A little late with this but better late than never right?
I was at the Global Coaches House at Gold Coast Australia (9th to 13th April). The event was organized by the International Council of Coaching Excellence (ICCE), and featured lectures and workshops by experts in the field of sport coaching and performance.
There were several common themes which would serve as great reminders for all coaches – the need to be Athlete Centered #athletecentered, to focus on the process #processfocused, you can’t do it alone… #collaboration, Resilience #Resilience, and Humility/Continuous Learning #CoachAsLearner.
I will attempt to share some of the key messages from a few lectures and workshops through a brief description and/or quotes by the speakers together with the associated hash tags.
Sir Graham Henry, Former All Blacks Coach and High Performance Consultant. He was the keynote speaker for the event. #athletecentered
“It took me 30 years to figure out it is about them, it isn’t about me.”
Raylene Bates, Coach Para Athletics NZ
“We need roadblocks to get better…”
Raylene lives by the statement to the extent of deliberately creating challenging environments to help her athletes (and herself!) develop resilience. #resilience
Also emphasized on the ability to reason and how it had help her work with people with different perspectives towards a common goal #collaboration
p.s. She was my favorite presenter!
Alyson Annan, Head Coach Women’s Hockey Team, Netherlands
Retired hockey superstar who coached the Australian Women’s Hockey team before moving on to the Netherlands. She was used to coaching and being coached in a coach-centered manner in Australia (players took instructions form the coach without questioning), and initially struggled in the Netherlands because the dynamics of the coach-athlete relationship was considerably different, specifically, athletes tend to question your decisions and were resistant to being simply told what to do.
“When you ask questions, you are learning to learn, learning to listen, learning to think differently and learning about your athlete.”
#athletecentered #coachaslearner
Prof Christian Cook, who spoke about Stress, Resilience & Learning in Medicine and Sport.
He draws the distinction between Resilience and Thriving. The former is the ability to bounce back from stress to the same level of performance, while to thrive is to bounce back beyond the previous level. His studies confirm that humans need the appropriate amount of stress to thrive! #resilience
Another of Dr. Cook’s studies found that seeing a leader perform well has effects on testosterone levels of the other players. The findings provided insights into how we should not limit leadership roles on the field to just one person.
John Atkinson, Performance Director, Canadian Swimming
Dr. Richard Charlesworth, HP Consultant & Former Head Coach, Hockeyroos & Kookaburras
Although this is a really brief and incomplete summary of the five days event, I reckon it would still be useful to my fellow coaches, and might even help to provide some new insights and perspective to their profession!
Coach Hansen
Coach Hansen 