[00:00:00] Dan: Hello and welcome back to We Not Me, the podcast where we explore how humans connect to get stuff done together. I'm Dan Hammond.

[00:00:13] Pia: And I am Pia Lee. Dan Hammond. Happy Easter to you.

[00:00:17] Dan: A very happy Easter to you too. It's, we are recording after the Easter weekend. Did you have a good one?

[00:00:21] Pia: I had a very good one. Well, it was three outta four was absolutely spectacular. Day four was not so good because I got a gastro, so that was a bit of a. We could say bomber, but I think that, that, that's probably a bad expression, but 

[00:00:36] Dan: Yes, definitely. That's an unwelcome house. Guest of the best of times. But, uh, 

[00:00:41] Pia: It's like the, it's like the, the way that my family reacts, which is to retreat in the furthest corners of the house. It's like the black death has arrived, cuz we 

[00:00:48] Dan: It's very wise. It's very wise. Yeah, absolutely. It's gonna get everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. You poor, poor thing. That's, that's grim. But, um, but you are recovered, I believe, 

[00:00:58] Pia: am fully recovered and I'm ready cause I'm taking on a community duty. Which is very, very relatable to our guest. You know, It was a, definitely a difficult decision because my level of competence is quite low. But I did see that there was a gap in the parent's responsibility and I have now stepped up to become the under eight. Soccer coach for the Byron Football team. So this is where my little son Oscar is playing. And I checked in with him that he didn't mind 

[00:01:26] Dan: Yes. That's the, that, that is a tricky one, isn't it? 

[00:01:29] Pia: and then, and you can't see this, but I bought a red whistle, so I have been practicing blowing

[00:01:34] Dan: I've, I've seen you on Zoom practicing and pointing. I think you, and I thought there's, there's an expertise there and there is isn't there? You, this is digging back into your past, into previous 

[00:01:46] Pia: it? is seriously, I ended up being an under 19 netball coach, and for someone who can't play netball, that is quite extraordinary with a string of parents down the sideline who were commenting partially on my inability to get it right. So I feel that, you know, I've, I can take this degree of incompetence and stretch it now into, into soccer. So I'm busily looking at YouTube to try and learn a few, few, um, few drills. 

[00:02:14] Dan: I'm sure you've learned. Yeah. And of course it's, it's a brilliant example. The coach doesn't have to be the expert, but, um, but you do feel like you need to know something, so I'm sure you are, yes. Hammering away at YouTube. Merely.

[00:02:26] Dan: But it's a brilliant segue.

[00:02:27] Pia: It is a brilliant segue. Yes. And I think, and, and so we're gonna meet somebody who's done this on a much larger basis.

[00:02:34] Dan: Yes, indeed, Richard Giles, who, um, I know personally because he's, uh, he's led Ilkley Town, the mighty Ilkley Town Football Club, which who are called the Bar Taters, after this song about Ilkley. And yeah, he has a wonderful story to tell about, um, working in a community and the things you can achieve, through football or anything else for that matter, I think you have some very general lessons to learn. So let's go and, uh, hear from Richard now. 

[00:03:00] Dan: Richard, a really warm welcome to we, not me. Thank you for being on the show.

[00:03:08] Richard: Thanks, Dan. It's a pleasure to be with you. Looking forward to the conversation.

[00:03:12] Dan: Great to see you. So are we. So we, okay, so we're gonna start, uh, with the conversation starter cards, get ourselves, you know, wet the whistle and get, get the pipes warmed up. Um, so I'm gonna choose a card for you, find out a bit about you.

[00:03:24] Dan: Oh God. It, it, we, they haven't had this one before. If I were a historic figure, I would be this person because this, this might take some thinking about.

[00:03:36] Richard: Yeah, just give me a moment. Um,

[00:03:39] Pia: it's not, it's not Trump. Who's in, who's arraigned today?

