ISSUE 007: Ben Olsen of Houston Dynamo FC

IN THIS ISSUE

• 🤝 Introduction: 2,500 subscribers strong! 

• ☕️ Issue 007 Sponsor: Kickoff Coffee Co. special offer

• 👨‍🎓 Soccer Thought Leaders: Ben Olsen, Houston Dynamo FC Head Coach

• 👥 Mentorship Opportunity: “Ask Me Anything” with Ben Olsen

• ⚽️ Soccer Jobs: The most interesting new jobs in soccer

• 📋 Featured Jobs: Video & Data Analyst - KC Current

• 🫵 Do This Now: A free framework for preparation & reflection

INTRODUCTION

Hello, Pathwayers!

Today, we are pleased to announce that this newsletter has reached 2,500 subscribers in just under two months! This is a milestone we’re proud of and we’re thankful that each of you have decided to come on this journey with us.

This week, our friend, and all-around-good-guy, Ben Olsen stops in to share his 20+ years of experience and wisdom. Ben is known as one of the great, genuine personalities in all of MLS - you’ll quickly see why in his candid responses.

In our conversation, you’ll get a good sense of Ben’s leadership priorities, his approach to building a staff and a culture, and why being uncomfortable has driven his career decisions. We’re also big fans of his response about what he saw in a Dynamo academy coach that led Ben to elevate him to the First Team technical staff upon arrival.

Additionally, Ben has agreed to be our first-ever guest for a ”Pathway: Ask Me Anything” session. This’ll be fun. We’ll limit the number of participants to ten lucky individuals, so be creative in your application responses. Details below.

-Nolan Sheldon, Co-Founder & Chief Experience Officer

SOCCER THOUGHT LEADERS: BEN OLSEN OF HOUSTON DYNAMO FC

“For me, I've always had this urge to push, to go and find out, and be uncomfortable.”

As both a player and a coach, Ben Olsen has dedicated the majority of his adult life to Major League Soccer. He recently sat down with us fresh off of an impressive inaugural season with the Houston Dynamo - not only did the club advance to the MLS Western Conference Final, but the team won the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup and, in doing so, also qualified for the 2024 Concacaf Champions Cup. 🌎

Prior to his tenure in Houston, Olsen served as Head Coach of D.C. United for a decade (2010-2020), making him the youngest head coach in League history with 10 or more seasons at the helm of an MLS team. He also held the role of Club President for the NWSL’s Washington Spirit, leading them to their first league title in 2021.  

Questions and answers have been lightly edited for length and clarity (and any emphasis below is ours, fyi!) 

PATHWAY: Benny, think back over your professional life as a player, coach, club president, and painter. What are the two or three qualities that have allowed you to be successful in each phase?

BEN: Everybody in this industry that I've known is competitive. I think I'm ultra competitive. I've been that way for as long as I can remember. I had an older brother and just competing and winning was always something that was really important to me. For better or worse, it was almost innate in me at an early age. So, to me it starts there on why I've been involved in sports and found myself to be in this position that I am at this moment. I'd also like to think that I'm authentic. I think that also is one of my strengths and has helped me through my career. Those two, competitiveness and authenticity, have carried me more than anything else.

PATHWAY: Rewind 12 months ago, you were just named head coach of Houston Dynamo FC - what was priority number one as you thought about the culture and staff you wanted to build at the club?

BEN: Well, it's two completely different things - building the culture was different than building the staff. The staff is an easy process for me at this point in my career. I know exactly what I need in a staff to put around me very, very clearly. I didn't understand that for a long time, but now from a leadership standpoint, I know who I am and who I'm not and what buckets I need to fill to make myself whole and my staff work at a high level. So the process there is literally building out three or four profiles of support. And whether that's assistant coaches, whether that's physical preparation coaches, they have to have the qualities that I need to support myself and cover up some of my deficiencies to make our group whole. 

