Mandy Green, Busy.Coach
What does it take to have the focus required to be a truly effective coach?
The keys are priorities and concentration.
A coach who knows their priorities but lacks concentration knows what to do but never gets it done. A coach who has concentration but no priorities, has excellence without progress. But when you harness both, you have the potential to achieve great things. John Maxwell
I frequently talk to coaches who seem to major in minor things. These coaches either spend more time on TV watching, surfing the internet, or on social media vs working on their goals like the quote above mentions. Or they spend 90% of their time during the day working on minor maintenance tasks instead of working on the major tasks that will help them make progress.
So the important question is, how should you focus your time and energy to become an effective coach?
Focus on Your Strengths
Effective coaches who reach their potential spend more time focusing on what they do well than on what they do wrong. To be successful, focus on your strengths and develop them. That’s where you should put your time, energy, and resources. Now, I don’t believe that anybody can entirely avoid working in areas of weakness, especially if you are low on staff and budget. The key is to minimize it as much as possible, and coaches can do it by delegating. For example, I delegate database entry of recruits from tournaments to students on work study. I delegate organizing food on the road to my juniors or seniors because it saves me a lot of time and it helps get them take more ownership. I delegate the reading of recruiting service emails to my grad assistant. That way when I’m in the office, I stick to the things I do best, such as the communicating with my top recruits, building relationships with my team, or planning training sessions.
Prioritize
When we are busy, we naturally believe that we are achieving. But busyness does not equal productivity. Activity is not necessarily accomplishment. Prioritizing requires coaches to continually think ahead, to know what’s important, to know what’s next, and to see how everything relates to the overall vision.
What is required? What must I do that nobody can or should do for me?
What gives the greatest return? Work in your areas of greatest strength. Is there something you’re doing that can be done 80 percent well by someone else? If so, delegate it.
What brings the greatest reward? Life is too short not to do some things you love. What energizes you and keeps you passionate?
I have found that these 2 concepts are common knowledge, but not common practice. They are easy to do, but also easy not to do. I have been working with a lot of coaches on setting their work day up this way and they love the progress they are seeing. It is simple but very effective.
These are just a few simple things that you could do to be a more effective coach who gets important things done. If you want more ideas, go to www. Busy.coach.