← Most Valuable Agent with Matt Hannaford
Most Valuable Agent with Matt Hannaford
How Parents Can Make Smart Decisions in The Chaos of Travel Baseball
00:27:41
What if the real game-changer in travel baseball isn’t your player’s swing-but your decisions as a parent? In this solo episode, Matt breaks down what he refers to as The Precision Process, a behavioral-psychology-based framework designed to help...
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All right, what is up, family? Welcome back to another episode of the Most Valuable Agent podcast. If you see me sitting here by myself, it should be a dead giveaway. Today's a solo episode. It is Monday, and so I hope you guys have a few minutes for me. I actually wish I could show you guys my outtakes because, you know, wanting to prepare for these things, it's kind of funny. I certainly don't want to be scripted and I don't want to, you know, be too long winded either. So I hope you guys have just a few minutes for me today. I'm going to do my best to make this the most enjoyable time that you will have today. I know I've gotten a ton of feedback from some of you parents who thank me in the DMs on social media or on the YouTube channel. So I do know that this is making an impact and this is a moment. I just wanted to say thank you and I hope that you continue watching. If any of these episodes add value to your life, I hope that you can just share them with other parents that ultimately are going through the same struggles that you guys are. So today's episode. Okay, I want to name, we're going to call this the Precision Process. Okay. How elite travel baseball parents make smart decisions in the chaos of travel baseball. Does that resonate? Hopefully it does. So let me start with this. So as you guys know, the travel baseball world, it is full of decisions that feel urgent, right? Things like what team do we play for, what tournaments, what showcases are worth us attending? Right? You have various coaches talking to you. What coach should we listen to? What events or showcases are best for my son's exposure? Right? How do we handle the college recruiting process? We've got various coaches reaching out. What do we do? How do we handle that? And on and on it goes. And it truly feels endless. But here's the truth. While it may feel like there are countless hard decisions you're needing to make, what I have realized over the years is most parents aren't really making decisions at all. At least I wouldn't. I wouldn't characterize them as decisions. I would characterize them as more reactions. Right? You're just reacting to the noise that needing to make a decision is making, if that makes sense. And unfortunately, when you do this, when you make these emotional reactive decisions, you end up exhausted. Right? Often over committed. And unfortunately, your son is underdeveloped. Rather than seeing the fruit or him seeing the fruit of what you as a family were hoping to get. So in this episode, what I want to do is I want to help solve that problem for you. So I'm going to walk you through something. As I said before, it's called the precision process. Now, this is a framework that is built from behavioral psychology. So it's not me just making this up. It's actually based on psychological principles. And these same principles and these same models, CEOs, right. Of these massive companies, even investors, these people hire experts to design these things for them and ultimately pay them millions for. But I want to give you something that actually is more adapted to you. The travel baseball parent navigating travel baseball. That is free and is worth your time to listen to. So what my goal is, so this process, it ultimately should help you make high quality decisions consistently. Okay? So even when emotions are high, when money's on the line, I feel like those two things are connected and everyone around you is, you know, feels like they're yelling at you about what to do next. These are the decisions that I want to help you make better and more consistently. So in order to do that, we're going to walk through various steps. Okay? So if you have something to write with, I would take it out. Now, thankfully for you, you can always pause this, you can always come back to it. This is not disappearing. So step one, you need to understand your environment. Okay? So in psychology, there's a concept called decision environment mapping. Basically, what kind of environment are we in now? Why do we do this? You can't possibly make a good decision until you ultimately know the environment you're in, right? So there are three types of environments that I want to introduce you to, but only one that you need to worry about. So the first of these environments is a stable environment. And if you have been in travel baseball long enough, spoiler alert. This is not travel baseball. Travel baseball is not stable. But this is the environment where the rules are known, cause and effect are predictable. So think like you're doing math homework, right? If you study more, you'll do better. So a big misconception here if you're a parent is, well, my son practices more, he a hundred percent is going to get better every single time. Now, we know that not to be true, but that is a false assumption we make based on an environment. Number two, the second environment is a complicated environment. Now this may feel like it's more about travel baseball, but just bear with me. This is where rules exist, okay? But the pattern