Product Description

In this invaluable book, Bill Russell shares the insights, the memories, and most important, the essential "rules of success" that influenced him in every aspect of his life, from raising a daughter as a single father to becoming a successful coach and mentor to others. Filled with personal and professional stories of his days playing with Celtic greats Bob Cousy, Tom Heinsohn, Sam Jones, and coach Red Auerbach, Russell Rules offers inspiring lessons on commitment, personal integrity, teamwork, and success.

"A true champion and a genuine hero." (Bryant Gumbel)

"A person of great character, great integrity." (Jim Brown)

"That rare public figure who is even larger in life, close up, than he is from a distance. [Russell] has that rare quality of authenticity." (Tom Brokaw, author of The Greatest Generation)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #500527 in Books
• Published on: 2002-05-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Amazon.com Review
There are those who would argue that Bill Russell was the greatest basketball player ever, not because of his physical talents so much as his ability to lead and work within a team. Recently, Russell has been a regular on the lecture circuit, helping businesses understand how to take the principles of "Celtic Pride" and apply it to their corporate cultures and customer relations. In Russell Rules, he breaks downs the qualities that helped to earn him 11 NBA championships into 11 leadership lessons that should enlighten just about anyone, including managers, entrepreneurs, and educators. --Harry C. Edwards

From the Inside Flap
He epitomizes innovation, teamwork, and leadership. Now, Bill Russell, winner of eleven championships as a player and coach of the Boston Celtics and five-time NBA Most Valuable Player, reveals the eleven lessons that helped him achieve his goals and can help anyone attain success in their professional and personal lives.

Bill Russell has been hailed as the greatest team player of the twentieth century, the most important and most valuable basketball player ever, and its greatest winner. Every CEO, manager, entrepreneur, or parent can benefit from his original perspectives on leadership and teamwork, which helped this living legend succeed beyond what anyone in his profession has done before or since. In Russell Rules, Bill Russell shares for the first time in print the insights, humor, memories, and most important, the essential "rules of success" that made him and his team perennial champions. He also shares his personal thoughts on his legendary battles with Wilt Chamberlain as well as how others (Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) would have fared with him in head-to-head play. filled with never-before-revealed stories of his days playing with Celtic greats such as Bob Cousy, Tom Heinsohn, Sam and K.C. Jones, John Havlicek, and coach Red Auerbach, Russell Rules offers inspiring lessons on commitment, personal integrity, team ego, and craftsmanship.

From the Back Cover
"Bill Russell is that rare public figure who is even larger in life, close up, than he is from a distance. Bill Russell has that rare quality of authenticity." (Tom Brokaw, NBC Anchor, Author of The Greatest Generation)

"Bill Russell and the Celtics taught me so much about victory and team. There is a sport ideal, and he and his teammates exemplified that more than anybody I've ever seen before or since." (Frank Deford)

"Bill Russell is a person of great character, great integrity; and if you can't stand the brutal truth don't talk to Bill Russell." (Jim Brown)

"Bill Russell is a teacher and mentor who taught about grace, power, teamwork, and commitment. Bill Russell has that uncommon combination of intelligence, consistency, and sheer will that made him a unique presence on and off the basketball court." (Bill Cosby)

"The true great champion of them all, and I've covered every sport you can think of, was Bill Russell." (George Plimpton)

"He was a lion of a competitor. He was the greatest competitor I was ever around who refused to lose." (Tom Heinsohn)

"He is a true champion and a genuine hero." (Bryant Gumbel)

Customer Reviews

How to Have the Brilliant Eye and Mind of a Great Innovator
Mr. Russell and Mr. Falkner have combined to create a fascinating series of insights into the elements that turned Mr. Russell's competitive intelligence and zeal into a winning approach to basketball wherever Mr. Russell played or coached. Basically, the idea is to play your own role in such a way that the performance of the team versus its competition will be elevated. The book contains many riveting basketball and personal examples from Mr. Russell's life. There are also a number of business examples to help you apply these lessons to your own situation. Although the book advertises 11 rules, these are supplemented by three subrules for each rule. So, in total, you get 44 rules. Although it's more than you will easily be able to remember, it will certainly round out your understanding of the mental, emotional, and physical processes involved in building the successful habit of winning. I thought that the book was the best example of sports thinking applied to business that I have seen.

