Coach Development: Some thoughts

Posted On Friday, 16th September 2011 at 07:30

“The athlete development pathway is clear… but what about the stages of coaching development?” - Vern Gambetta.

As part of their Internship, Gemma and Matt have been given research to do on various topics. Reflection and analysis are key parts of Coaching, and are often underused. In the first month they are looking at Coaching as a process. Here are Gemma's first thoughts.

After reading through some articles on Coaches education and practice, one  particular quote stood out to me about coaches own development. It was from the article “A Coaches Dozen: 12 FUNdamental Principles for Building Young and Healthy Athletes” by Avery D. Faigenbaum from the strength and conditioning journal.  The part that stood out was number 12: Never Stop Learning.

 My first thought; I couldn’t agree more. FaigenBaum spoke about how a coach should not just want to work with young and adolescent athletes, they should learn from each experience, learn from other coaches, professionals and resources, and always want to broaden their knowledge and skills to give these young athletes every possible opportunity to grow and develop in their sport. Wayne Goldsmith also makes some very good points in his ‘Ten Commandments of Great Coaching’. His second commandment, ‘Continuous improvement is everything. Success is a moving target’ highlights that you have to continually learn and improve in order to succeed.

 Can you afford to stop learning?

There will never be a stage where a coach will know every possible bit of information about coaching because the knowledge available is infinite and is always developing and evolving. Coaching techniques from, say ten years ago, have progressed and moved on to what we have today, especially with all the technology available now and with all the knowledge and experience gained throughout the years. And who knows, another ten years from now it may have developed even more.

 Because coach development is recognised as being vital in order to help athletes succeed across all sports, a lot of governing bodies are coming up with their own coach development pathways. Sport Coach UK has published the UK Coaching Framework: A 3-7-11 Year Action Plan, a big reason for this is the run up to the 2012 Olympics in London. Its aim is to increase the quality and quantity of coaching for all sports. Having coaches that are competent and have an up to date understanding in their field is vital for participation and athlete retention too. This needs to start from the grass root levels and throughout up to the elite levels.

 Coaches need to have adequate knowledge in all areas of the sport they are coaching, whether that is a team or individual sport. These areas include skills, tactics/game play, physiological areas, psychological areas and sociological areas. Ideally, a coach should have sound knowledge in all of them. Being weaker in one area and not developing it, or researching further into it in order to improve, will hinder the young athletes’ development.  

What is the best way to teach a coach? 

Tacit knowledge in Expert Coaching: Science or Art? by Christine Nash and Dave Collins has a section in their article about coach education. They mention that coaches need to be able to problem solve and make decisions, which cannot always be taught in a ‘traditional classroom approach’. Some research conducted by Gould, Guinan, Geenleaf and Chung, 2002; Cushion, Armour and Jones, 2003 found that coaches associated their development through the knowledge passed onto them by more experienced coaches, and observing them in the coaching environment. 

I believe this to be true by my own experience. Learning the requirements for the sport can be taught through pen and paperwork, but actually applying them and using them on young athletes is a whole other experience. Something that worked with an individual or group of athletes won’t necessarily work for another individual or group.

Without the practical experience and knowledge from what another coach may have learnt from a similar problem, a new coach will never learn how to make a decision and solve the problem at hand. You will need that classroom time to learn the basics of the sport you are coaching, but practical experience and knowledge passed on from other experienced coaches can’t be beaten.

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