John U. Bacon

When the Red Wings drafted Steve Yzerman in 1983, he was 18 years old, but he looked even younger – less a Boy Scout, than a Cub Scout.

But his baby face didn’t prevent him from notching a stellar 91 points his rookie season. Two years later, the coach named him team captain – the youngest in the Red Wings’ history – though he hadn’t really earned it yet.

Oh, he could score. In his twenties, Yzerman rattled off six seasons of 100 points or more – including 155 points in 1988-89. In the history of the game, only two players have ever surpassed that mark: Mario Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky. Not bad company.

Scoring will get you individual honors – that year, Yzerman’s opponents named him the league’s most outstanding player – but it won’t get your name engraved on the Stanley Cup. For that, a team’s best players have to do all the grimy little chores that don’t show up on a score sheet, only the win column – like playing defense. But defense was not Yzerman’s thing, and that’s why the Red Wings usually had good teams, but never great ones.

That all changed in 1993, when Scotty Bowman became the Red Wings’ head coach. Bowman had a remarkable record for coaching winners: He’d taken teams in St. Louis, Montreal and Pittsburgh to the Stanley Cup finals nine times, and won the Cup six times.

But Detroit hadn’t won the grail since Gordie Howe ruled the rink, almost four decades earlier. Bowman had his work cut out for him.

Bowman also arrived with a well-earned reputation for inscrutability. The legendary coach was so enigmatic, some reporters took to calling him, “Rainman.” But there was method to his madness: his headgames kept everybody on edge, which usually brought out their best.

No sooner had Bowman settled in Detroit than he started speculation that he was willing to trade the team’s star center. This shocking news sent ripples through the locker room, the city and even the state.

Bowman ultimately backed off, but Yzerman got the message. He started doing all those things that don’t win headlines, just games – like backchecking, grinding, and blocking shots. This shift in priorities cut his scoring in half – but doubled his value to the team.

He became a complete player – and a complete leader. He didn’t say much in the locker room, but when he did, everybody listened. And whenever new players wondered what it took to be a Red Wing, all they had to do was watch the 38-year old captain, one of the most skilled players in the league, take a knee to block a shot.

His younger teammate Kirk Maltby said, “When you see him blocking shots night after night, you can’t help but do the same yourself. Given all the things he’s gone through, you can’t ask for a better motivation to win the Cup.”

And those are just a few of the reasons why Yzerman’s name is engraved on the Stanley Cup, three times. That’s why his jersey is one of only six that hangs from the rafters at Joe Louis Arena. And that’s why he walked into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.

You can call him an All-Star. A Stanley Cup champion. A Hall of Famer. But the most appropriate title is one he received early in his career, but grew into over two decades: Captain.

No one in league history has served longer – and no one did it better.

About the author: John U. Bacon lives in Ann Arbor and has written for Time, the New York Times, and ESPN Magazine, among others. His most recent book is “Bo’s Lasting Lessons,” a New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller. Bacon teaches at Miami of Ohio, Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, and the University of Michigan, where the students awarded him the Golden Apple Award for 2009. This commentary originally aired on Michigan Radio.

Former Ann Arbor mayor Ingrid Sheldon, speaking to a leadership forum at Huron High School.

Some facts that students learned about former Ann Arbor mayor Ingrid Sheldon on Saturday: 1) She spent the first part of her schooling, through 7th grade, in a one-room schoolhouse on Earhart Road, 2) she thinks a large part of the mayor’s job entails cheerleading for the city, 3) she doesn’t take herself too seriously. This last fact was demonstrated as she pulled items out of a large “gift box” she’d brought, full of things she said would be useful for students in leadership roles – including a pair of yellow pompoms. And yes, she gave a little cheer.

Sheldon was keynote speaker at a leadership conference held Saturday at Huron High School. The event was organized by the school’s Interact Club, a service organization for  teens that’s affiliated with Rotary International. (Sheldon is a member of Ann Arbor Rotary, which sponsors Huron’s Interact Club.) About 40 students attended from Huron, Pioneer High, and several other local schools.

The Chronicle heard about this event via Emily Hsiao, a Huron senior whom we first met in January. Hsiao was one of the main organizers for Saturday’s leadership conference, held as part of National Youth Service Day.

Sheldon’s advice to students was practical: Leaders don’t have to be the people who have all the ideas and energy, she said. They just have to recognize and support those who do. She described a “spiral of leadership” as starting with one small thing you do, then learning about yourself, doing something more, building on every experience. In her own case, she said she started by volunteering with the Ann Arbor Jaycees, then got involved with the schools and finally in politics. A Republican, Sheldon served as a city council member from 1988 to 1992, then was elected mayor. ”I defeated the woman whose picture is in your program,” she quipped. (Next to Sheldon’s bio, where her picture should be, was a photo of Democrat Liz Brater.) Sheldon was mayor from 1993 to 2000.

