David Martín Lozano is the current head coach of the Spanish national water polo team. He is also a psychologist by academic training. In the past, he was a water polo player for Club Natació Atlètic Barceloneta, with which he won 8 Spanish Leagues, 9 King’s Cups, 8 Spanish Super Cups, and 6 Catalonia Cups. He was an international player 180 times with the Spanish national water polo team and participated in the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 Olympic Games.

As the national team coach, he has won seven medals in seven years. Those who know him highlight his emotional intelligence, his great work capacity, and his ability to convey confidence.

We talk with him about leadership and values.

________

If you have
a clear game model,
you will always know
how to find the path
that will lead you
to success.

How is a team built and what role does leadership play?

To build a high-performance team, you need to surround yourself with the best, with talented players and a good staff; you also need to have a clear game model and a working methodology that allows you to achieve the results you have set. Having a clear game model is essential. Otherwise, as a coach, you can find yourself trapped by doubts. When you know how you want your team to play, it is much easier to define the path to follow: which signings to make, how to select the members of your staff.

Can the leader, the coach in this case, afford to doubt?

In fact, I doubt a lot, but as a coach, I have to be clear about what I want to achieve beyond the doubts, which are always there and even more so at the elite level of sport where results are prioritized, where there is a lot of pressure and many criticisms.

What do you not want in a team?

Excuses and permanent toxicity. On one hand, with excuses, you cannot compete at the elite level. Nowadays, I think they are a general problem. Neither the referee, nor the ball, nor the cold water, nor anything can be an excuse for not performing at your best.

On the other hand, permanent toxicity does a lot of harm to the team. Everyone can have a bad day, but as a rule, the team must breathe a positive atmosphere. Therefore, I try to ensure that everyone who joins, whether players or staff, understands that bad attitudes and negative behaviors always stay out.

Does the leader build the team or adapt to it?

Both, depending on the situation. In the national team, for example, you can choose the players you want, but if you sign for a club, you will find a team that you will have to adapt to because it will take time to adapt it to your game idea.

A good leader is one who has the ability to adapt, who is capable of building from their idea but also knows how to adapt to the team’s characteristics when necessary. Sometimes you want to play a certain style of game, but the people you have do not allow it.

“Excuses and permanent toxicity have no place in my teams”.

Do you look for talent with relational skills?

This type of talent is also very important. You can win occasionally with cold relationships in the locker room, but if you want continuity in success, the relationships between team members must be positive.

Leadership in the locker room is very important. In this sense, I trust in shared responsibility, in shared leadership. You need to have four or five key players in the locker room who can convey your idea of behavior, training, and play to the whole team. When you work with so many people, it is very difficult to reach everyone individually. In this sense, there is a key figure, the “firefighter,” who has the ability to extinguish small fires because you, as a leader, cannot be aware of everything. If you have people who control the small things, you can focus on what is really important.

“Behind every success,
there is always
a lot of hard work.”

Is confidence key to achieving results?

No, not always. I don’t believe in the idea that if you believe it, you will achieve it. It has taken us a lot of effort to win a world championship. We have had to work very hard to do it. It is true that when we have achieved it, being aware that we were capable of competing with the best has increased our confidence in our abilities, and that has been positive.

Confidence is a very important part but not sufficient to compete at the elite level. There must always be many hours of work and also results behind it. No matter how much confidence you have, if you have never won a world championship, you cannot think every day “Today, I will surely win” and expect it to happen.

Do you lead consciously or does it come naturally?

Everything that is for the good of the team and to improve it, I do consciously. The team is above everyone, including the leader.

“As a coach,
my job is to maximize
the individual performance
of the players to help the team grow”.

Individual treatment does flow naturally. I like to be close to the players, have contact with them, talk to them. I understand that they are not just players, but that there is a person behind each one.

La capacitat per liderar es pot aprendre?

Hi ha qui diu que el lideratge s’aprèn i qui pensa que és una qualitat innata. Jo crec que és meitat i meitat: tothom té capacitat per liderar en algun moment de la seva vida. Pot ser de manera temporal o de forma més permanent. També hi ha una part d’experiència al llarg de la vida que t’ajuda a modelar la teva personalitat per ser capaç de gestionar un equip.

En aquest sentit, la meva experiència com a jugador, haver treballat amb diferents entrenadors o haver estat capità de vestuari a l’elit de l’esport, per exemple, m’ha ajudat molt.

T’has format específicament per liderar?

Soc psicòleg i m’he format en diferents aspectes relacionats amb el lideratge. També llegeixo molt i em fixo en persones que admiro com el Pep Guardiola o el Phil Jackson. Intento aprendre cada dia perquè crec que no pots deixar de formar-te.

The Values-Based Leadership Chair magazine has given me the opportunity to reflect on responsible leaders through the figure of David Martín, who is featured in an interview in this issue. As a good leader, he highlights the role of his team, which has achieved historic results. In another sport, he would undoubtedly receive extensive media coverage. It is an honor to talk about the responsible leader behind this unprecedented success in this and other sports. This leader is David Martín.

Applying one of the most contemporary leadership models, authentic leadership, we observe how its key elements are reflected in this unique case. Authentic leadership is defined by five levels: life story, self-control, self-awareness, support team, and integrated life.

Regarding the life story, David Martín’s career is deeply connected to water polo, complemented by his interest in the personal and professional development of others. In addition to his successful career as a player, Martín chose to study Psychology and specialized in the development of high-performance teams. Thus, his life story encompasses a long period as captain of the best team in the Spanish league and the national water polo team, combining professional successes with moments of personal growth.

The next level, self-control, emerges as an essential quality for any leader. Despite the successes achieved, Martín maintains an attitude of modesty and awareness of the dangers of fame and power, aspects that have negatively affected some of his sports colleagues in the past. As an athlete, he experienced difficult situations that, instead of weakening him, helped reinforce his own self-control, which he also imparts to his young players. This contributes to the sustained success that has culminated in seven medals in seven years.