And then the culture building part is a little bit different because this was a blank canvas and that's what excited me about this job. At D.C. United, it was more of sustaining a culture and in Houston it was building a culture - it was a culture shift. We boiled it down to three priorities: One, we wanted to bring in players and staff that were used to winning and come from cultures we valued. They also needed to be excited about building something new, because you can’t build culture alone. It needs to be the players' culture as much as it is the staff or club’s. Second, we needed to be fitter and take advantage of the hot climate in Houston and, third, it had to be really clear to everyone, especially the players, on how we were going to win games. You can sell a project but you ultimately need wins to get buy-in from the group. 

PATHWAY: You spent two years out of coaching. What were the benefits of doing something new - taking on different challenges outside of what you were known for?

BEN: It gave me the energy to come back and do this job. I just needed to get out of that job and see a different life. I needed a different look at anything other than the world that I've been in for a long time - just a daily grind of being a head coach, it was time to step away. It was just important for me to not go into any other role that had that intensity and that volatility. So I chose to lock myself in a studio for a year and become a painter. And it was really, really important for me to do that. And you're going to ask why? I think it gave me the opportunity to re-energized and appreciate what I also had for the last 10 years. And it gave me a chance to exhale and look back on 20 years of soccer and 10 years of being a coach and really be appreciative of the journey that I just had while stepping away and kind of recharging. 

PATHWAY: What's the benefit of making a career move like that - going from a place that you've worked for a number of years and going into a new role or new organization?

BEN: It obviously depends on the circumstances and what type of person you are - some people can stay somewhere their whole life and be happy. For me, I've always had this urge to push, to go and find out and be uncomfortable. And usually when I take that jump of being uncomfortable - whether it's becoming a painter or  becoming the President of an NWSL team or jumping onto ESPN (as a pundit) - all of these things were just such big leaps and they ended up being great. And when I say great, not that they were all successful, but that when I went through it, I learned a little bit more about myself and just grew a little bit. 

I've never been ready for any job I've ever taken. Whether it was my first D.C. United coaching job, where I was way in over my head, or as a club President of an NWSL club where I had to learn about ticket sales and operations and all the things I've never spent a lot of time dealing with - anytime I've taken those jumps, it's been very, very rewarding. But they've been hard. They've all been hard and they all take their toll because starting new, fresh, it's a difficult jump. It’s scary to leave for the unknown, however the feeling of accomplishment after jumping is a beautiful thing. 

PATHWAY: Upon arriving in Houston, one of the early moves you made was to add Dynamo Academy coach Adin Osmanbašić to your coaching staff as an Assistant Coach - tell us that story.  What was it about your early interactions with Adin that gave you confidence to bring him into your staff? 

BEN: When I was in the interview process last year, I walked in the room and Adin was in there and we were speaking. And after about an hour of talking about soccer, I remember telling Pat Onstad [Houston Dynamo General Manager], “yeah, that guy, I want that guy.” Adin had certain qualities that were perfect to align with my staff or compliment me. 

He's got a perfect skillset to compliment me as a head coach and could fill one of the profiles to make my staff whole. He boils down a very, very complex game so players can digest it. And it's one of the hardest qualities to find in soccer because there's so much nuance and it's so complex. Relaying that information, how you present it, and how you give the information is equally as important to the actual information itself. 

There's a lot of people that saw Adin as only an academy coach and wouldn't have known his quality because of his demeanor; he doesn't have a big voice and all these things - I think nowadays the profile of a coach, the spectrum of a what a coach is is so much bigger than it used to be. Our idea of a coach has changed and Europe has been doing this for a while - more of your academic coach that isn't yelling and screaming. But here in America, that hasn't been the case for a long time. So I think it's changing. I think that spectrum of what a head coach looks like is much broader. 

PATHWAY: Last one, what is your favorite thing about working in soccer?

BEN: That’s easy. Relationships. That’s it - that one’s easy. Relationships with staff and players; being in a work atmosphere, collectively going through the ups and downs of a season. That’s an easy one. 