I was a Lakers fan when I first moved to Boston in 1964. Naturally, I went to the Boston Garden to see the Celtics play. That was a transformational experience, because television and radio did not really capture what the team did. Never before or since have I seen basketball like I saw in those glory days. My admiration for the Celtics and Mr. Russell knew no bounds. Anyone who has been a fan or an admirer of the Celtics will find this book to be essential reading. You will get many new perspectives on what you saw during those 11 world championshps in 13 years.

Mr. Russell deserves respect for an unequaled sports record. He was named the 20th century's greatest team player by Sports Illustrated. HBO called him the greatest winner in the 20th century.

What many will forget is that he also had a very successful coaching career. He led the Celtics to two world championships as a player-coach (with no assistants!). He also built up the Seattle franchise into a world champion as general manager and coach.

What many never knew about are all of the individual examples of his integrity. For example, after divorcing he raised his daughter by himself.

Let me rephrase Mr. Russell's 11 rules to make them clearer to a business person:

(1) Commitment is essential to success, and commitment has to be based on insatiable curiosity that emotionally rewards the person. In other words, pursue an area of business that endlessly fascinates you.

(2) Apply your ego to the success of your team and your business, rather than to your individual success.

(3) Become the best and most active listener you can be. Act on what you learn.

(4) Be tough about demanding what needs to be done, but be considerate of people as you do this.

(5) Cast a long shadow with your ideas and standards, so that you influence the right result even when you cannot be present.

(6) Seek perfection and encourage it in others, bolstered by joy in what you are doing.

(7) Encourage trust, truthfulness, and mutual reliance.

(8) Immediately take control of the action to move forward constructively, regardless of what happens to your organization.

(9) Use your imagination to design new and better ways to enhance performance.

(10) Lead by establishing and reinforcing discipline, as much delegation as possible, and cooperative participation in decision-making. But don't forget to lead when it counts.

(11) Always be looking for the win, even when it seems impossible.

The book's final section emphasizes how to apply these principles of Celtics' Pride to your own organization.

I found the examples employed for rules 1, 2, 5-9, and 11 to be extremely helpful in understanding how to make a business better, even though they were usually basketball examples.

I recommend the chapter on Everyone Can Win as the best articulation I have ever seen of why focus on winning can make the difference.

Even if you are not a basketball fan, you should read this book. If you do not know the professional game, some of the examples won't work for you, but most of the message will.

After you finish this book, I suggest that you give it to those you work with, and follow up with a discussion of what the lessons are for your work.

Be a winner . . . always!

Useful, Insightful, Inspirational
Bill Russell has never been called conventional. With the myriad of self-help, leadership and personal improvement books in the marketplace, it's hard to break through the clutter...RUSSELL RULES clearly does. This book, like the author, is a WINNER.

As a woman, I was a little skeptical of the usefullness of the book, quite expecting a macho look at winning. A lot of kick butt talk and posturing.

I read this book and found the lessons applicable within minutes with my family and other situations we all experience on a daily basis.

The chapters on listening vs. hearing was particularly meaningful and are worth reading and rereading. He also introduces a very unique concept that is simple in meaning but powerful in reality; the concept of outside-in thinking.

This book is for everyone and we are going to introduce it as the first book of its kind to our book club.

A little pretentious, but entertaining reading
I always find it a bit pretentious when a sports book is written or marketed to have general application to life (Rick Pitino's obnoxious Success is a Choice comes to Mind), but with that caveat almost anything Bill Russell has to say is worth listening to if only because of the man's profound intelligence, wit, insight, and unique perspective on sports and the world in general. Will this book change your life? I doubt it. But then again, if we read for entertainment and enrichment, this book well suits the purpose, and if you happen to be a sports fan or better yet a basketball fan, so much the better as Russell provides much material about the golden age of basketball and the wonderful Boston Celtics before too much money spoiled it.