Author: Vernon Gambetta
Coaching Excellence – Part Two
It is absolutely necessary to have a clearly defined philosophy of coaching. It was be more than just words. It must live in your everyday actions as a coach. To help guide your philosophy and stay on course it is necessary to have a working compass oriented to true north. Nothing changes under pressure, adversity or with challenges. You stay the course because your philosophy is the foundation of your coaching beliefs and the beacon that guides you. Humility is a virtue than underlies coaching excellence. It requires an ability to accept criticism and deflect praise. Coaching excellence demands a strong self-belief coupled with humility. Coaching is not I, me, me, rather it is us, we and them. Great coaches are not the center of attention; they are facilitators, the conductors of the orchestra. They make sure all the pieces are in place. They know how to insure that everyone is on the bus in the correct seats and that the bus driver has a good current road map to the destination. Good coaching is athlete centered, coach driven and administratively supported, it is not coach centered. I know this is news to some of the huge egos that have prowled the sidelines over the years, but people did not come to see them, they came to watch the athletes perform. Great coaches are there in victory and defeat to lend perspective after the wins and comfort after loses. Great coaches are leaders, not followers. They lead from the front through example, not just words. They are teachers who look for every opportunity to teach and to learn. They are always working to improve their skills, not just technical skills, but interpersonal skills. The spotlight is on the athlete; the coach’s job is to make them better people and better athletes. Coaching is FUNdamental. You can have fun while teaching and guiding people toward excellence. Coaching is not a grind. Coaching excellence does not come easy it is a process that demands that you pay your dues. There is an old saying that you don’t enlist in the army as a general. You earn the right to progress each step of the journey. Every step of the way the coach must expect excellence and demand excellence from himself and those he is coaching. Excellence and its continuous pursuit then becomes a habit. Hard intelligent work is the price of admission for an opportunity to be the best. But it is more than hard work, it is work guided by your philosophy executed with intent and purpose. What kind of coach do you want to be? Do you want to be the best? It is your choice! There are no boundaries or limits. Clearly define where you want to go, delineate the steps along the way, continually assess progress toward the goal and adjust if necessary. 99% of the time the only person standing in your way is you, so define your mission and if you fail, fail forward, get up and keep moving. No need to try harder, try different but keep trying.
Coaching Excellence – Part One
(Introduction - This is the first of a four part post that I think is particularly important at this time and place. These are my ideas and observations on coaching excellence and coaching for excellence. Hopefully it will stimulate some thought, discussion and most importantly action.) The cornerstone of high performance is coaching. There can be no performance excellence without coaching excellence. For me as for any coach who wants to achieve excellence it is a journey, a journey of constant learning and practice. I have been fortunate to be a coach for 48 years and the journey continues. My goal is to share with you from my experiences what the characteristics of coaching excellence are. As an athlete in high school I quickly recognized that coaching was the difference maker. I saw a small school the same size as my school with very similar demographics achieve a high standard of performance. I wondered why. It became apparent that the difference was coaching. That school had a coach who was different. He did not talk about excellence he demanded it, not in a dictatorial bombastic manner but in his actions. His teams were prepared, they were ready to compete, and they did not panic, they thrived in competition. In my senior year in high we rose to a new level in basketball, why because of coaching. My coach raised the standard and all subsequent expectations. He got all of us totally committed and absorbed in the process. At a young age all of this underscored for me how important coaching was. I became of student of coaching. I was fascinated with the process. Regardless of the sport I could see that coaching made the difference. At the highest levels of sport talent is a given, but I could see that it was what was done with that talent that made the difference. It was the coaching. Coaching is not something you do; it is something you are with every fiber of your being. Jerry Garcia sums it up quite well: “ You do not merely want to be the best of the best, you want to considered the only ones who do what you do.” Be unique, be special and make all of those around special. There is no halfway in the path to coaching excellence. The only way to be excellent is to be all in all the time. How can you expect that of your athletes if you not leading by example?
Thoughts on TEAM
You don't build a team, your grow a team. It is not a mechanistic process, it is organic like growing a garden. It requires a high degree of care & nurture. It is not my team or your team, it is a our team. Together we are better! One for all and all for one.
More
Is more better? More miles, more tons, and more training sessions. Certainly, more can be better at various stages of a career, but and that is a very big but, you can quickly reach the point of diminishing returns. Now what? Then you are signing that old blues song the more better blues. Stop and think, analyze why and when can more be better. The longer I coach I realize the perils and pitfalls of more. I now understand that I need to do more better rather than just more. To make it better, less is more. Quality & consistent training accumulates and results in training that sticks.
