by Mike Davenport, Coaching Sports Today
[This is an update to a post from 2013 and is not intended to be legal advice and should not be taken as so. It is only meant to introduce a concept to coaches.]
Take a situation.
What would a reasonable person do?
What would a reasonable person think about that situation?
What action would a reasonable person take?
What is a reasonable person?
A “reasonable person” is defined as “a hypothetical person in society who exercises average care, skill, and judgment in conduct and who serves as a comparative standard for determining liability.”
That straight from Wikipedia.
Does being reasonable matter for you, Coach?
What a reasonable person would do is a standard used more-and-more to measure whether a person’s (and a coach’s) actions were appropriate, or not.
For example, imagine a rowing coach walking to the dock, looking out upon the river, and seeing nothing but a heavy blanket of fog.
Should the coach venture out into the “pea soup” to practice?
Or, should the coach decide to stay on shore and have the team do their workout off the water?
What would a reasonable person do?
Let’s say the team did launch their boats and row in the fog.
Then something terrible were to happen related to it being foggy.
How a reasonable person would have acted could make a difference if the incident becomes a legal issue.
Hard coaching decisions and being a reasonable person
Let’s take a different example—you are coaching high-school football.
It’s the fourth quarter.
Big game—championship game.
Your star tight-end takes a heavy hit to the head.
It’s pretty obvious the collision has taken a toll on him.
What do you do?
Do you sit him? Do you play him?
There are college coaches in the stands specifically watching him.
They might decide his fate in terms of the scholarship to Wicked-Big State U.
Tick-tock…what’s your decision?
Unfortunately, you are both physically and emotionally engaged in the situation and often it’s hard to act reasonably.
In the heat of a contest the focus we have can cloud our decisions.
Can you act like a reasonable person would?
Meet my imaginary friend
I’m not suggesting every decision you make should be filtered through our imaginary friend—that reasonable person.
What I am suggesting though is that when facing a coaching decision that could have serious repercussions, as a baseline, you MUST consider what a reasonable person would do.
And if it’s too difficult to do that, then you must find a real reasonable person to help you with the decision.
Let’s go back to the previous football example.
It’s been determined that it is too difficult, because of the pressure and emotion of such a situation, for a coach to decide like a reasonable person. So another person, someone more skilled, like a trained athletic trainer or physician, now makes that decision about the player returning.
So where do you go from here?
Again, this is not intended to be legal advice. But you need to know about the reasonable-person standard.
As the job of coaching sports continues to get more challenging, thinking and acting as a reasonable person could keep you out of hot water.
Improve your decisions.
Actually make coaching a little more enjoyable.
Keep learning