Ted Lasso, the award-winning Apple TV+ series, begins with a fairly ridiculous premise.
Ted, an American college football coach from Kansas, is hired to coach AFC Richmond, a struggling professional soccer (or should I say, football) team in England.
There is just one rather significant problem:
Ted knows almost nothing about soccer.
He does not understand all the rules. He mangles the terminology. He cannot even explain what “offside” means.
The team’s fans assume he is a joke. The players are skeptical. The press cannot wait for him to fail.
By any conventional measure, Ted is spectacularly unqualified for the job.
And yet, he understands something many technically brilliant leaders never learn:
His job is not simply to get better performance out of his players. It is to bring out something better within them.
Ted pays attention to the person behind the performance. He notices who needs encouragement, who needs to be challenged, who needs greater responsibility, and who needs help recovering from a mistake.
He does not lead every person in exactly the same way. But he consistently communicates the same underlying belief:
You matter. You are capable of more. And I am going to help you see it.
That sums up the People pillar of my Sustainable Leadership framework: shifting from getting work out of people to bringing out the best in people.
Here are five ways leaders can make that shift.
1. See the Person Behind the Performance
When Ted arrives at AFC Richmond, some people barely acknowledge Nathan, the timid equipment manager. They dismiss him, mock him, or treat him as though he is invisible.
Ted learns his name. More importantly, he asks what Nathan thinks.
That may seem like a small thing, but it communicates something significant: he sees Nathan, and Nathan’s perspective matters.
Leaders can become so focused on roles, responsibilities, and results that they stop seeing the human beings doing the work.
The employee who missed a deadline may be caring for an aging parent. The person who seems resistant may have been excluded from an important decision. The quiet team member may have the insight everyone needs but lacks the confidence to speak up.
Do you know what motivates the people you lead? What drains them? What they hope to learn? Where they want to grow? What kind of support helps them do their best work?
You do not need to become everyone’s therapist or best friend. You do need enough curiosity to see more than their output.
People are far more likely to become invested in their work when they know their leader is also invested in them.
2. Don’t Let Mistakes Become Identities
After Sam struggles on the field, Ted asks him a question:
“Do you know what the happiest animal on Earth is?”
The answer? A goldfish - because it has a ten-second memory.
“Be a goldfish,” Ted tells him.
Ted is not suggesting that mistakes do not matter or that people should avoid learning from them. He is helping Sam keep one difficult moment from becoming something larger:
“I made a mistake” can easily become “I always make mistakes.”
“I failed at this” can easily become “I am a failure.”
A leader’s response can turn a mistake into a learning experience.
When something goes wrong, start by getting curious:
What happened?
What were you thinking at the time?
Was the expectation clear?
What information or support was missing?
What can we learn from this?
Curiosity makes better accountability possible because it helps us respond to what actually happened instead of reacting to the story we‘ve created about it.
Hold people accountable for the mistake. Then help them become a goldfish long enough to move forward.
3. Adapt Your Leadership to the Person
Ted does not coach every player identically.
Sam needs encouragement. Jamie needs to learn that individual talent does not excuse selfish behavior. Roy needs someone to recognize that his influence extends far beyond what he can still accomplish physically on the field.
The goal is consistent: help each person contribute and grow. But how a leader helps each person do that will differ.
Many leaders support people in the way they themselves would want to be supported. But one person may gain confidence from greater autonomy, while another needs more context before moving forward. Someone may welcome public recognition; someone else would rather crawl under the conference table than be publicly thanked.
Great leadership does not necessarily mean identical leadership.
It means holding people to clear and consistent standards while recognizing that they may need different kinds of support to meet them.
Instead of assuming, ask:
What kind of support would be most helpful?
Where would you like more ownership?
How do you prefer to receive feedback?
What would you like to learn next?
How can I lead you more effectively?
The best leaders do not lower the bar for people. They learn how to help different people reach it.
4. Care Enough to Tell the Truth
Ted is relentlessly kind, but his kindness is not the same as avoidance.
He encourages people, believes in them, and looks for the good in them. He also challenges behavior that hurts the team.
Bringing out the best in people requires both.
Many leaders delay difficult feedback because they do not want to make someone uncomfortable. They soften the message until it becomes unclear. They hint, hope, and wait for the perfect moment.
Meanwhile, the employee may have no idea there is a problem.
Avoiding an honest conversation may feel kind in the moment, but it can deny someone the opportunity to improve.
Good feedback is not an attack. It is a respectful conversation about what you have observed, why it matters, and what needs to happen next.
Describe the behavior without assigning a motive. Explain its impact. Then give the other person room to respond:
“Is there anything I should be aware of? Can you walk me through what has been happening?”
Listen. You may learn something that changes your understanding of the situation.
Then determine the way forward together whenever possible. What is needed? More training? Clearer expectations? More frequent check-ins? A mentor? A different approach? An acknowledgment that the role is not the right fit?
Clarity and compassion are not opposites. Some of the most caring conversations we have as leaders are also the most difficult.
5. Believe in People - and Help Them Believe in Themselves
The handmade BELIEVE sign hanging above the AFC Richmond locker room door becomes one of the most recognizable symbols in Ted Lasso.
But the sign itself is not what changes the team.
Ted does.
He demonstrates belief in hundreds of small ways: by noticing people, listening to them, offering second chances, seeing potential before it is fully visible, and continuing to expect more from them.
Belief is not empty praise. It’s not telling everyone they are wonderful regardless of what they do.
It’s recognizing that people are more than their current performance.
Sometimes bringing out the best in someone means giving them an opportunity before they feel completely ready. It might mean asking them to lead a meeting, own a project, present an idea, mentor a colleague, or contribute to a decision they would normally be excluded from.
The message is:
I believe you are capable of more. I am going to give you room to discover it. And I will not disappear while you do.
Be clear about the outcome and any important boundaries. Ask what support they need. Agree on when you will check in. Then resist taking over simply because they approach the work differently than you would.
When leaders hold on too tightly, they may get the immediate result they want - but they prevent people from developing the confidence and judgment that make future results possible.
What Does Your Leadership Bring Out in People?
Ted Lasso certainly expects his players to work, grow, and put the team ahead of their egos.
But he never treats them as a means to an end.
He understands that leadership is not only measured by wins and losses. It is also measured by what people learn about themselves under our leadership.
Do they become more confident or more hesitant?
More willing to speak up or more inclined to stay quiet?
More able to recover from mistakes or more afraid to take risks?
More prepared to lead - or more dependent on the leader?
Projects end. Deadlines pass. People eventually move into new roles, new teams, and new chapters of their lives.
What they carry with them becomes part of your leadership legacy: greater confidence, stronger judgment, deeper self-awareness, or the courage to attempt something they once believed was beyond them.
The best leaders do more than get work out of people. They help people discover more within themselves.
And that is leadership worth believing - and investing - in.
