Analysis of Coach Carter as an Effective Leader

Introduction: Leadership means the ability that one person holds and has the power to influence other to follow him. Background: The film Coach Carter (2005), has the great character who has effective leadership qualities. The character namely, Ken Carter, who was the coach of the basketball team in the Richmond school. The name of the team was Richmond Oilers. The students in the team were undisciplined and poor in academics as well. Thesis statement: The purpose of this essay is to identify the vision and motivation factor had by the Ken Coach Karter as an effective leader, discuss about the ethics he had in his life, evaluating how his leadership style was effective and had a great impact on the people mind, and various lessons one can learn from his style of leading the team.

Vision and Motivation

Topic sentence: Effective leadership cannot be achieved until leader has a vision and motivation to achieve the common goal of the team. Evidence & citing: For example, In the film Coach Ken Carter (2005), was the coach of the team who was the visionary person. He unlike any other coach who only aimed at winning the game but also his students to perform well academically. His aim was to show the right path to the student in their life. The students in the Richmond often ended up their life in the prison or dead after graduation. He always addressed the team using the term “we”. He wants his basketball to win the match, although the players were superior in their game but they lack the ground rules of the team. They fight, abuse and tease each other for their fouls they commit while playing the match, which should not happen. Expertise is in the game is important but along with that they should have trust on each other. Appreciate each other efforts, motivate each other to play better for the upcoming matches but team set back the appreciation term in the starting of the film. Here the coach comes into his role as an effective leader, he had a vision that Richmond basketball team will win the very next match and will also perform well academically. He shared his vision with team. Sharing the vision with the team is very crucial so they could understand their goal because it was the team who has to establish his goal. Along with vision, leaders should also motivate their team to support. Evidence & citing: Ken Carter has the great ability to motivate his team. In the starting of the movie he says “Starting today you will play like winners, act like winners”. If they all will listen each other they can win the basketball games. Commentary: By the quoted words, we can understand that he builds up the confidence in the team that they can win if they work together with each other. Evidence & citing: The motivating style used by him was the Extrinsic motivation, in which the person is motivated by the external rewards or punishments. Commentary: Coach wants his team to do well academically so, he locked up the gym where they practice for their game. As a result of this lock at the gym, motivates the students to perform well in the exam and he opened it after they showed improvement in their studies. So, the leader should have some vision to achieve and some motivation factor that lead the team to work together to achieve it.

Ethics

Topic sentence: The term ethics means do the right things, for the right cause, at the right time. Ethical leaders always ensure the team reach their goal with loyalty, dedication and ethical. These leaders always have some ground rules to be followed and always ensure that they are being followed by their followers or the team. Evidence & citing: In the movie, Coach Carter (2005), coach Ken Carter was the man of words and very strict. He always follows the rules and regulations and want his Richmond Oiler team to follow it too. Evidence & citing: Carter wants his team to sign a contract before start practicing and playing in the team for the Richmond school. Commentary: The contract says that they all have to maintain an average grade of 2.3 throughout the graduation, they have to attend all the classes and sit in the front row wearing a tie. If they signed the agreement then only, they can play the basketball game. Ethics describes the moral values that one acquires and apply in their life. Evidence & citing: In the film Coach Carter (2005),” Sir is the term of respect” He wants his team to be a good citizen so, he addressed the young boys with the term “Sir” and asked them to use the word when speaking to each other. In addition to this, he wants his team to be punctual for the practice. Commentary: According to Coach, the practice starts at 3:00 pm in the gym and if the team reach as of 2:55 they are late. He was stick to his words if any student is late to the gym then he punishes him by giving them some number of suicides and pushups and if they fail to do so or argue he can leave the gym. He has a zero tolerance for the rule violation. There are some situations that everyone faces in his/her life when to choose one out of many options. Evidence & citing: Coach faces this ethical dilemma too when he has to choose one out of the job as a coach or to pursue his dream to open a new shop.

There are three principles to resolve the ethical dilemma, one is care based thinking. He was very careful for every team member without being bias. He addressed every member as a “Sir”. Another principle is rule based thinking, this tool is applied when decision is made in one step by setting up the rules. Carter was the person who ensures whether the students are following the rules or not. So, he made every team member to signed the contract. Lastly, end-based thinking is decision made that do the thing that fits for the larger number of people. Coach wants his students to be successful in their life and go to college rather than ending up in the jail or dead so, he decides to go school and work as a coach instead of pursuing his dream.

