Win More, Live Better

We spend a lot of time thinking about what it takes to succeed, but what if identifying the behaviors that guarantee failure could be just as valuable?  Drawing on lessons from UCLA head football coach Bob Chesney and Charlie Munger's famous prescriptions for a life of misery, we examine how identifying destructive behaviors can help us clarify our values and avoid becoming someone we never i...

Jamion Christian is the head men's basketball coach at Bryant University, bringing more than a decade of Division I head coaching experience and an international championship to the Bulldogs. Christian began his head coaching career in 2012 at his alma mater, Mount St. Mary's, becoming one of the youngest Division I head coaches in the country at just 29 years old. During his six seasons...

What if one of your greatest competitive advantages is being willing to look where others won't? Gil Brandt helped revolutionize NFL scouting by finding extraordinary talent in places other organizations overlooked, but his success wasn't simply about thinking differently. It was about knowing exactly what he was looking for, while remaining open-minded about where he might find it. In t...

At the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, Tanzanian marathon runner John Stephen Akhwari finished more than an hour behind the winner. Injured and exhausted, he crossed the finish line long after most spectators had left the stadium. When asked why he continued, his response became one of the most memorable statements in Olympic history. In this episode, we explore what Akhwari’s story teaches us about co...

One of the best ways to prepare people for difficult moments is to intentionally create more of them in training. Borrowing inspiration from Olympic gold medalist and Team USA volleyball coach Karch Kiraly, this episode explores an exercise he calls the "escape room" and how to challenge athletes to embrace difficulty, navigate frustration, and develop resilience. Learn More About Zach:...

Dr. Barry Davis is a Hall of Fame baseball coach whose career spans nearly four decades and more than 1,000 victories across three levels of college baseball. Barry began his head coaching career at Gloucester County College, where he won four NJCAA Division III national championships and earned four National Coach of the Year awards. He later led Georgia Southwestern to a conference championship...

What if you hired someone whose only job was to keep you from reaching your goals? What would they tell you to do? In this episode, Zach explores the concept of red teaming and how thinking like a saboteur can expose the vulnerabilities that might derail you or your team. With references to a famous speech by NFL Head coach, John Harbaugh, and a simple strategic planning team exercise, you'll...

If you repeated today’s habits and decisions for the next 100 days, would you be closer to what matters most or further away? That question and a lesson from NASA's Apollo missions is at the heart of today's episode. We explore how drift develops, why adjusting your route can help you stay committed to your goals, and how to recover when you veer off course. Whether you’re evaluating you...

You can’t force someone to change, but you can create the conditions that make change more likely. In this From the Other Side of the Mic episode, Zach joins Billy Allen on the "Coach Your Brains Out" podcast with additional guests Bernie Holliday and Ceci Clark for a wide-ranging conversation about one of the most important (and complicated) parts of coaching and leadership: Helping peo...

To celebrate the production of 300 episodes for Win More, Live Better and more than 40+ conversations with championship coaches across sports, Zach steps back to examine a larger question: What are the common themes great coaches consistently reference for sustaining excellence? In this masterclass episode, Zach references past guest conversations and explores the six core roles and responsibiliti...

When it comes to athletes, coaches see their qualities such as competitiveness, perfectionism, insecurity, confidence, work ethic and need to prove people wrong, to name a few. What they don’t always see is where those behaviors and qualities come from. Using Landon Donovan's journey to become a US soccer icon, this episode highlights what he can teach coaches about empathy, the motivation be...

Leadership requires knowing when to use the mirror and when to use the spotlight. When your team falls short, can you examine your own contribution before pointing elsewhere? When your team succeeds, can you step aside and give others the credit they deserve? Using a story from Tim Cook’s leadership at Apple and a recent leadership workshop, Zach explores why ownership and recognition both require...

You can hold the retreat, organize the team-building exercise, bring in the guest speaker, and put your values on the wall, but some of your most important culture-building opportunities happen in the ordinary moments in between. In this episode, we use Zach Mercurio’s research on mattering to explore what happens when people feel seen, heard, valued, and needed (and what happens when they don’t)....