[00:03:43] Richard: no, no, definitely not Trump. I, I, I'm gonna, I'm gonna say, um, Nelson Mandela. It's, it's, it's a kind of obvious one, but the re the reason that I'll choose Nelson Mandela is because he was able to forgive and move beyond an incredible injustice. And yeah, I think that takes a huge amount of humanity to, uh, to do, to do that. So, uh, Nelson Mandela for me.

[00:04:09] Pia: Good, good answer. I think we could have a bit more of his forgiveness in the world, actually, and a bit more tolerance. Yeah, I think the world could do with a bit more of that right at this moment, we don't have many, many good role models out there

[00:04:21] Dan: yeah, it's true actually. We are sort of being, it's a good, good one to start the conversation with Richard, I think, because, um, we tend to be programmed to inflame, don't we? We see things on social media and we're gonna wind it up. He actually made that choice to diffuse the situation, which, which is, yeah, it's not our, seems to be, seems to be rare.

[00:04:43] Richard: a long, I think it's a longer term game that he played for a greater benefit than he had to, you know, obviously suffer many, many years of, um, hardship. Um, but he was playing a longer game. And to have that foresight to, to do that, um, and to see, to see. You know, I'll look back at the, um, Ruby Well Cup where he was leading out in the South African team and they ended up winning. And that kind of comes whole circle. What, you know, what one incredible story. 

[00:05:16] Pia: Now we are gonna talk about football. So I'm gonna clarify this cuz we got international, international listeners. So football may be different in Australia than it is in England. And definitely if we have any, our US listeners would be very different. We'd be talking about different sports. So just for clarity, we are talking about soccer here, aren't we? That that is the, the nature of what we're talking about.

[00:05:41] Richard: Round ball.

[00:05:41] Pia: Ramble. 11 players with a round ball. Excellent. So t, so Richard Te, tell us a bit about you. Tell us and our listeners who you are and, um, yeah, and, and what your interest is in, in that round ball.

[00:05:56] Richard: Yeah. Okay. Thank, thanks, Pia. So, I mean, just a little bit background to give context. So, uh, my profession is finance. I, I'm a qualified actuary which is. Basically means statistician. I was part of PBC and then my last job was running the teacher's painting scheme in, in the UK, which has an incredible 2.2 million members. So I did feel the burden of responsibility of that at, at times. But I've always had a, a love for sport. Uh, it goes all the way back to, school days, I suppose. And it, for me, it was an outlet. An opportunity to, to be, to be myself and to socialize.

[00:06:35] Richard: I often say that I, you know, the two things that I, I was good at when I was at school. One was maths and one was sport. And you didn't make any friends by being good at maths. You know, I was kind of nerdy, nerdy kid in the corner, whereas you did if you could play football. So I, you know, I spent a lot of time doing that, And it taught me a whole bunch of life lessons. And I didn't realize at the time, but because I was playing and enjoying, but there's a huge number of life lessons like teamwork and communications and resilience, that as I got older and a bit wiser, I could see the connection back to, you know, to playing sports school.

[00:07:16] Richard: So I, um, just to finish where I'm up, up to, so I stopped my full-time job last. I decided to focus on issues that were important to me, particularly climate change and creating opportunities for young people, particularly through sports. So I wanted to, you know, divest myself away from a full-time job to be able to do different things that would. Enable me to move forward with those two, those two objectives.

[00:07:45] Richard: I'm now, I soon do busier than ever, so having stopped work, I said it's busier than ever and I do, I do five things, which is really, I think I'm, I'm kind of full. With the five things. I'm board director for two pension schemes, and three volunteer roles. I'm a trustee at, um, a multifamily trust in Bradford Chair of the Finance Committee. They run 20 schools. Some fairly challenging school situations in the city. I've just joined a charity called Baba Siani, who, um, work with a township, a school in a township in South Africa. And they send children, uh, from a school in the UK to go and teach sport to the kids in the school, in, in the township. Uh, and the third, the third volunteer, volunteer role that I do is I'm on the advisory group for an organization called Pensions for Purpose, which is using the weight of pension scheme investments, which is huge globally for the benefit of the climate sustainability, um, and, and a more just society. So to use that financial model if you like, to promote those causes. 

