Chad Willis, the head coach of volleyball at Georgia Southern University, sits down with us in this episode of the 35,000 feet podcast going over his start in his career as a coach, some exciting travel experiences, how coaching has changed his life, and some words of wisdom for future athletes.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How this past season went for Georgia Southern University Women’s Volleyball team (0:20)

• How Coach Willis got into coaching (3:24)

• Chad’s advice to athletes wanting to play in college (9:46)

• Chad’s favorite travel experience (11:50)

• Chad’s next adventure (13:59)

The Past Season for Georgia Southern University Volleyball Team

Morgan: Hi guys. Welcome back. It's Morgan. Today I'm sitting down with coach Chad. Thanks so much for joining us.

Chad: Thank you for having me, Morgan. Looking forward to chatting.

Morgan: Yes. We're so excited to get to know you and your team better and the travels that you've had. And so just to start off this, one of the questions I wanted to ask you is if you could tell us about the highs and lows of your season.

Chad: Sure. I think when you look at it on paper, it was a little disappointing, not only for us as a staff, but as a team, we certainly had some higher expectations. So we clearly didn't win as many matches as we wanted to, but I think when you take a step back and look at the big picture of some of the things that we were able to accomplish just from a culture standpoint, it was year one for us, and taking over a program that hasn't seen a lot of success in the last five or six years, really we felt like some of the positives, some of the takeaways we really needed to be mindful of. We're really just establishing some what we call our cornerstones, core values, and just focused on building good relationships from the player level to the staff level and everything in between that we feel are going to be impactful for us as we continue to move forward with our vision. So on paper, clearly we're all disappointed because we're competitive and we want to win, but as we reflect back now, we're able to take a lot of positives out of it. And I think it has prepared us, especially our returning group, for what they want to do moving forward.

Morgan: I love that you mentioned core values and relationships, things like that, because I think honestly, that's what takes teams the furthest.

Chad: Sure.

Morgan: And a lot of the time, that's what teammates remember, are those relationships they have, things like that.

Chad: Yeah. So we talk about it a lot with our student-athletes. And it's funny because any prospective student-athletes, any recruit that sits on the couch across from us in a meeting when they're on campus, one of the first things I tell them is number one, being student-athlete is hard, and number two when you're a part of this program, you kind of come in with an expectation that volleyball is really just a small piece of what we do. It's clearly the most time-consuming piece that we have, but in reality and big picture, it's the smallest thing we do. And our jobs as coaches is to teach is to mentor, is to foster an environment where ultimately they feel like they can grow into themselves and be better versions of themselves every single day and so when they look back on their experience, they feel like they're well equipped to handle the real world. So I have this quote that I constantly share with our team, and it's that the most important things in life aren't things. We can look back, and we can remember wins and losses and championships and banners and rings and all those things. But at the end of it, those aren't the things that we're going to take with us. It's going to be about relationships. It's going to be about service and how you impacted other people's lives. Those are the real takeaways.

Morgan: No, that's so true, especially because you're only going to be an athlete for so long. And you take those lessons with you forever.

Chad: Yeah, yeah. Such a small window.

Morgan: Oh, that's so good. Thank you so much for sharing that.

Chad: You're welcome.

The Start in Coaching for Chad Willis

Morgan: And I'm curious, how did you get to be a coach, Chad?

Chad: Yeah. So it's a really good question. And I promise you I will not try and drag this out into-

Morgan: You can. You can.

Chad: My two-hour ESPN autobiography, but I actually grew up what you would consider, I guess, an all American household/ both my parents were big into sports growing up, so it was sort of ingrained in us at an early age, especially team sports. I started off playing soccer and baseball, and I have a brother who's three years younger than me, and he played everything as well. And I got hooked on volleyball. Ironically, my parents were playing in a small church league, and so I got hooked right when I was in elementary, going into middle school with it. And that sort of kind of started my path into my passion for the sport. And I guess this kind of answers one of those questions of what is something people may not know about you? But actually I first started coaching when I was a junior in high school.

Morgan: Wow.

Chad: So I'm from Fredericksburg, Virginia, which is like a suburb of DC now, essentially. And there's a division three school there. It is now called the University of Mary Washington. At the time it was Mary Washington College. And so as a junior and a senior in high school, I served as their volunteer assistant coach. So-

Morgan: Wow.

