Lessons in Leadership
Insights from Minnesota Wild management and players
By: Michael Russo
Wether you’re a player on the ice like new Wild captain Jared Spurgeon or longtime veteran Zach Parise, running a hockey operations department like Wild General Manager Bill Guerin or running a team’s business operations like Wild President Matt Majka, the one thing you realize is that in hockey, great leaders have similar traits no matter what branch of an organization you work in.
Whenever Majka talks at Minnesota Hockey’s high school leadership conferences, the one thing the longtime Wild executive tries to impress on teenagers is that leaders come in all shapes and sizes.
In fact, while many may just assume that the head honcho of an entire professional sports franchise would be the loudest voice in the room, Majka is admittedly shy, reserved and an introvert.
Yet, he has made it work to the point he has worked for the Wild for 24 years.
“Whether you’re an extrovert or an introvert, one of the most important things that a leader needs to exhibit and gain is trust,” Majka said. “To me, that’s the foundation of leadership. When you gain trust, then people will follow. And you gain trust, in my opinion, by putting others in front of you and genuinely caring for their success and celebrating their success in front of yours.
“There are many different leadership styles out there and forms of it. But the one that always works is servant leadership; it’s about humility, putting others in front of you, celebrating others’ success and caring about the development of others before yourself. And that’s the one that I subscribed to, and it fits for my personality because I’m not a huge, big personality, extrovert, charismatic guy. That’s just not who I am.
“But I figured out, not too long ago, that I could still be an effective leader.”
Selflessness
Guerin, who played in the NHL 18 years in the NHL, won four Stanley Cups as a player and Pittsburgh Penguins executive, and captained the New York Islanders from 2007-09, says the characteristics that make a good leader on the business side is precisely the same on the hockey side.
It’s all about the crest in front of your jersey rather than the nameplate on the back, and that means inspiring teammates, making teammates feel comfortable and getting more satisfaction from your teammates’ achievements than your own.
That’s one big reason why Guerin chose Spurgeon as the Wild’s captain. The longest-tenured Minnesota Wild player is well known for trying to make young teammates feel at ease in the Wild dressing room. For example, Spurgeon had been corresponding with primo Russia prospect Kirill Kaprizov well in advance of him even signing with the Wild.
“I think a big part of leadership is how you treat other people,” Guerin said. “Good treatment of other people is when you naturally morph into a good teammate. And to me, that’s leadership. You care about the other person.
“It’s not all about big speeches or talking a lot. A lot of it has to do with being selfless and putting the team in front of yourself.”
That’s exactly what Guerin is expecting from Spurgeon.
Consistent & Reliable
The soft-spoken, undersized defenseman doesn’t need to give rah-rah speeches in the locker room. He simply needs to show up every practice and every game and lead by example. Be relied upon. Work hard. Support every other player on a consistent basis.“
I was a talkative guy. That was just my personality, but what I tell guys is, ‘We have you here for who you are, so be what you are,’” Guerin said. “I don’t want you to change. If you’re not a rah-rah guy, don’t be a rah-rah guy. Let your actions speak. If you’ve got something to say and you’re comfortable, say it.
“Chris Chelios, Brian Leetch, Dougy Weight, Scotty Stevens, Scott Niedermayer. These are guys that they all had their own style, but they just got it done. You look at Scotty Stevens and Scott Niedermayer. They didn’t really say much, but their play, their consistency, their presence, you could get behind all of that.
“Kelly Buchberger wasn’t a high point producer, but he would realize when our team was down and do almost anything to turn the tide of a game. And he sacrificed his body all the time for that. Chris Chelios, he was just fearless. Anything, on or off the ice, for his team. Anything. Consistency, too. I think that’s the biggest thing. These guys are like that every single day. It wasn’t like, ‘Oh, OK, I was there two out of five games or three out of five games.’ No. They’re there every night doing this stuff.”
Be Yourself
Mikko Koivu captained the Wild full-time since 2009, and obviously the stoic Finn has a different leadership style than, say, the quieter Spurgeon or even Parise. Spurgeon stresses inclusivity.
“We want everyone to have a voice, whether you’re 21 years old and played five games, to a veteran, and we’re all going to bounce ideas off each other,” Spurgeon said.
But he won’t be silent—that’s for sure.
“I feel like when I see something that has to be said that I definitely do speak up,” Spurgeon said. “But everyone leads in their own way, and if you try and change, then I think guys can see right through you, and there are guys that are more vocal, and we have plenty of those guys as well. We have tons of leaders in that room, and we’re all going to work together to get to that end goal that we all want so badly.”
Parise, who captained the New Jersey Devils to the 2012 Stanley Cup Final and the United States in the 2014 Winter Olympics, says he has learned to be a sponge around good leaders. But, he always tries to be himself.
“The most important thing about leaders is to say and do the right thing because young players are very impressionable,” Parise, 36, said. “Showing up at practice, working the right way, playing the game the right way. When I was younger, that was contagious. ... We were all going for the same thing. That was understood.”
Learning on the Fly
When Guerin first met with Wild players during a pre-training camp meeting after getting the GM gig in 2019, the one thing he tried to convey to each of his players was a team-first mentality. But no leader is perfect. He learned that as a player.
“Sometimes I was right. And there were times where I also said the wrong things,” Guerin said. “But I always felt my heart was in the right place and you want to. You just have to say it in a respectful way and just understand that these guys are your teammates, they’re humans, they have feelings. I made that mistake once, and it was awful.
“I called a couple guys out in front of the team, and it was the worst mistake as a leader I made. I think young kids think that if you call people out in front of everybody, you’re doing your job, you’re being a leader. That’s not always the case. You have to understand how that affects someone and you can get your message across in a different way, or privately.”
And that goes on the business side, too.
Majka always tries to be respectful to every single one of his Wild employees.
“I think what parents can or should do is to encourage their kids just to be themselves, to be genuinely themselves, because they don’t have to fit a particular style of leadership,” Majka said. “They don’t have to be someone they’re not in order to be an effective leader. They need to be themselves and genuine and authentic.
“Because again, there’s lots of different ways to lead. And I sometimes worry that we human beings think there is a prototypical style of leadership that looks a certain way, and feels a certain way.
“Everybody can find their place in a leadership position no matter what their personality is.”
Michael Russo writes for The Athletic. This is his 16th season covering the Wild and 26th cover-ing the National Hockey League. He co-hosts the Worst Seats in the House podcast on talknorth.com and Straight From The Source podcast on The Athletic. Both podcasts can be heard wherever you get your podcasts. Russo can be heard weekly on KFAN (100.3-FM) and seen throughout the hockey season on Fox Sports North and the NHL Network. Follow Russo on Twitter and Instagram at @RussoHockey. To subscribe toThe Athletic at a discount, go totheathletic.com/student.