So what else was in Sheldon’s box of leadership props? The collection included a book of jokes (sense of humor), a clock (punctuality), binoculars (vision), running shoes (keeping up), canned food (a “can-do” attitude), a diploma (education), and a toy phone that played a busy signal (perseverance). This last one was a tough concept to convey, since most students had likely never encountered a busy signal before.

[Editor's note: After Sheldon's presentation, students broke up into workshops, including one on journalism led by The Chronicle. There, we learned from students that, not surprisingly, they get most of their news from online sources. Yahoo News, USA Today and the New York Times were high on their lists.]

We couldn’t stay for the entire event, so we checked in with Emily Hsiao on Sunday to hear how the day unfolded. She reported that, as a service project, they collected 18 bags of trash from the school grounds on Saturday afternoon. They also brainstormed to come up with projects that address social issues – a “fit fair” for kids to learn about health eating and staying active, and an advice website for victims of dating abuse. “It’s amazing how kids can come up with this stuff with just a little encouragement!” Hsiao wrote in an email.

Some of the students attending Saturday's leadership conference at Huron High. From left: Jeremy Cohen (Huron High), David Wu (Saline Middle School), Douglas Yang (Huron High), Hao Hao Wang (Clague Middle School), Angela Song (Clague Middle School), Trisha Paul (Huron High). Standing: Andreas Hailu (Huron High).

But Rwanda? 

In 2007-2008, three local couples, well into their careers, traveled to the heart of Africa, landing in a country about half the size of Michigan. For differing missions, David and Valerie Canter, Andrea Sankar and Mark Luborsky, and myself and Rob Pasick stepped onto the warm black tarmac of modern Kigali airport, and began to work.

Over weeks and months, all of us trained people: doctors, officials, teachers, students, and researchers. In return, Rwanda trained us. We quickly learned things like how to make small talk before big talk, how to do the three-kiss greeting, and how to  establish trust before asking personal questions.

As Ann Arbor couples, we Linked/In, in real time. Rob and I happened upon Andrea and Mark on a hotel patio: “You’re from WHERE!!??” The Canters hosted me in their apartment on a recent three-week trip. We all returned to Ann Arbor profoundly changed by our experiences in this tiny sub-Saharan nation. I interviewed all of us recently, for this column.

But, wait, what about the genocide?

True, over one million died horribly at the hands of Hutu extremists in the 1994 anti-Tutsi genocide. Memorials are everywhere, and programs that promote “never again.” But it’s not true that Rwanda is dangerous. Rwanda has less political and street crime than any other African nation. By 1996, the government was on a fast-track to internal security, justice for victims, economic development, and good governance. Recent problems at the western border have not spilled across Rwanda’s borders.

Veteran Africa travelers are stunned at how modern, clean, stable, safe, and gleaming they find Kigali, the capital. Heads up, Ann Arbor: Once a month (Umuganda), six million adults stop what they’re doing, and work on infrastructure within their communities – cleaning, repairing, planting, weeding, and building.

The two major ethnic groups, Hutus and Tutsis, now live and work side by side, as citizens of one nation, not as tribes. Reconciliation there – anywhere – is not easy. Tensions are obvious to Rwandans (not us). But the government’s many creative attempts at ethnic unity (e.g. Umuganda)  have been effective. (Full disclosure: all six of us have become unpaid Rwandan good-will ambassadors.)

David and Valerie Canter, in Rwanda.

In 2008 Valerie and David Canter lived six months in Rwanda. Valerie, now teaching high school classes at Eastern Michigan University’s Early Alliance program on the campus of EMU, taught  English literature at a private secondary school in Rwanda – oddly enough, called Greenhills. She also worked at a public school for girls, called FAWE.

Working abroad is a fluid experience. Valerie  reports: “Sure, I taught my subject matter. But I connected more substantially by teaching  critical thinking skills. The students were used to reciting facts, not expressing and defending their opinions.”

Back in Ann Arbor, Valerie has struggled, like all of us, to reconcile the vast plentitudes in the U.S. with the stark poverty in Rwanda. She’s concluded that “there’s nothing wrong with having what you have, but it’s what you do with those things that matter.” Most primary school students are issued one pencil – for the year. She recounted how she and David reused pieces of tin foil the bakery used to package bread, “at least 20 times” before it finally fell apart.