The Big C – Culture
It seems that lately everyone has discovered culture. For me throughout the years I have recognized that culture is the difference maker. You have good cultures that nurture and support excellence and you have toxic cultures that breed mediocrity and failure. What is culture? It is intangible, it is the little things that make a difference. It is feeling of a unity, of commitment to a cause. Sometimes you can feel it and not see it. I know for sure it is not posters on the wall with inspirational saying, nor is t-shirts with catchy phrases, it is a feeling, a sense of purpose and alignment. It is seemingly unimportant actions like the Heisman trophy winner helping Jim Radcliffe clean up trash on the team bus. It is everyone taking ownership and responsibility for their actions so that everyone gets better together. It is actions more than words. Can you change culture? Sure, absolutely you can. It takes effort, constant vigilance to insure alignment with core values and observance of the actions that support those core values. Can good culture go bad? Yes, it sure can, just look at University of Oregon football when they lost their way and stopped taking care of the little things. Is culture important? Absolutely it is important if you want to achieve any level of sustained excellence, that is why I call the big C, without a sound culture there is no substance. Training becomes a grind, rules become unenforceable, bad behavior becomes the norm. Look around you. What is your team or organizations culture? Is it good or bad? If you are energized and look forward to the day I would say then you probably have the start of a good culture. You must work at building and sustaining the culture every moment of every day. Little things matter. One second late for a meeting is late – not acceptable. Not complimenting a teammate is not acceptable. Acknowledge the good and correct the bad. Once a great culture is achieved it takes more work and focus to sustain it. You can never relax and think you have it. It takes a sense of constant tension to maintain it. Great cultures are not always top down, they are led from within, everyone is all in and together with a unity of purpose.
Words
Words create images and images create action. This quote from Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg underscores the power of words: “At Cornell University, my professor of European literature, Vladimir Nabokov, changed the way I read and the way I write. Words could paint pictures, I learned from him. Choosing the right word, and the right word order, he illustrated, could make an enormous difference in conveying an image or an idea.” If you want change and innovation select words that convey the change or innovation you want to see. Then go beyond the words and take the action necessary make the change reality.
Get Past The What
What you do in training, the exercises are no more than just stuff unless you know WHY you do what you do. It is easy to go to these so called “summits” and come away with more stuff but all the stuff comes up short because there is little underpinning of why. To make training transfer to performance demands a deep investment in WHY to give the WHAT meaning, purpose and direction. Once you understand WHY and can articulate it clearly then the next step is to delve into the HOW, the actual movements involved, the rhythm and tempo. Then start thinking about teaching and introducing the movement. What movement problem will you give the athlete to solve that will elicit the desired response? Set it up so that the athlete can discover their own path. Next consider the WHEN, the timing of implementation of the exercise. To me the WHEN is how you lead into the movement and where it will progress to, the process. It is always more than the exercise.
GAIN X – Short but Spectacular
As one who is not given to hyperbole GAIN was too short but it sure was spectacular, it was easily the best we have ever had. After ten years, we don’t have it figured out but we sure are on our way. GAIN is not a conference, it is an event, an event that is meant facilitate networking and building a community of professionals who will question and challenge each other to be the best. It directed in four prongs 1) Athletic Development 2) Sport Coaching 3) Sports Medicine/Rehabilitation 4) Physical Education with the goal to foster communication and sharing between these disciplines. So many people have gone into making GAIN what it is today. I want to recognize them with a special thank you Melissa Gambetta (My Wife) – The brains behind the operation, the person who does all the hard stuff to make it run smoothly Ed Ryan who graciously gives up his time each year out of his busy schedule to do the onsite operations Tommy McHugh AKA Tommy Tech who does all the filming, manages the web page and his dad Patrick McHugh who helps him Rice University Men’s Track & Field who are our on-campus sponsor, specifically Brek Christensen, assistant coach. The GAIN Originals (Still Coming to GAIN) Tove Shere Adam Moss Bill Knowles Steve Myrland Greg Thompson Patrick McHugh Phil Bazzini Joe Przytula The Faculty Wade Gilbert, professor in the Department of Kinesiology at California State University, Fresno. Dr. Gilbert's areas of expertise include coaching effectiveness, talent development, and sport psychology. Editor – International Sport Coaching Journal | Consultant – USOC Coaching Education. Michael Joyner MD, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He has done extensive work in Physiology of Elite Athletes. Elite athletic performances are experiments in nature on the limits of human physiology. Dr. Joyner uses data from real-world competitions to understand the limits of human physiology. John Pryor, Former conditioning coach Japan Rugby, now the conditioning coach for Suntory Rugby, Brumbies in Super Rugby and Fiji. Jim Radcliffe, Head S&C Coach University of Oregon, a pioneer and a true master of the profession. Martin Bingisser, HMMR Media, Swiss National Hammer Throw Coach Nick Garcia, Athletic Development Coach & Assistant Track Coach, Notre Dame High School, Sherman Oaks, California Steve Magness, Head Cross Country and Assistant Track Coach University of Houston Bill Knowles, ATC Philadelphia Union Academy and HP Sports. Pioneer in reconditioning and return to play. Ed Ryan, ATC Head Trainer US Women’s Olympic Basketball Team, Formerly Head of Sports Medicine at USOC Randy Ballard, , ATC , Director of Integrated Performance, University of Illinois Joe Przytula, ATC Supervisor of Physical Education and Health, and athletic trainer with Elizabeth Public Schools, Elizabeth New Jersey USA. Greg Thompson, Elementary Physical Education Teacher Farmington Michigan, Currently Athletic Development and Age Group Head Coach, Livonia City Soccer Club Steve Myrland, District Performance Coach for Athletics, District Wellness Director Middleton Wisconsin School District Our Partners Their generosity makes it possible to have the quality faculty we have. 1080 Motion – http://1080motion.com/ makes of 1080 Sprint and 1080 Quantum Bridge Athletic – https://bridgeathletic.com/ makes of Bridge training management software Lane Gainer – http://lanegainer.com/ makes of the famous Bullet Belt