Most leadership advice is written by people who already sound like a leadership book. It’s polished. It’s abstract. It’s full of words like alignment and synergy and stakeholder management – and somehow you still don’t know what to do on Monday morning when your team’s dragging, your best performer is sulking, and your boss wants “more urgency.”
So here’s a different approach. The best leadership lessons I’ve learned (and the ones that actually work) often come from places that have nothing to do with corporate leadership:
- Great sports coaches
- Historical figures (not the quote-meme versions, the real ones)
- Parenting (yes, really)
Because leadership is leadership. Humans are humans. Pressure is pressure. And the basics don’t change just because you’re wearing a lanyard.
This article is all about actionable lessons you can steal – from unlikely sources – and use immediately at work.
What “Unlikely Sources” Do Better Than Most Managers
Before we get into the examples, here’s why these sources are so useful:
- They deal with raw emotion. Real stakes. Real fear. Real ego.
- They can’t hide behind jargon. If the team loses, the team loses.
- They’re forced to build trust fast. Especially in coaching and parenting.
- They teach under pressure. Not in perfect workshop conditions.
Corporate leadership often happens in slow motion. These domains don’t allow that. Which is why the lessons are sharper.
Great Coaches: What Elite Coaching Teaches About Leading Teams
1) Standards beat motivation
The best coaches don’t spend their lives trying to “pump people up.” They build standards that make effort non-negotiable. At work, “motivation” is unreliable. People have bad sleep, sick kids, low mood, dopamine-fried brains, whatever.
Standards are reliable.
Actionable ways to apply this:
- Define three non-negotiables for your team (e.g., “We respond to customers within 24 hours,” “We don’t ship without peer review,” “We show up to meetings on time or we don’t book the meeting.”)
- Repeat them relentlessly.
- Enforce them calmly (not emotionally).
You don’t need to be harsh. You just need to be consistent.
2) Great coaches coach the boring stuff
You know what wins matches? Repetition of fundamentals.
You know what makes teams effective? The boring basics:
- clear ownership
- good handoffs
- clean communication
- predictable cadence
- saying the quiet part out loud
Most managers want to talk about “vision.” Great coaches spend time on footwork.
Actionable ways to apply this:
- Pick one “fundamental” your team is bad at (handoffs, meeting discipline, writing clarity, estimation, etc.)
- Run a two-week improvement sprint with a single metric
- Celebrate improvement publicly – even if it’s incremental
When basics improve, everything else gets easier.
3) Praise effort publicly, correct privately
Good coaches protect confidence while still demanding growth.
Many managers do the opposite:
- They nitpick in public (“Just a small correction…”)
- They praise vaguely in private (if at all)
Actionable ways to apply this:
- In public: praise specific effort + impact
- “I liked how you handled that customer escalation – calm, fast, and you kept the team aligned.”
- In private: correct specific behaviour + next time
- “Next time, bring me in earlier – don’t carry it alone.”
You’ll get better performance and better morale.
4) The best coaching is constraint-based, not lecture-based
Coaches don’t just explain. They design training so the right behaviour is the easiest behaviour.
At work, we love telling people what to do. But if the system punishes the right behaviour, you’re done.
Actionable ways to apply this:
- If you want better documentation, make it part of the workflow:
- templates, required fields, “no doc = no merge”
- If you want fewer meetings, force agendas:
- “No agenda, meeting cancelled.”
- If you want faster delivery, reduce dependencies:
- simplify approval chains, empower decisions
Design beats willpower.
Historical Figures: What Real Leadership Looks Like When It’s Not Comfortable
Let’s keep this practical and not romantic. History isn’t a motivational poster. But it’s full of leaders who dealt with crisis, uncertainty, and imperfect information – sound familiar?
5) Clarity under pressure is a superpower
Some leaders are calm only when things are calm. That’s not leadership. That’s vibes.
Under pressure, your team watches you for cues:
- Are we safe?
- Is this solvable?
- Do we have a plan?
Actionable ways to apply this:
When things go sideways, say three things in this order:
- What we know
- What we don’t know
- What we’re doing next
Example:
“We know the client is unhappy about delivery. We don’t yet know exactly which feature caused the break. Next, we’re pausing the release, gathering logs, and I’ll update you at 3pm.”
People don’t need certainty. They need direction.