[00:08:57] Richard: Um, so I'm delighted to have quickly fallen. A bunch of things that help, you know, push forward on, on, on the issues that I'm interested in. And then there's a football club, which is the extra piece, which will come on to.

[00:09:11] Dan: Yes. Well, it's it's great that you've broadened the discussion, actually, but I, I would love to get into that football. This is where, where I first came across you. And it struck me even at the time, and you've sort of touched on this, but you had some, you know, big corporate roles that that tends to fill people's time and, and, and take people's energy, but you still manage to, to get to, to take this big role in the community as well. So could, could you just dive into that? What were, how that started? What, yeah, what drove you to, to, to extend yourself to, to that level. And then we can maybe talk about how you, how you went about

[00:09:49] Richard: Yeah. Yeah, I suppose probably accident really. The, I had played for the club, um, a fairly kind of modest play player, but I had played, when I moved to Ilekley, uh, one of the things I did was join the football club. Uh, and had a good time and I played five or six years. Had a good time. Made some good friends. 

[00:10:11] Richard: And then I, I left that, you know, I had a young family. I left that, uh, to one side. Unlike many, many people. My son started to play, he was six. And I, I was asked if I'd coach. So Pia, this is probably the journey that you are going on. But I, I realized I wasn't a very good coach actually, and it didn't play to my strengths. Um, but I did have other things, you know, in my background that could help the club. So I decided not to coach. But the, the big, the biggest thing was there's a junior part to the club, and a senior part to the club, and they operated completely independently, almost as if they, you know, there were two separate clubs. And I, because of my background, I knew the senior. Part of the club and my son was playing in the juniors, i, I made the suggestion, why don't we put the thing together? And there's loads of potential synergies, financial, operational player pathway, all sorts of things. And funding opportunities are bigger if you're a, if you're a, uh, combined club.

[00:11:17] Richard: So, that idea was landed favorably and, and I was asked if I'd help. Put the thing together and said, okay. I, I remember, I remember very clearly I said, I'll do this for one year. And that was in 2007, I think. And, and really what's happened is, so we, we did that, we put the club together, but there's always been something of interest to keep me involved. Um, so it, it's kind of grown by accident into, into a much bigger part of my life than I ever expected. It, it, it would do.

[00:11:54] Dan: And, and so how are football? How are the, I, I, I asked this because I suspect that a lot of. Community, um, or, you know, town sports clubs that are organized. And so how, how are they, how are they structured? Uh, is it all volunteers? Have you got, is it, how, how, how does the whole machine work?

[00:12:11] Richard: Yeah. It's, uh, it's volunteers and, and that's, that's a really interesting organization, you know, when you are relying on volunteers. It's all volunteers. We have a committee structure, which if you like, manage the business side of the football club. Um, so the finances, the safeguarding, uh, facilities, sponsorship, et cetera, et cetera. And there's about, it fluctuates, but there's about eight people on that, on that committee. And then the coaches and the coaches do the lion share of the work. They're, they're the kind of fate of the club to all of players and parents.

[00:12:54] Richard: Um, and incredible, incredibly, there's now 110 coaches at the club. Um, which yeah, it's just, and the time they put into it is, um, they have at least one coaching session a week and at least one game, and they have to prepare for that. So, so it's at least five hours a week. And there's a lot of organization that goes with it too. So you add all of the number of hours volunteered by people in the community. It, it is, is huge.

[00:13:24] Richard: The reason I know this we bought, cause I didn't really know how many coaches we had, but we bought every coach a jacket, Uh, kitted them up this year and I, I placed the order. So, so, so that's why I 

[00:13:37] Richard: notice. I know, I know. uh, and all, all initials cause they're all in the jacket. So, but yeah, I was amazed to find that we had 110 coaches, which is brilliant. And it, and it's, you know, it, the interesting thing is positivity breeds success. And I think people who, because it's such a positive, club and environment to be part of, parents will come down, they'll see the kids participating. They'll think, you know what, I like, I like this. I'll, I'll volunteer sometime and I'll get involved. And over, over 50 to 15 years, that's just grown into this army of volunteers that are doing amazing things. 

