I've Got Your Back

Introduction On the face of it, you'd be hard pressed to think of two guys more different than Brad Gilbert and me. I talk about stocks on CNBC; Brad flies around the world coaching Andy Roddick. But the first thing you need to know about Mr. Gilbert is that he is a man of many parts, and an important side of him is that he's a dedicated investor in the stock market. Which is what? indirectly'led to our first meeting.Back in the fall of 1997, when Brad was still coaching Andre Agassi, Andre hit a bit of a rough patch in his game. So rough was this patch that his ranking fell to an unbelievable 141 in the world. Andre wasn't too worried, though. He had his genius for tennis, and he had Brad. So when Cliff Drysdale interviewed Andre after a tournament and asked him if his ranking was going to return to its former heights, Andre looked into the camera and smiled that smile of his. ?Like Joe Kernen would say, if I were a stock, you should buy me,? Andre said. Now, to this day I don't know whether Andre Agassi was a dedicated viewer of my show or Brad Gilbert somehow put him up to making that remark, but I was pretty tickled, let me tell you. Soon afterward, I went out to dinner with Andre, at Campagnola, on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Halfway through the meal, in walked Brad Gilbert along with his wife, Kim. They make a pretty nice entrance, Brad and Kim. Kim is a tall, very pretty blond lady, and while I don't think anyone would call Brad pretty, he does have a certain athletic presence. Of course they spotted our table instantly. Brad saw me and smiled. ?Hey, Super Joe!? he called. The beginning of a beautiful friendship. From that first night, I liked Brad for his easygoing, slightly off-the-wall style, the way he had of hitting the nail on the head with whatever he said, even if the way he said it seemed sideways at first. He appeared shy, but you discovered in a minute that his convictions about everything? sports, politics, finance, food, human behavior'were strong and deeply held. His knowledge was deep on many fronts. His powerful positive energy and his quiet, humorous way of connecting when he talked with you made me understand why he was a great coach. I've Got Your Back fills out the picture. Who knew that Brad was not just a great tennis mind, but in a very real way, an important management guru? This is a book that can and should be read two different ways: as a source of delight for tennis fans eager to learn how Brad helped two great players, Agassi and Roddick, achieve their potential and as a source of enlightenment for anyone who wants to help the people he or she works with reach their highest potential. Like many important leaders, Brad started out'in his days as a top-ranked tennis professional'as a bit of a diva. But when he made the move to coaching, he quickly came to the knowledge held by the Level 5 Leaders in Jim Collins's Good to Great: that personal humility in the service of a greater cause (the success of the team) is the most effective style of all. When Brad started working with Andre Agassi, he'd never coached before, and so maybe a certain amount of humility came easy in those early days. He started thinking hard about what his own college coach, Tom Chivington?Chiv?had done and how he had done it. What he realized right away was that Chiv had taught in the best way possible: by example. Brad's coach was that rarest of creatures: a strong but humble man, a natural Level 5 leader. Chiv had a quiet voice, enormous positive conviction, and when he traveled with Brad on the pro tour, the simple desire to do whatever it took to make Brad comfortable and at ease with himself, to put him in the frame of mind to win. This meant everything from getting laundry done to booking practice courts to scouting opponents. Chiv worked hard and cheerfully because he loved his work. He never raised his voice. He was an inspiration, commandGilbert, Brad is the author of 'I've Got Your Back', published 2004 under ISBN 9781591840473 and ISBN 1591840473.