Everything I Need to Know I Learned on the Golf Course
By Joe Way, PhD, CTS
Most people get leadership lessons from mirroring the actions of their favorite bosses, TED Talks and motivational speakers, leadership retreats, or books written by people with better headshots than résumés. While I’ve definitely done the same, the lessons that really mattered in the long run were reinforced by “life lessons” from the golf course. Yes, golf… That horrible, awful, frustrating sport where you pay good money to torture yourself with trees, water, bunkers, and a ball smaller than a lime. Yeah, that sport I can’t wait to do more of.
I didn’t know it when I first picked up a club about six years ago, but every slice, every missed putt, and every miracle birdie was training me to better run my AV department. Leading in higher ed AV is not for the faint of heart. Between shrinking budgets, exploding technology, personnel crisis, and faculty who think HDMI is a type of SUV (yes, true story), you need patience, creativity, and the ability to laugh through the chaos. In other words, you need golf.
Play the Long Game
Golf is a marathon disguised as a walk in the park. Sure, you get the occasional “wow” shot, but the game is about 18 holes of strategy, not one lucky swing. If you’re only chasing highlight reels, or let yourself get too up or too down by early progress, you’ll flame out by the back nine. That’s exactly how running an AV department works. The flashy part of our job is cutting the ceremony ribbon on a brand-new building with 50 classrooms full of shiny tech. Everyone claps, takes selfies, and you get a nice email from the university president. But real leadership, the real work, was the long game played unto that point: years of planning, architectural drawings no one wants to read, vendor negotiations that drag on longer than winter, and spreadsheets so complicated the pivot tables have pivot tables. At UCLA, our modernization pilot didn’t just appear like a miraculous lucky hole-in-one. It was hundreds of small, disciplined decisions: getting stakeholders to the table, aligning with the Registrar and Facilities, proofs-of-concepts with manufacturers, team training, and executive alignment. None of it was flashy, but together, it created transformation. On the golf course, if you obsess over every shot, you’ll lose sight of the round. In both leadership and golf, it is about patience, persistence, and remembering that you don’t win the day, you win the tournament.
Know Your Clubs
Golfers carry 14 clubs. Why? Because you don’t use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Or in this case, you don’t pull out a driver on the green unless you enjoy being shamed by your golf buddies. In AV, our “clubs” are our people and our tools. Every technician, student worker, installer, vendor, programmer, and piece of gear has its specialty. My spreadsheet wizard who can slice and dice budgets in five minutes? that’s my 7-iron, consistent, steady, always reliable. My quick-thinking tech who can calm a panicked professor when the projector dies? That’s my putter, clutch under pressure. The key is knowing your team’s strengths and weaknesses and deploying them at the right time. Ask your “driver” to putt, and you’ll get frustration. Ask your “putter” to swing for the fences, and you’ll burn them out. It’s important to diagnose the situation and align talent and resources with the desired outcome. The instinct to grab the biggest “club,” without thinking through the consequences. That also comes with gaining familiarity over time. Which of your team are the best front-facing? Which are your head-down-get-stuff-done people? When you’ve taken the time to learn how your team works and behaves in different situations is when you know which club to pull from your bag at the right time. Right club, right shot. And yes, sometimes the right club is just picking up your ball and moving on to the next hole. But only sometimes.
Respect the Hazards
Every golf course has hazards: bunkers, ponds, trees, and that one goose that follows you from hole to hole and stares you down like it’s ready to throw hands. Hazards are baked into the game, and pretending they don’t exist is a rookie mistake. Thinking you can “beat it” will only cause more damage to your score, and well-being. If you’ve never driven it 150 yards, you won’t clear a 170 yard water hazard, no matter how much you hammer it. And yeah, your ball will go in the water on the short Par 3.
In AV, hazards look like:
– Budget cuts arriving after you’ve already signed a purchase order.
– Faculty senate deciding to change the room-use policy halfway through your install.
– Supply chain delays that leaves you with 29 rooms finished and one room full of piles of wires and good intentions.
– 200-person lectures where the mic battery dies mid-sentence, and of course, the Provost is speaking.
