Navigating the Sidelines: Tips for Coaches

As a coach, I’m sure you understand the importance of fostering a positive and supportive environment for your athletes. Sometimes, however, your support extends beyond the players - to parents. Adding to an already complex relationship between Coach, Athlete and Parent - as parents, we Parents emotionally invested, which raises challenges when there are process and or logic centered challenges that arise such as playing time, sport specific development, how the athlete is disciplined by a Coach. I’m a parent of 4, and have had to “check” myself with this many times.

As Coaches when we select teams or hold try-outs, we rarely think about the athlete holistically, we are often just looking for talent. Some mature coaches will look beyond this and look also for character. An even smaller number will look at the whole family. Many colleges, when they are recruiting look at the entire athlete - parents included. They ask, are parents supportive, are they a distraction, are the present etc? To be unequivocal about it - in the complexity of selecting players to our teams, we are really selecting families to our culture. This is true from middle school though college.

Depending on your stage as a coach, you’ve likely had a few experiences with both happy and challenging parents. I put together a few examples that I have experienced and that I have helped other coaches navigate over the years. I’ve kept them general on purpose, so that you can adapt them to your unique environment and team. My goal here is to help you effectively work with parents and ensure everyone's on the same page:

Communication is Key:

Set expectations early: At the beginning of the season, hold a meeting or distribute a handbook outlining your coaching philosophy, communication norms, and expectations for both players and parents. If you have not written our your philosophy or mission statement - do so and share it with Parents. It will help you stick to your core values as a coach and helps set the table for what parents can expect from you, and understand you decision making processes throughout the season, pinned against your values.

Be clear about your availability for individual discussions and establish boundaries to maintain a healthy coach-parent relationship. Before the season, I record a video message that has everything I’m going to discuss with them. After the meeting, I share the video - in case anyone was late, missed it, or new members come in. I tell them, I will share it again at a later time, to help remind myself and the team of our process and values. Set a note to yourself to share it again about half-way through your season and send it. This will serve as a reminder to everyone.

Proactive communication: Don't wait for issues to boil-up before reaching out. Regularly update parents on the teams progress, player development, and upcoming events. When we have open and regular lines of communication it’s comforting to busy parents, builds trust and prevents misunderstandings.

Actively listen: When a parent has concerns, give them your full attention. This might mean getting to a quiet or calm place so that you can listen without interrupting, acknowledge their feelings, and ask clarifying questions to fully understand their perspective. Right after practice is generally not a great time for this. To better plan these conversations, I ask parents to set up a call with me so that we “both have the time and space to discuss their concerns”. Most of the confrontational conversations parents have engaged me in, have come right after games - most of those have come after loses. You can imagine the typical reasons for those. I used to ask parents to hold their thought for 24 hours, to let them sit on it, before talking with me - especially when it involved playing time.

Over the years however, I realized this frustrated parents who were just trying to express themselves. My current philosophy is to hear them out, even after a game if I see that there is “concern” on their face. More than anything, I really want to listen to what their concerns are - but I also know that I will generally not respond or offer explanation in full at that time. The point here is to just listen deeply. I generally thank them for sharing their concerns and ask that they give me a day or two to respond. Sometimes I explain that their concern is important to me and I want to be thoughtful and consider everything. Given the game just ended, I want to give their concerns significant consideration and due process. This allows the parent to express their concerns, and gives me time to really consider a response. If you’ve worked with me for any amount of time, one of my constant themes, be it for athletes or coaches: the best response, is a planned response. So I can’t express enough how important taking time to consider a response is.

Focus on solutions: Whenever there are challenges, it’s very easy to defend or justify your actions or your system/scheme/etc. Instead, focus on finding solutions together. Offer options, explain your coaching decisions, and be open to feedback. One of the things I ask parents for in our first meeting is that their comments and cheering-on of the team focus around effort, rather than on basketball actions that are often not part of the team schema. I realize tho that this is very hard for parents to do. So, I often offer a film review or meeting for parents in which I explain the core and foundational factors of our team. Here are some examples of the things I teach them and the “sticky” language I use (for basketball):

1. I want every player to “peek at the rim” when they catch the ball. This gives them time to make a read and it’s an action that often gives us an advantage.

2. “Help with a hip” on defense - step into driving lances, cutting off the balls path to the rim.

3. “Air-em” get their defender in the air with a head or shot fake.

4. “POOP” in the paint (pivot out of pressure). If they get stuck in the paint, use the pivot series we teach to gain advantages.

