Global Coaching Perspectives

The Challenges of Sports
Performance Coaching
The coach’s impact on performance can be seen most prominently in elite
sport. In part two of her interview with Graham Taylor, Head of Coaching
at UK Sport, Sue Stockdale, finds out about the challenges for coaches and
leaders in the pursuit of excellence
Global Coaching Perspectives - Coaching in Context
2016 is an important date in the sporting
calendar: the summer Olympics and Paralympics
will take place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – the
opportunity for the best athletes in the world to
compete for a coveted gold medal.
There are many factors that influence an athlete’s
ability to perform at their best, but according
to Graham Taylor, Head of Coaching at UK
Sport, the most important one is the coach.
‘Coaching is no 1 - because even if you take
away everything else, the coach will still be
there beside the athlete. It used to be that an
athlete had enough in themselves to achieve
their ambition, but now there is not any athlete
in the world that does not recognise the value of
working with a coach. What a coach can do is
influence the athlete in many different ways. For
example, it might be encouraging the athlete not
to train so much, or to identify a smarter way to
train or prepare for competition.’
‘If the relationship between the coach and athlete
is not working well, neither will get the most of the
time that they spend together,’ he says. ‘This
means both coach and athlete have to maximise
their own performance. I think that the two factors
that make the difference for the coach are to
recognise the value of lifelong learning, and
reflective practice.’
Funding is a key factor too, says Taylor, because
it enables the athlete to focus on what it takes
to win. ‘At UK Sport, we do a lot of competitive
analysis as well as long-term horizon scanning
and strategic thinking. Then by constantly
reviewing the gap between where we are now,
and where we want to be, we are able to keep
focused on the key priorities.’
Confronting the Brutal Facts
Every athlete, coach or businessperson pursuing
excellence has to be prepared to confront the
brutal facts – a term coined by Jim Collins in his
book Good to Great 1 to describe the Stockdale
Paradox: the dichotomy between having faith
that your endeavour will succeed in the end, and
at the same time being prepared to confront the
facts of current reality, whatever they might be.
In order to assess current reality, UK Sport
commissioned an independent review of their
flagship Elite Programme for coaches. This
highlighted that whilst the programme was
world-class, it was not fulfilling their aim to
be world-leading. ‘It can be hard to hear that
message,’ says Taylor, ‘but you have to be
prepared to hear it. Timing is important to make
sure you are up to it, as sometimes individuals
are not prepared to address what the feedback
tells you. It can also depend on how the
message is delivered because it can break the
trust developed between both parties. The reality
is that when you focus on performance, there
is a hard edge to it, and if you are not prepared
to confront the brutal facts you are not going
to beat your competition. Of course, you may
be able to do so in the short term, but you may
not know why you were successful. Giving and
receiving feedback is therefore a key skill for
a coach.’
Innovation or Simplification
Another way to seek a marginal improvement
in performance is to innovate. However,
according to Graham Taylor, there are so many
technological innovations the danger is that the
January 2016 | Issue 8 | associationforcoaching.com | 23