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Archive for the ‘Coaching philosophy’ Category

maintenance

28 Jul

Every coach says the same things to their team: make sure you’re eating right, be sure to get enough sleep at night, don’t procrastinate on doing your work, etc. But us coaches are the worst in terms of following our own advice! We stay at work making calls or watching video a little bit later than we’d planned and end up going to the vending machine and having Doritos for dinner. We focus so much on our seasons that the project that our athletic director asked us to do a couple of weeks ago still hasn’t been touched. And on and on it goes…you know the drill.

If we want to stay in this thing for the long haul, we’ve got to take care of ourselves. Here are 5 things that I think are essential to avoiding coach burnout.

  1. Workout: figure out a way to get some cardio and strength training in during your season. It’ll keep you focused and energized.
  2. Personal time: for me, that usually is my workout time. During the season, we’re so available to our athletes and fans and parents that it can be mentally draining. Take time to recharge your batteries…whether it’s meditation or prayer or a morning walk. Make time for yourself.
  3. Have work buddies: we spend the majority of our time at work, so you need someone in the office that you can talk with when you’ve hit the wall, are frustrated, or just have a funny story to tell. For as much time as we spend at the office (whether it’s your actual office or your gym or court or field), we need to be able to have quality down time at work.
  4. Involve your fam: my husband comes to all of our home games and we’ll have the team over for dinner sometimes. It’s good for the team to see that their coach has some sort of balance in their lives and it’s good for your fam to see you in your element.
  5. Enjoy it: I love everything about being in season. The hard work, being in the gym, the ups, the downs, being tired from the non-stop pace, sweating through my t-shirt in our hot and sticky gym…all of it. Because I get to do the thing that I love to do. I love coaching and I love volleyball and this school is willing to pay me to do it. I think that makes me pretty lucky.

Is there anything that you would add to the list? What things keep you sane during the season?

 
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grrrr!

27 Jul

So, my dentist has a daughter who’s a sixth grader. I understand that you may not find that to be a fun fact, but what is interesting to me is what he said to me a few visits ago. While he was working on my teeth and rendering me mute (a travesty for any coach, for sure!) he starts in about how his daughter plays volleyball and he just wished that girls were more competitive. Only the drill in his hand saves him from me…but only momentarily. When he finished with my teeth, I pulled out my soapbox (which I carry everywhere with me), jumped on, and proceeded to tell him that girls are indeed competitive and aggressive and interested in wins and losses.

I’m amazed at how often I hear the same story…and it ticks me off. Here I am a female, former Division I athlete and uber-competitive, a coach of female athletes, and most importantly, a believer in female athletes. And while my dentist didn’t ask for help in encouraging his young daughter and her teammates to express their competitiveness, he sure got it!

My niece is a baller. She’s good at volleyball, rocks at basketball, and can high jump with the best of them. A couple of years ago, she got involved in a pretty non-competitive volleyball league and I saw early on that she had the raw skills to be really good at the sport (seriously, she’s only ten and is almost as tall as me and has a sweet platform), but she wasn’t surrounded by like-minded girls. I don’t see anything wrong with playing a sport to learn and have fun and meet people…but that’s not what my niece wanted to do. She wanted to compete, to contribute, and to win. But as long as she was with those girls, she wouldn’t. At that age, girls don’t want to stick out from the crowd but rather be part of it. I told my brother and sis-in-law to get her into a better league where it would be okay for her to excel…where she wouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb because she wanted to jump and spike rather than stand there and watch balls hit the ground.

Coaches of young girls need to create an environment where being competitive is good. Where you’re not “acting like a boy” if you happen to be a little girl and love sports. Most importantly, youth coaches should aim to create a community of young girls that affirm each other and their successes rather than bring each other down. So that’s what I encouraged my dentist to do, to bring his daughter’s team to one of our games so that they could see female athletes in action and how it’s okay to be intense and competitive…those things aren’t antonyms to being a lady. I also encouraged him to volunteer as a coach so that he could be there to encourage any sparks of competitive energy he saw in practice. And guess what? My last visit he informed me that he’s now the coach of the team.

I can’t be the only one who’s feathers get supremely ruffled when they hear something like this. How do you handle the “girls are passive and not aggressive” chatter when you hear it?

 
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what do you believe?

26 Jul

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This is John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success…what Coach Wooden thought had made his teams successful. I love the idea and spirit behind this pyramid and it’s served me well wherever I’ve coached. Every time I start coaching a new team, this is the first thing we do as a team.

Week by week, we go through the blocks. The team (who’ve previously chosen different blocks on the pyramid) will talk about what the blocks mean to them. I have each of the blocks laminated on 8.5″ x 11″ paper and we literally build the pyramid on one of the gym walls. This way, the team and I are on the same page in terms of what we think will make our team successful. The first time I did the pyramid, I led it…not even close to as good as when the players lead. I actually had a young lady write a spoken word poem about “poise” that shocked us all at its depth and creativity…we still talk about it even though she graduated a couple of years ago.

The pyramid is one of the things I believe in…part of my coaching philosophy. Another part I learned my first year of coaching, which is a weird time. I started coaching the year after I played, so I was still a player in my head, a coach in name only. I enjoyed playing with the team and showing them how good I was…disguised as helping them learn. I went to my first American Volleyball Coaches Association convention that year and learned from a prominent coach that I’d never be a great coach as long as I was trying to be a great player. Now, my teams don’t see me play. They see me coach and I think it’s better that way.

The last two things that round out my philosophy are preparation and availability. My teams know that they can expect a well planned practice everyday…and they also know that they can come into my office anytime and chat about whatever. Whether it’s something with the team or boyfriend troubles or they’ve just got a couple extra minutes and they don’t feel like going back to their dorm room.

Have you thought about your coaching philosophy? Does your coaching staff know it? Does your team know it? I’d love to hear yours…please share in the comments!

 
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