The lesson? Hazards happen. The only thing you control is how you respond, and how well you prepare mentally before the swing. Play it safe and play it confidently. In golf, you don’t stomp around screaming at the sand trap (well, you can, but it doesn’t help. Trust me, I know. I’ve tried.). You take your wedge, open the face, and get the ball back in play. Same in AV. Don’t waste time complaining when your vendor misses a ship date. Don’t panic when a system goes down 10 minutes before class. Assess the lie of the ball, make the smartest move you can, and keep the round going. Course (and life) management isn’t avoiding hazards, it’s maneuvering them without losing your cool.
Play Your Own Game
Golfers love comparing themselves to others: “He drove it 300 yards!” “She’s two under par!” Meanwhile, you’re just hoping to find your ball in the right zip code. But here’s the secret: the only score that matters is yours. Likewise, in higher ed, it’s tempting to compare your campus to the flashy new facility across town or that you read a case study of in the latest industry magazine. They’ve got LED walls in every room, motorized shades, and a budget that makes your CFO cry. Great for them. But if you spend your time chasing someone else’s game, you’ll lose focus on your own. Your job isn’t to be “the best campus AV program in the universe” (note to self.) Your job is to be the best program for your campus. That means aligning with your faculty, your students, and your mission. If that means fewer bells and whistles but more reliable systems? That’s a win. On the golf course, chasing someone else’s distance usually ends with you buying more balls. In leadership, chasing someone else’s priorities usually ends with you burning out your team. Most of the time, 90% of the pressure in a situation is just in your own head. Play your game. It’s the only one you can actually win.
Hot Dog at the Turn
No matter how the day is going, there’s always the hot dog at the turn. You could be 30 over par through 9, you could have donated half a dozen balls to the water gods, and your driver could be behaving more like a whiffle bat than a precision instrument. But when you hit that little shack between holes nine and ten, suddenly life looks a whole lot better. Mustard, ketchup, maybe some onions… the reset button pressed. Leading an AV department has its own version of the “hot dog at the turn.” It’s that moment in the middle of chaos when you pause, grab a small win, and remind yourself why you do this job. There are a lot of AV verticals, but higher ed is special. We make a true difference. Maybe it’s a professor who finally says, “Wow, this was easy to use.” Maybe it’s a student worker who nails a troubleshooting call without needing backup. Maybe it’s simply the first day of the semester ending with only five crisis calls instead of fifty. Those “hot dog moments” matter. They don’t fix your entire scorecard. They don’t erase every triple bogey project you’ve ever managed. But they fuel you to keep going. Leadership is exhausting if all you ever see is the grind. You need to savor the small joys, the mid-round hot dogs of AV life. So yes, celebrate the big installs and multimillion-dollar projects. But also savor the little resets. Because sometimes the difference between giving up and finishing strong is just a hot dog, a laugh with your team, and a reminder that the back nine is still waiting for you.
Patience Pays Off
Golf is 90% waiting. Waiting for the group ahead to clear the green. Waiting for your buddy to finish his pre-shot routine (seriously, is he rehearsing Swan Lake?). Waiting for your own brain to stop screaming at you to swing already. Patience is the hidden skill of leadership too. Roll out a new standard too fast, and faculty revolt. Push a project before funding is solid, and you’re left stranded. Launch a system without training your team, and you’ve just volunteered yourself for a semester of help desk tickets. I’ve learned that sometimes the best leadership move is to wait. As a “do it now” person, patience is not my virtue, however, taking the time to align priorities and stakeholders has never failed me in the end. It’s not procrastination, it’s waiting and seeing the line. Gather input. Build consensus. Let people adjust. Because once you swing, you can’t take it back. And just like in golf, it’s a lot harder to explain your decision once the green is misread and your ball drifts 20 feet past the hole and down the slope, into the bunker.
Focus on the Short Game
Everyone loves the big drive. It’s sexy. It’s loud. People clap. But if you can’t sink a three-foot putt, you’re toast. In fact, golf is supposed to be half putting. In AV, the short game is service and support. Faculty don’t care that your classroom is LSRS-scored a 72 out of 72. They don’t care that 999 times out of 1000, when they hit “On,” the system works. They care that when that one time something goes wrong, someone shows up quickly and fixes it without making them feel dumb. Your student workers, frontline staff, and support desks are the putters of your department. They may not get the glory, but they win the match. They aren’t flashy, but they are the ones who get to remove the cap at the end of the round, and raise the trophy. Invest in them. Train them. Celebrate them, because one bad support experience can undo years of good design work. Think about it: no golfer remembers their one great drive if they three-putted every green. Faculty don’t remember the million-dollar project case studies, they remember the five minutes they stood in front of class waiting for you to troubleshoot and reboot. The short game matters; it’s there champions are made.
