Coaching Philosophy Essay

The term coaching philosophy is defined as “a set of values and behaviours that serve to guide the actions of a coach” (Wilcox and trudel 1998: 41). Consequently a coaching philosophy is a resemblance of a coach’s attitude and behaviour.
The value of developing a coaching philosophy is that it ensures coaches and athletes a framework to allow them to build on a players skills and learn through progression. More specifically it helps a coach identify motives to make athletes perform to a higher standard and ensure they have a path in which they can follow and how they will contribute towards the team as a result of being a coach (Kretchmar 1994). The pathway in which a coach would follow serves as a guideline for their teachings; to work alongside an athlete in multiple situations. This means during training and competition.
The reason behind this is because pressures relating to coaching situations are not noticed when writing a philosophy. When using it during real life situations they may come in contact with barriers that you cannot change like weather for example. This therefore means that a coach’s philosophy may not always be truly functional. Because of these barriers a coach must create a more flexible and realistic philosophy that can be used during sessions. This allows a coach to be more readily available and create a significant amount of awareness towards circumstances that may change. If a coach can allow themselves to provide more flexible adherence to their coaching sessions within the boundaries provided in their own coaching philosophy; it creates the ability to more reactive to problematic tasks (Saury and Durand 1998’ Côté et al.