Dawn Staley on Knowing (and Demanding) Your Worth

I'm always looking for simple ways to make my day feel a little more meaningful, and Masterclass has become my go-to for that. In just a few minutes, I can learn from world-class instructors, whether I'm waiting for my coffee or winding down before bed.
One class that really stuck out with me, James Clear on building better habits. He said, you don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.
That one line just flipped switch for me. For just $10 a month billed annually, you get unlimited access to 200 plus classes from the best in the world across businesses, wellness, cooking, writing, and more.
And with thousands of short on the go lessons across 13 categories, you can learn your way on your time. Right now, our listeners get an additional 15% off any annual membership at masterclass.com slash hard things.
That's 15% off at masterclass.com slash hard things. Masterclass.com slash hard things.
Life is hard, but when it comes to sleep, that's hard too. Enter the ChiliPad by SleepMe.
ChiliPad is a water-based mattress topper that lets you customize your sleep temperature from a crisp 55 degrees Fahrenheit to a cozy 115 degrees Fahrenheit. So you can finally fall asleep and wake up feeling refreshed.
ChiliPad funnels a thin layer of water underneath you as you sleep, achieving active and consistent temperature control. Plus, you can schedule automated temperature changes too.
Visit www.sleep.me slash hard things to get your ChiliPad and save 20% off with code hard things. This special offer is available for We Can Do Hard Things listeners

and only for a limited time.

Order it today with free shipping and try it out for 30 days.

You can return it for free if you don't like it with their sleep trial.

Visit www.sleep.me to try ChiliPad.

And finally, make sleep the easiest thing you do. Today we have coach Don Staley.
Oh my God. As everyone on the planet knows,

Dawn Staley is the NCAA National Championship winning head coach

of the University of South Carolina Gamecocks women's basketball team,

a three-time Olympic gold medalist,

and a Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductee.

She is from North Philly, which means she can do anything. Her new book, Uncommon Favor, Basketball, North Philly, My Mother and the Life Lessons I Learned from All Three is available now.
Welcome, coach. Okay, but I'm going to get a lot of street cred for coming on your show.
Like, it's up. It's up.
It's up. My friends, it's up.
Yes. We feel the exact same way about you coming on our show that's exactly right okay so don we have a lot in common and one of the things that i was struck by is being the youngest of a big family your attachment attachment to maybe socks.
For me, socks are still to this day probably my most prized possession because it was like hit or miss if you got two of the same socks growing up. It was like Hunger Games, but socks were the prize, okay? So I must know, as you are also the youngest of a big family, what is your relationship with socks now? I have to know.
You know what? I very rarely wear socks. Isn't that crazy? Yes.
What? Like, seriously, very rarely do I wear socks. Wow.
So do your feet not get sweaty? Well, sometimes. But then I have a collection of sneakers that I could just get another pair.
So you wear sneakers like the rest of us wear socks. Yeah.
That's good. Not quite, but I can't remember the last time I wore socks and it was because I wore some moccasin shoes and it was winter but I still don't wear like all of our games like I have no socks I do get criticized a little bit with our players because I don't have any socks I love that that.
All right. We're going to have a big

conversation around stuff that we read in your book and other things that we've seen on the

television with you on the sidelines coaching South Carolina. I mean, get out of here with

how awesome you are on the sidelines. But I just want to start off by talking a little bit about

UVA. You went there for college, played basketball there.
And when you were getting recruited, there was a time where you didn't want some of those coaches who were recruiting you to come to your house. And your mom said something to you that you never forgot.
What was it? My mom said, never be ashamed of where you grow up. I don't know if I was ashamed, so to speak.
I'm really private. I don't want to give people the most sacred things of me.
And I do believe my neighborhood was that. And I think it was more so of sharing that intimacy with other people because I love my neighborhood.
Like I adore all the people that I grew up with. I loved growing up in the projects.
I did the camaraderie. Everything was like a big family, especially in the block that I grew up in.
I mean, some of the surrounding areas might have been a little sketchy, but what we had, I didn't want to share. So I was a little bit selfish with that because I would say my mother, our house was immaculate, very, very clean.
My mother, and I'm going to probably date y'all, right? My mother changed like, you know, the paneling that you put on the walls. She changed that like every season.
Like I could go to sleep and wake up and my mother has changed the entire house around and it looks like a different house. Like very tidy, very neat.
So it wasn't that I was ashamed of where I grew up. It was more of everybody can't be a part of the greatness of the projects.
I love that. Because your mother was my hero on page five of the book.
And I actually stopped reading and read a passage to Abby in the very beginning because I was having an out-of-body fantasizing moment. Can you tell us what your mother would do if she came home and the dishes weren't done? Listen, listen.
Y'all got to understand it was five of us, right? Yes. Five of us in the house.
We each had a week to wash the dishes, right? I hated dishes. I would really pay my brothers the $10 allowance that I would get to wash my week, right? Of dishes.
Now, it was probably my fault because I paid them and it's my week. And if they didn't wash the dishes on my week, I wasn't washing them.
Right. So I would walk past them, look at them and keep on going.
And then everybody would do the same thing because we all hated washing dishes. And then my mother would come home after cleaning somebody else's house.
Right. Her kitchen needed to be cleaned so she could cook for us.
And then she see last night's dishes. And when I tell you, you know, let me see if y'all understand this part of it.
Florida Evans, good times. Of course.
The damn, damn, damn. Well well you could have did a hundred dams because

