FLS members and followers may enjoy taking a look at a new website- www.sport500.co.uk . A variety of contributors pen interesting pieces, all no more than 500 words in length.
Learning to Lead
The majority of sports coaches, when asked about their purpose, would say something like ‘to improve players (or teams) and to be successful.’ Some coaches of youngsters might add ‘to have fun’. Few would refer to improving them as people or developing leadership qualities.
I know, because I have run many workshops for coaches and asked the question.
I follow this up by asking whether, if leadership development was a stated purpose, would it require them to coach differently. Most agree that it would. We then go on to consider this more deeply, often beginning with examples of leadership being found wanting in high level sport that we witness.
We are not very good at producing leaders in our major sports. If we were, we may not have so many foreigners in leading coaching and administrative roles. It all goes back to how teachers and coaches operate, from school to club to country.
Coaches are leaders. They are instrumental in bringing about change. They are experienced and knowledgeable. They are important. Far too often, they coach using didactic methods, whereby the athlete is a passive recipient of information and instructions. The coach does most of the talking at half time, injury breaks, team talks and in practice sessions. The typical coach is very good at developing a group of willing followers.
Of course, when thought of in this way, it is clear that most coaches need to change. They should coach in such a way that players become more skilful in decision-making and understanding their sport. How is this achieved? In a nutshell- by asking and listening. Encouraging players by asking them what they think, what needs working on, and even getting them to run sessions, is a start.
It sometimes needs a brave move on the part of the coach. Stuart Lancaster, a fine man who in many ways did a splendid job with England Rugby, was once asked what proportion of the practices were coach or player led. He said it was 70-30 coach led. When asked why the players did not do more, he said that the coaches did not think the players were ready for it.
I organised a conference las year on coaching sport to develop leaders. Brian Ashton made a fascinating contribution. He showed a picture of some youngsters in the 1950’s, satchels over shoulders, kicking a football on the way down the street to school. He said he had done that, and whenever possible, he and his pals would organise a game, in street or playground. They would select their own teams, decide on the rules, whether it was a goal or not, and make changes if it was not a good game. At the age of 6, Brian said they were organising their own sport, and then, tellingly, that over the next 30 years, people took that away from them.
I hope this sets you, the reader, thinking. In future articles, I hope to go a bit further into how to coach to develop leaders. It is important.
Bob Reeves
On September 15th, FLS will be jointly hosting with Loughborough in London, the Second Annual Leadership through Sport Conference. It will take place at Loughborough’s London campus in the Olympic Park.
The particular theme of this year’s conference is-
‘Sustaining Success- Challenging from the Front’.
Taking part will be an array of leading figures from sport, commerce and the military. These include Eddie Jones (England rugby), Danny Kerry (GB Womens hockey), Kate Richardson-Walsh (GB Womens hockey), Toni Minichiello (Athletics), Harry Keogh (MD Coutts Bank), Richard Hytner (ex Saatchi and Saatchi, now founder of ‘Beta Baboon’).
Full details will be announced at the end of May. Any FLS members wishing to be placed on a reserve list should contact liz.reeves@flsport.net.
FLS is playing a leading role in a rugby coaching conference being held at Oxford University on May 28. The general theme concerns coaching to develop leaders and encouraging better decision-making on the field.
Bob Reeves, Director of FLS, will head a workshop on coaching, and the legendary French player and coach, Pierre Villepreux, will take a practical session which will explore and demonstrate his renowned coaching philosophy. Lynn Evans, experienced coach at club and university, renowned for his approach to coaching skills, will also be taking part.
Any FLS member wishing to attend should contact Joe Winpenny-
In the Spring we will be holding more of our successful workshops. One of these will be a review of the Olympics, with contributions, we hope, from UKSport and some of those who took part. More information in the near future.
Our young FLS leaders were prominent in Rio.
Georgie Twigg was a member of the Womens Hockey team that won gold. There were terrific signs of leadership and team spirit in the group of players and coaches.
Tom Mitchell was captain of the Rugby Sevens team. They had a terrific tournament, but the final, against Fiji, was perhaps a game too far.
