AD in Residence: Gordon AD Jason Linders

As Director of Athletics, how would you describe your leadership philosophy? How do you ensure that it resonates with both your staff and student-athletes? How has it evolved from your early days as a football coach through your career growing throughout Division I schools to being a high school AD to Gordon?

My leadership centers around people (student-athletes, coaches, staff, stakeholders) + GROWTH. We work to empower staff, communicate clear expectations, and provide support where needed, but for me leadership begins with people! How you influence others. How you treat people. How you recognize others and how you can best serve them. I love seeing other people develop – that’s my WHY! I try to serve our student-athletes, coaches, and staff daily with humility, understanding, and positive energy. We work to build trust and develop a culture of continuous improvement while glorifying Him through victory.

It’s all about relationships! We ensure that both our staff and student-athletes know our vision, mission, and objective, which is to increase brand affinity as one of the top Christian colleges in the nation for competitive excellence and the student-athlete experience while using our platform in Athletics to disciple young people to Christ. The head coaches rotate presenting different topics in our head coaches meeting, we typically conclude our staff meetings with a leadership initiative, sports supervisors discuss leadership with the head coaches they are serving, and our coaches teach leadership daily in their team meetings, team devotionals, practice, film sessions, player meetings, etc.

My leadership has evolved mainly around being more intentional in my thought process, thinking more globally, assessing the big picture vs. through the lens of a program or position group (when I was coaching), and using more emotional intelligence (social awareness, empathy, relationship management). Serving others is cliche, but as I tell my staff almost daily, leadership is not about a formal (or even informal) position of authority, it’s about the opportunity to build relationships, serve others, and provide guidance and/or resources to help others toward a specific direction or help them accomplish their goals.

You took over for an AD who had been with the college for more than three decades, including 14 leading the department. Over the last year, what have you done to understand the culture at Gordon, build trust with the student-athletes, staff, and campus, and create alignment with the college’s mission?

Culture is an organization’s brand and championship culture is built through consistency! I have always worked to be a culture builder. I really feel I've always been able to connect with people and build trust, communicate a clear vision, hire/recruit/develop people who fit the institution I am serving, and multiply their leadership. Leadership is about making everyone else better! I’ve done a lot of listening in almost one year here at Gordon, continue to build relationships with campus partners, ensure we are in alignment with campus leadership and the mission of Gordon College, and as a leader, I always feel we must communicate a plan with clear expectations, as well as work to communicate the facts, costs, and challenges. You also need to believe in people and make sure they know the desired outcome.

Schedule permitting, I try to attend as many home contests as possible. I’ve met with as many student-athletes (SAAC members, captains, and seniors) as I can  to gauge positives & challenges regarding their student-athlete experience here at Gordon, and what we can do better as we walk alongside them in their spiritual formation. 

On campus, I send a weekly email every Monday morning outlining any significant wins, updates, and our home events for that week to all faculty/staff, serve on campus committees, and work to attend campus events outside of Athletics. Earlier this academic year, we also served during Move-In Day to help the student body move in, participated in many campus events with our teams, organized the first-ever Athletics Chapel (worship, student-athlete testimony, keynote speaker, worship) earlier in March and that was well received, so we are working to build bridges with our campus partners, as well as faculty and staff to show a culture of collaboration.

What was the process for establishing the mission, vision, and core values of the department? How have you and will you engrain that into the day-to-day to create more buy-in?

We didn’t revise the mission or the core values of the department because we have been working on the strategic plan this academic year, but we have emphasized knowing and following that mission, and making decisions that are student-centered and consistent with our values (Faith, Character, Leadership, Competition, Service). Our vision is simply to create the best possible student-athlete experience here at Gordon College, including building and sustaining programs that disciple young people to Christ, compete for conference championships, graduate our student-athletes, and prepare them for life after sport. Our leadership team has worked within a steering committee consisting of several campus partners (and an outside consultant) to form a 4-5 year strategic plan, which we plan to finalize this summer to be able to introduce in August to several constituents, including campus leadership, alumni, donors, and our Board of Trustees. We work at building trust and buy-in daily towards a culture of continuous improvement and collaboration.

In light of the increasing financial pressures on small college athletics, what strategies do you have for maintaining a broad-based program of 24 varsity teams at Gordon?

Collaborating with our campus partners in the Controller’s Office, we look at budget simplification (while ensuring student-athlete experience exceeds expectations) by shifting non-essential operational expenses to Restricted accounts, intentionally capping allowable requests on specific line items, and work strategically within the parameters of our new adidas agreement (5-year agreement) which allocates promo funds for team apparel, uniforms, and equipment.

Collaborating with Advancement, we are working to cultivate relationships with our alumni base, increase the percentage of student-athlete alumni giving, being more strategic in how we fundraise (including our Clash of the Tartans event), exploring new corporate partnerships, etc. Being consistent with campus initiatives during the budget planning process, we look at areas where we can be more efficient with operating expenses, find different revenue streams, and continue to recruit prospective student-athletes who fit Gordon College, so we can not only continue roster enhancements, but help contribute to enrollment growth of the College. 

Gordon College has seen impressive success in athletics under your leadership. What are the key factors that have contributed to building such a strong, consistent athletic program at the college? What specific things do you look for when hiring and adding to your team?

We have had some success in the classroom with one of the highest department GPAs recorded this past fall (23 of 24 teams with a 3.0 or higher team GPA), being more engaged on campus, in competition, and working to create a better student-athlete experience, but we have a long ways to go as a department to achieve consistent competitive excellence (which is where we all want to be). We all know college athletics is a result-oriented business, but it’s all about people! We’ve continued to have strong leadership and expertise in our soccer programs both of which consistently compete for conference championships (our women’s team qualified for the NCAA Championship last fall), our Rowing program has won back-to-back ACRA national championships in the lightweight women’s division, our men’s golf team had it’s highest finish in program history last fall finishing third, both Tennis programs have been consistently in the top 4 teams in the conference (the women lost in the semifinal round of the conference championship last fall), and our cross country/track & field programs continue to build overall depth (most notably with our All-American distance runner Rachel Brennan who has been a trailblazer for the program finishing 13th at the CC Championships and 8th at the Indoor Track Championships, respectively). 

Some key factors continue to be the support we receive from our Board of Trustees, President Hammond, our campus leadership, faculty/staff, campus partners, and alumni, as well as current students. As evident in our Clash of the Tartans fundraising initiative this year, our percentage of alumni giving was up and 14 of our teams exceeded their 2025 program goals, so we’ve got some good momentum going into the spring seasons and I think our student-athletes feel supported, which hopefully continues to translate into wins on the field!

We look for professionals who are a Gordon fit, expertise in their respective sport, someone who genuinely wants to disciple young people to Christ, develop them, and prepare them for life after sport. We need great evaluators of talent who can build and sustain healthy team rosters, compete for conference championships, fundraise, graduate their players, and compete for conference championships!

What are your key initiatives for Gordon as you begin year two as AD and how have you prioritized those goals?

Our first priority is to recruit and retain top talent, especially in our head coach positions, keep building a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement, fundraise including building out our corporate partnerships, balance the budget, keep improving the student-athlete experience (i.e., nutrition options, sports performance program, sports medicine care, travel, adidas gear/apparel, facilities enhancements, student-athlete events, etc.).

As we complete our Strategic Plan, our priority areas include Faith, Learning and Living; Student-Athlete Well-Being and Performance; Competitive Excellence; Financial Responsibility and Sustainability; Campus and Community Engagement; and Commitment to Shalom.