every single thing in that sink my mom crashed out in these young people's terms she crashed out

on those dishes and left them there for us to clean up and for us to fend for ourselves as far

as dinner i just know that every mother listening

right now is just having a sacred moment of celebration. So she reduced us to just only eating with paper plates, which is what you deserved.
So I want to talk a little bit about your mom because I can imagine the coach and the player you were had a lot to do with her. Can you tell me like what leadership ideals or principles do you still employ in your current life because of your mama? My mother really was the sweetest, like the sweetest.
She would give her last to anyone, to anyone. But my mother had a short fuse for injustice or a short fuse for anyone she felt like was being taken advantage of.
Whether it was her, whether it's a stranger, like she would speak her mind, even though she had nothing to do with the situation. It was just a mere fact of she felt like somebody was getting taken advantage of.
And I'm going to give you an example of we would go Christmas shopping, right? We go to

the mall and my mother didn't drive. So one of us was driving.
And if we turn our blinker on

to go into a parking space and somebody zoomed in a parking space,

now she would make us park behind the car and wait for the people to come back out after shopping so she could get off of her chest what that person did. So for me, I'm probably not to that degree, but to the degree of this.
Now I travel a lot. Like I got a lot of frequent flyer miles.
I go to places and I got so many mileage that I got status. I got status.
So I get to go to the line, the first class, the priority line. And there was an instance where I'm in the front of the line and there's somebody in the back of the line.

This man was in the back of me.

And the service woman was like, sir, can I help you?

Right. Like, I don't know if they were calling me, sir.

You didn't know what to be offended about. I don't think I was like a man either, but he was calling a guy behind me.

And I'm looking around like, and the first question she asked me, are you first class?

Yeah, that's... behind me and I'm looking around like um and then the first question she asked me are you first class and I said yes I'm first class and then she was like okay come up and then I had to tell her this is very my mom like and I told her no actually I'm nicer than my mom right I said you're not going to mess my day I told her I said you're not gonna mess my day up so her service was nice after that but I just told her that I'm just gonna keep a cool head and you're not gonna mess my day up because it was early in the morning so it's things like that that because of mother, I can't let it go.
And it's actually not for me. It's for the next person.
So it's not for me. I'm going to get through.
I'm going to get by, but it's for the next person that, you know, you assume doesn't have this status to be in that particular line. I love that.
The standing up for yourself is standing up for the next person. That is it.
I think that that's so important. And it reminds me of the story when you were at UVA and the Dean called you in and said some things to you.
Can you tell us a little bit about that story? Well, I remember I am shy by nature. Everything about me, I didn't talk a whole lot.
I'm the youngest, so you don't really get an opinion. You don't.
You just got to sit there and just kind of listen, observe, and you sharpen those skills because I was a great listener. I was a great rules follower, but UVA was incredibly hard.
I almost got kicked out of Virginia because I had a bad first year, bad first year. And at Virginia, we don't say freshman, sophomore, junior.
We don't

say that. We say first year, second year, third year, fourth year.
So I had a really bad performing

first year in the classroom. So my coach, Debbie Ryan, you know, she, she set it up real nice.
She set the alley real nice. The only thing I had to do was reach up and dunk it.
So she set this meeting up with the Dean and the Dean was the person that was going to decide whether or not I stay at UVA or I had to take a year off just from inadequate academics. So I'm shy.
Like, I'm really, really shy. And I go in and sit down in front of the dean and I'm like, no eye contact, none of that.
So the dean is saying her piece, you know, what types of things can you do to help yourself? What kind of mechanisms? Right. And I'm not really saying anything.
And then she says, you're going to have to conform to the way we do things here. And then, you know, like conform.
I'm from North Philly. We got our way.
I don't conform to anybody. That's my bubble talking.
That's not, you know, me actually using words. But people who don't talk a whole lot, we do talk with our expression.