Chad: I was exposed to the coaching side of things at I guess what you would consider a relatively young age, 16, 17 years old, but that sort of put the bug in me. And I did my undergrad at James Madison University, and my time there, I worked with three different volleyball teams. So I was a manager for the varsity team. I coached the women's club team and played for our men's club team. So I did that for all four years.

Morgan: Wow.

Chad: And then was fortunate enough to know the right people, which sounds like a cliche, but that's what it's all about, is being in the right place and having the right contacts. And that started my coaching career at Elon and then through Wake Forest and App State and now Georgia Southern.

Morgan: Wow. No, that's such a cool story. I love how it worked out and you knew that you wanted to coach for so long.

Chad: Yeah. And I think a large part of that is the teaching aspect of it. I think one of the most impactful influences I had in my life was probably my grandmother, who was a teacher and reading specialist for 30 plus years. And I was telling somebody the other day I can remember vividly growing up. I had all the typical, every ball and bat and Nerf gun known to mankind growing up as one of two boys. But she used to take me to these teacher supplies stores. And when I was in elementary school, I would buy grade books and planners and all these pens and a whiteboard. And my parents would make fun of me because I'd shut the door to my room and have this imaginary... Most people had an imaginary friend. I had an imaginary classroom, where I'd be yelling at students and disciplining them and grading papers and all this good stuff.

Morgan: Oh my gosh.

Chad: But yeah, I think about that, and I think about what I do now and how I have what I do... The reason I do what I do is I'm just passionate about educating and mentoring. And I think a lot of that just stems from growing up and being around her and seeing how it was in her life.

Morgan: It's so true. And I've seen in my own life that coaches seriously can be the most influential people because they probably spend more time with you. Your players probably spend more time with you than parents that are in their lives all the time.

Chad: Yeah, yeah. That's something too, and I always like to say it was a lot different when I first got into coaching because I just thought it was about the volleyball. It was like if I can hit the ball this way, if I can do it, then I can coach it. And so that's sort of your mantra as you grow up, and then as you evolve and as you mature and you get a little bit older, you get a little bit wiser, you start to realize that it's much more about just the relationships and the impact that you have on these young people's lives and how decisions you make and conversations that you have, they mean something and a lot of times can be a big differentiator for a lot of these kids.

Morgan: Wow. It's so true. No, it's so true. And that just made me think of a question I wanted to ask you is-

Chad: Sure.

A Key Takeaway from Coaching for Chad Willis

Morgan: What's one of the biggest lessons you've learned personally from being a coach?

Chad: Right. I think probably one of the biggest lessons for me has really just been to be genuine, try not to do too much or be something that you can't, or even worse, that you're not. I can remember when I was fortunate enough to get the job here at Georgia Southern and came down for my first meeting with the team. As soon as I walked in the locker room, after I introduced them to my wife and my two kids and made sure they knew that I was a family man first and foremost, the first thing I said to them was, "Listen, I'm not here to be perfect. I'm here to be real. I think part of this process of you all learning and me learning and walking alongside you is to let you know that I'm going to make mistakes just like you do and that ultimately we have to approach failure with the right mindset and that it can be very impactful for us. It can be a strong motivator, an excellent teacher, but you have to have the right mindset about it."

So as I've gone through the years and looked back on a lot of the players I've coached and coaches I've had the tremendous opportunity to work with, I think that's the one thing that stands out to me, is I've been really fortunate to surround myself with a lot of people who just know what it's like to be genuine, just be open, honest, and real and try not to be something that you're not.

Morgan: I love that. No, and that's like great advice for, I think, every stage of life.

Chad: Sure, sure.

Coach Chad Willis’s Advice to Those Who Want to Take the Athletic Route

Morgan: I think that's amazing. If you're an athlete that's wanting to play for a team or university, what would your advice be to them?

Chad: Yeah. I mean, I think along those lines of open, honest, and genuine, the first thing that I'd say to anybody would be the same conversation I said we have with recruits who come to us, and that's doing this as hard. Being a student-athlete is going to be one of the hardest things you probably ever do, but if you can figure out a way to manage your time appropriately, if you can really commit and invest yourself to the work and, for a lack of better terms, the grind, as they like to say, yeah, it's all hard, but to me, some of the greatest fulfillments in my life, both personally, professionally, and spiritually, have all come from places of struggle and adversity. And so even though it's probably going to be one of the hardest things you ever do, it can be the most rewarding thing you ever do as well.

