Leadership/Management

NBA’s David Nurse On The 3 Mental Habits That Will Optimize Your Business

David Nurse—who has helped 28 NBA All-Stars reach their pinnacle—loves to use the example of Steph Curry to make a point of great professional pride: confidence lies in self-awareness. To illustrate his statement, David points to Curry’s 2009 scouting report that listed him as slow, small, unathletic, at best a “backup/fringe” player who “relied too heavily on his outside shot.”

“Are you kidding?” asks David. “If Steph Curry had allowed the report to influence his mindset, he might have said, ‘You know, maybe they are right?’ But Curry didn’t allow others to cap his potential or give him an excuse.” Thirteen years and multiple NBA Championships later, the only argument anybody has about the Golden State Warrior is where he belongs on the All-Time NBA Team.

As a former professional basketball player, David’s ability to get into the zone and master his mindset led him to two Guinness World Records for shooting. In 2016, the Brooklyn Nets hired him as a coach to help players improve their three-point shooting, and they went from 28th in the league to second.

Since then, David has applied his mindset and leadership programs to more than 100 NBA players. His tools have also helped Fortune 500 CEOs, tech moguls, Hollywood actors and musicians develop better habits. “Since 80 percent of what we do each day is habitual,” David pointed out, “we need to be intentional about our habits.”

In the podcast, the author of Pivot & Go discusses how leaders can master their minds through confidence, cooperation, service, and purpose.

David poses the question, “If everything is taken away in your life, are you okay? Do you stand for more than what it says on your business card? If that’s where you find your confidence, it will go away. Where does your core self-awareness come from?”

YOU WILL LEARN

 • 3:30   How to identify insatiable drive.

• 8:30   How to live in service of others.

• 10:00  His experience coaching Mark Cuban.

• 14:00  Three mental habits you can cultivate to optimize your business.

• 20:00  Why the word potential means nothing in itself.

• 25:00  How to develop a process that focuses on your strengths.

Check out the full Corporate Competitor Podcast interview archive and subscribe to new episodes.

Don Yaeger

Over the last 30 years, longtime Associate Editor for Sports Illustrated and 13-time New York Times Best-Selling Author Don Yaeger has been blessed to interview the greatest winners of our generation. He has made a second career as a keynote speaker and executive coach, discerning habits of high performance to teach teams how to reach their full potential.

Share
Published by
Don Yaeger

Recent Posts

From Photo Film Maker To Biopharma Giant

CEO Lars Petersen shares how Fujifilm took advantage of technological competencies to pivot and build…

24 hours ago

Championship Conditions: What Leaders Must Build First To Win Under Pressure

When results wobble, elite teams don’t grit their teeth—they rely on conditions built long before…

2 days ago

OpenClaw: A New Class Of Autonomous AI Requires Attention

The rapidly spreading autonomous agentic AI system highlights how agent-based technologies are advancing faster than…

2 days ago

SailPoint CEO Mark McClain Says A Work-Life Imbalance Should Only Be Temporary

When work swallows everything, it’s not a badge of honor—it’s a warning. In this week’s…

4 days ago

From Restaurant Closure To National Brand

How Shivani Dhamija shut down a failing concept, pivoted to packaged foods and built Shivani’s…

4 days ago

Just How Different Are Public And Private Firms? 

A new survey examines how public and private companies manage short-term demands against long-term strategy—and…

4 days ago