So I probably just scratched my face up and just listened.

And then when I walked out of there, I know that Dean stamped, kick her out.

She's not ready. She can't handle the rigors and she can't handle how we do things here.
And she can't live up to the standard of UVA. So Debbie Ryan, thankfully, she knew the type of fighter I was.
She knew that I just needed a little bit more tapping into the very thing that to this day, when my back is against the wall, you know, I fight. And I had to use competition to increase my ability to learn, grow, acclimate, conform to the ways in which you had to at UVA.
So Debbie got me another chance and I just started competing with my classmates like I was out there on the court. And then it made sense to me after that.
Like the very things that are you, we tend to forget when we're going through something that's new and difficult. But when you really think about it.
I'm the most competitive person you ever meet, but I never looked at my teammates as the opposition. So when I started to do that.
I started to utilize the resources to get the results that I needed to get in the classroom. And I started utilizing the tutoring at UVA.
I found out that I couldn't really listen and take notes because it's hard. So I got somebody to take notes for me because that was a resource that I use.
And then I would just listen to the professor's lesson. So it was just all of those things.
Like if I keep making the same mistake on the court, I'm going to watch film to see why I'm making that mistake and how I could do things differently. It's the same in any other difficult situation.
For me, it was academics, but also college. It's a system that you have to learn,

like talking to your professors, showing interest in your academic status. I know that from experience, but I certainly know it in just finishing my 2050 year of coaching.
what does the future hold for business ask nine experts and you'll get 10 answers bull market or bear market rising or falling rates inflation up or down can someone please invent crystal ball? Until then, over 42,000 businesses have future-proofed their business with NetSuite, the number one cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, HR into one fluid platform. With one unified business management suite, there's one source of truth giving you the visibility and control you need to make quick decisions.
With real-time insights and forecasting, you're peering into the future with actionable data. Whether your company is earning millions or even hundreds of millions, NetSuite helps you respond to immediate challenges and seize your biggest opportunities.
Speaking of opportunity, download the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning at netsuite.com slash hard things. The guide is free to you at netsuite.com slash hard things.
netsuite.com slash hard things. As summer winds down, now is the perfect time to ease back into learning.
Whether kids are gearing up for school or enjoying the last days of break, IXL is an award-winning online learning platform that helps students build true understanding across subjects. IXL adapts to each learner's level, pace, and needs, making it a powerful tool for catching up, staying sharp, or getting ahead.
It's also a time saver. One subscription provides access for the whole household across all grade levels.
And when extra support is needed, IXL is a smart, affordable alternative to expensive tutoring sessions. IXL is used in 96 of the top 100 school districts in the U.S.
Make an impact on your child's learning. Get IXL now.
And We Can Do Hard Things listeners can get an exclusive 20% off IXL membership when they sign up today at IXLlearning.com slash weekend. Visit IXLlearning.com slash weekend to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price.
Hello, friends. As you know, back to school season, meaning back to crazy bananas life season, is officially here.
And speaking of bananas and overscheduling, I've been leaning hard on my Whole Foods market runs right about now to keep everything on track between packing lunches, planning quick dinners in the 13 minutes we have together, and just trying to stay sane during busy weeks. They've seriously come through.
One thing that's been a total game changer is the 365 by Whole Foods Market brand. I started picking up their frozen waffles and breakfast sausage and all kinds of things like that for the hectic mornings.
And this is like magic because the kids get a good breakfast. We all get out the door on time.

It's a win, win, win.

And for lunches, they have organic granola bar multi-packs and they have reduced sugar

juice boxes, bagged apples, all the things that are fast, easy, and you feel good for

them to be eating.