[00:14:15] Dan: I personally, when I see professional football, it, it's a culture that I, I think is pretty appalling actually, right from the top. FIFA is rotten and if I think about football as a global thing, I just sort of think beautiful game, ugly business. But actually as soon as my daughter got involved with this club, I thought, wow, this is, this is amazing, beautiful game and, and a really nice atmosphere. So I think what you're, just from the recipient's end, you've, you've managed to sort of,. Yeah, and there can be ugly scenes with parents and things like that. We've never seen any of that in, in the games that we've been with. So, so you, so that is material. How apart from being a jolly nice chap, how the hell did you 

[00:14:59] Richard: Yeah, Yeah, I mean, you're spot on with the, you know, at some point, I'm, I, I'm embarrassed by the behavior of, you know, football in general. There's so many positive things done by footballers, but the headlines are of often caught by the neg, the negative examples. And yeah, I, I, I, I think there's a culture which has got some unpleasant ties to it. But yeah, I suppose what I saw was the positives of, it's a, it's in the, in the UK it's a working class game. And it's an outlook for historically for working class people to socialize and, um, I guess ultimately increase their self-worth or self-esteem by doing something positive and collective and build a community around it. And there's, there's a huge part of football, which is based around community.

[00:15:53] Richard: if you, you know, you go back to the working men's clubs and all the rest of it, and now look at Ilkley, it's, it's really a community asset. We've had to work hard to focus on the positives at every step of the way. And I guess how have we ended up with such a positive environment? We have to weed out those examples of negative behavior, which do occur. Not, not, not very many, but we have had occasions where parent behavior's not been acceptable or a coach is, um, you know, showing the wrong values, um, in the way they're leading the team. And I can count on one hand where we've had to intervene and say, you know, that this is not the club for you. But it was, it was essential we did that because the whole culture is affected by those examples.

[00:16:41] Richard: So, um, not easy to do and not, not always easy to know when to do either. That's the other thing I'd say is, what is the right moment? How long do you give somebody to work out whether they're a fit for the club and the values and the culture we want? And it's making a change when it's not working out is quite painful. And we've had to go through that, as I say, I probably count on one hand how many times, but it has been painful and destructive. And sometimes there's players in the team or other people affected who have re reacted in the short term negatively to it because, because of the relationship that they've got.

[00:17:20] Richard: But if you take a club perspective and a club for you, we're building a culture that, you know, works for the community and, and creates a positive place for people to be. So sometimes we've had to take that short-term pain to build something that's what we want it to be 

[00:17:36] Pia: And Richard, did you involve the community in sort of determining what those values were? Like how, how did they come about?

[00:17:43] Richard: Not really. Not really, ,if I'm perfectly honest. Yeah. Um, but we are doing that. So we're playing catch up in some ways because this has become something that, you know, I didn't envisage it would become. And Dan knows, we, we did some work around our purpose, vision, and values five years ago. So we were just, we were just an everyday football club. You know, if it go back to when I joined, people just turned up and played football. And it was all about organizing and doing the do and making it happen. but we got to a size where, you know, Ilkley, this 14,000 people live in Ilkley. 2000 people are connected with a club in some way, either playing or watching or coaching. So it's a huge impact, a part of the community.

[00:18:25] Richard: So yeah, five years ago we, we said, well, what, why are we doing this? What, what's it all about? And Dan actually did a little bit of work to facilitate some, some workshops, um, and we came up with a purpose, a vision, and the values that we, we stand behind. And from that point we started to share, you know, if you go to the club now, there's a big board and it has those three things per purpose, vision, and values, that every time you walk past you can see what we're all about and what we're trying to, and they're not, they're not football connected, really. They're more than that, they go beyond that.

