Professional development for Coaches is critical. And the best Coaches know that to be the best, they must continue to develop professionally. They need to continue seeking opportunities to access new information and network with a diverse range of fellow Coaches.
The Australian Government is taking a leading role in providing these kinds of opportunities for Australian Coaches.
For the past two years, the South Australian government has enlisted Athlete Assessments’ Bo Hanson to present on the topic of ‘DISC and the ‘People Side’ of Coaching’ as part of their Coach Development Program.
Karen Pilgrim, Community Presenter, Coaching and Officiating, Office for Recreation and Sport, said the aim of the program was to provide an opportunity to further develop sub-elite Coaches that were recommended and endorsed by State Sporting Organizations.
“This program is an opportunity for Coaches to focus on the people skills of coaching and to engage with high-performance Coaches and industry professionals,” she said.
“It targets Coaches in South Australia who are committed to progressing to a higher level and who would benefit from additional development opportunities.”
State Sporting Organizations were approached to nominate one female and one male Coach with potential to progress through their accreditation levels to state or representative coaching in the near future.
“This year we had 29 participants representing 17 different sports,” Karen said.
“All participants completed a full day workshop with 4 x Olympian, 3 x Olympic Medalist and International Coaching Consultant, Bo Hanson. The workshop concentrated on and helped participants have a greater awareness of themselves as a coach and an understanding of their athletes.”
They also all completed their DISC Profiles prior to the sessions.
Bo said it was a good opportunity to get different Coaches together from a range of sports and look at coaching from more than just a technical perspective.
“Coaches today are literally inundated with X’s and O’s. There is more information available on YouTube or various sport specific sites to keep a Coach occupied for months – learning new drills and sport specific techniques,” Bo said.
“But what we tend to notice is that Coaches love to learn about how to work with and understand their athletes as people,” he said.
“Recent research has even clarified this principle as being the key to sustained success. We would never say the technical side of sport is not critical, just that knowing this information does not mean you can connect with your athletes to be able to teach them effectively and that is the defining difference in the best coaches in the world who we have been fortunate to call clients,” he said.
“Instead of focusing on just technical skills, we looked at what all sports have in common and what we can learn from each other. And the fact is everyone needs to, and should be, improving their ability to interact with their teams,” he said.
“The organizers demonstrated a progressive approach to Coach development that we are starting to see happening around the world. They put a value on the people side of sport and know that it’s a key performance indicator.”
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