The former C.E.O. of T.D. Ameritrade has left the business world to pursue his first love of coaching college football. After helping the Univeristy of Nebraska-Lincoln athletic department as a volunteer, he hopes to land a division I coaching job the the 2011 season.
Q: How did you originally decide to leave your job as defensive coordinator at Dartmouth to enter the business world?
A: By the time I had gotten to Dartmouth I had four children and during my first season, my wife filed for divorce. On a football coach’s salary it would have been difficult for me to support myself independently and support four children and a wife. So ultimately, I moved into the storage loft above the football offices at Dartmouth. Now it gets cold in Omaha. This is Hanover, New Hampshire. It is colder there, and the loft had no heat, so I could see my breath during the winter time, and I lived there for two years.
The issue was in order to move up in the coaching profession you don’t get a job across the street. You have to get up and move. That was what concerned me, I didn’t know how I would move and still take care of my family. At the end of the ’83 season, that spring Miami had upset Nebraska for the national championship, and they offered me a job to go there.
One of the toughest decisions I’ve ever had to make in my life was turning down that job because by doing so it meant I had to give up coaching. Had I taken the job, I would have had to live 1,000 miles away from my kids. I wouldn’t have been able to see them. I wouldn’t have been able to afford to bring them back and forth. It would have been many months where I wouldn’t have been able to see them during the season. So I just didn’t know how I could do that, so that was the year.
I always had an interest in business, and I accepted a job in the institutional MBA training program at Merrill Lynch. There were 26 of us, 25 MBAs and one football coach.
Q So you eventually became CEO of T.D. Ameritrade but decided to step down to become a full-time volunteer with the University of Nebraska at Lincoln Cornhuskers. How did that decision come about?
A: In 2008, when most of the financial service world was imploding, we had our sixth consecutive record year. I think one of the responsibilities that a leader has is his/her own succession. We weren’t in the middle of a major acquisition. We didn’t have any major problems. I thought that the timing was right to pull the trigger on myself.
We made the announcement that summer of 2008, and when we did so, I had actually gotten a tremendous outpouring from Wall Street about some pretty large firms asking me if I would consider going out there and talking to them about their job or becoming part of their succession plan. I had a couple of different networks talking about possibly my own show. I’ve written two books and was asked to write a third.
Then I got a call from a group of alums associated with Yale telling me at the end of the 2008 season the head job there might be open, would I be interested, and my initial response was, ‘Guys, I haven’t coached football for over 20 years’ they said ‘and we think we know the skill sets that a college coach is supposed to have, and we believe you’ve got those, so why don’t you think about it,’ and I really did.
The next 5 or 6 months I didn’t lose a second of sleep over the other opportunities, but what I couldn’t get out of my mind was possibly going back to football, and across two careers the thing that has always given me the greatest satisfaction is the impact I’ve been able to have on others. There is no satisfaction that makes me feel prouder than helping an 18-to 22-year-old boy become a man. So that part of football touches my heart, the other side of it, I’m not a wild football fan. I don’t watch extra games. I would rather read a book or watch a movie.
I have always been intellectually stimulated by the strategy, the science, the structure, the art of football. So on one hand, working with the kids touches my heart, and the other hand, the game itself touches my head. So when I think about what else there is I really want to do with my life, that is what I think I want to look into.
Q:Have you set any goals for yourself in this second big transition into coaching?
A: I hope by the 2011 season I am a head college football coach.
Q: At any level?
A: Division I.
Q:How did your business world experience make you a better football coach?
A: I think in the business world you operate under tremendous pressure. You run on a multinational and global basis. You have got to be able to work with those people, you have got to be able to unite and excite those people for a common mission.
A typical head football coach really works hard and tries to be great at a lot of things. When I got to the business world, I found out you can’t be great at a lot of things but there are a handful of things that really, really matter. How can you makes sure you get A pluses in the things that matter, and react as best you can in other things. I think I would bring that to the coaching world that maybe I wouldn’t have had, had I stayed in coaching the entire time.
Q: How has your experience at Nebraska differed from the more hands-on coaching experience at Dartmouth?
A: Well, as the defensive coordinator, I was the boss of the defense, I run the defense, I make the calls, I finalize the game plan. I don’t have that type of responsibility at Nebraska. NCAA rules prohibit me from actually coaching, so I was there primarily to learn.
I had 100 percent access to coach (Bo) Pelini, the entire defensive staff and coach (Tom) Osborne. I was there at all the coaches’ meetings, I was there with the team and I had the opportunity to relearn first hand to what extent the game has changed or the kids have changed. Am I sure I really have the skill sets to become a really good head college coach, and am I sure this is something I really want to do? All of these things I was able to learn.
Q: Did you find that the athlete as a person has changed since your previous days of coaching?
A: There is a greater emphasis today with the Internet and technology being what is. To be connected, everyone has got to be connected. This was not true of the athletes that I coached. They didn’t have that.
Everybody today seems to like rap music, that was a tough adjustment for me to make, but I think for an 18-to 22-year-old man, he is going through the same pressures, same concerns, same anxieties, same insecurities, the same challenges with his peers, with his friends, with his family, with relationships, pressures as an athlete, pressure as a student, pressure in the community, the exact same things that the kids I coached had.
So I think the individual hasn’t changed at all, but the environment that individual is a part of has changed somewhat. An 18-year-old boy today is similar to an 18-year-old boy 25 years ago.
Q: How do you plan on getting to where you want to be as a football coach? Is Nebraska the last stop, or is there something else?
A: I truly believe I have a competitive advantage as a head coach. I’m not sure I have a competitive advantage as an assistant. I think I’ll be a great advisor and mentor to my assistants, and I think I’ll hire attractive assistants, but that’s not where I think I have a competitive advantage. I think I have a competitive edge as a head coach. So my intent is to go to from Nebraska to a head coach, or maybe for some reason, it wasn’t meant to be.
Q: So a school should hire you as their head football coach because of your leadership skills and ability to manage?
A: I have been a proven winner and leader across two careers. I know how to unite and excite a team. I know how to attract a staff. I know how to recruit. I know how to bring together a program. I know how to create an inspirational mission upon which the program creates a foundation and you build that program.
I was a much better business leader because of the 16 years I spent as a football coach; I absolutely believe I’ll be a much better football coach because of the time I spent as a senior business leader.
Q: What would you say is the biggest obstacle to success for college coaches today?
A: I think especially at the B.C.S. level there is so much money with television contracts and bowl games, etc. There is an incredible pressure on a coach to win right away.
Now I think there is also pressure on a head coach, and I think that the second part of this is very fair. A head coach isn’t just a head coach. He is an ambassador for that institution. I think sometimes the coaches might forget that. I think that might be a pressure on a head coach, but that should be a pressure that is expected from a head coach.
Q: Had you never left football, where do you think you would be right now?
A: I don’t know where I would be today, but I absolutely believe that at some time I would have been a head college football coach at a major college.
Q: But no regrets along the way?
A: No, I did everything that I had to do at that particular point in time in my life because that was what I needed to do at that point in my life. It would be almost cowardly to look back and say, ‘oh, I could have done this or I could have done that.’ I did what I had to do when I did it.