[00:18:59] Richard: So we set, we set our purpose to be, to support community wellbeing. And there's kind of two levels to that. There's the individual level, so the wellbeing of the individual who's participating or what, or even watching. There's the, there's the pH physical benefits from playing football, but also sociological psychological benefits that have been part of a part of a group. So it's that individual level, but also at a community level. You know, we take the 2000 people who feel part of something in the community. It's, it's now serving community wellbeing as well as at any individual level. So, so that's our purpose. The vision was to be the best club in the Yorkshire, um, best community club. I think it's important to say best community club. We don't aspire to be necessarily the best on the pitch all of the time. That's part, that's part of. But at our core is being the best community club and serving the community. Um, and the values were around respect for others, support others learned from others. So that was quite a, quite a significant moment in the club's development to, to articulate purpose, vision, and values.

[00:20:12] Richard: And what we've seen since then is the club has gathered taste because people are, people are attracted to. So we, the volunteer numbers that I was talking about earlier, we get volunteers because they can see those values being lived, um, and experienced. So, and now we're, we're onto the next stage, which is our next strategy we're starting to think about, and we're doing this, you know, right back to the roots, uh, and engaging the full membership. All of the coaches. We run a workshop for the coaches, um, two, three weeks ago. We're about to launch a survey to all of the members so they can input into the process, and who, who knows where that will take us? I, I, you know, I've, I've got some ideas, but the future belongs to the membership, you know, and for, it is for them to determine where we, where we go next.

[00:21:06] Dan: That's great. Um, Richard in that, in those discussions I remember, but, um, there was a, a lot of conversations around winning versus participation. For example, you know, these two and, and I think we see a lot in teams that people are trying to manage polarities. Like, you know, I think they call it polarity management or, you know, there are tensions aren't there, between how do you, what are you all about? What's, what's important? And if I remember rightly, you mentioned that when audio was best on the field wanted to be participative. Was my memory right for a start? Was it was a discussion around that? And if so, how did you navigate that tension to land in a place where everyone can feel like they can, um, be part of it? 

[00:21:46] Richard: You, your memory's good, Dan. Definitely, uh, spot on with that. We, yeah, we, I suppose we, we had quite a lot of discussion about performance and participation. And I, I started that discussion thinking it was one or the other that you're either encouraging mass participation or you're a performance based club or team. And that was, that was my thinking as we entered into the process.

[00:22:11] Richard: By the time we came out of it, I changed my view that these are complimentary. Participation and performance feed, feed each other. Um, so we came out of that, and we've got two streams effectively. We've got a participation stream, so we want to be open to everybody. we don't want to turn any, anybody away from playing football.

[00:22:32] Richard: Um, just to, just to mention, we, if we, full range of players. We have boys, girls, men, women, veterans, and now super veterans, which are the really old guys. Which is an important part of our community who is still engaged in playing football, 

[00:22:47] Dan: I think I'm, maybe this my chance to have a great reentry to the world of football if they're super 

[00:22:52] Richard: You'd be welcome. You'd very welcome, Dam. So that's the participation part, but we then have a performance part, and I'll come back to talk about a team level, how this plays out. But the performance part, we have an academy, we have specialist goalkeeper coaching. We have a first team that plays at the semi-professional level. We have a scholarship with a local school that builds a pathway from junior football to senior football at a good standard. We have a good standard of, uh, women's team as well. And that is there for the young people in the participation stream who want to perform at a higher level. We, we offer that. And I do think those two feed each other. So the, the greater the base of participants, the stronger the performance stream. The stronger the performance stream, the more attractive we are to participants. So the, you know, these feet, these do feed each other. 

[00:23:44] Dan: Thank you. Yeah. The, the come you, the really interesting you went from that sort of that polarity to actually come to how, how that can be an and not nor That's some, that's, that's inspiring I think.

[00:23:55] Pia: so for you personally, you know, the, the, the realization that when you started this journey that you weren't a coach. What's been your biggest learning in the whole process?