Explore so many ways to save on Back to Schoolschool finds at Whole Foods Market. Okay, I have to talk more about what you said a little bit about the competition because it's fascinating to me in my own experience with that word and that experience and what it's about.
Have you done any like real thought and analysis on yourself as to why you're so competitive? Like, where does that come from? Well, I think very early on, I'm the youngest. Like everything was a competition in my household because I had older siblings and it's a pecking order.
I didn't tell y'all this, but my oldest brother and myself, we share the same birthday. Like I don't even have a birthday.
Oh no. Right.
So I think it just comes from being the youngest. Right.
And I think it comes from being a girl that played a boy sport. Like I was the only girl in my neighborhood that played basketball.
I played tackle football. I played baseball, like everything that guys were doing, I was doing.
And it came with ridicule. It came with perception of you not being good enough.
Yeah. I'm working twice as hard as them, twice as hard to be accepted.
And then because of that, you know, I had a burning desire and insatiable desire to be better than them. So that stirred my competitive juices so much that it became like really who I am.
It really is still who I am. And I navigate from my competitiveness.
Like I sit here and we lost damn near about 30 to UConn. Right.
Like I really can't believe it twice, like with a talented team, But then you have to put things in perspective. I know what that felt like.
Like, I know what it felt like to be dominant because that's what they were. They were truly dominant.
Like you, when you've been there before and you've been on the other side of it, you understand that sometimes the synergy they took into the tournament, it was just their time because it was just our time just last year. And then you have to get better.
Like they got better players, they got healthy and you got to tip your hat and respect that dominance. And if you've never experienced that dominance, which a lot of talking heads on social media, they've never experienced dominance to respect it.
They start taking stabs at our players, like they're not good enough. They start taking stabs at me, like I can't coach, like I got out coach.
Like it's, it's all of these things when it's more about respect and they had an incredible run that no one was beating them in this particular year. I think that that's so fascinating.
And I want to talk a little bit about that, that this idea of competitiveness, like the ultimate form of

competitiveness is to be truthful and honest in the respect when you're dominated. Yes.
That is next level. Can you talk a little bit about that? Like, how do you come to that understanding with being so competitive? One, you understand it because you've been on the other side of it.
Two, it's the very thing that drives you to get better, like to never feel what you felt and do something about it. I'm sitting here today.
I spent this past weekend entertaining recruits to get better, like to get better. If we win a national championship, I don't know if we have, who we have on campus this past weekend.
I don't know because we're probably preparing for a parade. We're probably doing so many other things except trying to get better.
and although I don't stay drunk off of our success, because I always want to get back and continue, but during this time is where teams who aren't the number one team in the country who didn't win the national championship, this is the time that you get better. Are you more comfortable in that getting better time or the post mountain, like the climbing or the mountaintop? Because when you're talking, I'm thinking about in your book, when you talked about post gold medal, how did you feel after you won the gold medal? Abby and I talked about this for an hour after that part in the book.
Relieved. When I got my first gold medal, I mean, it was the only thing that I wanted to do as a child was win a national championship and win a gold medal.
Because that's the only time that I saw women play live on television. So those two things were my goals.
And since my friends who grew up in the projects, again, we really didn't have anything besides ourselves and pride, right? So I would verbalize that that's what I wanted to do. And then my good friend would antagonize me that I wasn't good enough.
You're never going to do that. And it wasn't a friendly, playful manner, but the really competitive in me probably wanted to stab him, you know, in those moments, right? Like, but I used it to make good decisions, to increase my chances of actually accomplishing those things.
And when I did get my first gold medal at 26, that's my lifelong dream. And I got it at a fairly young age.
And then once I got it, I'm like, I went into a short, like, I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to do anything else.
So I went into a period where

I never felt like this before. When you win stuff, you want to be greedy.
You want more, you want more, you want more. But for me, it was like, what do I do now? And then I had to go right into the ABL because there were two leagues that started after we won the gold medal in 96.
And I couldn't get myself to play. I couldn't get myself to practice.
And this is my love. Like basketball is the very thing that I absolutely love to do.
And I didn't even know where to turn besides just don't do it. I don't feel like it.
So I'm not going to do it. I didn't talk to anybody.
Like, you know, nowadays you have mental health specialists and coaches and all of these things. And when you grow up in the projects and when you're from North Philly, that's taboo.
Like you don't go tell your feelings to anybody. And I did it, But I got through because I looked at Lisa Boyer, who's been coaching with me for the last 23 years of my 25 year coaching career.
She was my coach at the time and she was very accommodating. And she allowed me the space to just kind of decompress.
and then it got to a point where I'm like, I'm letting her down. My teammates who are, you know, with the Richmond Rage at the time, I'm letting them down.
Like they expect me, they need me, they want me. And then I'm not there for them.
And they're going through training camp and I'm here just not being able to get myself together. So when I started thinking outward instead of inward, like me, me, me, me, I started thinking about them, them, them and team.
I kind of snapped out of it. And then once I got down there, you know, it was like putting on an old shoe and I was back.
I snapped out of it.