Jay Johnson is the head baseball coach at LSU and one of the most accomplished coaches in college baseball. In five seasons at LSU, Johnson has led the Tigers to two national championships, winning the College World Series in 2023 and 2025. He became the fastest coach to win multiple national titles during his tenure at a single school and has twice earned National Coach of the Year honors. His he...

Human nature is to expect progress to be steady, visible and linear, but most meaningful goals are accompanied by setbacks, course corrections and periods when you have to take a step backward in order to go forward. Through the metaphor of tacking in sailing, this episode offers a better way to understand the inevitable zig-zags of growth and how to adjust your process in pursuit of goals, withou...

We conduct background checks before giving people important responsibilities. So why not do the same with the beliefs we give influence over our lives? In this episode, Zach shares a simple way to examine the evidence behind your assumptions and limiting beliefs, challenge outdated conclusions, and make sure your past isn't unnecessarily dictating your future. Learn More About Zach: Email Zac...

Paul Goldstein is the Director of Men’s Tennis and Head Coach at Stanford University. Across 12 seasons leading the Cardinal, Goldstein has compiled more than 200 wins, guided Stanford to the NCAA Championships every season, won conference championships in both the Pac-12 and ACC, and earned ITA Northwest Region Coach of the Year honors five times.  In 2024-25, he led Stanford to 26 wins, an ACC C...

Culture matters, but not simply for the sake of having a great culture. It matters because of what it enables people and organizations to accomplish. This episode explores how leaders can connect culture to behavior and performance, why there isn't one universally “great” culture, and how working backward from desired outcomes can help create an environment where people can consistently do th...

Growth often comes with an uncomfortable period where the demands of what we’re doing exceed our current capacity to handle them. Using the remarkable story of James Lawrence’s 50 Ironman triathlons in 50 states in 50 days, this episode explores the gap between new demands and our current capacity and why we should be careful about deciding too quickly that something isn’t working. Learn More Abou...

The moments when you most want to quit may also be the moments where you have the greatest opportunity to create separation. Inspired by a question Chris Bosh learned from Kobe Bryant, this episode explores how performers can create separation when things aren't easy. Drawing on lessons from Randy Pausch’s famous “brick walls” message in his last lecture and my own experience training for my...

Not every great performance starts with feeling great. Last week, two of the world's top music artists, Taylor Swift and Noah Kahan, reminded me of the same key lesson that is relevant for elite performers in any domain. In this episode, we explore why feeling your best isn’t a prerequisite for doing your best and what becomes possible when you stop treating your internal state as a predictio...

Mark Gottfried has experienced college basketball from nearly every angle including as a player, assistant coach, head coach, broadcaster, and now as a speaker, mentor, and podcast host. Mark began his coaching career at UCLA, where he spent seven seasons as an assistant and helped the Bruins capture the 1995 national championship. He went on to serve as a Division I head coach for more than two d...

In 1943, Edwin Land’s three-year-old daughter asked him a simple question after he took her picture: Why couldn’t she see it right away? Her question helped activate an idea that had been developing in Land’s mind for years and ultimately contributed to the invention of the Polaroid camera. In this episode, Zach uses that story to explore why meaningful growth frequently occurs before it becomes v...

What conversation are you currently talking yourself out of? Difficult conversations rarely become easier simply because we avoid them. More often, the frustration, assumptions, and tension continue to build beneath the surface. In this episode, Zach shares some practical strategies for navigating difficult conversations and becoming more skilled at them. Learn More About Zach: Zach's Email -...

John O’Sullivan is a former collegiate and professional soccer player, longtime coach, author, speaker, and the founder of the Changing the Game Project—an organization dedicated to creating better experiences for athletes by transforming the way we coach, lead, and develop people through sport. John is also the host of the Way of Champions Podcast, where he and Dr. Jerry Lynch have had nearly 500...