Every Coach eventually writes a What is Coaching post as a means to explain the benefits of having a coach on your side. I wonder, though, do Bankers who blog, write The What of Banking posts, or is it obvious, seeing how our financial system is set up?  Are there The What of Garbage Collection posts?  Do we need to be convinced of the reasons for these vocations? No, but we sure do need them if we want to buy a house and then keep it garbage-free.  While people understand and revere sports coaches, other coaches can mystify people.

If you were Don Shula, who died in May, 2020 at 90, you’d go back and forth between Pebble Beach and South Florida, pop on a teal jacket every once in a while and bask in the $30M USD fortune you accumulated becoming the winningest coach in NFL history. You’d say things like,” Success is not forever and failure isn’t fatal”, and, “The superior man blames himself. The inferior man blames others”. And you’d be right. He was right. His philosophy coupled with his own work ethic and ability with people earned him the title and the riches, and nobody questions it, from Monday morning quarterbacks to high flying CEOs (often, I’m sure, one in the same).

Why DOES a football team have a coach, though? Aren’t the players elite athletes who know the ins and outs of their game? Of course they are, but they didn’t get that way on their own. And each player doesn’t have to see the big picture, but they need to understand where they fit. Coaches guide, push and prod their athletes to develop their skills even further, to hone their crafts so they’re also getting the millions because they’re doing the one thing professional athletes are paid to do - Win.

Scouts look all over for young players with talent and keep tabs on them, sometimes for years.  Talent alone isn’t enough, though.  Who gets coached, then, to the point of success?  The driven, motivated players. The players who decide they’ll succeed because they are willing to do what it takes to succeed.  Notice that I didn’t say the gifted.  Of course, natural gifts and skills are helpful (shoutout here to a fun book by Canadian writer Terry Fallis, Albatross, wherein natural gifts do get you winning, but they don’t keep you playing. That’s a job for motivation and drive). It was a passion for hockey and the drive to keep honing his incredible skills long after team practice, that earned Wayne Gretzky (another Canadian), the name The Great One. He wanted to be coached.  He wanted to improve. Otherwise, he would have been a great rep player who went on with a different life.

Gretzky exponentially increased his hockey success because he had great coaches who worked with him by analyzing his game, breaking down what needed improving, and creating strategies to ratchet up his abilities. A player’s job is to play to the best of their ability - it’s not to coach themselves.  That’s rarely their strength. The coach’s role is to have a variety of strategies and plans at hand that they can use with a player.  To sometimes urge, sometimes hold up a mirror to things that require change in order for success to happen, and always to support. To literally be in the player’s corner. It’s a great place to be.

Working with people who want to grow their success in any area of life, is an exciting place to be. My continuous learning means that I’m always building new strategies into my practice to benefit my clients as they grow their businesses, their professional abilities, their creativity and their plans for their lives. Just like athletes, one size doesn’t fit all as my clients grow into themselves, but I’ll urge, hold up that mirror and always, always support. The client’s corner is truly a great place to be.