7 Coach observation: pulling it all together
To help summarise this session there are two important final activities for you to complete that pull together your thoughts and ideas on observation and feedback.
Activity 7 Pulling together your thoughts and ideas on coach observation
Timing: Allow about 40 minutes
Part 1
Read this extract from a blog post (5 minute read time) by Dave Keelty. Keelty is a coach developer and mentor, having worked with organisations including New Zealand (NZ) Rugby, NZ Football, and Leinster Rugby and Hockey. The extract addresses many of the issues and ideas that you have considered in this session.
How might you now develop your approach to observing and giving feedback to coaches in light of any new insights you have gained?
Is coach observation worth pursuing? [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)]
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Discussion
The article draws out several themes from this session which may influence your practice. These are:
- The focus of an observer can be steered by how their observation is being directed by the presence of an observation tool or not.
- As Keelty says, behaviours are often prematurely judged through the observer’s own ideas and bias about good or bad coaching.
- It is important to understand what the coach is trying to achieve, why and how. Knowing the intention of the coach is critical and you need to be careful about entering ‘advice mode’ before you fully understand the coach’s aims for any session.
- Narrowing or expanding your observational focus can depend on the nature of the relationship you have with a coach as opposed to their relative expertise and experience.
Dave Keely’s blog can site can be found here: https://medium.com/ @CoachngUnleashd
Part 2
Listen to the discussion between Andy Bradshaw and Alex Twitchen. How do the issues and points they discuss further develop your ideas and understanding about observing and providing feedback to coaches?
Download this audio clip.Audio player: Audio 1
Transcript: Audio 1
ALEX TWITCHEN
Andy, from your experience as a seasoned coach developer, what are your thoughts around the process to observing and providing feedback to coaches?
ANDY BRADSHAW
I think one thing that's really important is the timing of any observation, so building the relationship with the coach, starting to understand where they are on their journey, what their needs might be. I think at times, it can be a little too easy to think, I'll just jump in and watch the coach. So actually, really thinking about that timing question and then starting to think about if and when we feel that an observation is going to be useful and going to be relevant and maybe uncover some interesting points.
And that might be raising a coach's self-awareness of what they're doing, using the observation as a feedback tool. There's the question to ask around actually how am I going to observe. Am i just going to go and watch the coach see that environment, see how they operate with other coaches, and what that environment looks like? So again, a bit of a broader context of where the coach works.
It might then be that you can be more specific at times. So it might be an element of filming the coach. You might do something on an audio recording so where you actually get the coach to maybe verbalise what they're doing, maybe just record the audio of the words, again, just as an analysis tool.
Actually thinking around, well, what's the purpose of this? I think that's really crucial for the coach to have in their mind. And that's a conversation that you'd have with the coach and quite an open and honest conversation. I think one thing to be very mindful of is how intimidating a coaching observation might be. And there's this certainly from a cultural and traditional point of view, people might be quite intimidated by someone coming to watch them and think that that is going to be judgmental, is going to be something that is going to pick out all the things that they're doing wrong. So that lead into any observation is crucial.
ALEX TWITCHEN
It's the planning, isn't it?
ANDY BRADSHAW
It is.
ALEX TWITCHEN
It's so important to actually plan and observation with a coach, because you've got go get their buy-in. They've got to be invested in the process and understand the process and how this is there to help them develop and improve. It's not a judgement on them.
ANDY BRADSHAW
No. And what you are looking for is to try and get as close to what natural coaching performance might be. And that is an issue. When we do coach, then often than not, we are putting on a performance. But you want it to be as close to reality as possible. And that might take some time. So more often than not, the coaches on first reflection if they see themselves on video, they'll be reflecting on, I didn't realise I looked like that or sounded like that or walked or stood like that.
And what you're looking to try and do potentially with an ongoing series of observations and feedback is to get beyond that to some of the key bits-- why they were doing things in a particular way, why they maybe spoke to a particular player or group of players in the way that they did.
So that planning is crucial. And I think it's just vital. It's planning done with the coach not to the coach, that they see the purpose of it. It's a supportive process, so not a judgmental. One it's part of their ongoing journey. And for the most part with coaches, it's a crucial, crucial intervention to build that self-awareness.
ALEX TWITCHEN
And everything you said that is really interesting from the perspective of observing and providing feedback to a coach on a typical coaching certification course where we might just see them deliver a 15 minute, 20 minute, half an hour practise. And I sometimes wonder in that particular situation whether we're actually really observing and assessing their coaching, because how can we in that kind of environment? For me, it's more about, well, we're observing and assessing their technical understanding of their sport, because everything you said about the importance of planning and getting the coach's buy-in into an observation and really making a supportive process is very, very difficult to achieve on your typical coaching course that you might do with your governing body. What are your thoughts about that?
ANDY BRADSHAW
What you'll tend to get is you'll get a snapshot of coaching. And what you're looking for is you're looking for more of the entire film, the entire movie, the, well, actually what does that coaching look like. And that is always something once you come to having the conversation about any observation or footage that's been taken or video that's been viewed that you get the fuller context. It's a start point for a conversation. It's some data which will enable you to have a really hopeful rich and meaningful conversation.
But it's not the only thing. And I think that's mindful for the coach developer just to ask some really good questions. Why did you do this in a particular way that you did? Not it being a threatening I want to find out exactly why, but actually just give me the context. And if things had gone differently, what other things had you considered maybe? How might you have changed this plan or this approach depending on what you saw in front of you? So the skill of the coach developer or the coach educator is just to find out the bigger picture.
ALEX TWITCHEN
And it's really interesting that I sometimes think that we don't give feedback to coaches. What we try and have is a shared conversation, a dialogue with the coach, that it's about as much as their input into the process as much as my input to the process. So I've often wondered whether actually feedback isn't the right term. It's about having a conversation. It's having a dialogue. And like you say, it's understanding their intention-- why did they do that, what were they hoping to achieve, what was their kind of thought process before that-- and building up that kind of rich dialogue, which I think when coaches get a lot from.
ANDY BRADSHAW
And as you have explored in other bits of this course, it's not about the coach developer coming in and providing the answers, it's about finding or helping the coach to find out those answers themselves. And it might be a little bit of staring and guiding. But it's a collaborative journey, not a directive one.
ALEX TWITCHEN
Andy, it's perfect. Thank you very much.
Audio 1
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Discussion
The discussion between Andy and Alex highlights several further aspects of the observation and feedback process. These are:
- The timing of the observation – when is the right time to start observing a coach and what benefit will the coach gain from the observation.
- You want to observe a coach as close to reality as possible and not see a performance just for your benefit.
- Plan an observation with the coach and emphasise the supportive nature of the process.
- Instead of feedback aim to have a conversation and dialogue with the coach – a shared conversation which is rich and meaningful. This is perhaps challenging to achieve in some contexts such as a coaching qualification course, but not impossible.
There have been several ideas discussed in this session and perhaps the overall message is that observation and feedback practices can be developed with experience. The process of observing and providing feedback via rich and shared conversations is also dependent on the context and role you are fulfilling as a coach developer. If, for example, you are tutoring a coaching qualification course you are more constrained when compared to supporting an individual coach in a mentoring role. Nevertheless, the key principles and considerations still apply, they are just implemented differently.