While watching Full Speed, the NASCAR documentary series, I heard crew chief Jim Pohlman summarize performance with a simple statement:
“Process, communication, execution. If you can do those three things, it will lead to good results.”
The more I thought about it, the more I realized he wasn’t just describing racing. He was describing football officiating.
As officials, we spend a great deal of time thinking about execution. We want to get the call right. We want to spot the ball correctly, administer penalties accurately, and manage the game professionally. When things go well, we often credit good execution. When things go poorly, we usually point to a breakdown in execution. We tell ourselves we missed a foul, mishandled an enforcement, or failed to recognize a developing situation.
Sometimes that’s true.
But I suspect many of the mistakes we attribute to poor execution actually began much earlier. The visible mistake may have occurred in the third quarter, but its roots were planted long before kickoff. More often than we’d like to admit, execution is not the problem. It is merely the symptom. The real problem is a breakdown in process or communication.
Every successful officiating crew operates according to a process. The process begins long before the officials gather at the field. It starts with preparation. Officials study the rules. They review mechanics. They think through unusual situations and refresh themselves on areas where they may be vulnerable. They arrive prepared to contribute rather than hoping someone else will carry the load.
That preparation continues when the crew gathers for its pregame conference. Unfortunately, some pregames become little more than social gatherings. Officials catch up on life, talk about previous games, and exchange stories. There is certainly nothing wrong with camaraderie, but the purpose of a pregame is not entertainment. The purpose is preparation.
A quality pregame creates clarity.
Each crew member should leave the pregame knowing exactly what is expected of him. Responsibilities should be understood. Mechanics should be reinforced. Potential challenges should be anticipated. What formations might we see tonight? How will we handle hurry-up tempo? How with the weather affect the game? What are our mechanics on goal-line plays? How will we communicate during penalty enforcement? What if we have a measurement, an ejection, overtime, or a weather delay?
The specific topics matter less than the mindset. Strong crews intentionally think through situations before they occur. They do not wait until a crisis unfolds before deciding how they will respond. When difficult situations arise, they often appear calm and composed, not because the situation is easy, but because they have already discussed it. They have already worked through it mentally. In many cases, the first time they solved the problem was in the pregame.
Crews that neglect the process often find themselves improvising. That may work occasionally, but improvisation is a poor substitute for preparation. The game moves too quickly, emotions run too high, and the stakes are too significant to rely on spontaneous decision-making. Officials who consistently perform at a high level are rarely improvising. They are drawing from preparation that occurred hours, days, and sometimes years before the moment arrived.
Yet even the best process will fail without communication.
Football officiating is one of the few activities where five, six, seven, or eight individuals must function as a single unit while scattered across an entire field. No official sees everything. No official has all the information. Success depends upon information moving quickly and accurately among crew members.
That communication begins before the snap. Officials share information about formations, clock status, substitutions, unusual alignments, and potential concerns. It continues during the play as officials exchange information through signals, eye contact, and mechanics. After the play, communication becomes even more critical as crew members relay foul information, enforcement details, clock status, player numbers, and observations that may affect the ruling.
When people hear the word communication, they often think about talking. But communication is much broader than that. Communication is the successful transfer of information. It is not enough for one official to know something. The right official must know it at the right time.
Many officiating mistakes are not rules mistakes at all. Someone on the crew knew the correct information. Someone saw the player’s number. Someone recognized the enforcement spot. Someone observed the dead-ball action. The mistake occurred because that information never reached the people who needed it. The crew possessed the answer but failed to communicate it.
That brings us to execution.
Execution is what everyone sees. It is the visible outcome of everything that came before it. It is the correct ruling on a bang-bang play. It is the properly administered penalty. It is the calm handling of a heated situation. It is the official who confidently steps into a difficult moment and gets it right.
Because execution is visible, it receives most of the attention. Fans notice it. Coaches notice it. Evaluators notice it. Officials notice it.
What often goes unnoticed is that excellent execution is usually the product of excellent preparation and excellent communication. The crew that flawlessly handles a complicated play did not suddenly become brilliant in that moment. The groundwork was laid long before the play occurred. The process created clarity. Communication created awareness. Execution became the natural result.
This is why I find Pohlman’s quote so compelling. He did not start with results. He did not even start with execution. He started with process and communication because he understands something that applies equally to racing and officiating: results are usually the byproduct of doing many small things correctly.
Officials often focus on outcomes. We think about ratings, playoff assignments, championship games, and recognition. There is nothing inherently wrong with those aspirations. But directly chasing outcomes is often frustrating because they are influenced by many factors beyond our control.
What we can control is our process.
We can control how thoroughly we prepare. We can control the quality of our pregame discussions. We can control our commitment to studying rules and mechanics. We can control how effectively we communicate with one another throughout the game. And when those things are done consistently and well, execution tends to improve.
Not perfectly. We are still human. We will still miss a play. We will still make mistakes. But crews that commit themselves to process and communication place themselves in the best possible position to execute when the pressure is greatest.
The next time your crew struggles, resist the temptation to focus only on the visible mistake. Look deeper. Ask whether the issue truly began with execution or whether it started much earlier. Was the crew adequately prepared? Did everyone understand their responsibilities? Was critical information communicated effectively?
Because often, execution is simply the final link in a chain. When the first two links—process and communication—are strong, the third one has a much better chance of holding when the game is on the line.
Quiz
Read the quiz stem and then choose the best answer.
Free kick from the K-40. While the loose ball is rolling on the R-40, R44 blocks A55 below the waist at the R-45. R12 recovers the ball at the R-38. Enforce the penalty for R44’s foul from the ______.
- K-40
- R-45
- R-38
Review Rule 10-4-2b