Thank You’s & I Owe You’s

With every “thank you” comes an “I owe you.”

Nick Saban, University of Alabama Coach, knows a lot about what it means to be a servant leader, according to the Leadercast 2016 event we recently attended as a team. “Don’t ever miss the opportunity to serve other people and help them the best way you can,” said Saban.

Saban said that as leaders, consider how you invest your time. “Sometimes your presence is really important, more so than anything else you can do, and everybody has time to do that,” he said.

And while physical presence and time with people is important, also give consideration to how you thank those you are leading. That can be forgotten, in many situations.

“Don’t ever miss the opportunity to say, ‘Good job.’ Don’t ever miss the opportunity to say, ‘I appreciate what you did,’” said Saban. “There’s one thing that I always say with a thank you; there’s always an, ‘I owe you’ that goes with a thank you.”

Your Very Best

Saban recalls this was a lesson that he learned while he was playing little league baseball in West Virginia as a child:

My little league coach would show me, I was nine years old, how to catch my balls. [I] still remember it like it was yesterday. He worked extra with me. My Dad was there to pick me up and when I walked off the field I said, “Thanks, Coach,” because I was eager to learn and wanted to play and all that. My Dad said to me, “With every thank you goes and I owe you.”

He asked his Dad what that meant, and his Dad explained that it meant, “I owe you my very best.”

He said this past season he told his players the same thing: thank you, and I owe you my best for your work. “I thanked them for their hard work and all that they did, but then I said there’s an ‘I owe you.’ I owe you our very best in helping you be prepared and have the right mindset to go into the playoffs and to try to win the championship.”