Ep. 6. Culture is the Long Game

Bob Dunbar is an orthopedic trauma surgeon at Harborview Medical Center, a former Peace Corps volunteer and U.S. Navy officer.  He also coaches high school lacrosse. 

Drawing on Bob’s experiences as a surgeon, Peace Corps volunteer, Navy officer, and youth coach, we discuss what healthy culture looks like when it is built deliberately, and how that culture drives success far beyond the scoreboard.

At the core is a simple idea: excellence is built through repetition, mastery of fundamentals, incremental progress, and consistent habits. And those standards are reinforced by coaches who earn trust, model commitment, and genuinely care about the kids they lead.

Bob talks about the physical and psychological importance of playing multiple sports and the risks of specializing too early.  He describes the benefits of programs that do not cut kids based on athletic ability, but instead find a place for any athlete with the right attitude who is willing to work hard.

We also discuss good and bad parent behavior and Bob’s own journey as a sports parent, including lessons his children learned through adversity, growth, and self-belief.

Note: Opinions expressed are those of the host and guest and not necessarily those of Mercer Island Lacrosse Club.

Transcript

Matt 0:03

Welcome to the Long Gate, a podcast about youth sports development and how programs like Mercer Island Lacrosse build champions on and off the field. I'm your host, Matt Cooper. Every great youth sports program is built on a great culture, but many coaches can't always tell you exactly what that means or why it matters. Today's guest can, because he spent his life inside institutions where a deliberately built culture results in sustained excellence. Bob Dunbar coaches high school lacrosse at Mercer Island. He's also an orthopedic trauma surgeon at Harborview Medical Center, one of the busiest trauma centers in the country. Bob also served as a naval officer, and before that he worked for the Peace Corps in Burkina Faso in West Africa. And now, between teaching young doctors and doing 24-hour call shifts for emergency surgeries, Bob dedicates his free time to coaching kids. Our discussion today, like most of our podcast episodes, isn't just about Mercer Island Lacrosse. It's about what any youth sports program needs to build something that lasts and how culture is the foundation of any organization that consistently produces excellence. We'll also discuss the benefits of kids playing multiple sports instead of specializing in our club's approach to not cutting kids based on athletic ability and instead finding a place for anyone willing to work hard with the right attitude. Bob, welcome. Great to be here, Matt. You've been inside some genuinely great cultures in the institutions I just mentioned. What do they have in common?

Bob 1:39

Great cultures typically have clear leadership, clear goals. There's typically a transparent flow of information. There's accountability when things go wrong and recognition when things tend to go right. Good cultures tend to look for the things that aren't going right, identifying them and then trying to make them better as well.

Matt 2:03

Before we talk about how those concepts translate into youth sports, let's briefly touch on your background. High school was in Boston, college at Holy Cross. And then after that, the art gets a little bit unconventional. It was the Peace Corps, then medical school, then the Navy, then Harborview. Talk us through that.

Bob 2:22

Sure. I graduated from Holy Cross in 1985, and that was the time of We Are the World and Band-Aid. And a lot of my friends were getting jobs in sales, and these things didn't really have great interest for me. I was looking for some sort of adventure. I was hoping to be able to do something meaningful. The Jesuits pushed the Jesuit volunteer corps, and that lit me on to the Peace Corps. And I fortunately did get accepted. I got sent to Burkina Faso, where I taught secondary school math in French. I had to learn I had taken French in eighth and ninth grade, so I had to essentially learn that during the summer in an immersion program. And then I got sent to a school where I had five classes of 60 kids each in four different levels of math.

Matt 3:15

And uh in the Peace Corps at Burkina Paso, that was the first time coaching entered the picture.

Bob 3:20

Yeah, actually at the high school I was coaching, I actually helped coach 17, 18-year-old girls in basketball, and we actually won a national championship. There there weren't a lot of teams, to be quite fair.

Matt 3:32

So is it fair to say you're the only Mercer Island high school coach who has a national championship under your belt? As far as I know. We're breaking news here on the long game podcast. Okay, and then medical school and then the Navy. What took you to the Navy?

Bob 3:47

Sure. I got into Georgetown University Medical School and I it was pricey, so I took a Navy scholarship to do that. So I did my residency at Cornell's Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City. But then I was sent to Japan and I was there for three years prior to returning back to Norfolk, where I was actually in one of the teaching programs for the Navy, teaching orthoresidency. And that was really my first foray into academic medicine, and I really enjoyed it. And I found that teaching anything at any level is among the most satisfying things you can do, just seeing the lights come on for people the first time and helping them get better and achieve their goals. And then what brings you out to Seattle? I had been trained in general orthopedics, but I found that I liked fixing fractures more than anything. So I want to pursue a fellowship in orthopedic trauma. So I looked at a number of places, and among them was the fellowship here at Harvey Medical Center is essentially one of the best ones in the country. And thankfully, I was accepted there. I did the fellowship and was ultimately asked to stay on as staff.