isn't obvious. So think about it like guess. The analogy that comes to mind is like Pitching or hitting mechanics, right? The right change, the right tweak to a mechanic, it could help. But it's also individualized to the player. So sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. Okay, so the third one, this is the one that I want you guys to remember. This is the chaotic environment. Sound familiar? This is where there are no clear rules and outcomes. They're all unpredictable. That's travel baseball, unfortunately. But let me explain. So the reason that you, the parent, have been having such a difficult time is because most parents, you are stuck trying to apply stable logic, which again is that math logic, right? The, the first one where you know, you think you study more or you think your son plays more, he's going to perform better. And what you do is you apply it to the chaotic system, which is environment three, where the outcomes are unpredictable. So that's why you have felt like, I don't know, I'm broken, right? My decision making is broken. None of this is working because in a chaotic environment, the goal actually it's not control. The goal is clarity. And that's what I'm going to help you with today. So you, the parent, what you need to get clarity is you need a process that ultimately filters out the noise and it helps build confidence even when the outcome is uncertain. Because the outcome is going to be uncertain. That was. Step one, define your environment. You with me so far? Great. Step two, define your North Star. Okay. Every elite decision maker starts with one thing, alignment. Because you can't measure a good choice without a clear destination of where you want to go. That probably sounds familiar because if you've ever done any goal setting, what do we do? We write down where are we trying to get to? What are our goals? Right? How do you expect to get anywhere if you don't know where you're going? So what I want you to do is I want you to ask yourself, what's the true goal of our son's baseball journey? Now do this as a family. So don't give me your son's goal, but give me you as a family. What is your goal for your son's travel baseball journey? Now if your answer is that's a scholarship or maybe it's I want my son to get drafted, that's a fine one, but it's also a little incomplete. So let me explain. The deeper guess goal for you should be more about transformation, right? So what kind of growth or maturity or leadership, what kind of opportunity are you looking for? Something beyond just the short term result or box score. If you've never heard about an individual that I'm going to tell you about right now. This guy's name is Steven Schwarzman. He's the CEO of a company that you may have heard of called Blackstone. Now, when he hires people, he has been known to talk about how he seeks out athletes. And what he's said is, and I quote, I tend to like people who are athletes only because you guys can take pain, okay? If you're a good athlete, you push yourself to a point where it's not pleasant, okay? Now, athletes, we all know this. You guys learn resilience through discomfort. Now, I think a lot of jobs do that as well. But specifically athletes, this is why one of the reasons I think so many people and so many parents actually do encourage their kids to play sports is because they recognize the life skill that comes from doing it, okay? So that's what this journey ultimately should be focused on building. So here's how I want you to write something that I'm calling your North Star statement. This is your. Your big goal statement as a family, okay? And this is what I want you to write down. So our family. Our family's baseball decisions will prioritize blank, okay? So our family's baseball decisions will prioritize blank and write something down there, okay? If it doesn't help our son do blank, it's a no. Okay? So I want to give you an example. So our family's baseball decisions will prioritize development over exposure. Maybe that's something that resonates with you. Or alignment over convenience. Or maybe for you, it's consistency over chaos. Maybe that resonates. So if it doesn't help our son become a more skilled, mature and resilient and developed player, then it's a no for us. Okay? So what I just gave you, that North Star statement, that's going to be your filter, okay? So every future choice runs through it. If it doesn't move you towards your North Star, it's out, okay? Now, this exercise that I just gave you, it is not meant to be restrictive. I'm sure you're doing this and you're thinking, ooh, I feel like this is going to eliminate a lot of stuff. It's not meant to be restrictive. It may feel like it now, but over time, you're going to see that it's actually the exact thing that is going to give you clarity, and that is the goal. Okay? So so far, if you're with me still, you've gone through two steps. Step three, I call this the 3x3 clarity grid. Okay, so this is actually a framework that is taught to executives, but I've adapted it for you. Travel, baseball, parents. So when you are faced with a big decision like joining a new, I don't know, travel team or spending money on going to an event or a tournament, I want you to ask yourself three questions across three dimensions. Right? That's why it's called the 3x3 grid. So three, three is nine. There are nine total questions. The first three are all questions that are based on logic. Okay, so one, what are the real measurable facts of this decision? Okay, so