Tips, Tools and Real World Advice for Youth Athletic Coaches

Ask a coach about any aspect of their game and they’ll tell you – they’ve got it covered.

They have a system.

Offense and defense, batting and pitching, blocking and tackling, even substitutions; coaches have a system for everything.

Denny Davidson has coached girls and boy’s basketball, baseball, and girl’s fastpitch softball for more than eighteen years.

“Here’s my most important system.” he said, holding out a beat up, vinyl zippered folio. “I keep every shred of team-related paper right here in this folder and it goes everywhere I go. To every game, to every practice and to every meeting I attend. If somebody asks me for a birth certificate, a medical release, a schedule or a phone list, I know I have a copy right here.” he continued, patting the worn black pouch with the kind of affection most of us reserve for an old friend.

As usual with rookie coaches, Denny learned the hard way.

“I had to forfeit a baseball game my first season coaching because the other team thought one of my players was too old for the age bracket.” he explains. “I couldn’t produce his birth certificate or my league roster because I’d left them on my desk at work. I couldn’t even sit the kid and play the game because it was a league rule that the certified roster had to be present for review at the umpire’s discretion at every game. It was a bona fide coaching loss and I swore I would never do anything like that to the kids again.”

Denny’s story is pretty common.

First-time coaches are usually handed a list of names with phone numbers, a bag of equipment and a pat on the back. Organization and preparation are individual matters and your league administrator will rarely give you advice on managing these things.

Every league and every organization is a little different.

At the youngest ages kids won’t usually be required to provide birth certificates or social security numbers, but as soon as teams start to travel, verification of age and identity are mandatory.

As soon as you accept your coaching position, be sure to ask your league administrator what’s required for your team and specific age bracket or league. If the commissioner of your league operates out of a different organization or some other governing body, have this conversation with that person as soon as possible to give yourself time to pull together the information you need.

I can’t tell you how many coaches spend hours the evening before the registration deadline driving from house to house picking up photographs, social security numbers and signatures.

Here’s a list of the items Coach Davidson keeps in his pouch:

• Registration forms
• Roster
• Photo ID cards
• Phone list
• Medical release forms
• Birth certificates
• Scorebook
• Game schedule
• Practice schedule
• Game assignment/playing time matrix

“Once I came up with my system it was easy to maintain.” explains Denny. “Most of my players return from year to year so I already have their birth certificates and social security numbers on file. I created my own roster and schedule forms on the computer and they’re simple to update. It leaves me with a shorter list of stuff to chase down and takes a ton of stress out of my pre-season preparation.”

…and one more thing.

“I keep a complete set of duplicates in a file at home just in case I misplace my stuff or somebody accidentally leaves with it in the confusion that can sometimes follow a game.”  warns Denny.

Both have happened.

Taking the time to come up with your own personalized system of organization will help to minimize your stress level, eliminate surprises and give you the freedom to focus on your other systems, and on the kids.

Soccer season – the real one – is right around the corner. Signups are closing and coaches are already planning their initial August workouts. Most seasons will kick off with a Labor Day tournament and end with a tournament over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

Four months of soccer. Sixteen weeks to accomplish your objectives. One hundred and twenty days to turn 15 kids into a cohesive unit, advance their individual skills and provide them with an experience that’ll instill in them a love of the game and bring them, and their parents, back for next season.

• So what’s your plan and how will you measure your success?
• Have you clearly outlined and articulated your objectives?
• Do your players understand their role and responsibility in achieving those objectives?
• Do your players’ parents understand what you expect of their kids and of them?

Long time youth football coach Robin Bivona is a big believer in crystal clear communication. Over the years, he’s created handouts designed to set clear expectations for his players, his coaches and his players’ parents.

Coach Bivona’s Player/Parent handout is ten pages long and packed with incredibly insightful information intended to answer questions, set expectations and nip potential problems in the bud.

The handout contains all the basics:

• Coaches’ names and contact information
• Instructions for preferred methods of communication with the coach
• Practice schedule and locations
• Week by week summaries of practice plans and objectives
• Policy on playing time
• Mandatory Parent/Family/Fan Rules & Etiquette for a GOOD Football Experience

Bivona touches on proper nutrition, hydration, sleep habits, even age appropriate movies to rent, like “Rudy”, that support his positive approach to team sport.

His packet of handouts is among the most comprehensive I’ve seen. Did I mention he has a different one for his assistant coaches and a brief survey each player must complete at the first practice? He covers all the bases—twice.

But remember, Coach Bivona developed these manuals through years of learning the hard way. By dealing with misunderstandings, miscommunication and poor parent/fan behavior.

You can nip a lot of these issues in the bud too by creating a simple one page handout, and giving it to every parent as soon as you possibly can.

Include the following:

Your COMPLETE contact information. Email address, cell phone, home phone and work phone. Be sure to let them know your preferred method of communication, set an expectation for the timeliness of your response and be sure you follow through. Give parents explicit instructions for asking questions or lodging complaints.

Key dates. If you have a set practice time and place, this is where you tell them. Same thing for games. If you don’t have this information yet, let your parents know this and assure them you’ll provide it as soon as you’ve got the information.

Does your organization have a picture day? A skills competition? An awards banquet? Include these dates and times too. If you don’t know, you should ask your league administrator. They usually plan these dates out well before the beginning of the season and should be able to tell you.

Policy on playing time. Check with your youth organization in case the league in which you’re participating has pre-set minimum playing times for each kid, then build your policy around that.

Expectations. This can be as simple as “have fun and learn” to something more demanding, depending on the ages of your players and your youth organization’s charter. Be sure you understand this charter when crafting your own expectations and explain to your parents that your goals are in line with the organization’s goals.

Provide a short list of unacceptable parent/fan conduct. Your youth organization may already have guidelines you can use. If not, take a look at Coach Bivona’s here.

Other team needs.

• Do you need a team mom?
• Will you be expecting parents to provide a halftime or postgame snack and drink?
• Do you need help setting up fields or transporting equipment?
• Do you need everybody’s email address or alternate phone numbers?

Make a list of the things and help you need. You’ll usually have plenty of of volunteers, especially on younger teams.

Well thought out, written communication provided early and often will help you to keep the focus on fun and improving player skills.

Do you have a parent letter or a team manual you’ve developed over time? If you’d like to share it or add some insight from your own experience, feel free to chime in.