Matt 4:53

Let's move on to the main theme here. This episode is called Culture is the Long Game. This whole podcast is focused on culture, but we're going to drill down in it today. So, Bob, building on what you've learned serving inside these institutions that we've just talked about, and what you've seen as 10 years as a coach at a program that has a reputation for sustained excellence. What are the most important aspects of culture for a youth sports program?

Bob 5:18

I think that the most important aspects are continued growth of the player within the team. And that it means learning skills and building on them, making incremental progress. Excellence tends to be relatively mundane. The uh often things that look magical from the a sideline is just a series of small tasks that are mastered and then put all together.

Matt 5:43

Great athletes say, the secret is there's no secret. Get the fundamentals right, practice them every day, small habits compound. How do you convey that concept to kids in today's world who might be looking for the magic answer and who might struggle to realize or understand that greatness is built by doing the fundamentals, the small things, over and over again?

Bob 6:05

I think our program shows that each season we start with a group of kids and we are unhewn at the beginning. And through the hard work that the kids and the coaches do together, we gradually get better. We get the right people into the right positions, we figure out what plays work best for our offensive players, we figure out what the best defense is together, and then by repeatedly doing these things, we get better and better.

Matt 6:36

So we've talked about the organization you've been a part of, which I would call genuinely mission-driven culture. Peace Corps, Navy, Harbor View. Is there something that you've seen in these institutions that you've tried to take into your coaching in youth sports?

Bob 6:53

I would have to say that they're very different. The military is obviously very structured and hierarchical. Peace Corps is probably more akin to being like a wrestler or a swimmer or ice skater. You're out on your own in a smaller area. They're not that similar in that regard. They do have a esprit de corps, a commitment to excellence, and commitment to service. And that's something that we try to impart in the program. I think it's really important that the boys coach the smaller kids. There's so many advantages of that. The little kids love it, they come up through the program, they can't wait till they can do it themselves.

Matt 7:36

And how has the 10 years you've spent coaching in a great youth sports program focused on the long game made you a better doctor and teacher of doctors?

Bob 7:47

Aaron Powell Sure. I've found that coaches are immensely optimistic, probably more so than surgeons. Surgeons are like farmers, they're always, you know, it's not raining enough till it's raining uh too much, perhaps too pessimistic. And uh I've really learned to be one more optimistic in general, but also to try to see the potential in folks, maybe better than I had previously. I do think if you I think folks can take great strength from people believing in them. I certainly did. I can think of a time when I was in residency where I was running around from the emergency department to the OR to the ward one night. I was the only guy on call, and I got called by one of my attendings, and I went to him and I reported about his patients, and he put his hand on my shoulder and said, Hey, you're doing a great job. And I honestly could have fallen over. It made such a difference to me. That little bit of recognition, I think, is really important to folks coming up who are perhaps unsure of themselves.

Matt 8:51

And have you used that specific lesson as you've been coaching? And would you advise other coaches or aspiring coaches to meditate on what you just said and understand that if they put their hand on a kid's back who's just messed up and said, hang in there, that can mean the world of difference?

Bob 9:06

Yeah, I think that saying so can go a long, long way. And uh when people know that you care about them, then you can provide the feedback that really can help folks become their best.

Matt 9:17

Yeah, I'm gonna uh dwell on that a little bit. You were kind enough to share with me a presentation that you gave to a graduating class of residents, and it was focused on lessons that you learned as a coach and how that has applied to your career as a teacher of doctors. And a few quotes jumped out, and I'm gonna read them to you and just get you to react to them. And one of them was by Clint Hurdle, who says athletes ask three questions about all coaches. Do I trust him? Is he committed to excellence, and does he care about me?

Bob 9:45

Yeah, I actually think that I that was one of the ones I took very much to heart, and I think it's helped me because I think if the resident or the player can answer those things positively about me, then I'm gonna be able to provide feedback. They're gonna know that I do care about them so that if I say something isn't going well, it's not gonna be atta an attack on them personally. It's because we're both trying to get better.

Matt 10:12

Yeah, so coaches out there listening to your athletes are gonna most listen to you when they think that they can trust you and that you care about them. Also, along the line of what the attending said to you, Goethe said, treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of being.