let me give you an example. So you're trying to analyze whether you should attend a tournament. Okay. Um, maybe for you. Well, the tournament claims there are going to be hundreds and hundreds of college coaches that are going to be there. And so it should be a good idea that you go. Right? But do you know if any of the programs that are attending, any of the college programs that are attending are actually a good fit for your son's level or academic goals? Right. Now, sometimes I recognize you may not have access to this information, but let's assume for this example that you do. And let's say maybe, I don't know, five programs, right? Five college programs out of the hundreds are actually going to fit with your son's goals. Now, all I'm suggesting is that should influence whether you decide to go. You may still decide to go, and that is fine. But at least make the decision knowing, okay, this is why we're going. And we recognize that maybe the likelihood isn't great, but it's still worth it for us to attend. Or maybe for you, you're saying, you know, yeah, that gives me clarity. I don't think we should attend. Now, the risk reward, it's just not big enough. Okay, so that was number one. So the second question on logic is, what assumptions are you making or what's uncertain about the decision that you can't know? Okay, now that may be a little confusing. So let me give you an example. So let's say again, you're trying to analyze whether you should attend an event or not. And. And you're assuming as a parent that the exposure that your son is going to get will create opportunity. Right? But there's really no guarantee that anyone's actually going to go to his particular game to watch him. See what I'm saying? So that should give you clarity on is this worth our time or not? Does that make sense? All right, number three, what is the cost? Now, this is probably the most popular one. So what is the cost based on time, based on money, Obviously based on energy. That's probably something that you guys don't think about often. What is the cost based on those three things? So as an example, this event costs X number of dollars, and it requires flights to and from, not only for our son, but for us as parents. Let's assume it's over four days. You know, I was just at the World with Bat and Jupiter. So that tournament, well, it's actually a little bit more than four days. But let's say you're analyzing that. Well, that's four days of hotels, rental cars, food, miss school potentially, and training time. Okay, so what I just gave you, those are three questions based on logic, which means we have six left. So the next three questions, those are based on emotion. All right, so number one is, what is my fear if we don't do this? Right? So what is your fear, dad, if you guys don't go? Maybe for you, your fear as well. If we skip this event, my concern is he's going to fall behind his peers or be forgotten by the Scouts. Okay, name that. That's your fear. Make it, don't avoid it. Name it. Okay, number two, what's the reason behind us feeling like we should go? Right. An example of that is maybe you're going because another family that you're close to is going and they're telling you you're stupid not to. Okay. Despite the fact that maybe it doesn't fit into your development plan. You're thinking, well, we probably should go because everyone's saying we're dumb if we don't. And that fear that is being creative or created, rather, is the reason why you feel like you should go. Okay, so that's number two. Number three, are either of those emotions that you felt going through those last two questions? Are either of those emotions rooted in comparison or ego? Okay, so for example, if you thought in the first one I gave you, if you thought that skill skipping the event meant your son would fall behind his peers or be forgotten by Scouts, then, yeah, that's based on comparison, right? You're comparing him to another guy, and it's also based on ego. Well, I want my son still to be a dude, and I don't want him to be forgotten. What does it say if, you know, he's forgotten? That's bad. You know, is he gonna fall out of favor with people? And I recognize that you guys may say, well, I'm not entirely ego or not entirely comparison. I understand, but the point is, it's supposed to give you guys clarity. Okay? Or if the second one is the reason behind you not wanting, or, excuse me, the reason behind you wanting to go rather was because another family is gonna tell you that you're stupid not to go despite the fact that it doesn't fit your development plan. Yeah, that's also rooted in ego and comparison. So again, name it and be aware of it. Okay, so those three questions I just gave you are based on emotion. Now we have three left. Now, these last three questions you need to answer are based on timing. Okay? So number one, is this decision, is it urgent or is it just loud? Okay, meaning everybody is talking about this event. Right? It may not be an event that fits into our schedule or seems to be required given his age, but everybody's talking about it. Okay? Number two, is my son developmentally ready for this event? So an example of that is, let's say he's 14. He's still building strength and consistency. And, you know, maybe the focus for you guys this year is prioritizing development over exposure. And you may not think that this event is necessary for you guys to attend given your plan and given his age. Okay, you follow? And the last one, does this serve our