For the third year in a row I had the distinct privilege of serving as the head coach for our 14 and Under Northern Section Zonal team that recently competed in Kalamazoo, Michigan this past July. This elite tournament has tremendously strong competition and throughout the event our players battled hard, showed great effort, and bonded strongly as a team.
While my job at Zonals is to help the players, I also try to be available to assist the parents as much as possible. However, since I’m spending my entire day on-court coaching players throughout their grueling national matches, I never feel that I’m able to truly address some of the difficult challenges that our parents face on a daily basis.
That is why I’m writing this article for the parents. In my opinion, coaches need to take far more time to speak with parents to address the biggest obstacles they face with regards to helping their children succeed on-court. With an increased dialogue between coaches, players, and parents we can ultimately help everyone to have a far more enjoyable, rich, and rewarding experience that sets all of these young athletes up for success.
How Can I Help You?
The first action coaches can take to better serve our parents is to start a dialogue, and the first question we have to ask is, “How can I help you?” It amazes me how many private and group lessons are conducted on a daily basis without a real understanding of the specific wishes of the clients. Parents are employing a coach’s services for a reason, and if we can better identify their desires then we can most effectively serve them and their children. Instead of wasting time trying to figure out what these individuals need, first take some time to figure out what these parents actually want.
How Can We Reach These Goals?
Once you have identified the desires of the parents you can now more effectively figure out the best way to reach these goals. Here the coach can utilize their distinctive expertise, creativity, and wisdom to design a developmental plan, which will serve as a road map for the student’s training and success. A sound plan will also help to set the minds of the parents at ease as it allows them to understand how their needs are being addressed. Furthermore, the parent always has unique insights into their own child, and they can help provide valuable information that can assist in the effective creation of these plans.
As a side note, please understand that I’m not promoting a dictatorship where parents begin ordering their coaches around the court determining what and how they teach! No good relationship can ever progress in this manner. What I’m encouraging is regular healthy and open communication with parents, which can assist in the overall developmental progress of their children. While it has been famously said that, “Good fences make good neighbors” we can’t forget to leave a gate in the fence for helpful ideas and insights to come through.
Creating Greater Connectivity
Once the initial dialogue has begun you need to have ways to continue the discussion. Personally, I’ve found it extremely helpful to schedule check-in times with my parents to review their children’s tennis development.
Having a phone conversation, sharing a coffee, or even exchanging a few text messages can go a long way in creating greater connectivity between coaches and parents. These meetings are crucial for sound team building as they serve to instill confidence in the developmental plan, increase coach/parent camaraderie, and help all parties to voice their observations and concerns. Occasionally, I will even have meetings that include the player as well, which is also exceedingly valuable.
Essentially, all parties need to have a voice, feel valued, and believe in the plan. Without trust and communication you are creating a sub-optimal learning environment and limiting the potential growth of your students.
Please Help me in Continuing the Dialogue
No tennis player is an island. As a high performance tennis coach I absolutely believe that the stronger the connections between coach, parent, and child, the better the young athlete will perform. No one knows his or her own child more than you, so here is how you can help me to perform my job better.
If continuing this conversation sounds useful to you, I would greatly appreciate a quick email to Danny@colossaltennis.com that contains the biggest challenge you face as a tennis parent.
By better understanding your unique challenges I can more effectively serve the larger tennis community by helping to implement strategies that address these issues in the future. Developing a successful junior tennis player is a highly complicated task, but by increasing the communication between both the coach and parent we can set the stage for a more successful journey for all of these young athletes.