Father's Day and The Lasso Way

The past three years have produced thousands of articles outlining leadership lessons learned from the hit Apple TV show Ted Lasso. Themes like “be curious not judgmental” and “be a goldfish” have been constant in my LinkedIn feed and it always warms my heart to see such callouts to my favorite television show (Apologies to Monica, Chandler, and the rest of the gang). If you haven’t started this show, I can’t recommend it enough and if you haven’t finished it, please don’t read any further. Spoilers are ahead and this show is too good to be spoiled by little old me.

While volumes have been written about the leadership of Ted Lasso, very little has been said about how the show discusses fatherhood. From the first season we see how important a positive fatherly influence can be. Jamie Tartt’s struggles to be a team player, as well as his inability to process Ted’s kindly paternal coaching style, clearly stems from his need to be the alpha and impress his alcoholic father. This plot point is magnified in Season Two’s episode Man City as Jamie follow’s Freud’s (or is it Jung’s) advice and physically defeats the elder Tartt. This tension is reconciled in Season Three’s Mom City as he finally forgives the man for all the harm he has caused and realizes in doing so that he can finally play the sport he loves for himself and his teammates.

Rebecca hates her father for his affairs and tries to find forgiveness in her heart after his death. Roy serves as a father figure to his adorable niece and is rewarded with overflowing love and admiration. Kit man, coach, and Wonder Kid Nate struggles for his father’s attention throughout the series and it is through his relationship with Ted, and the subsequent implosion of that relationship, that we can see how much he hungers for paternal affection. In contrast to this, Sam Obisanya’s character finds love, support, and guidance as his dad tells him how proud he is while also challenging him to find the moral path and make difficult choices.

In one of the series’ more shocking revelations, Ted discloses to the team therapist that his father – a man he has repeatedly referenced throughout the series as an inspiration and guide – killed himself when Ted was sixteen years old. His death provides context for Ted’s coaching philosophy and helps us understand why he is so dedicated to communicating his love and appreciation for the men he leads on and off the field.

And yet the leadership that we have celebrated for these three seasons has been flawed. We acknowledge his work with the men of AFC Richmond and yet miss an obvious failure. Aside from a few references during series, it isn’t until the penultimate episode, Mom City, that we are reminded of Ted’s own responsibilities as a father to his son Henry who is 4,438 miles away. While his motivations for coming to England in the first place have a bit of misguided nobility, the success we see him achieve and the lessons we see him teach are at the expense of missing out on his son’s childhood. Finally, as the series closes, we see him return to Kansas and take on the most important leadership challenge of the show – being a present father. In the last few seconds, we see him coaching Henry’s soccer team and his eyes reflect a joy that has been missing for quite some time.

Leadership begins at home. For Ted Lasso, it also ends at home. His leadership journey becomes complete the minute he returns to his son, even though it means forsaking the success and relationships he built across the pond. While this was a lesson he was slow to learn, the impact of this choice will no doubt make him an even stronger leader in whatever professional endeavor he finds next.

Last Father’s Day I was a brand new father to a one-month old little girl. A year later, the challenges and the joys of my most important leadership role have become much more clear. While it can all seem so daunting, a wise man once said “Taking on a challenge is a lot like riding a horse. If you’re comfortable while you’re doing it, you’re probably doing it wrong.”