Bob 10:29

Yeah, I think that really speaks to what I was trying to say in the story I was telling about in the emergency department. That young attending saw something in me that I wasn't sure was there myself and helped me believe in it too.

Matt 10:44

Aaron Ross Powell And then one the the quote you listed at the top of the slide was you think you have more time. And then it talked about senior night, the end of residency. Yeah, and that's a that's a dense statement, but unpack that a little bit for coaches or athletes or parents and how that can help us enjoy the moment we're in and get more out of it.

Bob 11:04

Sure. It seems like the world is all in front of you with the program when you got a somebody in the one, two, or three, four program, blink your eyes, and they're gonna be playing in high school. And the high school was just it's four years. There are some long days, but some really short years. And transitions can be really hard. Transitions are hard for the kids, they're hard for on parents when they're becoming empty nesters. There's no time like the present, right? This is the season. Let's make it work. Let's go now.

Matt 11:37

Kiernan Coles made this point when he gave advice to everyone listening to the podcast and said, hey, when you're in high school, you get four and only four chances to win a state championship. That's it. So make the most of every day. Okay, we're gonna shift gears a little bit and talk about a unique aspect of our club growing more rare, especially in today's day and age, and that is our relentless focus on multi-sport athletes. And even for the very best lacrosse players, they are encouraged, not required, but encouraged to play other sports outside of lacrosse season. So tell me a little bit about what you see as the advantages for the athlete of that and for the program.

Bob 12:20

I think it's a huge advantage to play multiple sports. It encourages exploration and bravery. Even if you're not as good at these other sports, you you maybe you get to see what it's like to be a role player, even a practice player, and maybe have some more empathy for the players uh, you know, on your own team who aren't seeing as much playing time as you are. I think it helps avoid the repetitive injuries or the potential psychological burnout. I think it's uh as a coach, I'm selfishly like our best face-off guys have been wrestlers and guys who play basketball or soccer know how to move on offense without the ball. The guys who similarly defense or hockey, they know how to play defense on guys or football players and hockey players understand there's an element of physicality that really is a significant part of our sport. So having folks who have done these other played these other sports is a huge advantage to them as lacrosse players, too.

Matt 13:25

Aaron Ross Powell And then speaking as a doctor, talk about what you see as the dangers or the downsides of the current phenomenon of more kids specializing earlier and earlier in in a single sport.

Bob 13:37

Aaron Powell Yeah, from a sort of medical perspective, there's a so many identified specific injuries to a repetitive injury, and then there's overtraining issues as well. And to the point where there are formal recommendations on how much you should do at a time, how much rest in a week, a couple months off, a seasonal rest as well, to avoid these and again not to get mentally burned out, and then not want not to be fun anymore and not want to play, period.

Matt 14:08

Bob, in conversations you and I have had, you you actually said something really interesting, and that is that you think not only should kids play multiple sports, but it's really healthy if kids play one sport where they're not very good. And the reason I say that's interesting, at this day and age, most parents drop the sports that their kids aren't good at to focus on the ones where they think their kids are better. So talk a little bit more about what you see as the advantage of a kid playing a sport where they're not very good.

Bob 14:38

In general, the I would say that the pressure is often off, right? There is not this pressure to perform or pressure that of expectation of potentially getting to the next level. They're doing it for fun and for the love of the game. And they also get to see and feel what it's like to be one of the non-stars and perhaps have some empathy for the players on their team if they happen to be a star.

Matt 15:07

You also were a sports parent. You have four kids, two of your kids played lacrosse, and you told me a story about your son where he had he had to deal with some adversity. I think our parents listening today would learn and appreciate hearing from that.

Bob 15:21

Sure. My son Ben, it was the the summer before seventh grade, and he had been on the silver team, but he really wasn't doing a lot to get ready for for black team tryouts in September. And a number of his friends were playing football, so they were doing like double sessions in the afternoon. They were all in good shape, and he was laying on the couch playing his DS or what have you. And a couple of times I said, Hey, maybe you want to do this, and he just was dismissive about it. And as you might imagine, the tryout didn't go as well as he hoped. Now, he's a seventh grader, but that year, most of his friends they had a really strong class, and there wasn't a very big eighth-grade class. Most of his friends made the black team. So he was one of the few kids on the maroon. As it turned out, it was a lesson. He learned that like you can't just show up and expect to succeed without being prepared. And he got a lot more time playing on Maroon and was one of the sort of critical players, maybe, uh, on that team, and got more, certainly more time than he would have gotten on the black team, and became a much better player, and then did make it as an eighth grader, and then had a really nice career in high school as well, being a pretty big contributor all through and being part of the 2019 championship team.