So my advice would be stay the course. Don't let setbacks define who you are or what you're capable of doing. Commit yourself to small goals every single day. Don't chase success. That may sound sort of cliche, but it's something that we talk consistently with our student-athletes about. We don't really talk a lot about success because that's always comparing yourself to someone or something. We talk about have a pursuit of excellence mindset, which means every single day come be the best version of yourself, focus on the three things that you can control, your attitude, effort, and actions towards others, and then if you put one foot in front of the other and have that right mindset about you and look at failure as the motivator and teacher that it is, then oftentimes results will take care of themselves. So that would be my advice.

Coach Chad Willis’s Most Exciting Travel Experience

Morgan: No, that's awesome advice. And I like that you mentioned focus on what you can control because we can focus on working hard, and I love that you said that, so thank you for sharing that with us. Yeah, and I guess, what's your most memorable travel experience, Chad?

Chad: Oh, geez. I've been all over the place. I've only been overseas once. That was my junior year in college. Our men's club team took a 10-day trip over to Europe to play. So I don't really have one travel experience that really stands out above the rest. And I think I just look at it from a big picture perspective of I'm very fortunate to have had the opportunities to go to a lot of different places. I haven't really done the whole pen a pen on every state you've been to in the continental US, but I'm sure I've hit pretty much 80% to 90% of them just through the opportunity to compete and recruit. And so I think that's something that I really do enjoy about my job, is the fact that I have the opportunity to go and visit a lot of different places, experience some different cultures and groups of people. Had we had had this call under normal circumstances, I probably would've just told you about the mission trip that my family and I were supposed to be on about two weeks ago. We were going with Athletes in Action through our on-campus ministry here at Georgia Southern down to Nicaragua-

Morgan: Oh, wow.

Chad: For five days to install clean water filters for a little local village down there. So I would say that's probably what we'd be talking about right now had that trip not been canceled, but-

Morgan: Oh my goodness.

Chad: But we're hopeful we're going on the same trip next year. So I'm really looking forward to that and Just an opportunity to go and serve others and see how we can be positive impacts in other people's lives.

Morgan: Oh, I think that's amazing. One thing I really love about traveling is a lot of times service is incorporated into travel.

Chad: Sure. Yeah, yeah.

The Upcoming Season for Southern University Volleyball Team

Morgan: And so I think that's awesome that you guys are doing that. Yes. Okay, and then I wanted to ask you, what are you looking forward most to this upcoming season?

Chad: Well, first of all, let's keep our fingers crossed and say our prayers that we get a season.

Morgan: I know.

Chad: First and foremost. That's where everybody's mindset right now is, is there really going to be any sort of normalcy when we get on the other side of this? But I think right now certainly, this whole COVID-19 and how it's impacted the world right now is it's forced me to do sort of some personal reflection. And yeah, I'm excited about the season, but I think more importantly, I'm just excited to get back in front of our team, to have our staff together, our support staff, our coaches and administrators, and our student athletes. We're a family. We talk about that all the time, but sometimes we take that for granted. So I think that's probably the biggest thing I'm looking forward to this season, is coming back and being able to put our arms around each other and love on each other and just be grateful for the opportunity we do have to be together. And clearly, when we get back to a certain level of normalcy, we'll start banging the ball around a little bit and get our minds focused on what our goals were prior to this. But certainly, this has caused sort of a perspective shift for a lot. So I'm just really looking forward to this season as just getting back with my team and getting in the gym every single day and working hard on our cornerstones and the things that we're about.

Morgan: Well, Chad, thank you so much. I'm so excited to see where your team goes. And I love that you mentioned all these goals because, I don't know, I can see that that's going to take your team far, and I can tell the passion you have for being a coach. And so I'm excited to see where your team goes.

Chad: Well, I appreciate it. Thank you, Morgan.

Follow Georgia Southern Volleyball:

• Georgia Southern University Women’s Volleyball Team Twitter

• Coach Chad Willis Twitter

Podcast made in partnership with Acanela Expeditions

Theme Song - I’ll Just Be Me by Gravity Castle