Belichick’s explains why “less is more” with his coaching staffs

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Have you ever wanted to get an inside look at the mindset of one of the greatest coaches of all-time?

Thanks to Paul Rabil’s inaugural “Suiting Up” podcast, you now can.

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick was a recent guest on Rabil’s podcast, where the two spoke about Belichick’s coaching philosophy, team culture, management and more.

“Less is more” is really what Belichick takes pride in. He uses this mantra in his staffing, coaching and other departments throughout the organization. In fact, Belichick annually has one of the smallest coaching staffs in the NFL.

“I’d rather have fewer people doing more work than more people doing a little more work,” Belichick said, “As long as everybody is busy, as long as everybody feels productive, they feel good about what they’re doing and they feel like they’re contributing; I think when people have lag time and kind of not enough to do, that leads to getting distracted and complaining or being less productive. So even though you have more people, sometimes less work gets done.”

Belichick’s way has proved very successful over the years, and it also carries into a lot of other parts of the Patriots organization, from the staff to the team and more.

“From a ‘getting everybody on the same page’ standpoint, which is critical, the fewer people you have to manage, the easier it is to get everybody on the same page,” he said, “So if you’re talking to 10 people, it’s hard to get all 10 people doing the same thing or doing the right thing. Now you make that number 20, instead of 10, it’s even more difficult.”

So basically when Belichick wants things done or said, he doesn’t want to depend on others to relay the message. Makes sense, right?

Other topics of the podcast included what Belichick looks for in players, team culture, the story behind the saying “put it in the drawer,” what books he reads and more.

To learn more about the ways of the GOAT, listen to the podcast here.

Follow Megan on Twitter: @carnahanmegan