North Star or does it derail it? So, for example, does this showcase, does it serve our North Star or does it derail it? Well, you know, the showcase, maybe it falls right after when you were going to shut your son down from throwing. If he's a pitcher, or maybe if he was a position player too, or he played two way, maybe you guys were planning on him getting meaningful rest. So going to the event would violate your plan for recovery and development. Okay, does that all make sense? So when you go through those nine questions, you're going to find that 80% or more of the so called, I don't know, urgent decisions collapse when you think through it logically and you remove all the noise. Okay, and what's left? Now that's where the leverage lives, right? That's what you're going to need to use in order to make these wise decisions. So moving on, I've just gone through three steps. So now let's get to the four step, which is for you to check for any cognitive biases. Now, I recognize you may say, what's a cognitive bias? What are you talking about? So before we go any further, let me define what I mean when I say cognitive bias. So a cognitive bias is basically a mental shortcut, right? So it's when your brain takes information in when it's under pressure, it's your mind trying to ultimately make, I guess, a shortcut, right? Wants to make a quick call, but in doing so, it often skips logic and it defaults to emotion or habit, which is the problem. So the thing that I want you to know, even the smartest people in the world, they fall for these traps. So don't think of these biases as bad. You're human, they happen. So just be mindful of that. It's not bad. It's just reality. And in travel baseball, unfortunately, these biases are the things they can lead you actually to expensive mistakes, right? When people make mistakes making these decisions, usually it comes from these things. And the reason for that is because the emotion, really the emotion around the environment, the more your brain ultimately relies on those shortcuts that feel right in the moment, but aren't actually right for you long term, which is really where we should be spending time thinking about. So what I want to do is I want to give you three of the most common cognitive biases that I have seen in all my years in this business, in travel baseball. The first of these is called the FOMO bias. So fomo, if you don't know, stands for fear of missing out. Okay. And this drives decisions more than logic. So this looks like you saying yes to a tournament because you're afraid that your son is going to be left behind, right? Not because it's the right decision to go, but, but because you're afraid he's going to be left behind. That is the fear of missing out. See how that makes sense? The second one that I see all the time is what's called the social proof fallacy, which is, well, if everyone's doing it, it must be right now. What you don't realize is 90% of the families are actually copying each other rather than basing whether or not they should go on anything meaningful. Okay. When we go through which events to attend with our clients, it is all very, very strategic. There's never a situation where years in advance we can lay out we're definitely going to all these events. It is a case by case basis based on a number of different factors. So the social proof fallacy should ultimately expose whether or not you're doing it because it's right or because everyone else is doing it. Okay. The third is the sunk cost bias. You've probably heard of this before, but this is basically when. Well, because we've spent all this money for you, that may be because of the team or the coach or maybe it's the, you know, training, whatever it is, because we've spent so much money, we can't possibly walk away, right? Even when it's not working. So what do you do? You double down thinking, well, more is better, right? That's gotta be the answer instead of ultimately taking a step back and reevaluating. So my question for you is, did any of these three cognitive biases stand out to you? If they did, circle the one that did, I think it'll be helpful for you to go back and remind yourself of. And you should know that the most elite decision makers actually train themselves to see these biases before they act. Some of the smartest people in the world can recite these biases. They're constantly on the lookout for how their thinking is flawed, right? So if they're doing it at the highest level, shouldn't we account for some of this stuff? Shouldn't we be aware of some of this stuff? And it's not going to hurt you to be aware of it. It could only help. So don't you want to at least have that tool in your toolkit? I think it's wise. So one of the ways that you can start training yourself with this is really to name them out loud. So what that looks like is, let's just say you're making a decision and you feel this kind of rush of emotion that, oh, man, we have to say yes to this. Like, that's the feeling that's coming to mind. Pause and say out loud, wait a minute. This might be the FOMO talking, right? Or if you're compelled to go merely because everyone else is, ask yourself, why do I think going is the right decision here? Am I going because everyone else is going? Right. That's that social proof fallacy, right? But naming the bias, it's ultimately going to eliminate the power that it has over you. Okay, so that was step four. Now step five. We're almost done. Bear with me. Is the decision simulation. Okay, so