How Can Coaches End Joysticking Players & Enable Them to Discover How to Do Sports on Their Own
For this article, we will define “youth sports” as participation in a competitive team sport for children ages 5–18.
We must admit that the stakes are much higher in youth sports than we want to acknowledge.
American families spend from $100 to $24,000 per year on youth sports for their kids. The seasons come and go so fast.
Strong experiences in youth sports lead to improved lifestyles for the participants. The well-being of children, and having fun takes priority over winning, but winning is still important for a lot of the members.
Let’s take a moment and assume a few things about youth sports so that we’re all on the same page:
- Parents love their children and want the best for them.
- Children like sports and aren’t being compelled to play.
- Coaches are competent enough to perform their job.
In competitive youth sport, the interpersonal relationships among the parent, coach, and athlete are often referred to as “The Youth Sports Triangle” (Wylleman, 2000).
Youth sport is unique because it involves communication, coordination, and maintenance of relationships among multiple adults, all of whom are vested stakeholders in a child-athlete’s sport experience (Lindsey C. Blom, Amanda J. Visek, and Brandonn S. Harris)
The Coach’s Role
The coach is the leader of the team, and this is not debatable. Accepting this, it’s their prerogative to make judgment calls and decisions regardless of others’ views If youth sports were a company, the coach would be the CEO of the company.
1. Explain the fundamentals of competitive sport.
Competition: How to win, lose, and take the role on the team.
Skill Development: The basic skills required to excel in a specific sport.
Sportsmanship: How to engage with opposing players, team players, referees, and the coach.
Work-Ethic and Character: Challenge children to do more than they thought possible. Educate kids that character is determined by who they are when no one is watching.
Commitment To Excellence: Do things right from the first time. Motivate kids that if they want to achieve greatness, they must do small tasks incredibly well.
2. Collaborate with parents.
Besides promoting the basics of competitive sport, engaging with parents must be a priority of the coach. You must build strong lines of communication because you will unquestionably cause confusion and resentment from your biggest support system if you don’t.
The coach doesn’t want to talk to parents? Then they shouldn’t coach.
They must enjoy working with people enough to communicate with them. Remember:
- A coach that is very familiar with their sport is an expert.
- A coach that can motivate athletes to do what they were asked is a teacher.
- A coach that keeps parents included is an effective communicator.
An expert, a teacher/educator, and a powerful communicator make a great coach.
3. Share the coaching philosophy with the players and the parents.
The coach should explain their coaching philosophy and vision for the season with parents and players from the first day.
- What is the end-purpose by the end of the season?
- What should parents need to notice by the end of the season?
- What does winning mean to the coach?
Without explaining their vision, it will be chaotic and confusing. This often makes a group of parents consider the coach can’t properly lead their children. And if the coach gives no grounds to understand their actions, why should they?
A good coach shares their vision so everyone involved can get behind it.
4. Create a medium for feedback, and be open to accepting it.
Ultimately, coaching is a job. Accepting feedback is crucial to a coach’s development. It is a coach’s role to be sensitive to other perspectives, create a preferred medium for receiving feedback, and lead parents to their preferred medium when parents deviate from it.
Regardless if it’s email, phone calls, or chats after practice, the coach should set definite boundaries. This is the only time or medium that parents are invited to request feedback on the team or their athlete.
When the disconnection happens, the coach starts to joystick their players, taking away the opportunity for them to discover how to do sports on their own.
A coach is more inclined to start joysticking players when:
1. They lack empathy.
How a coach was as an athlete usually defines their coaching style. Humans instinctively resonate with others who have encountered similar experiences.
If the coach was a prominent athlete, it is not hard to guess which team members they’ll naturally relate to most.
However, it is a coach’s responsibility to decide how all team players perform best and also to get along with parents.
It’s not comfortable for a parent to watch their child remain on the bench. The coach shouldn’t include them in the game if they aren’t prepared just to make a parent happy but should empathize with the parent’s feelings.
2. They lack the focus on development.
A coach who doesn’t accept feedback or is ignorant of other’s opinions does not belong in coaching. The “my way or the highway” coaching method declined in the 1970s, and for good reason.
By the end of the season, the coach should become a changed person. They should dare themselves to make improvements on even the most superficial tasks.
Children will be less scared of failing if they know their coach is prepared to fail.
3. They attempt to take on the role of parent.
A coach’s role isn’t to encourage or be a cheerleader. They are the head of the team, and should always speak their mind and stick to it.
Giving out atta-boys or atta-girls like candy isn’t beneficial to anyone. Coaches should encourage children to earn their praises.
Respect your players by giving them specific, constructive feedback that improves their behavior. Coaches shouldn’t evade the fact that a child is not performing a skill correctly.
When the coach says “good job”, they should be honest about it. They must realize that kids smell the lie from a mile away. They usually notice before the coach does if they did a great job or not.
4. They are too involved.
The moment a coach begins focusing on self-glorification, they’ve already lost. Coaches should realize that coaching is about servant leadership. Their role is to facilitate experiences, not to joystick children or manipulate circumstances.
It’s okay for a dedicated coach to admit they aspire to win a state championship. But they should not work from this perspective.
The coach should discover the best process for supporting skilled, strong children for their chosen sport, and constantly adjust to this process. This continuous process should be the fire that leads to a championship.
Bottom Line
The key takeaway is that sports are a means for personal growth and life lessons at a critical development stage for children. Parents have proven they are willing to spend a lot of money to make sure their kids have good experiences.
However, it is the coach’s job to get the team to maximize their performance, and decisions are made from that lens. Therefore, the coach’s individual choices should not be analyzed under a microscope. Their performance should be evaluated based on a broad body of evidence and this evaluation usually takes place after the season.
As coaches, if we want to end joysticking players and enable them to discover how to do sports on their own, we need to make sure that the dynamic of the relationships from the youth sports triangle is a healthy one.
If you want to know and do more to improve the impact of youth sports on children, take a look at our latest project or check our most recent trailer here:
(thank you to Andreea Purel for contributing to this article)