Play with Integrity
Golf is bizarre: it’s one of the only sports where you’re expected to call penalties on yourself. No refs. No instant replay. Just you and your conscience. If your ball moves an inch, you’re supposed to admit it—even if no one saw. Leadership is the same. When projects go sideways, own it. Don’t blame the vendor, the weather, or Mercury being in retrograde. Take responsibility. Say, “This was on me.” Then fix it. I once had to tell leadership that a major project delay was due to our team misreading part of the RFP. It was painful. I wanted to bury that mistake in the rough and walk away. But owning it built credibility. People trust leaders who admit mistakes far more than those who spin excuses. Golfers respect honesty. Teams do too. Put it out. There are no gimmies on the tour. But if your buddies offer you one, kindly pick up your ball and head to next hole. Enjoy the win.
Lean on Your Foursome
Golf isn’t a solo sport. Sure, you swing your own clubs, but you almost always play in a foursome. And that’s where half the lessons come from, not the scorecard, but the banter, the wisdom, and occasionally the bad advice that sounds great until you’re slicing into the pool on the fourth fairway on the right (ahem, my house, buddy!). Leading an AV department is no different. You need your foursome. Not just the people who report to you, but the colleagues, peers, and mentors who keep you sane. They’re the ones who talk you through the rough patches, tell you when your stance is crooked, and occasionally hand you the right “club” when you’re reaching for the wrong one. I’ve learned as much from hallway conversations with other colleagues as I have from formal conferences. Sometimes the smartest fix for a problem doesn’t come from a white paper or a consultant, it comes from your peer who says, “Oh yeah, we tried that. Here’s what actually worked.” If you don’t feel you have a reliable foursome at your work, leverage the power of the HETMA community to fill out your group. In golf, your foursome keeps you honest, cheers your good shots, and laughs with you when you chunk it. In AV, your community does the same. Whether it’s your staff, your vendor partners, or your higher-ed AV peers across the country, don’t play the round alone. Lean on your foursome; the round is always better when you’ve got people alongside you to share the wisdom… and the occasional mulligan.
Celebrate the 19th Hole
Every round of golf ends in the same place: the clubhouse. The infamous 19th hole. It’s the sacred space where stories get exaggerated, scores get conveniently rounded down, and you laugh about the triple (err, quadruple) bogey like it never happened. It’s the communal gathering where you just relax, refresh, and take in the blessing that you got to spend four hours with your friends and colleagues. In AV, the “19th hole” is culture. It’s pizza on a Friday after finishing a crazy install. It’s recognizing the student worker who went above and beyond. It’s pausing during the chaos of semester start-up to say, “We did it. We survived.” If all you ever do is grind, your team won’t last… or worse, they’ll stay, but stop caring. Celebration fuels the next round. It bonds the team. It makes the hard parts worth it. And let’s be honest, the best leadership is buying the first round and letting everyone else tell the story of how they carried you.
Final Round
Golf is a cruel teacher, but an honest one. Some days, you’re ripping it down the fairway. Other days, you’re three (or, twelve) balls deep in the woods wondering why you didn’t pick up bowling instead. Leadership is the same. You’ll have good days, bad days, and days where you question your sanity. But if you keep showing up, keep swinging, and keep learning, you’ll get better. What golf taught me is what AV leadership requires: patience, adaptability, honesty, and humor. It taught me to manage hazards without panic, to celebrate victories big and small, and to focus on the short game that actually wins the round. So no, I may never break par, but if I can lead my team with the same persistence and joy golf demands, then I’ve already won the round that matters. Now, if my staff meetings only had a beverage cart.
Connect with Joe Way:
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/josiahway
X (Formerly Twitter): https://www.x.com/josiahway
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/josiahway