It's that team thing. I wonder how individual sport athletes recover from post- Well, it's happened to me, Dawn.
You know, I'm also a gold medal winner. And after I won, I gave myself the anthem to celebrate.
and then I'd step off and I just felt down.

It's like the post-Olympic gold blues.

They call it gold medal syndrome. And it's literally a phase because there's this huge lead up to the Olympics, a huge prep.
The whole tournament feels like another world. And then you reach your goal.
You get this gold medal that you dreamt off your whole life.

And for me, I want to ask you this, like it didn't give me the thing that I was in search of.

Yeah, it was fun. I loved it.
I wouldn't give it back, but I was in search of something else.

Is your competitiveness and your desire to win, are you searching for something there?

And have you found it if you are searching? For the most part, I've never really been selfish about winning. It's always been for other people.
Like I really took with me to the Olympics in Atlanta. My hood, like I took my hood, I took North Philly into the Olympic games.
And there's something about that pressure, that pressure, not even a pressure of, you know, the country. Although you get super patriotic when you're playing an Olympic game, super like ultimate like the like the ultimate, right? But for me, I was bringing in, like, I felt like I had to do this for all the people in North Philly.
Like my hood, my projects, everybody that was tuned in to watch wanted, like, I couldn't let them down. We had to win.
And that that was pressure in itself and then every time that I experienced this it's always for someone other than me and I do think basketball it's a debt that I'll never be able to repay it for all it's done for me and like my you know in Philly and my players and my coaches and everybody that's helped. Like, I feel like I could never check off that debt because it touches so many lives.
You know, I don't have any kids, but my nieces and my great nieces and my nephews and everybody that comes behind us, they're going to see something different. And they're going to strive for something different.
And then everybody that is from my hood, they felt what I felt because I allowed that every, you know, if I go back to 96, I know I talked about North Philly. I know I talked about where I was representing just everybody in my basketball journey, because everybody that's in your basketball journey has touched you good or bad.

Right. You got haters.
You got doubters. You got supporters.

You got the myriad of people that contributed to the moment.