Leadership Effectiveness

Topic sentence: A leadership effectiveness can be determined by the way they manage and handle the resources available and inspire the team. In the movie, Coach Carter (2005), the coach acquires transactional leadership style to train his students. Transactional leadership styles come into picture, when the leaders are focus on the specific task to achieve the goals and also make use of giving rewards and punishments if required to motivate his followers. Ken Carter was focused to win the basketball match and also the Richmond’s team members to perform well academically. For the former focus, he calls the team for the practice in the gym each day, if anyone arrived late, coach punishes him by giving extra pushups and suicide. The Principal of the Richmond, Garrison, also said to the coach “Your intensions are good Mr. Carter, but your methods are a bit extreme”. When it comes to his vision, he was very tough person. For the latter focus, he asked teacher for the progress report of the student to check whether they are improving or not. To enforce them to study, he locks the gym until they start showing improvements in their studies or not. There are some traits in the leader to follow them.

Traits in coach that lead the team to follow his rules and regulations. One was the knowledge in the coach. He has 39 years of experience of playing basketball game and had gain higher level of expertise in the game. He used to say words like “hold the ball”, “defense” while the team played the match which shows his higher insights about the game. At the same time, he was fair to all the team member without being bias to anyone. His own son was in the team of Richmond basketball, but he punishes his son too for being late to the practice.

Triarchic theory that applies to the coach Carter, is the practical – contextual intelligence theory. According to this theory, the person tries to adapt the environment or enhance accordingly that best fits them. Ken changed the environment in Richmond school, where every teacher and parent think that they cannot do well in their academics. Although Ken was tough with the young players in the Richmond, but he acts rude just for the betterment of the student. He proved everyone wrong and changed the environment completely at the end of fourth month.

Contingency theory means how the leader acts according to the situation and achieve success accordingly. In the film, Coach Carter (2005), Coach has given the great example of decision-making model of leadership. In the meeting, that was arranged for taking the decision that whether the locked gym should be open or not for the students. Ken takes the decision not to open the gym until they score well academically. All the teachers, principal and parents boycott his decision but he was stick to his words. He explained everyone that if you open the gym today than they are spreading the message that playing game overweigh the academics marks. He also highlights that more that 80% of the students who graduate from the Richmond goes behinds the bar than college. He quit the job but the student accepts his decision, ask him not to leave the job and start studying with more concentration. So, young players support his decision and put their efforts to accomplish it.

Personal Leadership Development

Topic sentence: Personal leadership can be developed through observing the real heroes, who are act as an ideal for other and set an example for others to follow it. Evidence & citing: In the film, Coach Carter (2005), the coach Ken Carter is the best example of the role model or as an effective leader. The earlier situation in the Richmond school was totally worse, 60% of the graduates from Richmond ends up in the prison and 33% of the black male is caught by the police for committing crime. After Ken Carter, joined the Richmond the environment was changed. Commentary: The young players were not only playing extremely well but also perform good in studies. Like him, one can learn how to become visionary and set up goals for the life even if you thing it is not possible to achieve. Person needs to stick to his dream and try to become better than the last day of your life, always compete yourself not others.

Topic sentence: The major lesson that can be learned from the coach Carter, is to work as a team. Evidence & citing: In the film, Mr. Cruz was giving 2000 pushups to complete before Friday but he was unable to complete it then Mr. Jason Lyle stands for him and said that he will do the remaining pushups and also said to coach that” You said we are team, one person struggles, we all struggles”. Commentary: Earlier team does not have the unity but under his training they learned unity trait too. According to the team behavior and ability they should pick up the leadership style. In the movie, coach uses transactional style to train the team.

Conclusion

Conclusion paragraph: In a nutshell, we can say that the movie, Coach Carter (2005), was very inspiring and Carter set example for the others. He had a vision that Richmond basketball team would win and also academic improvements. With the use of various motivational technique, he inspires the team to achieve the shared goal. Ethics were set by the coach for the team to achieve the goal by enforce them to signed contract. The effective leadership style chosen by him was transactional, which had a great impact on the people’s mind. 

References

• Carter, T., Robbins, B., Tollin, M., Gale, D., Schwahn, M., Gatins, J., … Carter, K. (2013). Coach Carter. Hollywood, California: Paramount Pictures, [2005]. Retrieved March 25, 2019 from http://ra.ocls.ca/ra/login.aspx?inst=conestoga&url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=cat00912a&AN=cclc.660923&site=eds-live&scope=site
• Vision And Motivation. (n.d.). Retrieved March 25, 2019 from http://www.totalengagementconsulting.com/blog/tag/vision-and-motivation/
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• Triarchic Theory of Intelligence. (2017, November 18). Retrieved March 25, 2019 from https://www.psychestudy.com/cognitive/intelligence/triarchic
• Leadership and The Contingency Theory University. (2018, February 6). Retrieved from https://www.villanovau.com/resources/leadership/leadership-and-contingency-theory/