Ed. Note: Be sure to check out Ben’s art studio. The Dynamo also have a couple of open jobs if you want to go work alongside Ben:

• VP, PR & Communications - Houston Dynamo FC

• Staff Accountant - Houston Dynamo FC

• Dynamo 2 Performance Coach - Houston Dynamo FC

MENTORSHIP OPPORTUNITY: “ASK ME ANYTHING” WITH BEN OLSEN

We’re thrilled that Ben Olsen has agreed to be our first ever guest for a “Pathway Ask Me Anything” session. We will select 10 participants to join us for an exclusive 40 minute session with Ben on Zoom. Be sure to include a fresh and creative question in your application - we will select what we believe to be the top 10 questions and those individuals will receive an invitation to join us next week for what is sure to be a fun and memorable experience.

• PATHWAY ASK ME ANYTHING APPLICATION: Ben Olsen, Houston Dynamo FC [click to apply!]

SOCCER JOBS: THE MOST INTERESTING NEW JOBS IN SOCCER

New week, new jobs! Here are a handful of the most interesting - and most recent - jobs that have been posted.

• Editorial Manager - Lega Serie A USA ($80,000-$100,000 in NYC)

• Videographer - Austin FC (MLS)

• Assistant Coach - Racing Louisville FC (NWSL)

• Senior Director, Soccer Growth - U.S. Soccer [USSF]

• Director, Brand Marketing & Fan Experience - D.C. United [MLS]

DO THIS NOW: FRAMEWORK FOR PREPARATION & REFLECTION

Whether you’re beginning a new role, taking on a leadership position, or mastering the finer details of your profession, a framework that allows for daily preparation and reflection will make you more thoughtful, intentional, productive and, most importantly, effective in your work.    

As an Assistant Coach, one of my primary roles at D.C. United and Austin FC was to prepare and deliver high-level team training sessions every day throughout the season. For many years, I had a sheet of paper pinned to my desk that I referred to as my “Gotta Get This Right List.” This list contained what I believed to be the most important aspects of creating a high-performance environment and delivering a high-level training session for the team.  

Simply, I would reference my “Gotta Get This Right List” before training to be sure I had incorporated every important detail into the day’s session plan and, similarly, immediately after training, I would use the list to reflect and assess my performance and effectiveness, always identifying areas for growth.  

Included below is my “Gotta Get This Right List” from the 2022 season with Austin FC. 

PATHWAY RECOMMENDATION:

Take 5 minutes to create your own framework. Here are a few thought-starters:

• Write down one or two of your primary job responsibilities

• What is the core objective connected to each responsibility?

• List key details that will positively contribute to achieving the objective

• When reflecting on your performance, how do you measure success?

Final thought: Your framework doesn’t have to be perfect or final - as you can see, mine isn’t anything special; but this simple framework becomes powerful with daily commitment and refinement. Make a habit of checking your list every morning as you prepare for your work and at the close of the day to reflect on your effectiveness. 

I hope you find it as useful as I have.

-Nolan

When you’re ready, here are a few ways we can help you:

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3. And, if you’re a club or brand looking to hire the most ambitious talent in soccer, drop us a line and we can tell you about our process, our growing talent pool, and the services we offer.

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LAST WEEK’S ISSUE: DOMINIC CASCIATO OF UNION OMAHA

In case you missed last week’s issue, you can find it here. [reminder: It’s free!]

• We caught up with USL League 1 Coach of the Year, Dominic Casciato

• We share a framework for how you can approach crafting your very own standout cover letter

• And, as always, links to a bunch of recent soccer jobs! ⚽️

How about those boys from Columbus? Congrats to the 2023 MLS Cup Champion Columbus Crew. If you missed our conversation last month with the Crew’s President & GM Tim Bezbatchenko, now is a good time to revisit it.

See you next week, Pathwayers.

• John Bello

• Kyle Sheldon

• Nolan Sheldon