Matt 16:40

And for context, for our listeners on Mercer Island, from kindergarten through fourth grade, we do not distinguish based on skill, but then starting in fifth and sixth grade, we have an A and B team. A is silver, maroon is B, and then as Bob was just talking about, for seventh and eighth grade, the black team is the A team and the maroon team is the B team. Now it's time for our lightning round. Okay. You've you've heard the pod before, so quick questions, quick answers, first thing that comes to mind. One word that best describes Mercer Island Lacrosse Consistency. What do you listen to on your commute or on long drives, other than the long game podcast?

Bob 17:19

I listen to the Martyrmaid podcast, I listen to the Daily, I listen to Dan Carlin's Hardcore History.

Matt 17:29

Something young players worry about that matters less than they think. Statistics. Something they don't worry about enough. Stick skills. Best thing about coaching that nobody tells you going in. What a great bunch of guys the other coaches are. One habit a middle schooler can build right now that pays off in the long game. Get their offhand up to speed.

Bob 17:56

Hardest thing you've ever asked a player to do. We had a goalie who in warm-up had cut his had a ball go through his thumbnail and he we asked if he was able to go back in, and he did. How'd he play? He was great.

Matt 18:15

Okay, we'll move on to what we call the parent clarity segment where we speak directly to youth sports parents in lacrosse and elsewhere. And one thing that I want to talk about first in this segment is our club's policy, including at the high school level, of not cutting anybody based on athletic ability. If you show up, if you have the right attitude, if you work hard, there will be a spot for you on some team for Mercer Allen Lacrosse. Not necessarily as a starter, not necessarily on the varsity, but especially if you've been with the club and work hard, you will play all the way through. That's unusual these days. Talk about what you see as the benefits of that.

Bob 18:58

I think it honors the commitment that the players have made all the way through. It encourages folks to try and come out. As I said earlier, it's helps them be brave and explore different types of things. For my own part, the Peace Corps gave me the bravery to try medicine. And if I hadn't been encouraged by my folks and to try things like that, I that might I might never be where I am. In terms of the non-cut program as well, it allows close friends to play. It allows for multiple levels of talent to be in it together. I think it encourages a fun of being together. I think that's important in a, particularly in a small, if you have a smaller program, it gets more people involved. So I think that encouraging folks to play helps them find things that they might not have realized on their own that they might have been good at. Or at least enjoy.

Matt 20:01

And maybe makes room for late bloomers, that kid who might be an athlete but doesn't have the stick skills to make trial tip.

Bob 20:14

And or if they're not the absolute star, they become a critical role player who plays an important part in part of a season or even a championship.

Matt 20:28

It's a lot more work for coaches because you are coaching kids who might actually require more coaching and statistically are probably going to have less payoff when it comes to the scoreboard.

Bob 20:38

You know, I remember something that Mark Larson said uh it was actually not so long ago. He said, you know, you can it's fun to hang out with the A students, and uh but you know, if you can take a C student and make them into a B student, you're really doing something. So uh I think there really is value in having folks with different capacities.

Matt 21:03

And from your 10 years of coaching in this program, describe what you think great parent behavior looks like.

Bob 21:11

It looks like parents who come to games, but maybe not practices, who cheer for their players but not against the other team, and they don't maybe try to coach from the sidelines. They honor their their kids' team commitments, and that means the time commitment, the travel, the the all the things that go along with it?

Matt 21:35

I think most youth sports parents are very well-intentioned. Everyone loves their kid, everyone wants the best for their kid. But where does a well-intentioned parent who may not realize it actually get in the way of their kid's development?

Bob 21:50

Aaron Powell I think when you try to bulldoze all the struggles away, that that's the beginning part because I think that these are it it's still a protected environment and learning how to overcome smaller struggles and s not as hard things helps you get better later at overcoming bigger struggles and much harder things. So if kids are don't have any struggles and everything's been bulldozed out of the way, I think we're doing kids a disservice. I also think that getting further away from the norm, people are keeping kids out of their local high school program to prioritize a club or looking for special treatment or not going on team sponsored events that had they had signed up for ahead of time. That's probably bad behavior. I think you're doing your child a disservice by not honoring the commitments that you made up front.

Matt 22:56

Today a lot of the things that we've discussed are how youth sports can teach deeply important lessons that go well beyond the field and maybe are more important off the field. Do you see any trends in today's youth sports culture that make you worried we might be losing a bit of this?

