Captain, or Coach?

Business is Good with Chris Cooper

Podcast Script: Why Business Leaders Should Be Coaches, Not Captains

Intro Music Fades In

Host: Welcome to BusinessIsGood, the podcast where we explore the ideas and practices that help entrepreneurs grow their businesses and create lasting success. I’m your host, Chris Cooper. Today, we’re tackling a big question: should you lead your business as a “captain” or as a “coach”?

To illustrate this, I want to start with a story from hockey. Bobby Hull, nicknamed “The Golden Jet,” was one of the greatest players to ever lace up skates. Known for his blazing speed and powerful slap shot, he dominated as a player in both the NHL and WHA.

But Hull also took on a rare challenge: he tried to be both a player and a coach at the same time while leading the Winnipeg Jets in the WHA during the early 1970s. He had incredible success as a player and later achieved even greater success as a coach, but his tenure as both didn’t work out the way he—or the Jets—had hoped.

Segment 1: The Player-Coach Dilemma

Bobby Hull’s time as a player-coach highlights an important leadership lesson: you can’t do both jobs effectively at the same time. As a player, your focus is on performance—executing plays, scoring goals, and being in the action. But as a coach, your role is to oversee the big picture, strategize, and make tough decisions to guide the team to success.

Even some of the most celebrated names in hockey, like Larry Robinson, achieved greatness as both players and coaches—but never at the same time. Why? Because these are two fundamentally different roles that require completely different mindsets and skill sets.

Segment 2: The Captain vs. Coach Paradigm in Business

This same distinction applies in business. Many entrepreneurs try to lead as captains when they really need to be coaches.

Let’s break this down:

1. Limited Perspective on the Ice:
2. When you’re in the trenches with your team, you can only see what’s directly in front of you. You don’t have the big-picture context that a coach has from the bench. In business, this means getting too caught up in day-to-day operations and losing sight of long-term strategy.
3. Emotional Proximity:
4. As a captain, you’re shoulder-to-shoulder with your team. This camaraderie can make it hard to make tough decisions—like moving someone to a different role or cutting an underperformer. A coach, however, has the necessary distance to prioritize what’s best for the organization as a whole.
5. Distraction by Small Tasks:
6. Captains are busy tying their skates, taping their sticks, and focusing on their personal performance. Coaches are busy drawing up game plans, scouting opponents, and thinking about how to improve the team. In business, staying stuck in “captain mode” means you spend too much time on the wrong things—handling tasks that someone else could do instead of focusing on growth and vision.

Segment 3: Why Being a Coach Wins in Business

Here’s the truth: real leadership isn’t about scoring the most goals. It’s about enabling your team to win.

As a coach, your job is to:

• Make hard decisions that benefit the whole organization.
• Delegate tasks and trust others to execute them.
• Hold your team accountable and provide constructive feedback.
• Focus on strategy, vision, and the next big opportunity.

Many entrepreneurs default to being captains because it’s what they know—it’s comfortable. They’re great at doing the work, but they shy away from the harder, more abstract job of coaching. But this mindset limits growth. Your business can’t scale if you’re always on the ice.

Think about it: players are replaceable. You can hire someone else to score goals. What you can’t outsource is your role as the strategist, the decision-maker, the one who guides the organization to bigger wins.

Segment 4: The Difference Between Playing Hard and Winning

In hockey, every team plays hard. Every team wants it. But the teams that win consistently are the ones that have:

• Clear goals and alignment.
• The right players in the right roles.
• Strong chemistry and leadership.

The same is true in business. As a leader, you can spend all your time working hard and feeling like a hero. Or you can step back, guide your team, and lead them to success.

Conclusion

So here’s the question I want to leave you with: are you trying to be the best player on your team, or are you committed to being the best coach?

Bobby Hull’s story reminds us that even the greatest players can’t do it all. To truly lead and win, you have to get off the ice, step behind the bench, and focus on guiding your team to victory.

Thanks for listening to this episode of BusinessIsGood. If you enjoyed it, please subscribe, share it with a fellow entrepreneur, and leave us a review. Until next time, remember: your job isn’t to play the game—it’s to coach your team to win.

Connect with Chris Cooper:

Website - https://businessisgood.com/