after taking notes like that, using

some of those team bonding exercises, using some of those

things that help your culture, and needed them too. With that

2007 2008 national championship back to back, she needed some

those personalities didn't mix at the beginning. A lot of

people don't know that, but those teams needed some of that,

and she used that. So again, I asked, Are you open to change?

Are you comfortable being uncomfortable? Think about how

uncomfortable you would be if you are whatever you are of the

century. You're the best. And you go there and you're taking

notes to 20 something, and you're taking notes and you're

going back to where the industry you're really good at, you're

applying it. I mean, how open to change could you possibly be?

And so that I asked somebody listen like, Are you resisting

change? Is there somewhere in your life, career, home, maybe

in your health? I don't know. Are you resisting change? That's

what we enjoy helping with. That's what mom enjoy helping

people with, being comfortable, being uncomfortable, being

comfortable with change. That was one of the things my mom was

actually consistent. At. Sounds weird. She was consistent being

uncomfortable. She was consistent changing and always

trying to get better. So that was a long winded answer to say.

Did I play sports? But yes.

That's awesome. This has been so meaningful. You

know, I could have gone online and read her bio, but hearing

you talk about her super meaningful. And I think it

really shows again. One of my favorite quotes that you quoted

was people don't care how much you know until they know how

much you care, and this really brings that to light. Yes,

you're honoring your mom without a doubt, but you're also really

putting into others to better their lives, an amazing woman.

Thank you for helping me get to know her today.

Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me.