Bob 23:12

Yeah it just feels like youth sports is becoming one big business and two adult entertainment with the too much money going into it, particularly when kids become very specialized or there's some hope or even expectation that they're going to go to the next level then there's the private trainings for all different aspects and whether it's the running, strength, shooting or for other sports there's all sorts of different private trainings where it it is one of the Mercer Island ways to throw money at a problem. I don't think that's necessarily the way to go about things.

Matt 23:51

So if a middle school parent comes to you and says hey my kids telling me that they need private lacrosse lessons what's your advice I think just go to practice and go to the wall and you'll be fine. As we wrap up Bob summarize your best advice to a youth sports coach or a parent volunteer who wants to play the long game and build a culture that will develop life skills as well as produce excellence on the field.

Bob 24:19

I think I'm going to start with a a parent and I think that parents who let their kids have this be their thing and own it and are in the car saying boy that was a great game and not dissecting what they could have done better is a good start. The time that kids tend to quit sports is in the 13 to 15 year range and some of the s reports seem to say it's the parents effect on it where they're taking the fun out of it that is really one of the major things that makes kids quit. In terms of a coach who's going to start a a culture that does this we start on fundamentals and I think you'd be should be very clear with your goals. And one thing that Coach Ahern does is that he focuses on us playing our best. We don't very rarely talk about winning a game or this number of goals or what have you it's it has everything to do with the game being played beautifully us playing to our best potential and if I think if we focus on that rather than wins and losses we're going to be far better off.

Matt 25:34

Now you also told me a neat story of of your daughter and how the lessons of self-reliance and just a real determination to do things that she might not otherwise have figured out she could do when it came to lacrosse and playing in college. Why don't you tell us that story?

Bob 25:53

She was a four-year goalie starter at MI and she started to think that maybe she wanted to play in college and we started thinking about what programs there were around here. The only D1 program was Oregon and we looked online and it looked like they had already recruited a goalie for her a year. Typically they recruit one per year so I tried to encourage her to look at other places but she was dead set on Oregon. And at the end of her junior year she was voted all state and then two weeks later she came running into me and said I'm gonna I'm in I'm in I'm in I'm like what are you talking about? And she says well they fired the coach the new I'm gonna convince the new coach to take me I'm like okay and she goes there's a camp and we had already done a number of other camps and spent a fair amount of money and I was a little reticent but she was so convinced and I said how confident of this are you? She's like I'll pay for it. I'm like okay all right so she and her friend drove down to Eugene where they had a camp for the with the new coach with the recruits they already had the prospective recruits and campers and Allie and her friend went down as campers. And on Monday morning there were campers and Monday afternoon they moved Allie to the recruits and on Thursday afternoon they signed she committed there and I'm just like holy oh my goodness so this is like this fantastic story of just exactly what you want for your kids to believe in themselves and find their dreams. And she wound up having a great career at Oregon she was a starter her junior and senior year.

Matt 27:28

Aaron Ross Powell But when you look back is there anything specific that you think about what you and your family did as Allie was coming up that built that things you did or didn't do that you think led to that remarkable story?

Bob 27:40

I'd love to be able to say that I was more integral to that but really it was Allie's believing in herself more than anything else. This was her thing and I was supportive and if she asked me questions I would try to answer I did not foist my thoughts on how to play goalie on her I'll give you a little more credit it sounds like you followed the exact advice you gave our listeners which is that this is the kid's journey and let it be the kids' journey and they'll take it where they want to take it.

Matt 28:09

The final question I'll ask you is we've touched on it given your job orthopedic trauma surgeon at Harborview you've now done this 10 years. You've contributed a lot to a lot of kids why do you keep doing it?

Bob 28:23

Well I the easy answer is I think I get at least as much out of it as as they do. Certainly seeing the lights come on and helping is really fun and important and meaningful to me. Being part of a team and part of this program has been extremely meaningful and satisfying to me getting to learn from Coach and all the other coaches as well it's been an incredible opportunity for me. I actually didn't think that I would have enough to offer but between the goalies a little medical ease and being a gray hair or no hair I've cobbled together some measure of worth.

Matt 29:04

All right Bob I want to thank you for your service to the Peace Corps, to our country and the military to our community at Harborview and to our kids through coaching what comes through in today's conversation is that cultures that last and produce excellence in medicine and the military and youth sports are the ones built around something bigger than winning and that focus relentlessly on long term development. Your experiences describe what good culture really looks like and what it costs when it isn't there. Every parent and coach listening today whatever program their kid is in just got a pretty good framework for knowing the difference and that's the long game. Thanks very much Bob thank you Matt