6) Choose principles before you need them
The leaders who lasted weren’t the ones with the cleverest tactics. They were the ones anchored by principles. At work, if you don’t decide what you stand for in advance, you’ll decide it in a panic.
Actionable ways to apply this:
Write down your leadership principles in plain English. Examples:
- “I don’t throw people under the bus.”
- “Bad news travels fast.”
- “We solve the problem, not punish the person.”
- “We don’t lie to customers.”
Then use them as your decision filter.
When you live by principles, you become predictable in the best way.
7) Symbolic actions matter more than speeches
Historical leaders often understood something modern managers forget:
People remember what you did, not what you said.
A symbolic action under pressure becomes culture.
Actionable ways to apply this:
Pick one visible behaviour that signals your standards. For example:
- You show up prepared to every meeting (agenda + decisions)
- You publicly take responsibility when something fails
- You do the hard conversation early, not late
- You protect your team when politics gets ugly
Culture is formed through moments. Not memos.
Parenting: The Leadership Cheat Code Everyone Pretends Doesn’t Exist
If you’re a parent, you already know: you can’t “manage” a human like they’re a spreadsheet. You have to lead.
And if you’re not a parent? Doesn’t matter. The principles still apply.
8) You can’t control people – you can only control the environment
Parents learn fast: you can’t force a kid to love broccoli. But you can design meals, routines, and norms. Same at work.
Actionable ways to apply this:
Ask:
- What behaviour do I want?
- What behaviour does the environment reward?
Then change the environment:
- If you want honesty, don’t punish truth-tellers.
- If you want initiative, stop micromanaging every detail.
- If you want calm, stop creating urgency theatre.
People are rational within their environment.
9) Boundaries are kindness (when they’re consistent)
Weak boundaries create anxious teams. If your expectations change based on your mood, people become cautious, political, and defensive. They start managing you.
Actionable ways to apply this:
- Set boundaries clearly:
- “Messages after 6pm are for emergencies only.”
- “We don’t accept last-minute scope changes without moving timelines.”
- Hold them consistently.
- Don’t apologise for them.
Boundaries aren’t aggression. They’re clarity.
10) Name the emotion, reduce the heat
Parenting teaches you how to handle meltdowns – yours and theirs.
At work, people don’t “melt down” as obviously, but it’s the same thing:
- frustration
- insecurity
- fear
- resentment
- shame
Actionable ways to apply this:
When someone’s heated, try:
- “I can see you’re frustrated.”
- “This feels unfair to you.”
- “You seem worried about how this reflects on you.”
That’s not therapy. It’s leadership.
When people feel understood, they calm down faster, and you can solve the actual issue.
11) Attention is your currency
Kids behave better when they get attention for good behaviour.
Adults are the same. They just dress it up as “recognition” and “visibility.”
Actionable ways to apply this:
- Catch good work quickly (within 24 hours)
- Be specific:
- “That doc was clear and made decision-making easy.”
- Don’t wait for performance reviews
If you ignore good performance and only show up when things break, you train your team to associate you with stress.
How to Turn These Lessons into a Simple Weekly Leadership System
Here’s a practical cadence you can run – no fluff.
Daily (10 minutes)
- Ask: “What’s the one thing my team needs from me today?”
- Remove one blocker.
- Give one piece of specific recognition.
Weekly (30 minutes)
- Re-state the standards (briefly)
- Review one fundamental (pick one)
- Fix one environmental issue (process, tool, or workflow)
Monthly (45 minutes)
- Identify one “culture moment” you want to create
- e.g., how you handle bad news, ownership, customer commitment, quality bar
- Make one symbolic action that reinforces it
This keeps leadership practical and visible.
Common Mistakes People Make When Copying These Ideas
Mistake 1: Borrowing the vibe, not the method
Quoting a coach isn’t leadership. Building standards is.
Mistake 2: Confusing “tough” with “strong”
Strong leadership is calm, consistent, and fair – not loud.
Mistake 3: Thinking culture is posters and perks
Culture is what gets rewarded, tolerated, and repeated.
The Bottom Line
If you want to lead better, stop only learning from leadership books.
Steal from places where leadership is tested under pressure:
- Coaches teach you standards, fundamentals, and confidence-building.
- History teaches you principles, clarity, and symbolic actions.
- Parenting teaches you boundaries, environment design, and emotional regulation.
Leadership isn’t a title. It’s behaviour. And the best leadership behaviours are usually the simplest ones – done consistently.