Her husband, David Canter – a doctor, researcher and former head of Pfizer’s Ann Arbor research labs – worked  with the Access Project out of Columbia University. His original mission was to help the Access Project staff more effectively manage the small medical centers that dot the rural landscape.

Instead, he says, “I helped them develop a model for evaluating whether or not the centers were being effective.” And since only 500 doctors serve 10 million people, well-run centers are critical.

“How does this tiny nation make so much, of so little? Rwanda delivers very basic health care to its 10 million citizens for an insurance cost of two dollars per person per year!” David’s stay in Rwanda re-focused his own career. Now at the University of Michigan’s  William Davidson Institute, his work centers on refining business models of health care in the developing world.

Working in post-conflict nations is always an up-close experience, and quickly becomes personal. David continues: “The genocide became personal for us when Pat Pasick, Valerie and I accompanied a Rwandan friend, Celestin, to a village where his sister was murdered. Villagers at one of Rwanda’s 10,000  local justice courts, called gacaca, knew where she might be buried. We saw Glordia’s newly dug remains laid into a casket, then visited the pit toilet hole where she was dumped. In the crowd that followed us to the site, we met the man who very probably helped kill her, in 1994.” 

Rob Pasick leads a leadership workshop in Rwanda.

Rob Pasick – founder of LeadersConnect, an executive coach, and organizational psychologist – went to Rwanda for the William Davidson Institute at U-M’s Business School. His mission was to train Rwanda’s top 100 government officials in leadership skills, in three trips to the nation. On Day One, he got a loud and clear wake-up call. Training here would be really different.

“We started 4 hours late, which is customary,” Rob notes. “The training was kicked off by a speech from a Minister accompanied by several Uzi-armed soldiers who stood watch outside the conference room door.”

“Very quickly, though, I felt very much a part of the government’s mission. Leadership groups are very bound to each other, at the personal level. After two separate, exhausting day-long sessions, one group swept me up to attend a funeral, and another to visit a man’s wife in a hospital where she had just miscarried. That’s the level of care they have for one another. I learned a lot from them about work-life balance.”

Like the Canters, Rob’s work morphed quickly into a larger project. “I saw quickly that training second-tier leaders, like Secretary Generals, wouldn’t be effective unless we also trained their bosses (Ministers, including the Prime Minister).”

Patricia Pasick with her in-country director, Evas.

As a psychologist and writer, using my skills in Rwanda was a no-brainer. Showing up takes you much of the way. A contact, a phone call and a school visit is all it took to set up a pen pal project with some local schools (Pattengill in Ann Arbor, University Preparatory School in Detroit, and Ida Community Schools). I consulted to several schools about special needs kids, and drafted a book based on the personal stories of men and women leaders who established the current government.  

Then, a meeting with a Secretary General set in motion a government-sponsored program to bring a version of StoryCorps to Rwanda. The project – Stories For Hope-Rwanda – will collect and record family and cultural stories between elders and young people. Untold stories abound in Rwanda, and I’m aiming to write, record, and publish as many as I can. A sixth trip is planned in 2009.

Andrea Sankar and Mark Luborsky are medical anthropologists at Wayne State University, where Andrea is also the chairperson of the anthropology department. They made three trips to Rwanda for Family Health Alliance, an organization dedicated to improving and enhancing the health of women and families in resource-poor environments.

Mark Luborsky and Andrea Sankar with their team in Rwanda.

“Our mission was vague, to develop a HIV/AID program for people already diagnosed with the virus, and train local Rwandese to conduct interviews about why people follow or don’t follow their drug regimens.” 

Andrea continues: “In retrospect, the training of locals to conduct life stories was the most important thing we did. The Health Ministry now has an additional research tool.”

One of her lasting impressions was the Rwandese dedication to making things work, even in terrible poverty. “I saw such pride, purpose and dignity in the midst of impoverished conditions, like the absence of clean running water, or electricity. And the commitment to rebuilding the nation is incredible.”

Andrea tells the story of their co-worker, Emmanuel, who adopted four orphans after the genocide, adding them to the six he already had. “He’s a church leader, and weekend graduate student in nutrition. His mission is not to better himself, but the nation.”

“That’s another take-away for me after three trips to Rwanda. Leadership matters. Seeing such strong leaders in Rwanda rekindles my optimism in the U.S., with the coming new set of leaders.” 

Back in Ann Arbor, in these discomfiting months of economic turmoil, we all agree that Rwanda has much to teach the West about leadership, determination, equality, conflict-resolution, and getting through hard times. For Rwandans, it’s all about hard work and hope. Why not for Americans?

About the author: Patricia Pasick is a psychologist and writer who lives in Ann Arbor.