And I'm so appreciative of all of them, all of them. I want to talk a little bit about coaching.
And, you know, you played professionally for many years and started coaching with Temple. I want to talk about like your coaching philosophy and early days, you had mentioned that you were putting process before people.
And I thought that that was really interesting. Can you talk about what that means? Like I never wanted to coach.
I was so much a player that although I had some great coaches, none made me feel like I wanted to be them. Like none of them.
Made me feel like, you know, to me, the gratification was in the people who are actually doing it, like the players. And then I was asked to turn Temple Women's Basketball program around, which I was asked two questions, right? Two.
One was, can you lead? And then I'm like, can I lead? Like, I mean, I was the captain on every team that I played for, so I mean, I can lead. And then the next question that this AD asked me, and I was just meeting with him because it was Temple.
It was North Philly. They knew I was coming back because I was training with the 2000 Olympic team.
The final four was in Philly. So I felt I had to go meet with him because he asked one because I'm'm from North Philly, two, three.
He knew I was going to be there. And then I sat down with him.
He asked me those two questions. Can you leave? And they said, can you turn Temple Williams basketball program around? To me, that sounds like a challenge.
And I'm drawn to challenges. I'm super drawn to challenges.
And he stunted me with that because I wasn't taking that job. I'm a player.
Like I'm about to play in the Olympics in Australia, Sydney. And then he said, well, can you come down the hall and meet some other people? Right.
I'm like, sure, I'm here. Like, so I walked down the hall.
He sits me at the head of a conference table with like 10 or 12 people sitting around this table and they're like asking me all these questions like where do you see yourself in five years I said playing in the WNBA and they're asking me all these career questions y'all I was on an interview and I didn't even know it. They were interviewing me for the job.
Now, granted, I'm 29 years old. The only interview I've had is a tryout.
Right. Right? So, I'm just being as frank as can be because I'm ignorant.
I didn't know what was happening. So, no, I don't see myself as a coach.
No, I don't see myself like John Chaney, who is a legendary coach. No, I don't see myself like that.
I'm just. Two weeks later, I took the job.
Oh, my God. I took the job for this reason, because I thought about young people.
Like, I thought about their experience being 18 to 22-year-olds and how my experience as an Olympian, because it's utopia for me to represent the United States in the Olympic Games. Like you have teammates who only think about winning, right? Only thing they don't care who gets what attention, what spotlight it was.
We did it together. We have fun.
We had knockout drag out arguments trying to get better. We would compete at the highest level.
We would sharpen each other's iron and we would let nothing come in between us and go like nothing. So I bottled all that up.
And I'm saying if if I can help young people come together like that. In a game that we love.
Why not? Why not? Again, I made decisions based on not me like I was good with playing like I'm good. Let me play this out.
But I started thinking about young people, all the players there at Temple and how I can help change the trajectory of their life and their perception of their life and to give them something that basketball gave me. Like I was so prideful.
I was so like competitive. Like I had a place to put all these things and I wanted to give that to somebody because it felt so good that I know I want people to share in that feeling.
And look what happens. I think I get more gratification from coaching than they probably get from playing for me.
And again, this, that, Oh, that basketball thing where it's the gift that keeps on giving. And I'm not trying to, I only had one goal as a coach.
Once I started coaching, really started coaching. And that is, I want to be in a hall of fame for coaching.
Like the only goals I had were those Olympics, national championship. And then when I played long enough to know that there was a Naismith Hall of Fame, selfishly, I wanted to be in the Hall of Fame.
And now selfishly, I want to be in a Hall of Fame as a coach because, one, it allows me to just kind of give the credit to all the players and coaches that I coach with. Because it's not me as a coach.
Yes, my name will go in. But you know how many people were all hands on deck for that to happen? And it's a way for me to pay homage to them.
So coaching found me. really, it really did find me because I didn't seek it out.
But again, my heart took me to that place. Did you know the average bottle of water contains 240,000 tiny particles of plastic? Yeah, it's shocking, especially with recent research showing microplastics in our bodies and even our blood.
That's when I knew it was time to ditch plastic and get a water filter that actually works. I switched to the LifeStraw Home Water Filter Dispenser and haven't looked back.
It's the only water dispenser that filters over 30 contaminants, including bacteria, PFAS, and yes, microplastics. And it actually makes your water taste good.
I've noticed a big difference. No more weird taste, no more guessing what's in our water, and we're skipping plastic bottles now, which is great for the universe.
Plus, for every product sold, a child in need receives a year of safe water. That's more than 11 million to date.
Skip the plastic, go with LifeStraw. Your body and the planet will thank you.
Use code HARDTHINGS for 25% off your first purchase of a LifeStraw home product at lifestraw.com and say goodbye to microplastics forever. Have you noticed that your family wants dinner every single God-given night? It doesn't matter that you've served it the last 12 nights.
Here we are at 630 and they're asking for it once again. It's unrelenting and it's unforgivable.
You've probably heard of HelloFresh, but if you haven't tried it lately, you're missing out. It is the answer to our problems.
I used it a while back and liked it, but this summer I came back and they've leveled up. They've doubled their menu.
You can choose from a hundred recipes each week. I just made the chickpea tikka masala the other night so easy and the flavors were next level.
Also, did you know that they have ready to eat meals now? I'm talking zero labor. The best way to cook just got better.
Go to hellofresh.com slash hard things 10 FM now to get 10 free meals plus a free item for life. One per box with active subscriptions.
Free meals applied as a discount on the first box. New subscribers only varies by plan.
That's hellofresh.com slash hard things 10 FM to get 10 free meals plus a free item for life. On this show, we talk a lot about resilience and what it really means to support one another.
For healthcare and wellness professionals, that's the job. Day in, day out.
Doctors, nurses, dentists, chiropractors, therapists, they're the ones who show up for us. So it's just as important that they feel supported too.
That's why we partnered with FIGS. For too long, scrubs were just an afterthought.
Not anymore. FIGS scrubs are thoughtfully designed in innovative fabrics made to meet the demands of the job and look good doing it.
There's a full range of styles and go-to colors, plus limited edition drops that bring a little joy into the everyday. With back to school season upon us, it's the perfect time to stock up with some fresh outfits for the year.
And Figs just dropped a brand new collection of limited edition styles and accessories. If you're in healthcare or shopping for someone who is, You can get 15% off your first order at wearfigs.com

