May '24 • Youth Baseball Coaching
The "Hidden Agenda's" on your Team and How...
At the beginning of each season it is important to verbally and visually address team goals with the entire team and their families (parents). It is important to use this time to get one goal that the whole team is working towards together.
Then, the coaches, together, need to sit down with each individual and discuss their personal goals. This step in the process is so important, and I see so many coaches who mean well, but they don't understand the importance of having these individual meetings. Don't just send the kids home with the homework assignment of "writing down their goals." This does need to be done, but the importance of the actual sit down with each player cannot be over stressed. When you take the time to sit down, discuss, and mostly listen to what your player wants to accomplish, what their actual goals are, you build another level of trust with them. In this meeting you make it clear, you are here for them, and to help them reach their goals. This will also increase the players' buy in to your coaching philosophy and make for a much more productive learning environment.
Now, why did I call this post "Hidden Agendas?" If you don't do this with your team and then individually with your players, there will be a different agenda for everyone, and you may think your team is on the same page, but you will find out through the season that you couldn't be more wrong. Unless you specifically go through this process, here are some of the hidden agenda's that will be running in the background:
Parents:
"I'm just trying to get my girl noticed by some of these other teams that win a lot, then we can move to another team"
"My kid is the best first baseman on this team, why does the coach always have her playing outfield"
"My kid is the best catcher on the team, why does the coach sometimes play the other catcher over her?"
Players:
"I am just doing this because I don't want to disappoint my parents"
"The coaches don't like me, I need to find another team"
"She is the coaches daughter, that is why she is always batting third instead of me"
Coaches:
"I need to find a new third baseman, if we just had a solid third baseman we could win more often"
"I am done after this year, I can't deal with these parents anymore"
"I don't feel appreciated, all these players do is come to practice and act like it is social hour"
"Why don't these girls do any work in between practices? Don't they want to get better/win?"
And these are just a few of the hidden agendas that are running in the background while you as a coach are trying to figure out why the team isn't consistently winning, why they are not progressing like teams you have had in the past etc...
Hidden agendas will kill your team chemistry. Make sure you take the time to get everyone in alignment, know your players and their goals, know what the parents are looking for, and know what your coaching staff is looking for. If you know all these things, you can really begin to get them all in alignment and then your practices will be more productive, you will have players doing things to get better on their own time, and you will ultimately start winning games that you thought you couldn't
Good luck coaches!
Coach JT
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The "Hidden Agenda's" on your Team and How...
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