[00:24:06] Richard: I, I think maybe the big, the biggest is put team first. And this, this plays into my personal values, but, um, you have to always look beyond what, what I want my personal, you know, objective to what's the right thing for the club, what's the right thing for the, for the team. Not always easy to do, but always thinking about what's the, what's in the best interest of the club or the team? Genuinely team centered approach to it. I think that's, that's one, that's one of the big learnings. 

[00:24:39] Richard: I, I am interested in, um, you know, personal psychology and, and some of the lessons, you know, from that and bringing that into, into the club and having a growth mindset at every, at every point, just creates more opportunities for, for, for people.

[00:24:56] Richard: And maybe the third, the third learning would be when things are not right, have the courage to, to make a change where you need to. So possibly, you know, I could argue that we've been too slow to make changes when we needed to, and we've, we've kind of tolerated an imperfect situation for months and years in some, some situations. And it's always got better when, when, when you, you cut telling you it's not right, but you tolerate it cuz you think, you know, may, maybe it's acceptable but not, not right. If you know what I mean. But once you make the change, it quickly heals itself and moves to a better place. It, it almost every time we've made a significant change cuz we're not comfortable with something, it's quickly healed and, and got better. So may maybe your, you know, learning there would be change a bit more quickly. Don't, don't, don't stand for something that's not instinctively correct for you.

[00:25:52] Richard: I did wanna talk about team. Um, so one of the, if, if it's okay, one of the interesting dynamics that we come across all of the time is should a team be trying to win every game or should it be trying to develop players over the long term? And we've, we've seen all flavors of that from under eights who are trying to win every game and they're picking the best five players and they're training them up to be the next Lionel Messi, we've seen that end of it to, we don't care, you know, the other extreme, we don't care what the resource is, we just want the kids to have a good time. And where you fit the balance between those two is it's, it's an ongoing tension. Uh, if I'm on, if I'm honest. But we've learned the things that are most likely to be successful. It's, it is obviously somewhere in between which is, there's this question of streaming. So do, do you select players into a group based on ability? What age do you start to do that? And I think the trade, the trade off is at every stage the players improve, if they're with a peer group who are similar ability. So they push, they push each other. But, yeah, if you're, you're involved more, if you're with a group that's the similar ability. So that does lead, lead you towards streaming, uh, and probably at a fairly early age. But where we've found, um, it works best as if there's flexibility on that, that streaming approach. So, yeah, in might, week to week, month to month, season to season, there'll be movement between the different groups. Um, as players needs for development change. You know, they may, may be progressing quickly or they may be standing still. So what they need for develop looks a little bit different.

[00:27:45] Richard: So the best are in groups we've found are ones that do stream, but keep that flexible, and have a, an ongoing dialogue about what's what's right for each player in, in the different groups.

[00:27:58] Dan: That's really interesting. And, and, and I, I think that's, you know, that we had a conversation that we were talking earlier about performance and participation, but the, the rubber does hit the road, doesn't it? When you are, you're a goal down and someone is subbed on who's less capable than the others and the, what the hell are they doing? You know, but it's, so, yeah, it's quite difficult to balance those two.

[00:28:19] Dan: But you've come to that nuanced point of actually with streaming, but with some flexibility. It's, that's, that's a challenging leadership to get down to those 2000 people, this more nuanced view rather than Right. We're, we're about performance and streaming. This is what we do. It's very tempting, isn't it, to have that clear cut view and very bit of an easier job in a way. How have you managed to get those 2000 people to have some understanding of this, that more nuanced view?

[00:28:49] Richard: Yeah. I mean, we it's not, it's not. I suppose we are not directional. We're not, we're doing not directional to the coaches. We don't dictate, this is the club philosophy. Because, and this is back to the volunteer point, is people volunteer because they want to, um, do something they enjoy and have some flexibility to manage it in the way they want to. They don't really want a kind of list of do's and don'ts from the club about how they do it. And I think that's a probably a fundamental of a volunteer organization, is you have to fit the roles around what people want to do, rather than either way around, which often, you know, if you're pay, if you're paying somebody to do something, this is the job you're gonna do. And, and, and it's fairly well specked out. Whereas with volunteers, we don't find that, you know, even people, cause ultimately if somebody doesn't want to do something, they'll stop, stop doing it.

