Contents
In professional sports, the hard logic often prevails: if you want to lead, you have to instill fear, punish players and tame the stars. The series “Ted Lasso” tells the opposite story. Its main character has almost no hard power. He lacks expertise, a track record and backing. What he has is an attitude that draws others in. The series is a lighthearted but precise study of Soft Power within a team.
A coach who is meant to fail
Situation
The series by Jason Sudeikis, Bill Lawrence, Brendan Hunt and Joe Kelly premieres on Apple TV+ on August 14, 2020. Ted Lasso (Jason Sudeikis), coach of an American college football team, becomes head coach of the English soccer club AFC Richmond. The owner, Rebecca Welton, has secretly picked him because she hopes he will ruin the club her ex-husband, Rupert, loves so much.
Link to the principle
Ted starts out with no authority at all. The players laugh at him, the fans insult him, the press mocks him. He cannot impress anyone with expertise and has no backing from above. If he wants to achieve anything, he has only one way: to win people over.
Kindness as a method
Situation
Ted bakes biscuits for the owner and brings them to her. He also pays attention to the kit man, Nate, whom hardly anyone has noticed until then. He hangs a sign reading “Believe” in the locker room. He takes an interest in the players as people, not just as performers.
Link to the principle
This is soft power on a small scale. Ted forces no one and buys no one. He becomes attractive because he takes people seriously. People who feel seen follow more willingly than people who are afraid. Nate, the kit man whom Ted is the first to notice, later becomes an assistant coach.
The difficult star
Situation
The talented striker Jamie Tartt is arrogant and plays only for himself. The captain, Roy Kent, an aging midfielder, is grumpy and impatient. Ted relies not on punishment but on conversations, patience and clear expectations. Roy becomes a leader and later a coach himself. Over the course of the series, Jamie learns to play for the team.
Link to the principle
Soft power works slowly. It changes people not overnight but over weeks and months. Ted does not give up on making demands, but he makes them in a way that does not humiliate the other person. This is how change from within takes the place of obedience imposed from outside.
The owner confesses
Situation
Toward the end of the first season, Rebecca confesses to Ted that she hired him so that he would fail. Ted forgives her. At the end of the season, Richmond is relegated from the Premier League all the same.
Link to the principle
This scene shows two things. First, soft power has won over Rebecca herself. She could not resist Ted’s kindness for long. Second, soft power guarantees no success on the field. The relegation is a reminder that attraction does not replace expertise, tactics and quality.
When soft power breaks down
Situation
Nate, Ted’s protégé, becomes insecure and harsh as success comes his way. At the end of the second season, he tears down the “Believe” sign and moves to the rival club West Ham. In the third season’s finale, the players put the sign back together. In 2021, the series wins the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series. A fourth season, in which Ted coaches Richmond’s women’s team, has been airing since August 2026.
Link to the principle
Nate’s path shows the opposite: if you seek power through harshness and belittling others, you lose their trust. The players putting the sign back together themselves is the series’ strongest image of soft power: an attitude that people have made their own survives even an attack on its symbol.
Key takeaways
Key lessons
- Take every person seriously, including the one nobody else sees.
- Kindness is not weakness when it is combined with clear expectations.
- Be prepared for soft power to take time.
- Attraction does not replace expertise.
- An attitude that others make their own will carry on even without you.
Summary
“Ted Lasso” tells the story of a coach who is supposed to run a soccer club without any expertise and against the secret wishes of his boss. He wins over the players, the staff and finally the owner through kindness, patience and example. The series shows how soft power develops in a team and how it changes people, and also where it reaches its limits: it is no substitute for quality on the field.
Sources
- Joseph S. Nye Jr.: Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics. New York: PublicAffairs 2004.