The Olympics demonstrated again the value of planning, and having the right people in key positions. Funding helped a lot of course, but the success of the swimming team, after a pretty dismal London Olympics, demonstrated that it is not all abut money. After a successful Beijing Olympics, swimming was on a high. Over the next 4 years, however, they never once met the targets set by UKSport. Indeed, 6 months before the Games in London, Baroness Sue Campbell (then Chairman of UKSport) told me that they were in for a terrible shock, predicting a poor Games for the swimmers. This is indeed what happened. Having subsequently been warned of reduced funding unless changes were made, a new Performance Director, Chris Spice, came in, the system was changed, and they went to Rio with confidence, ending up doing better than in Beijing, eight years earlier.
Key factors it seems to me-
-Have the right people in the right place
-Develop leaders throughout the system
-Address what is needed for top class performance and leave no stone unturned in doing what is necessary.
-Learn from mistakes
Some of this is addressed in Matthew Syed’s latest book, a must for sporting leaders- ‘Black Box Thinking’.
Bob Reeves
I have to say what a great day I had on Thursday, I didn't want it to end! Loughborough Uni in the Olympic Park is such an excellent venue,. It was a great experience for me to explore this campus and learn whats on offer.
All the Speakers and Panelists fulfilled my expectations and more.
It is a great help to us in the Polo World to get access to such gatherings and please include us in the future.
I will be joining the Leadership in Sport Foundation so I hope to see you again soon. JD
Breakout session
I have now been a member of the FLS programme for 3 months. In that time, I have met with my mentor Vic Luck on 2 occasions alongside having continuous email correspondence. In our first meeting, Vic and I outlined clear objectives that I wanted to get out of the programme. These were that I wanted to gain a better understanding of what it was to be a great leader. I wanted to be a leader who inspired others to lead and I wanted to learn how I could be the driving force behind that. I also wanted to gain a better understanding of how and why I currently lead in the way that I do and what improvements could be made to my on court contribution but also to my life away from the court within my role at my law firm.
Vic was able to provide me with a detailed philosophy behind the programme and introduce me to the 360 review tool. He encouraged me to ask my peers within my team as to how they view my leadership and what improvements did they think I could make personally in my role as Captain to guide the team. Following the meeting I distributed questionnaires to my team mates asking them to be as honest, open and as frank as possible in their evaluation. I found the feedback invaluable. It allowed me to see whether the way in which I viewed my leadership was actually in fact being received positively by my team mates in practice. Vic also came down to a game to watch my leadership in action. This was then followed up by a feedback session alongside my Head Coach. I found this particularly helpful as it gave a full circle approach. We were able to talk about his observations from the game but my Coach was able to provide input as to my behaviours and contributions on a daily basis. This provided a 'full circle' approach. From Vic, my Head coach and my team mates feedback, I have developed some action steps over the next few months to continue my journey of 'leading' with purpose and my goal of always striving to be better as we continue our quest for the Netball Superleague Championship title.
‘One of the most exciting things FLS has done is up and running in the new year. We have put together a small group of outstanding young sportsmen and women, of whom 6 have already captained England, and over the next year, they will be given opportunities to develop their leadership capabilities. They each have a mentor, someone prominent in sport, business or the military, and they will have the chance to meet many other leaders during the year, as well as attending all FLS events. The impetus for this project has been the fact that in the United Kingdom we are still not producing enough people ready to take on leadership roles as players, high level coaches and administrators. FLS seeks to assist in the development of leaders in, of and through sport, and this first cohort of young leaders will be given every assistance to fulfil their potential on and off the field of play. The group includes-
Eboni Beckford-Chambers- Netball
Charlotte Edwards- Cricket
Katy McLean- Rugby Union
Tom Mitchell- Rugby Union
Emily Scarrett- Rugby union
Georgie Twigg- Hockey
Mark Tomlinson- Polo
Luke Wallace- Rugby Union
The mentors for this group members are Vic Luck (Director FLS), Bob Reeves (Director FLS), Maj General Stuart Skeates (formerly Commandant, Sandhurst), Richard Hytner (Vice Chairman Saatchi and Saatchi), Tim Griffin (CEO Dell UK), Josh Lewsey (Director FLS), Kevin Bowring (RFU Elite Coach Development Manager), Andy Cosslett (CEO Fitness First Ltd).
The FLS website will feature the programme and will report on how it develops.'
See Vic Luck's article on a five month programme at Saracens Academy to accelerate the development of leadership capabilities- click here.
FLS Director Vic Luck is involved in some inn innovative leadership development with the Rugby Players Association. Check in the resources section for the related article.