These articles were written by Alan Stein on his Stronger Team Blog.
Assistant Coaches’ Code:
- Your #1 job is to make your head coach’s job easier. Be a servant leader. Find what your head coach needs you to do and do it!
- Act as if it is your team. You will have your own team one day. Act like it now.
- Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. No excuses.
- Add value to everything you do, every single day… on and off the court.
- Enforce the team’s culture and standards at all times. Protect the locker room.
- When you find a problem… find a solution. Your head coach has enough problems as it is.
- Be professional. Period.
- Encourage and motivate everyone in your program to buy in to what the head coach wants – from players, to managers to other assistants.
- Bring energy, enthusiasm and effort every day.
- When asked for your input, speak honestly. Don’t be a ‘yes’ man (or woman).
Coaching Absolutes:
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- Don’t focus on winning (outcome); focus on preparation, effort and execution (process).
- Winning is a result of:
The execution of the fundamentals
The ability of all players to work in unison… all the time. - A team can only reach it’s true potential if:
The most talented player is also the hardest worker
Everyone in the program buys in to the ‘We > Me’ concept
Each player is in peak physical condition - You either accept it or you correct it.
- You play the way you practice.
Alan Stein
ABCs of Success
Here are the ABC’s of success:
A – Adapting, Asking
B – Believing
C – Caring, Challenging, Creating
D – Dreaming, Defusing
E – Engaging, Envisioning, Evaluating, Evolving, Educating
F – Failing, Focusing
G – Growing, Grinding
H – Helping
I – Innovating, Inspiring
J – Juking, Juggling
K – Knowing
L – Leading, Learning, Listening, Loving
M – Mentoring, Mending
N – Networking
O – Objecting, Outworking, Observing
P – Preparing, Pursuing, Pushing
Q – Questioning
R – Reaching, Reading, Resolving
S – Searching, Seeking, Serving, Sharing, Simplifying, Striving, Smiling
T – Thinking, Tweaking
U – Understanding
V – Viewing, Voicing, Valuing, Varying
W – Working
X – Xeroxing (‘copying’ – couldn’t leave X out!)
Y – Yearning
Z – Zigging and Zagging
Now you know your ABC’s… I hope you’ll do these things with me!
Hardwood Hustle Blog
http://www.About.me/AlanStein
Not too sure about all the asst coaches’ recommendations. The best coaches in the world are dictators. ala jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola. Assistant coaches need to first fully understand the head coaches decision making process. That is very very difficult to do. There are so many nuances that assistants do not understand. I am very exact about what they can and cannot do. I discuss extensively. If my team is up by 5 goals I hand them the team and observe their decision making process.
I encourage a lot of discussion but the decisions are always mine. I try and carry 2-4 assistants. They are, true, head coaches in training. Hopefully.
Some of the other thoughts were good. It is not the assistant coaches’ team. That one is way off.
rsf
I appreciate the comments and perspective that you contribute Rick. Thanks! Brian
The problem with #2 is that it isn’t the assistant coaches team or culture. The team and culture belongs to the head coach. It’s the assistant’s job to prepare, recruit, adjust and react to what the head coach wants.
I agree with Rick, they should be head coaches in-training, but the culture certainly belongs to the head coach.
Thanks for your input, Tim. I didn’t interpret #2 in the same way you did. IMO, there is no question that the team and culture belong to the head coach. My interpretation of #2 is that the assistant should make his or her current job their primary professional focus and that future head coaching aspirations should take a back seat to the work for their current job. My feeling is that the entire article was written from the perspective that an assistant is there to be an extension of the head coach. It helps me to know how visitors to the site view the posts. Thank you!
Assistants are a part of the programs culture and have to enforce it in cohoots with the head coach. Assistants that aren’t a part of the culture will divide the program.
Only thing with number two is that you can’t act as if it’s your team but you have to think like it is. I think every head coach should have to be an assistant prior to being hired as a head coach.
Bottom line : Never back stab your head coach!
Bottom line: Never stab your Head coach in the back!
Assistant Coaches’ Code (Ben’s Note: I am a Head Football Coach and an Assistant Wrestling Coach):
Your #1 job is to make your head coach’s job easier. Be a servant leader. Find what your head coach needs you to do and do it! (Ben’s Note: I agree that this is the #1 job of an Assistant Coach. We must understand that doing our #1 job isn’t about the HC as an individual/person, rather it is about the program/team and the better we do our #1 job the better the program will be in the end.)
Act as if it is your team. You may have your own team one day. Act like it now. (Ben’s Note: All coaches should have a sense of ownership in the program. Own your role. Assistant Coaches have the difficult task of feeling ownership as well as working to uphold and completely support the HC in the process…i.e. ownership yet knowing it isn’t “your” program at the same time. Not easy, but do it anyway.)
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. No excuses. (Ben’s Note: This is perfect)
Add value to everything you do, every single day… on and off the court. (Ben’s Note: Again – perfect. Strive for consistently adding value in everything you do big or small for the program’s benefit.)
Enforce the team’s culture and standards at all times. Protect the locker room. (Ben’s Note: this is so very important. In football moving forward, this is something we are going to spend a lot of time emphasizing and working to change positively.)
When you find a problem… find a solution. Your head coach has enough problems as it is. (Ben’s Note: This has been somewhat joked about in the past, but it is a fundamental truth for Assistant Coaches. Be very careful and try not to state problems without a suggestion of solution as well. If there is a problem that you see and don’t know how to fix it, then the way the issue is presented to the HC or Staff needs to have careful thought/consideration given to it.)
Be professional. Period. (Ben’s Note: Yup)
Encourage and motivate everyone in your program to buy in to what the head coach wants – from players, to managers to other assistants. (Ben’s Note: I believe the community, personal friends/family and parents of players should absolutely be added to this list.)
Bring energy, enthusiasm and effort every day. (Ben’s Note: Sometimes I have to count the steps from the school to the field and by the time my feet hit the grass I am ready to go with focus. Find what works for you individually to “trigger” the right mindset and approach to practice/games. Don’t just walk out and bring your issues from the day onto the practice/game field – it will absolutely negatively impact all those around you. Again, striving for consistency with this is the greatest struggle (for me at least.) We all know we all want and love to be coaching kids, but life can get in the way at times – find your method to combat bringing your “baggage” to practice/games.)
When asked for your input, speak honestly. Don’t be a ‘yes’ man. (Ben’s Note: I would just add, that when our input/opinion as an AC is contrary to the final decision made by the HC, that we have to sell out to that decision anyway – lay our internal conflict/disagreement aside – because we know it is a fact that everything the HC decides is because he believes/knows it is best for the program whether we like the decision or not.)