with the code FIGSRX. That's wearfigs.com, code FIGSRX.
it's so clear that all you do is in service. And there are moments in our lives where in order to be of service for the next person or others, we have to stand up for ourselves.
Like you did in the airport, like your mother did at the meat counter, which we're going to have to get to. So can you tell us what you knew you had to do after you saw Sedona Prince's video during the COVID bubble? Tell us what the video was and then what it was a catalyst for you to do at USC.
So during COVID, all the teams that made the NCAA tournament on the men's side and the women's side, we all played in the same city. And I mean, social media is it was prevalent back then in 21.
And what we saw was a I mean, it was L.A. Fitness at the men's tournament.
Like, seriously, it took L.A. Fitness, planted right smack in the middle of the men's city and where the tournament was being held.
And then where we were, I mean, literally, it was just a yoga mat and like two barbells and a stand. Like it wasn't even a full barbell stand.
It was just like two

dumbbells. And Sympathistona Prince, who was, you know, probably very savvy when it came to, you know, TikTok and Instagram, and she put it on her account.
And there was an explosion of the comparisons,

everything that was lacking

on our end. And then they started putting out, you know, what they got as far as gifts and what we

got. It just didn't sit right with me.
And I'm not knee jerk. I really am a processor.
So I try to

sit with it and see if it's a look, sound or feel like, you know, this is,

it's a lesson in a book where if something looks, sounds or feels off, I got to address

it.

Yes.

And if something looks, sounds or feels great, I'm going to promote it and encourage it.

So good.

So I didn't knee jerk it.

The next day, I felt like I had to address it and encourage it so good so i didn't knee jerk it the next day i felt like i had to address it you know and just writing an open letter about the disparities in the men's and women's game and then us coaches started to get together and talk about how we fight this, how we prevent this from ever happening again. And we had to amplify it.
We had to get in our platforms and lift our game up coach by coach. And then I got back home.
We ended up going to the final four and losing in the semifinals. And then I went back home and it was time for me to, to renegotiate my contract,

you know, process and things. I'm like, I'm fighting nationally, you know, for equity in our sport.
And yet at the time I was probably the most successful coach on campus. The men's coach that was here had not had the success that we had.

But when you look at his raises not his salary men are going to it's just normal that they just make more than you just know a normal thing so we get used to that right get used to that but then when you see the success that he had the success that was having. And he was getting more of a raise and I was getting more of a raise.
I'm like, I can't be out here fighting on a national level and I can't even get it straight here on our campus. Yeah.
So I asked my agent to step down. Let me do something a little bit different because my ass is a lot different than a normal raise.
And he didn't want to step down. He wanted to give it a shot and fight.
But we had been through this renegotiations for probably five or six times by then. And they always get to a point because you build up rapport with my agent and AD and they always get to a point where they're

like, oh, we don't have any more money. Yeah.
Like, OK, OK, I'll settle. Right.
So but this time I told him what I wanted to do. I want to equal pay, not equal raises for success.
I want what he's making. Yes.
Right. Yes.
Right. So I hired a lawyer, local lawyer, Butch Bowers.
And what's believed in it? He said, you're the best coach on this campus. You deserve this.
And he's speaking the same language I'm speaking. And then it didn't hurt that he was kind of best friends with the charity board, like their besties.
They vacation together. He knew all the legislators.
He knew everybody. Right.
He knew all the players. So he started the negotiation process with our A.D.
and it stalled for a long time. I mean, we started in April and we finished in October.
Wow. Right, it took that long.
It took that long. And it went back and forth.
And throughout the process, you know, the AD would, we had a really good relationship. You know, he would call for something else, but then we got into the negotiations.
And I think they were probably at just a million dollar raise, right? And he's like, you're going to leave all that money on the table? And I said, I'm not going to leave it on the table, but if you're going to give me a million dollar raise, you're not far off from where we need to be. Right.
And we're not even supposed to be talking because he needs to be talking to the lawyer, not me. Right.
You know, but he had to bring it up. And I just, you know, we went back and forth and back and forth.
And I told him, I was like, you can actually look good from doing something like this from a national level. But I also know that when you're in the room with your peers, like other ADs, you know, he could probably be the one that they're saying, man, why you do that? Why you start? Why you start this trend? So there's the pressure of that.
I understood that. I really did.
You know, but when you look at the type of success our program was having, you can make a case for it. Like you can make, is it an anomaly? I don't know, but you know how to talk the talk, you know, to make yourself still look good and still make yourself feel like you're still one of the boys in the room.

Even though you did this, you opened the door for such things to happen.

And then finally, the president got involved.

