Lead In 30 Podcast

The Transfer Portal Is Open - Leadership Lessons from College Football

• Russ Hill

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Have you seen what's happening in college sports? We could learn a ton in business from what's going on in collegiate athletics right now! In this episode Lone Rock Leadership co-founder Russ Hill dives into why he thinks the rise of the individual in sports is about to spread to business. Here's some of what you'll get in this episode:

• the transfer portal explained and why it maps to work
• coaching moves as a test of loyalty myths
• identity shift from company-first to free agent
• the rise of individual power over firm control
• annual portal mindset for career value checks
• smart compensation linked to contribution
• healthy guardrails without restrictive non-competes
• what winning organizations are doing now
• setting New Year focus on team momentum

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About the podcast:
The Lead In 30 Podcast with Russ Hill is for leaders of teams who want to grow and accelerate their results. In each episode, Russ Hill shares what he's learned consulting executives. Subscribe to get two new episodes every week. To connect with Russ message him on LinkedIn!



SPEAKER_00:

The transfer portal is open. How many thousands of college athletes, football players, right now put their name in the portal? Wait, this isn't a sports talk show, so what does that have to do with leading a team or a department or an organization? Actually, tons. Let's talk about it.

SPEAKER_02:

This is the Lead in 30 podcast with Russ Hill. You cannot be serious. Strengthen your ability to lead in less than 30 minutes.

SPEAKER_01:

It's time to end the confusion. Get the new book by the founders of Lone Rock Leadership. See why executives at Lockheed Martin, Signa, Teva, Chili's, and so many other companies are praising Deliver. Why some leaders get results and most don't. You can download the first chapter right now and request two free copies shipped to you at LoneRock.io.

SPEAKER_00:

Happy New Year to you. Welcome in to the first pod, the first episode of 2026. If you're listening at the time that we put this out, it's uh it's just the beginning of the year. And uh if you're listening to it later, then who cares? Hopefully your year is going well, whatever time of the year you're listening to this. Hey, you all, I gotta acknowledge that I'm in a rental car and uh and I don't, I can't, I don't I'm driving. So the audio I think is being recorded through the car because I'm connected to Bluetooth, and so the audio quality is not gonna be as crisp, as deep, as normal, as good as it normally is. Can you just roll with that? Uh is that all right with you? Will you just be patient? I won't make this a very long episode um because I don't have a ton of time anyway, but I wanted to get this out because I got a lot on my mind as the new year is kicking off and as you're getting back into the grind if you're listening to this around the time that we put these out. And uh I just want I've got a ton I want to share with you. So I just decided screw it, we're gonna do it even if it's going through the car audio. So just be patient with me on that. Welcome in to the Lead in 30 podcast. This is uh this is the sh uh a podcast where we take less than 30 minutes. There are all these shows out there that are an hour and a half, two and a half hour long episodes, and I I just I don't have time for that. And there's a place for those, and many of them are the highest-rated, most downloaded shows out there. I actually think the length of the show has a lot to do with it's a long thing, the formula, whatever, um, for why they're so high on the charts. But but there are other factors in there too. Anyway, I respect the fact that you're busy. If you're listening to this podcast, you most likely well, I can't imagine if you're not leading a team, maybe you have aspirations to do it at some time. And and so you've got you've got your own career, you've got the people you're leading, you've got your customers, your clients, your partners, your vendors. A lot of you have families, whether the kids are young or old or at home or not, and you've got other responsibilities. So I just assume that you're like I am, and you're busy and you don't have a lot of time. So unless we call a lead in 30 podcasts for a couple of reasons. Number one, we take less than 30 minutes in each episode to give you a framework, a model, a best practice, a story, something to think about, implementing in the way that you lead others, because if you're static, if your trajectory as a leader, your skills are flatlining, the market's not, environment you're in's not, the needs and demands of teams and organizations and markets, that's not static. So how can you continue to increase your value as a leader if you're not increasing your you're upgrading your ability? So that's what we focus on in this episode. Why am I hosting it? Well, because I like to. And because uh everyone, I drew the short straw. No, actually, this is uh we're into the 400, over 400 episodes now. So I've been recording these for a long, long time. My background is in the media, spent almost two decades in it. So I got a lot of um desire, a lot of um time spent talking to audiences. Somebody asked me at uh at church actually recently, um, I made some comments from from the pulpit from the podium about uh how I grew up shy and introverted. And this person asked me afterwards, they're like, How like how is that possible, Russ? Like you're you were in the media, you you hosted shows and you you you you um you're you're on stage in front of people now. And I said, you know, um I'm actually still introverted, but it's a long story. Um I gained I gained confidence in my voice. And um actually that makes me think about something else I want to talk about, but I'm saving that for another episode. I I just I found my voice is the long uh and short of it. And so I'm still introverted. I've got a lot of friends, a lot of family, a lot of people around me who would they would love to be in front of or around other people 24-7. Like if their bodies didn't require sleep would be socializing nonstop. I am not that way. I love being with people. I love connecting with people. I love being on a stage, I love being in a social setting until I don't. And so I love being on a stage for two hours, four hours all day. And then I need time on the airplane alone. I need time in the hotel room alone. I need I love going to a social gathering. Anyway, so uh I spent a lot of time in the media, that's why I'm and and and now I work uh in in in the leadership lab. I'm one of the co-founders of Lone Rock Leadership, and so here I am on this podcast. Anyway, if you want to find out more about our firm, go to Lone Rock.io. Lone Rock Leadership is the name of the company. Okay, we are gonna talk in this episode about the college football portal. And a lot of you are sports fans, but some of you aren't. So I have to give you 60 seconds of background for the few of you who don't know what I'm talking about. So, college football a few years ago went to this portal system to where basically every athlete became a free agent. And it's totally uprooted and changed college sports as we know it. Some of you think it's destroyed it. Some of you are so upset about it. Some of you love it, some of you have no clue. So basically, there's this period of time when college football athletes can go in, they put themselves in a database, they basically say, I want to be in the portal. It'd be like you um applying for a job or announcing that you're leaving the organization you work at and you're available, you're on the market. And so now all these teams know, oh, I can go look at these, these are the quarterbacks that are available. These are the wide receivers, these are the offensive linemen. These are the athletes that are available. And then they have a period of time where all these teams can make offers, right? Because now our college athletes are paid. Again, this isn't a show about whether or not that's good, bad, or whatever. It just is. And um, and so they're paid. So these schools come all, they all come out and make offers to these athletes, and then they have a limited window where they get to apply or they get to