[00:29:45] Richard: So back to the point is, we, we don't dictate to the coaches how they stream. But what we do is promote good examples, good practice. Um, so they can see it in other groups and there's, there's a healthy network of sharing from the under tens. We'll share with the under nines and so on and so, so forth. So it filters through the club, by this osmosis if, if you like, of other coaches and, and promoting good examples and others seeing the experience of older, older teams where they've maybe tried it one way and it's not worked, or there's been some negative feedback, and they've learned through that, and then the next group coming behind, we'll see, uh, you know, learn from that and, and, and not make the mistakes.

[00:30:29] Richard: Plus, plus then, this is the important point, is the extreme outliers at either end, you know, overly competitive or totally uncompetitive, they, they have left the club because it's not worked. And they're often, often through their choice, often through their choice, not our choice, but occasion. Occasionally, as I was saying, we have to intervene, but we've had some teams where it's been all about winning. But if you're not in the top six or seven players, you're not involved. And, and we've had to, we've had to say that's not acceptable. It's a combination of not directing, but intervening where the outliers are not, you know, not, not, right.

[00:31:14] Dan: Yeah. it's good. It's challenging. Yeah, it's exactly, it's a, it's a nuance that it's, it's a more challenging, challenging leadership choice, I think, and to, to be able to just, yeah, osmosis is a good word. You rarely see that in the, uh, leadership, uh, leadership courses. But, uh, it's, it's, it sort of seems to sum up that, uh, that approach.

[00:31:37] Pia: And you can't have any authority because that's not the situation that you're in, but that you do need really clear direction. I think that's where the vision and the and the purpose plays a big part, cuz that that's what people buy into.

[00:31:50] Dan: Yeah, it sounds like it's a question of making that a sort of a reasonably large, a sort of a vessel that a lot of people can fit into, but without saying that you have, you know, without being too cut and dried about it. Um, but yeah, it's very interesting how you've, how you've, you've come into this nuanced position and, um, and how, how that is, how that's implemented.

[00:32:10] Dan: So Richard, um, leave us with one. I know you have loads of other interests, uh, in your life. You give a lot of your time now to, um, a number of courses we've really focused on, um, on football today. But, um, given your, if, if you think about all your different roles you take, could you leave our listener with a sort of, you know, we, we talked about some learnings. What's a, what's something they could do tomorrow that you've learned that could really make a difference for them if they're working in a community or in any, any group of humans?

[00:32:41] Richard: I suppose, uh, that, you know, I think a practical thing people can do is engage others and think beyond themselves. But in working with others, what more can you achieve? And sports, quite tribal, but actually we're all trying to do the same thing. So work, work out which of the groups can help advance your calls and If your cause is to helping people to have better opportunities, it doesn't matter if you're playing for Ilkley Town or Ley, or you're playing hockey or you're playing cricket, it, none of that matters. So work together with other people who are fundamentally trying to do the same thing and go beyond that tribal, you know, this is my team. this is my team. we've got to win. 

[00:33:31] Dan: It brings us neatly back to Nelson Mandela, I think Richard, to the top of our conversation in, in a way. So, uh, very nicely done. But, um, but thank you Richard, so, so much. Well for the, for the work that you do for the community. But thank you for joining us today on the show. I think it, this is our final, um, episode of our season. I think this has just been a, a really, um, heartwarming, um, and inspiring way to end our season. So thank you so much for being with us.

[00:33:57] Richard: It's pleasure. Thanks for having. 

[00:34:03] Pia: I loved, um, Richard's two Ps that he talked about, participation and performance, you know, that slight dynamic tension of enjoying the game, but also wanting to win. And, um, he talked about putting the team first and, and what are the learnings, you know, that's sort of having that growth mindset.