5. “Go off two feet” if their shot can be blocked or bothered, go off two feet. Refs don’t call fouls, the call control. Going off one foot we are off balance and the ref cannot determine if we had poor balance or the defender disrupted our path. Going off two feet, we demonstrate control - if our path is altered, we often get the foul call.

6. “Hit, seal and chase” for every rebound.

7. “Attack space” anytime they see open lanes.

8. “BF&G” - ball fake a grimace - which gives us an advantage and often creates passing and driving lanes.

9. “1, 2, 3” is our phrase to get into made shot transition - from the time the ball exists the net, we want to be able to take a high quality shot in 3 to 3.5 seconds (while the defense is scrambling back).

So, in teaching this to parents I’m essentially teaching them our “action goals” or “points of emphasis” relative to foundational team skills. Rather than hollering for every kid to “shoot it”, or box out - in teaching them I’m hoping they echo our action goals from the side lines. I’m hoping they’ll holler: “air-em” or “POOP” when athletes are in the paint. I’m banking they will offer reminders during free throws to “hit, seal and chase” or “1, 2, 3” on a made free-throw. So in effect, parents are helping anchor or core foundational action goals and they feel like they are contributing. After all, they echoing what I’m emphasizing during the game as well. By coaching parents early and often, you are building a solid communication plan that will help the performance of your athletes. When you, your team and your parents are all on the same page, providing reminders for “action goals” it’s more likely to have a positive impact on the teams performance.

I often receive videos from parents of athletes I used to coach. The parents share videos of their child doing certain actions I taught, like "air-em," "BF&G," and "boom 1, 2" (our shooting footwork off a dribble). Using easy-to-remember phrases to teach our goals really works - the videos prove it. Years later, the athletes still remember the concepts as do the parents.

Below find some examples of conversations and themes that you may find yourself in and ideas on how to address them.

Examples of Conversations:

Scenario 1:

Parent: "My child didn't play much in the last game. I'm concerned about their development."

Coach: "I understand your concern. It’s a challenge for me to to ensure everyone gets playing time - some of my decisions are based on game situations and the whole picture that I’m looking at in a game. That is, sometimes a player is scoring but they are not getting back on defense - I generally sub players in who are executing on both side of the ball. Sometimes, I pull a player out who my be struggling with emotional control - they may be jawing with the refs or other players, they may exhibit poor body language after a mistake etc. If you would allow me time to process the game, watch the film so that I can give your concerns the consideration they deserve I would appreciate it. Would you like to schedule a time to discuss this next week?”

Scenario 2:

Parent: "The referee made a terrible call that cost us the game!"

Coach: "I understand your frustration” (note: focus on what you can control). “We all make mistakes – myself included, referees included. The key is to focus on what we can control. I spend most of my energy focusing on us, as a team, executing on the things we have been preparing for and the putting forth a full effort to get there. That’s for more important to me than one questionable call - we can’t control or know when those will happen. But, we can control how we execute our game plan - and that’s what we’ll put our focus back onto gong forward”

Scenario 3:

Parent:"My child seems stressed and unmotivated lately. How can we help them?"

Coach: "I've noticed similar challenges. Have you talked to your athlete about this? Let’s set up a time to talk, so that we can work together to create a positive practice environment that will help them succeed. It might also be a good time to check-in and ask them if they enjoying playing or still want to play” (note: sometimes kids play, and even talented kids, not because they want to but because it’s the expectation of their parent. Asking this question of the athlete amight just help them discover if this is the case. It’s also a good way for the parent to check-in with themselves - “am I unknowingly putting pressure on my athlete to play).

Closing Thoughts:

Empathy goes a long way: Put yourself in the parent's shoes and try to understand their perspective. Remember, rarely are parents going to come to you “logically” about their child - we are emotional about our children. Stay calm and professional: Even in heated situations, maintain a calm and respectful demeanor. Avoid gossip and negativity", this can be hard especially if other parents come to you about another parent or challenging athlete. Never speak negatively about players or parents to others. Seek support if you're struggling to navigate a difficult situation, reach out to a fellow coach, mentor, or sport psychology professional for guidance. Often times, when I’m working with teams to help them with sport psych, I end up helping coaches with navigating challenges they are facing within the team. Sometimes, having a fresh perspective is all you need to help an athlete excel.

In taking a broader, systemic approach to your coaching for parents and athletes, you can build positive relationships with parents and create a more supportive environment for everyone involved. I believe, this ultimately leads to a more enjoyable and successful athletic experience for all.

Become an Unstoppable-Mind athlete.