Coaching is a profession of love. You can’t coach people unless you love them. – Eddie Robinson
Whether it is the kids on the team, or a co-worker, coaching is just another word for showing them that you care and want to help. And that takes love, caring, and concern.
What does that mean?
Today’s quote is from a legend in American College Football. In it, he describes his job, coaching, as a profession of love. If any of my coaches are an example, it’s often tough love, but love none the less.
He finishes by saying that without love, you cannot be an effective coach. This part plays into another old saying “No one cares what you know until they know that you care.”
Without love for your players, it’s going to be hard to build a relationship with them. Without the relationship, it’s going to be hard to get them to work as a team, and to follow you and your instructions.
While I wouldn’t have thought to have put it this way, it seems a pretty open and shut case. Yes, there are those people who are in the position of coach who are jerks, but real coaches who make a real and positive impact on their players, that takes love.
Why is love important?
As I mentioned above, love (in the platonic sense of caring and concern) is a necessary precursor to an effective relationship. A leader can get by with just respect or fear, but a coach is much more than just a leader of the players.
To encourage and to mentor, these things take more than simple authority. I doubt many Privates love their Drill Sargent. They respect them, and understand their position of authority. They may learn, but Drill Sargent aren’t known for being encouraging, or their skills as mentors.
Not that it’s a fair comparison, as a coach serves a different group of people and is a completely different job description. But I hope it helps to illustrate how important a loving relationship is in a coaching or mentoring type relationship.
Where can I apply this in my life?
I can hear you saying “But I’m not a coach! I don’t even play sports!” That may be true, but you are, or easily could be, a person of influence in the lives of others. It might be young kids, it might be co-workers, or it might be people in your social groups.
Whether it’s your kids, some neighborhood kids, or the kids at the mall, you have some level of influence. That influence will improve as your relationship with the other people improves. The easiest way to do that is to show them that you care, that they matter to you.
This also works for your friends, your acquaintances, and your co-workers. If you can somehow show them that you care, that they aren’t just some random person you are busy ignoring, you can have some influence. Even a dedicated introvert like myself can manage it every once in a while, and so can you.
Have you ever seen someone doing something incorrectly and stopped long enough to explain how it is done properly? How well did that go, and did it seem to match your level of showing that you were trying to help and valued the person you were trying to help?
In my experience, if you just burst in, tell them they’re doing it wrong, lecture them on the proper technique, and then walk off, you’re probably not going to get a very pleasant reaction. Have you ever done that, or had someone else do it to you?
If you ask if they would like some help, and offer your knowledge and skills in a generous and pleasant manner, you will get a better reaction than if you sound haughty and condescending, right? Have you ever done that, or had someone else do it to you?
What do you think, do you think you could find a way to help others do a better job at something you’re good at? Even if it’s something as simple as opening a door, a smaller child can struggle with modern, self closing doors. But there’s a technique for that which works for small kids, if you know how.
As I mentioned before, this applies to any age and every aspect of your life where you interact with others. Every once in a while, someone will try to do something with less skill than you possess. If you can show them that you care, you can coach them on the subject.
We can all help a little bit, here and there. The only question is are you willing to care enough to actually do something about it. Well, do you?
From: Twitter, @SportsMotto
confirmed at : http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/story/10108144 2nd Quote
Photo by woodleywonderworks
Happy Birthday to Coach Robinson, born 13 February, 1919.