accept the offer or not. And then there's all this shuffling of players. And and and that's led to tons more coaching changes than we used to see. And so many of us who are are I I I I love college sports more than I love professional sports for lots of reasons. Basketball, football, especially. I'm just a huge college football fan, college basketball fan. And and so the but the world's very different now than it was a few years ago. So you have, and by the way, I'm gonna apply all this to organizations. And our job leading, because we're most of you who are listening aren't leading a sports franchise or a sports team. Few of you are, but most of you aren't. So I want to apply this to why am I talking about this in in context of your job, your day-to-day? It's got tons of application. I want you to start thinking about it as I'm laying this out, and then I'm gonna kind of make my own connections and you see if they they align with the connections or the takeaways that you've got. Okay, so there's all these coaching changes now. And and so a head coach will go, and some of the schools that are in the conferences that my team's in, uh that the teams that I cheer for, there are head coaches that have left recently. And so then they take a good number of the coaches that are with them. Like the head coach will go and they'll take the offensive coordinator, or they'll take the offensive line coach, or the wide receiver coach, or the the athletic trainers, or whatever. And it just ticks fans off. They're like, oh my gosh, you're not, I thought you were loyal to us. I thought you were one of us. And now, not only did you take an offer from another organization, another team, another school, but now you're taking all these coaches from us. And and you get on Twitter, you get on X, and people are just losing their mind about it at lots of different schools and lots of different conferences. And you want to know what my perspective on this is? I'll tell you my perspective. And this is where I'm gonna start making the um the comparison to careers. I used to identify for years, you all, for years and years and years and years. I identified like it was probably I'd say my identity was probably first and foremost to the family that I was raised in and my last name. So that was part of my identity. That's where I'm from, right? That's my ancestry, my lineage, my my how I was raised, the part of like that was probably the biggest part of my identity. Second for me would be um religious, spiritual, just the way that I was raised. It's part of how I identify. And and so that that has always been like second or third. And and there's nuance to that, right? Because not everyone who identifies as Catholic or Baptist or Muslim or Mormon or whatever, atheist. They're not all the same. You can't put the same stereotypes or generalizations on everyone, but you can put some. And so I would identify second, probably religiously or spiritually, as to what my belief system is. And it's unique to me, but there are elements of it that I share with different groups. Like, for instance, I share part of my identity with all Christians, I share part of my identity with all believers, I share part of my identity with specific anyway, you get the point. So third or fourth on my list, like it would be top five, you all. Top five would be the organization, the company that I was employed at. And I I cared a ton about the the the brand, the logo, the name on my business card back when we carried those. And so I went to work for a company and I identified, like I got the email address when that was a thing. Yes, I lived before email was a thing. And and and I got my email address, and I'm like, wow, I'm identified with that company. I actually have an email address at that company, and that was a big part of my identity until until those companies when I started to get old enough and experienced enough and moving up the org chart enough to either fire people or watch others be laid off or watch other changes around me. First, it was watching other people around me. Then it was me terminating people and watching the emotion that generated in them. Like it it was crazy to knowing that okay, today I'm gonna go in and I'm gonna fire, I'm gonna meet with this particular manager or this employee, and I'm gonna let them go. That was extremely hard for me to do. Why? Well, in part because they identified so deeply, they were like me. That company, that organization, that brand was such a big part of their identity, and I was ripping it away. And I had to sit face to face with them because I believe that's how you do those conversations, and and have that hard conversation and give them a chance to react to what I was saying, and I would watch that. And then I got ultimately, then I then I left organizations, I opted out, and I watched how that played out, and then ultimately got to a place in my career where I was invited as told to leave an organization. And what I realized was oh, that company doesn't really identify with me. Well, they did for a while when they were getting what they wanted from me, but when they didn't get what they wanted from me, or they didn't want to pay, or put together a package that met my needs, the value that I thought I had in the marketplace, or go in the direction I thought that they should go, that organization had no difficulty. And by the way, I was on the other side of this, right? They had no difficulty removing me from them or not seeing me as part of it anymore. And so what started to happen was the way that I identified myself, defined my identity, shifted, and I became, in my own mind, a free agent. And that was a massive shift for me. Massive. Because I that wasn't how I identified before. I was like almost militaristic. You're I was part of the army, I was part of the part of the the the armed forces, so to speak. Uh the I I'm just telling you, like, I stood and saluted. I wore the uniform. That's the comparison I'm trying, the analogy I'm trying to make here. I wore their flag. And then I realized, oh no, this mark the market is not like that. Rush, you're looking at this wrong. And honestly, we write about this in our book, The Great Resignation, that came out, you know, during COVID. Um, and and there's some chapters