Other Work

Probing Paper

10/23/06

How Coaches Motivate their Players: Their Communicative Strategies

Criticism vs. Support

A Probing Interview Project

Juancarlos Nunez Ruiz

Department of Speech Communication

University of Arkansas at Little Rock

In today’s world of competitive sports, coaches are under constant pressure to be successful, and getting their players to perform at their best is the key for success. Motivating his or her players is one of the most difficult tasks that a coach has to face because different people are motivated in different ways. The challenge for coaches, thus, is to find the right approach for each individual. Finding the right way to get players to perform at their best can be the difference between a win and a loss. The purpose of this paper is to gain an understanding of the strategies that coaches draw on to motivate their players.

After conducting several interviews with college coaches, I found that they reported two distinct strategies used depending on the context that they are in:

(a) pushing and critiquing on practice, and (b) stroking and encouraging on matches. This paper proceeds by describing these different strategies.

Pushing and Critiquing during Practice

Offering criticism is never easy: there is always the potential to threaten a person’s sense of self. Criticizing can be difficult because it threatens the other person’s face. It’s important to be face-sensitive when you do it. All of the coaches that I interviewed agreed that pushing and critiquing their players’ performance was the most efficient strategy to motivate players during practices. They also said that pointing out the negatives is the best way to go in practice, but you have to do it with sensitivity towards the person, so it is not to discourage and harm them in the long run. One coach shared the following:

I can be very negative in practice, you know, but I feel that practice is the time when I need to be like this. There’s nothing at stake here, I’m just trying to help my guys improve and make them work on their weaknesses. I need to criticize them, so they can improve. I can’t do that in matches, it needs to be now. But I also need to be careful, you know. If I go too hard on them, I might make them lose their confidence, and that’s not what I want. All I want is to help them improve, that is why I do it.

As this conversation relates, practice is the setting where you want to point out negatives and push your players. As he said, there’s “nothing at stake here.” This discourse illustrates an important dialectical tension. There needs to be a balance between criticizing and encouraging. Coaches need to be critical enough so that their players can work on their weaknesses, but no so much as to discourage them. Another interviewee shared a similar sentiment, saying that practice is the place where you can get away with being very critical and negative. Once the match starts, you can’t do this and expect your players to respond. Being negative in a match just doesn’t work. Listening to him talk about real matches, led me to additional questioning about the communicative methods that coaches use during official play. This leads me to the second major theme of my project.

Stroking and Encouraging during Matches

Are there real differences between what should be said in practice and what should be said in a match? All of the coaches were in agreement. It’s important to understand and manage this distinction in order to be a successful coach. Players have a different mindset when it comes to matches; they need to believe that they are the best and that their opponent can’t take them down. They can’t afford to think about their weaknesses, but rather need to concentrate on their strengths. As one coach stated:

The way you approach a match is completely different to the way you approach a practice. In practice players are more relaxed and open to criticism. But in matches they are not. You can’t come down on them hard in a match. It’s not the place to be negative. In a match you need to be the most positive guy in the world, and remind them constantly that they are better than the other guy. This has always worked for me, and I will continue to be like that.

As the above statement says, coaches always need to be aware of the context that they are in, so they can motivate their players in the best manner. There are clear opposites in the way you handle players in practice and matches. The key is to strike a balance between support and criticism. This balance can be difficult to achieve, and those who attain it will be successful.

Conclusion

In this paper, I described the different strategies that coaches use to motivate their players depending on the setting that they are in by presenting two accounts from different coaches. Being a good coach, this study would suggest, involves managing criticism and supportive remarks. Yet, these practices must occur in the right context.

I found there to be two major settings where motivational strategies differ: practice and matches. Interviewees agreed that in the setting of a practice, the best way to motivate was to push, criticize and point out negatives. They said that they did this so their players would work on their weaknesses and improve from their mistakes. Interviewees also had a consensus when it came down to motivation in matches. They stated that, in order to get your player to perform at his best during a match, you need to be positive with him, and let him know that he is the best. I hope that by looking at these conversations, your understanding of the way that coaches motivate their players has grown, and that maybe you will be able to use this in your life when trying to motivate a person to do something for you or help you. Knowing how to motivate people is a skill that few possess, and can help you achieve many things in life. Arousing in others an eager want is power.