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What today’s athletes expect from coaches

This is an excerpt from Social Issues in Sport 5th Edition With HKPropel Access by Ronald B. Woods,B. Nalani Butler.

COACHING PERSONALITY

It may be unfair to lump all coaches together in a single group and attempt to describe their personalities, beliefs, and orientations. However, in every occupation, certain similarities among practitioners give the impression of a certain type that has some basis in fact. Furthermore, coaches are not immune to being stereotyped. Movies, television, and books often present a coach in a baseball cap wearing a whistle around his neck and shouting profanities at hapless young athletes. Of course, these representations are unfair when applied to an entire group, but they are based in part on years of observation by athletes, parents, and spectators.

In fact, researchers have revealed that, historically, male coaches have typically manifested certain personality traits. Sport psychologists Tom Tutko and Bruce Ogilvie and sport sociologist George Sage collected information in the 1970s suggesting that coaches tended to be moderately conservative; that is, they tended to value loyalty to tradition, respect authority, expect obedience, follow standards of conduct accepted as normal, and have a strong religious orientation. In highly competitive environments, coaches in traditional team sports still tend to exhibit these characteristics because that style of authoritarian coaching fits with the so-called professional model of coaching (Sage 1973).

Athletic coaches tend to be more conservative on most matters than the college students they coach—a situation that has often led to conflicts. However, when compared with some other adult groups, such as businesspeople and farmers, coaches are more in the middle of the road. Compared with other teachers at both high school and college levels, coaches tend to be among the most conservative. Historical reasons for this tendency toward a conservative personality include the following (Lombardo 1999):

• Coaches are typically former athletes who have seen their own coaches operate in a conservative manner, and they tend to perpetuate that style.
• Coaches often have clear concepts of right and wrong based on strong religious and cultural backgrounds.
• Coaches often come from working-class families that emphasized traditional values and respect for tradition and authority.
• Because most coaches are held accountable for their team’s performance, they like to control the team even if doing so means coaching in an authoritarian style.

Since Lombardo conducted this research, sport has changed, and in many instances the changes mirror shifts in society. Women are now more engaged in competitive sport as athletes, significant progress has been made in racial integration in sport, and scientific research on sport has added to the existing knowledge base for coaches. However, there is still significant progress to be made in each of these areas.

Active coaches today have certainly been affected by their own athletic experiences, mentors, and life experiences. However, if they simply model coaching behavior on past experiences, they will likely encounter difficulties. Young athletes today have grown up in a world much different from the one their coaches grew up in. They have more personal freedom, are more likely to question authority, tend to make decisions without parental knowledge or support, and often rely on peers for advice and counsel. These changes have resulted in part from the decline in stable, two-parent families, as well as general societal trends toward a more permissive environment and a lot of independence for kids because many families have both parents employed outside the home.

In this atmosphere, young athletes expect to enjoy the sport experience, and if they don’t, they often simply withdraw. They expect coaches to be attentive and interested in them as people rather than just as sport performers. As a result, though authoritarian coaches may succeed in certain situations, they have generally been forced to modify their coaching behaviors to adjust to today’s athletes. Many coaches of women’s teams also have learned to adapt to the specific needs of their female athletes, which can differ from the needs of male athletes.

Research into coaching behavior while working with young athletes reveals that coaches who support the development of autonomy include athletes in decision making, provide meaningful choices, and emphasize the intrinsic reasons for playing sports to increase athletes’ motivation and enjoyment. On the other hand, authoritarian and controlling coaches can intimidate, expect athletes to follow the coach’s lead without questioning, and use extrinsic motivation to shape behavior. Furthermore, athletes today expect coaches to be socially supportive, to be interested in each athlete’s welfare as an individual, and to treat athletes with respect rather than demanding it (Knight et al. 2018). To be successful, sport coaches need to be better educated about and sensitized to the needs of each athlete, which is quite different from coaching in past decades. (See the next section for an in-depth discussion on coaching leadership styles.)

An in-depth look at the characteristics of coaches today is likely to reveal patterns that differ from those of the past. In addition, coaches in certain individual sports may have different views from traditional team coaches. Consider, for example, the role of a tennis or golf coach who deals with only six or eight athletes, compared to a football coach who presides over a squad of more than a hundred athletes. Naturally, with such a large squad, the opportunities for close interpersonal relationships are limited, and the coach may be forced to adopt a role like that of the CEO of a small company.

More Excerpts From Social Issues in Sport 5th Edition With HKPropel Access

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