in there that are just timeless, and it talks about these trends and the rise of the individual versus the rise of the firm. And it's really, really important for you to understand those dynamics because they're not static. The firm becomes more valuable in certain parts of our market, and then the individual becomes more valuable. And if you you see that ebb and flow, and generally over time, the firm, the trend line is clear. It goes back and forth a little bit, up and down a little bit over time, depending on market conditions and what's happening. But overall, the trend line is the individual is becoming more valuable. And that, my friends, is where the college portal becomes important. So, those of you that are bellyaching about these athletes going into the portal, or you're so ticked that this coach who you thought like they are my school, like that that's my school, and that that's who they are, and they've got our flag on, and they've got our logo. Oh, come on. Do you know how easy it is for them to pull off that shirt to wear a different hoodie? And so we're seeing in college sports the rise of the individual. And are there some negative aspects to that? No doubt. Are there some things that need to be worked out to make that better? Yeah. But I'm gonna, and this is not gonna be a popular opinion that I'm gonna share with some of you, but it is my opinion. I love it. I love it. There's nothing better for you, for me in the market than the rise of the individual. And I love people seeing, you know what, I've got some value. These are the skills I've developed. Now, did that university help me? Yep, you helped me. Did that coach help me? Yep, you did. And now my but I did a lot of the work. You didn't make me a better quarterback, you helped me make myself a better quarterback. You tracking with me? That's a massive difference. You can't make me something. So the same thing happens in organizations, and the more we go in that direction and the trend line is there, some of your organizations, some of the industries and organizations you all work at are slower to realize this trend, and you don't you're you're losing the battle for talent more than other organizations. But the more you realize that's the way the market goes, and the more you embrace it yourself as like are do you view yourself as being in the portal every year? Because if you don't, why? Why not? Now I'm not saying you go out and you actively like you gotta be committed to the organization you work at. Don't don't hear me wrong. Like, I took the job, I took the role, I signed up for this, I'm committed to it. Like I'm gonna I'm gonna deliver what I said I'm gonna deliver. And while I'm delivering that for you, I'm developing myself and increasing my value in the market. And so I this is not static. So my contribution is gonna increase. At the same time, I need you to increase my my compensation. Because I control my contribution, you control my compensation in in most regards, or you know, the percentage or whatever else depends on what role you're in or whatever else. And and so we need we need to we now I b I believe like we shouldn't we shouldn't have athletes leaving three games into the season, and we don't, right? Like, no, you're locked in for the season, for the year. And you need to show up at all those games and bring your all. But when the season's over, like, yeah, you should be you should be talking to other teams. You should be testing out your your value in the market. You should go out there and see, and you need to do it with confidence, you need to do it with humility, you need to pay homage and respect to the people who have helped you. You don't turn your back on them, you listen to them, you give them a chance to respond to your needs or your desires, and and then you make a decision and they make the same decision. I just think there's so much, so much good that comes from that. And really good organizations, in my view, and I see it day in and day out in the line of work I'm in, working with. With all these different companies, all these different organizations and so many different industries, I see that the ones that are viewing it this way and embracing it and structuring compensation packages and are out there are less insulated, are less in a bubble. I've been talking about this for like years now, you all. If you've been listening to this podcast, I hope it's been sinking in. Because I've been telling you this ever since we studied it and wrote it in the great resignation. That's when it hit me. I'm like, whoa. And because I I read all this, I read all these papers, all this research about organizations versus the firm and and things dating back to the 1920s and studied it. And our newest book that that's called Deliver, why some leaders get results and most don't. The last few chapters of that book are historical. We actually started the book with them and then ended up moving them to be the last of it. We give you historic um perspective on leadership styles, like what Henry Ford chose, what Thomas Edison chose, and a guy none of you have ever heard about that we give a whole chapter to, who I think there ought to be statues for, and he ought to be studied in business schools because he modernized, transformed leadership, started anyway. There's so much you got to read in the book. Anyway, so I I really highly value looking at these historical trends so that then I can make some determinations based on what's happening in the market about my own strategy. Are you tracking with me? Like, are you thinking about this in this way? And so I look at what's going on in college sports, I'm like, yeah, this is awesome. And no, if you if you're offended that that coach left, you're a fool. And I don't mean that disrespectfully, just with any disrespect, because I have the same emotions, like, ah crap, we lost that coach, or oh, that person went. But I'm not fooled. I'm not sitting here thinking, oh, those coaches are totally loyal to this, and and and them being at that school is one of the top three parts of their identity. Maybe it is today. But you know what, how you know how easily we fire coaches? Like how easy. And you expect them to not want to go pursue their market value? That's insane. Like you're why don't you