[00:34:23] Pia: So, you know, and I think he's had to make some tricky calls when coaches aren't, you know, are not kind of living by the values and the purpose of what they're trying to create. Cause he made that really clear.

[00:34:36] Dan: Yeah. He used that phrase, got rid, didn't he? And I think this is a, there's a sort of an edge to all this stuff that people do with teams and communities and teamwork that, that you have to. There's a point where you've got to say, actually you, this is not a happy home for you and you're not making the home happy at some point. But, and I, as you said, I love that the, and I, I have experience of working with this group a little bit around this participation and performance thing, wanted to be inclusive and also, and also perform.

[00:35:04] Dan: And it definitely started out, as Richard said, I loved his humility around saying, I went into this thinking we had to choose. But he came outta that conversation with a sort of what we would call a sort of an and mindset is how they balance those tensions. And I think that as, as we said in the, in the conversation, it's something that is important for all teams. It's very rarely do you say, we are purely doing this. You know, we're, we're getting sales at any cost. No, actually the, even, even when it looks cut and dried, there is some, it's often balanced with some other Yeah, it's an an thing. Exactly.

[00:35:36] Pia: Quite incredible because you've got 110 coaches. We've got 110 hoodies or jumpers or 

[00:35:42] Dan: Yeah, that's, 

[00:35:43] Pia: that's a phenomenal that. So, you know, just from a community perspective, that's a large percentage of ilkley that are involved in the football club.

[00:35:54] Dan: dramatic, isn't it? And it has a massive hockey club, by the way. There's a, the, the, which is hugely successful. So, um, yeah. But as far as you realize that Richard, while he was holding down some big jobs in the pension industry. He's also running this organization on the side of two and a half thousand people. Effectively, if you include the parents run by these 110 sort of managers, really these coaches, it's, it's, it's impressive. It just, that is sort of inspiring, I think.

[00:36:23] Dan: And I think the other thing I would add, I think this is a, this is something I, uh, I, you know, that I was pondering about as we were talking to Richard was Richard is not a big, noisy figurehead in the town. You know, he, he's, he has done this through, you can tell from his spirit and his approach, he's done this or engaging with people both around him, but also getting them to take, to, to own the club. And I think it's, he's an exemplar, an exemplar of the fact that you, to be a team leader or a leader, you don't have to be that sort of, You know, the great man extrovert, noisy personality. He has done it a different way. And I think he's demonstrated that, um, you know, you can see how smart he is and what great approach he's taken. But he hasn't, he hasn't required that sort of, in a way, it's his ego that he hasn't let come up to say, I need to be sort of admired and adulated for this. Cause he's done a lot of this quite quietly, but hugely effectively.

[00:37:29] Pia: I think he's very driven by the purpose and he sees the value of sport and what it can add to ordinary families, um, to be part of something, to contribute to something. And I think that's, that's something that I think was, that came out from him. I mean, he's didn't even, he wasn't even a very good coach, but he's created, he's created a system, a community, which is actually much harder to do. And, um, you know, and living, breathing, vibrant part of, of the society. So, you know, full kudos to him. Huge job.

[00:38:04] Dan: Absolutely. And, uh, yeah, a lot of young players really benefiting from that and the town will benefit and so on. So, um, yeah. Wonderful to hear. But that is it for this episode and this season. Um, we will be back in June. We're taking a little break, but we'll have some lovely, fresh episodes for you in about six weeks time.

[00:38:23] Dan: But you, for now, you can find show notes and resources at squadify.net. Just click on the We Not Me podcast link. If you've enjoyed the show, please do share the love and recommend it to your friends. And if you'd like to contribute to the show, just email us at wenotmepod@gmail.com. We Not Me is produced by Mark Steadman of Origin. Thank you so much for listening. It's goodbye from me.

[00:38:44] Pia: And it's goodbye from me.