The biggest stereotype about youth athletics is the “win at all cost” mentality, which rears its ugly head more often than not. How many coaches are reliving their glory years or pretending that they are coaching in the NFL or the NBA when they coach young athletes.
It is essential that coaches reframe their approach to coaching. Coaching goes much deeper than if a team wins or loses. Successful coaches have staying power from season to season because of their ability to foster a love of the game and develop talent. Winning, while important, is secondary.
COACH LIKE A TEACHER
A teacher doesn’t stand before a room full of students on the first day of school and expect them to know all of the material for the year. If a U.S. History teacher stood before a classroom and the students were able to spit back the entire history of the country on Day 1 the teacher’s job would be completely unnecessary. The approach a classroom teacher takes is that it is their job to get the students to a certain point of proficiency by the last day of school.
This is the same approach that a coach must take. No matter the sport, the players will show up not knowing everything they need to know on the first day of practice. Yes, there will be players of varying ability levels, but all will have the potential to grow from the first day of practice to the last game.
A coach can’t look at the schedule and begin worrying about how to go undefeated. The job of the coach is to set challenging, but realistic goals for each player as well as the team, and help them to get there. The wins will come.
GROWTH MINDSET APPROACH
A growth mindset approach goes hand in hand with reframing the approach to coaching. The “win at all cost” coach looks at the ability levels of each player on the first day of the season and makes season-long decisions based on their abilities. The coach gravitates towards the best players and figures out ways to hide the weaker ones.
You are only as strong as your weakest link. I have seen plenty of teams with talented individuals not win because of the reliance on those individuals. The morale of the team is not good and when those players do not perform, the team fractures.
A coach must take a holistic approach to the season – focusing on growth and player development. This is where the magic happens.
About a decade ago, I watched a youth football team finish with an undefeated season. The team had one absolutely amazing running back who was bigger, faster and stronger than anyone on the field. That young boy ran for four or five touchdowns a game. The coach’s game plan was simple – hand the ball to the running back and win the game.
While the team went on to win every game, it was obvious that not everyone on the team was having a great experience. The other boys had no involvement in the game other than to try their hardest to make a few blocks. They were not learning the game of football.
The future success of that group of young men was sacrificed for the ego of a coach.
When that group moved on to high school, they struggled. No longer was that running back bigger, faster, stronger than everyone else on the field. Others in his class caught up and he had to play against older athletes as they were not in age-restricted leagues any more. The players in that group did not have a foundation necessary for success. They didn’t understand the key basics of playing the game. That star running back became very frustrated by his lack of success at the older level.
And you know who was blamed for it? The high school coaches.
You know who was praised? The youth coach for going undefeated with a group of boys who were now struggling at the high school level.
The youth coach took a win at all cost approach and won every game the easy way. However, that was not in the best interest of the team and even its star player.
A coach is in charge of developing every single player on the team. The coach must take a growth mindset approach in that every player can improve. Some will end the season at a different level than others, but all can move in the same direction.
The players on the team must embrace challenges. There will be skills they do not understand. There will be drills they can not do. The role of the coach is to help the players grow.
WHERE IS THE FOCUS?
With the growth mindset mentality, the focus of the team should be on improvement. The coach sets goals for each practice and each game and helps the team to attempt to meet those goals. Players must see success through improvement, not wins and losses. This can be challenging, as keeping score of success is not as black and white as wins and losses.
The coach must believe they can get better with consistent effort. This is where the motivation happens.
For the other 10 players on offense in that youth football game there wasn’t much motivation. They watched their teammate run up and down the field to victory. However, if they were focused on executing their skills, the sense of accomplishment would be much greater.
Confidence grows when each player is treated as an important part of the team. A coach has to be able to work with all of the players on the team and stress the importance of their positions and contributions.
VIEW THE TEAM AS A CLASS
A good teacher doesn’t consider the school year as a success if the top student gets an A. That doesn’t mean the teacher did his or her job. A good teacher reflects on the year if the entire class shows improvement. Did all of the students reach some level of mastery by the final exam? Did the student who earned a D in the first marking period finish the year with a B?
A good coach can not measure the season based on how the best player performs. A true team is formed when all of the players improve and contribute in some way.
By reframing the approach to coaching, everyone wins. Each player becomes a better player and the team ends the season must stronger than when it started.