just crawl in a time capsule and go back? Because that that there was an era. That's the way it's been for most of our lives, for those of us that have been around for a minute. But it's not that way anymore. And I promise you, I promise you, this trend will not reverse itself. You cannot make it go backwards. Now you can reform it a little bit and put some guardrails on it, just like we do in organizations. But like the greatest thing that ever happened in organizations is the death of the non-compete. And I know a lot of you still put it into your employment contracts, but any employee who ever hires an attorney, we did it when we left the firm. We actually looked at, we hired two different law firms, and we said, hey, we've got this non-compete with the firm that we used to work at, evaluate it, and we had uh attorneys in different states, and both of them came back and went, Oh my gosh, yeah, you would be dumb to even abide by this. There's no teeth in it. Now, we had loyalty to where we worked, we had respect for the organization and the leadership, and they uh showed respect back to us, and so we negotiated, and we we were we were team players, they were and we were. And so there were specific organizations that that firm would say, please, Russ, don't would you mind not going and working with that organization? I'd say, Yep, no problem. I'm gonna respect that. Legally, you got no teeth, you can't do anything, but I'm gonna respect it. And then other organizations that say, Yeah, you know what, you've got the strongest relationship there, yada yada, yada, go go pursue that. And so when that non-compete was in place, anyway, my my larger point here is what's happening in college sports is beautiful. I love it. I'm a fan of the individual. I just am. And I think that that your one of your focuses in this new year, if it hasn't been in the past, is increasing your value in the marketplace. So that when you decide you want to put your name in the portal, you're gonna get some offers. And I'd love for you to identify with the organization you're at. We got people working for us at Lone Rock Leadership. They're unbelievably talented. I hope we'll keep them forever. Not forever, but you know what I mean, until they no longer want to work. But I'm also gonna make decisions that are smart for the organization and not overextend ourselves and not not throw out compensation or incentive packages that don't mark or don't match what what the reality in the marketplace is. And I expect the same from individuals who work for us or work with us. You know what I mean? I want them to be smart. I want us to be smart, and I'm a believer that you can you can meet in the middle. And so maybe we're gonna make it sweeter for you than we really want it to be, or you know, that feels good to us, and maybe you'll take a little bit less or whatever, we can work it out. And and that that exchange, that conversation is beautiful. I love it. I I I'm driven by it. And I hope you are too. So, in the middle of all that's going on in the world of college sports at the time that I'm recording this, that's my take. It's not a sports talk show, but I see tons of application. And and actually what's happening in the sporting world, in the college sports world, is just a continuation of a trend. Like again, we got chapters of it in in our in not our most recent book, but the one that came out like five years ago, The Great Resignation. And we've got chapters in there where we got all the data. We show it all, all kinds of stats. And um, and it it's just the story is it's just the numbers are clear. This is the trend line. The individual is becoming more powerful, and the firm is less. And those of you that don't get that, or you work for an organization that where the organization still tries to flex and still tries to put people in their little you know, box and not not respond to the market, yeah, you're losing talent. And you're not as competitive, and your market share is going to decline, and you're not gonna innovate a lot. And you're and and by the way, and if you're part of the problem or part of the thinking in that, you're missing out on a ton of value you could be gaining or gaining access to in the marketplace. The people, the smartest out there right now, are aware of these trends, they're watching it, and they're responding to it. And uh I hope you get the spirit in which this is intended. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say here. And uh and it it it's about it's about functioning well in this environment. And um, and so I hope you I hope you hear it that way. Anyway, that is what's on my mind. Happy New Year, everybody. I hope you had a great holiday break. I want to talk more in the next episode about how you're leading your team in this new year. What are you doing to hit the ground running, not just kind of at a decent pace? And I know how it is, you all. You loved being on, not all of you were on break. Some of you you just finished the busiest time of your year or you're going into the busiest time. So it's not the same for every one of us in every industry. But um, for the vast majority of you, you're you you got a break during the holidays. And I know it's a little bit rough to get back in the grind and back to the schedule for some of you. If you don't like your job, if you don't like what you're doing, then it really sucks. And you need to work on that. You need to make some changes. And I hope you'll do it sooner rather than later for lots of different reasons. But uh, for the rest of us who love, I love what I do. I'm passionate about it. I love who I work with. I love it. I love my colleagues. I I just absolutely have enormous respect for them. None of them are perfect, and by the way, neither am I. And I love our clients. I love the organizations we work with because they are spending money on developing themselves, on their leadership team, they're upgrading talent, they're committed to growth. And I I I just absolutely love that. All right, hopefully this audio worked. Thanks for your patience. Happy New Year, more to come.

SPEAKER_02:

Share this episode with a colleague, your team, or a friend. Tap on the share button and text the link. Thanks for listening to the Lead in 30 podcast with Russ Hill.