Great Job Coach! - Introduction
CONTENTS
John H. Salmela
- It's over. The final point is scored, the buzzer has sounded, the finish line is crossed. The victory is assured. Athletes tumble together giving bear hugs, high fives, and hair tussles. Their dreams are met, goals have been accomplished, and joy reigns at the competition site. While the fruits of their labors are deservedly theirs to be cherished, the result of their supreme dedication to hard work, intelligent training, and readiness to perform, the athletes know their talents alone were not enough. And they often turn to their beaming coach who is standing right behind the pack of swarming athletes. The coach is then immersed into the celebration. There are smacks on the back, hugs, and the ultimate, but simple reward: "Great job, coach!"
- And it is a great job! What other sphere of achievement brings such emotional surges, such public adoration, such feelings of accomplishment, no matter how fleeting? Few athletes, whatever sport they choose, rise to the highest levels of achievement alone. Athletic excellence requires an estimated minimum of 10,000 hours of training, or 20 hours weekly across 10 years. It rarely happens without the physical presence, knowledge, and driven passion of an expert coach.
- Great Job Coach! approaches coaching in an unprecedented way. The book reports expert coaches' viewpoints on what it takes to succeed and remain at the top in the complex environment of coaching. All dimensions of high level coaching are considered: from creating the initial vision of achievement; to training the complex array of factors that unite the body and the spirit of each athlete at a given moment in time; to dealing with the many demands of unpredictable sport situations. Great Job Coach! is an impassioned account of how expert coaches, both amateur and professional, evolved from their careers as athletes to their present status; how they accomplish their remarkable task of directing young men and women to the highest levels of achievement; and how they feel the coaching profession can be improved.
- It is surprising that other treatments of the coaching profession have not benefited from the collective and comprehensive personal experiences of expert coaches who have excelled at the national, world, and professional levels of sport. Many books and manuals are available for beginning and developing coaches which present sport science and practical knowledge on the fundamentals of coaching. However, for coaches about to enter, or currently working at more advanced levels, something more is required. Some coaches have voiced their need to go beyond current texts on the nuts and bolts of coaching fundamentals; these are obviously of lesser use to those already working in established sport programs and already possessing a significant body of effective methods within their own sport discipline. We feel that instruction at the upper levels of coaching programs should be complemented by a richer source of acquired knowledge: the comprehensive, practical knowledge, the strategies, and experiences of successful coaches who have proven themselves on the international sporting stage.
- The intent of Great Job Coach! is to provide just that. It is written in the language of coaches and organized around the themes that emerged through our discussions with them. Great Job Coach! is not a "how to" technical book on coaching. Nor is it a set of sport science recipes to enhance immediate sport performance. Great Job Coach! deals more directly with the process of becoming an expert coach, the subtle aspects of decision-making in a wide variety of situations which these coaches have developed mainly through living the life, or, the art side of coaching. While the art of coaching is, by its very nature, difficult to convey, it is always raised as a crucial success element in the job of coaching. Opening these doors of wisdom is our mission with Great Job Coach!
- Over a three-year span, 22 of Canada's leading coaches were interviewed for two to four hours using the same probing procedures. The intent was to find out how they reached the top of the coaching ladder. What was the nature of the accidental and planned events in their evolution from first being athletes, then moving on a career path that took them from apprentice, to developing, and finally, to the highest level of coaching? Once having arrived at the top, how were their over-riding philosophies translated into both tried and innovative procedures and new ways of applying knowledge and effective tactics and strategies for competition? Finally, Great Job Coach! ends on a reflective note and considers the future directions of the coaching profession and better ways of facilitating the personal development of future coaches. In short, Great Job Coach! is a distillation of the knowledge of internationally renowned coaches who provide us with practical insights for the art of coaching.
- The 22 coaches came from professional, national, and university teams. They were identified by Basketball Canada, Field Hockey Canada, the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association, and Volleyball Canada as being among the most knowledgeable and respected coaches in their sport, having consistently produced athletes at the national and international levels over an extended period of time. The average age of the coaches was 45 years and all had coached for more than 18 years. Not only did our participants have proven track records on the competitive floor, they were also deemed by their respective associations as being articulate communicators and educators and capable of verbally transmitting their knowledge through the interview process.
- Jack Donohue
- Peter Ennis
- Tom Kendall
- Don McCrae
- Kathy Shields
- Ken Shields
- Kathy Broderick
- Liz Hoffman
- Dru Marshall
- Jim MacDougall
- Marina van der Merwe
- Shiaz Virjee
- Dave Chambers
- Guy Charron
- Clare Drake
- Dave King
- Perry Pearn
- Donna Baydock
- Mike Burchuk
- Clément Lemieux
- Greg Ryan
- Brian Watson
- All coaches were asked to discuss their own personal athletic history, evolving visions of coaching, team-building procedures, approaches to both training and competition, and reflections on improving coach education. The intent of these sessions was not only to determine the extent of each participant's knowledge, but also to see if any commonalties emerged as we learned about their evolving careers. Were there, for example, common experiences as coaches made the transition from one level of coaching to the next? Were there experiences in one sport which could be applied to another?
- The contents of Great Job Coach! emerged from the interviews which were driven by general statements such as: "Tell me about how you progressed from an athlete to becoming a coach." "How do you think of a long-range plan before the start of each season?" "How do you make the link between training and competition?" "How can the education process for coaches be improved?" These queries untapped the information flow for Great Job Coach!
- Great Job Coach! is unique in the way it addresses the needs of coaches:
- The lessons are in the colourful language of coaches by using frequent, dense quotations to make a point.
- The lessons can be applied to a variety of other sports, not just for team sports.
- The lessons provide a comprehensive treatment of all areas of coaching and rely on the views of our interviewees to inform other coaches.
- The lessons from each major section are summarized in bulleted form in a Chalk Talk format.
- The senior author, Professor John H. Salmela, has written or edited 14 different books on sport psychology and has published over 80 research and applied articles in the field. He is currently working on other sport specific books on expert coaches in team and individual sports.
- The collaborators, Gordon A. Bloom, Guy Desjardins, Jr., Sean P. Draper, Natalie Durand-Bush, Patricia S. Miller, and Luiz Carlos Moraes, are all master's and doctoral students at the University of Ottawa. All are active researchers in the art of coaching and are skilled analysts of qualitative data. They are also accomplished writers and published scholars.
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[Credit]
- Copyright © 1996 by Potentium, Inc.
- All rights reserved.
- Produced in Canada.
- ISBN 0-9680935-0-7
- 2006-05-26T16:16:49,0
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