They got to the place where it was equal pay and we made a big stink out of it, which was good because, you know, the women's soccer team the national team was going through their thing and during the negotiation of mine you know there was a special cnn i watched it sad and they gave me more power to continue my fight they did to see their fight you know to fight, like it gave me, like, this is what I'm supposed to be doing. And I feel like it was a selfish act on my part.
But again, I was comfortable. I was making a lot of money, but it's really not for me.
It's for the next coach. It's for the next sport.
It's for what we should be getting for our successes.

And I always bring up revenue like you're not revenue producing. Says who? No, we don't get two million dollars a year.
You know, every time there's a tournament going on, the men get that. Each school, participating school in the NCAA tournament, they get two million dollars.
Right. units is what they call them.
But you can't tell me. I walk every day.
And my walk path takes me all around this campus, right? And if they knew how many students come up to me and tell me that they came to school because of watching women's basketball, that's tuition, right? You can't tell me that we have sellout crowds, right? Concessions cost. It all costs.
You can't tell me we're not revenue producing, right? We are revenue producing. You can't tell me the amount impressions that our school gets because we're in the final four for the last five years.
Right. I know because every time that we go to a final four, board members want to come.
You know, the president is always there. They're holding meetings with donors that more money's coming in to entertain at the women's final four.
So we are revenue producing. And I just think it's really hard for people to swallow.
Like on this campus today, on this campus today, I know there's a lot of animosity towards me for how much I make. Really? Yeah, I know there are people that make it really hard for us to get the things that we need to get because they don't feel like I should be making the type of money that I'm making.
And it's a shame. It really is a shame because, you know, they got daughters.
Like you got daughters and you feel this way. You don't feel like your daughter should get what her worth is or what she deserves because of the successes.
I really don't get it. I don't throw it in people's faces.
I don't. But I do stand up and I do speak out on injustices and equities, you know, inequalities that I hope that if there are women on this campus, that they can speak up for what they deserve.
Professors on this campus, you know, are female that are doing just as much or more than their male counterparts should be paid as such. And I hope I've set that example to where everybody will be brave enough.
You know, sometimes you do have to risk it all. Like I was willing to risk it all.
And I will say this in my negotiations, if they weren't going to give me a raise, then give me a zero buyout. It's a fair trade because I know my worth.
Don't not give me what I'm worth and hold me to, you know, buyouts are like three times more than what you make. You can tell your value by your buyout.
Ah, interesting. Yes.
So you were coaching them them though. You're not on the court, but you are teaching them through your own personal struggle with the school, what they do next in the next place, in the next room they're in where some man tells them there's, we don't have the money.
It's just so you're a 360 coaching them how to be in the world, how to step in the world. It's so beautiful.
Yeah. I just want to say from this house to yours, what you do, how you do it, the emotion you bring to the sidelines is important.
And standing in like your complete self all the time and bringing so much joy to people and also being an activist just by living and breathing and being the person you are is just so important. And I know it's tiring at times because gosh, can't we just play ball? Can't we just play ball and not have to deal with all this shit? But unfortunately, we're in positions that are us taking space is just an act of protest in a way, an act of revolution.
And you are a walking fucking revolution, sister. I am so grateful that you came on this podcast to talk to us today.
Thank you. And thank you.
Your platform is, it reaches so far and you unapologetically, you all keep doing what you're doing. You inspire us.
You give us stamina to continue to do what we do. And I really appreciate you all.
And thank you for my extra street cred for being on the podcast. Back at you.
Back at you. Yeah.
Thank you for the extra street cred.

Amazing.

All right, everybody go pick up Uncommon Favorite, whether or not you play basketball.

That's right.

It will help you in every room you're in, know your worth and live through service.

Your mom would be so proud of you right now.

Coach Staley, thank you for everything.

Thank you.

See you next time, Pod Squad.

If this podcast means something to you, it would mean so much to us.

If you'd be willing to take 30 seconds to do these three things.

First, can you please follow or subscribe to We Can Do Hard Things?

Following the pod helps you because you'll never miss an episode and it helps us because you'll never miss an episode. To do this, just go to the We Can Do Hard Things show page on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey, or wherever you listen to podcasts and then just tap the plus sign in the upper right-hand corner or click on follow.
This is the most important thing for the pod. While you're there, if you'd be willing to give us a five-star rating and review and share an episode you loved with a friend, we would be so grateful.
We appreciate you very much. We Can Do Hard Things is created and hosted by Glennon Doyle, Abby Wambach, and Amanda Doyle in partnership with Odyssey.
Our executive producer is Jenna Wise-Bermanerman and the show is produced by Lauren LaGrasso, Alison Schott, and Bill Schultz.