what I want you to do is I want you to ask yourself, if I make the right choice with this decision. Okay, I'm sorry. If I make this choice, in this decision, what will life look like in 30 days? What will it look like in six months? And what will it look like in one year? Okay? The reason we do this is because most parents really only think about what life's going to look like this weekend when they're at the event. But the real impact, as I'm sure you guys know, whether you think about it or not, is decisions Compound meaning, you know, if you spend all this money to go to this event, well, that's money that you don't have in your pocket or it's money that you can't utilize for other things. So they compound. So a question to ask is, does this choice create margin or does it create chaos? So what I mean by that is, does joining another team add two more practices a week, right? Which is less family time and more fatigue? That's chaos. Or does it grow skills or does it just add games? So an example of that is a structured eight week hitting routine or program can build measurable skill. But maybe a meaningful, or, excuse me, a meaningless weekend showcase may give you 10 more bats, but really very little feedback, right? That's what I mean when I say, well, it just adds ads, games. Now, I want to make this clear. Some showcases are absolutely worth going to. Some tournaments are absolutely worth going to. But I do believe that that shouldn't change whether or not you ask yourself about whether you should go or not. And do they meet your North Star? As I told you earlier, it's really important to remember that you know the best decision makers, they don't make fast decisions, okay? They make what I would call forward decisions, right? Ones that they've thought through which have a better chance of aging well and really moving them toward their North Star, okay? That is step five, step six, almost there is the debrief loop. So here is the most powerful part and my favorite part of this. And this is where 99% of the people drop the ball, okay? Every decision, it deserves a review, right? Call it a post game review, right? Coaches do it in. I mean, it's Monday, so I don't know if you guys watched football yesterday. What do coaches do once the weekend's over, right? They go watch film, they review what worked, what didn't work. So for you, I'm not saying you have to do this once a week, but maybe once a month, maybe once a quarter, sit down as a family and ask what worked for us this month? What worked for us this quarter? What worked for us after the summer, right? An example is maybe you cut two tournaments and that gave you more time as a family, right? Maybe gave your son more time for focused training. And his velocity jumped, right? His arm felt better, he wasn't as tired, right? Ask yourself this. What drained us? Not just what drained my son, what drained us as a family? Three straight weekends of travel. Everybody was tired, right? Maybe your son's grades slipped. You should be aware of that stuff. Don't just gloss over it and also ask yourself, what should we be repeating? Right? Maybe you went to a tournament and it was a great one. Maybe you should consider going back. Okay? Maybe you went to a local college camp, and it. It gave great feedback that may be worth going to again, right? So see these things with your eyes open. Also ask yourself, what would we skip next time? Right? Maybe you went to that showcase and it didn't really align with your plan, and it actually created more stress than value. Be aware of it, write it down, talk about it as a family. This is how you're going to build a decision database. It's going to be when you stop repeating mistakes, right? You stop repeating mistakes, and you start recognizing patterns, success patterns. That's how all these elite thinkers and parents grow more precise over time. So we are finally there. In closing, if you take one thing away from this episode, I want you guys to make it this. The number one reason why it has felt chaotic. It's not because you're unaware. It's not because you've done anything wrong. It's really because you don't have a system. And that's okay. You know, you don't need to take control. You just need to create a system that works for you as a family, one that is designed to get you where you actually want to go. Okay? This process, this precision process that I just gave you guys, it isn't about perfection. I'm sure you know that, like I just gave you is a ton of information. What it is, though, is about creating leverage through what? Not control through what, clarity, right? When you build that system, the noise fades. You stop chasing every opportunity, and you start creating them, right? Start creating these opportunities for you guys. And that's how you and your son are going to stay grounded. That's how you're going to stay focused, certainly how you're going to be aligned, especially in a world that's constantly trying to pull you in a million different directions, right? The goal of travel, baseball, it is not to survive, right? It's not as much as you think you're surviving right now. It is to master it with precision. Okay? And what I ultimately want all of you guys to get from this is from, you know, years from now into the future, I want you to look back and say, that wasn't so bad, right? That wasn't chaos. Sure, a lot was thrown at us, but that was one of the best experiences that us as a family have ever had together. Thanks for listening, guys.