Why Great Coaches Need Executive Coaching
Most coaches are exceptionally well-trained to coach their sport.
They know how to teach technique, develop position groups, recruit, build game plans, analyze opponents, and develop student-athletes.
Then they become a head coach.
Suddenly, the job becomes much bigger than coaching. They're managing people, money, relationships, risk, reputation, and an increasingly complex organization.
That's an executive leadership job.
Yet most coaches receive little formal training in executive leadership or professional management. This is the leadership gap I help coaches address through executive and leadership coaching.
The Head Coach Is More Than a Coach
I've spent much of my career on both sides of this equation—as a Division I student-athlete, coach, athletics director, university cabinet member, NCAA governance leader, and fundraising executive.
I've seen firsthand how dramatically the responsibilities change when a coach becomes responsible for an entire program.
A head coach is responsible for:
Budget management and financial decisions
Hiring, firing, and developing staff
Crucial conversations, conflict, and accountability
Major fundraising and donor relationships
Relationships with athletics directors, presidents, boards, and university leaders
Corporate partnerships and community relationships
Admissions and financial aid
Campus police and student conduct
Title IX and general counsel
NCAA compliance and conference relationships
Internal athletics and university administration
Media and public relations
Student-athlete development and well-being
And that's not a complete list. Think about what we're asking one person to do. The problem isn't that coaches can't do these things. Many do them exceptionally well.
The question is: Where did they learn how?
Coaches Are Trained to Coach. Who Trains Them to Lead?
Most coaches spend years developing expertise in their sport. They attend clinics, study film, refine recruiting strategies, develop practice plans, and constantly improve their competitive approach.
But how many receive the same intentional development in executive leadership, organizational management, emotional intelligence, difficult conversations, financial leadership, stakeholder management, or executive communication?
Leadership doesn't automatically come with a coaching title. And technical expertise doesn't automatically translate into executive leadership. That's not a criticism of coaches. It's a development gap.
This Is Where Executive Coaching Can Help
This is the work I do.
As a certified executive leadership coach, I work with coaches and athletic leaders who are navigating the transition from being an expert in their sport to becoming the executive responsible for an entire organization.
Coaching provides something successful coaches often have very little of: a confidential, objective environment in which to examine their own leadership.
Who can challenge a head coach's thinking without an agenda?
Who can help them work through a difficult personnel decision?
Who can help identify a blind spot or think through a complicated relationship with an athletics director, president, major donor, staff member, or university administrator?
That's where executive coaching can be particularly valuable.
Research supports the value of coaching in organizational settings, including positive effects on individual performance, well-being, coping, and work attitudes. Research also suggests that a client's readiness for change can influence coaching outcomes.
I've explored that important prerequisite in Are You Ready to Be Coached? Why Coaching Readiness Matters.
Why My Experience Matters
There are many excellent executive coaches. What I bring to coaching college athletics leaders is a combination of experiences that is unusual.
I've been a Division I student-athlete.
I've been a coach.
I've been a Division I athletics director.
I've served as a university cabinet member.
I've served at the highest levels of NCAA governance.
I've managed complex organizational relationships and negotiated major partnerships. And I've raised more than $100 million in philanthropic support.
Now I bring that executive experience together with formal training in executive and leadership coaching and doctoral study in Strategic Leadership.
I don't coach coaches on how to coach their sport. I help coaches lead the increasingly complex organizations they've been entrusted to run.
Great Coaches Don't Need Coaching Because They're Failing
This may be the most important point. I don't believe coaches seek executive coaching because something is wrong with them.
The best coaches I know are lifelong learners. They already coach their athletes and staff because they understand that development requires intentionality.
Why should their own leadership be any different? The higher a coach rises, the more valuable an objective thought partner can become.
Great coaches don't need coaching because they're failing. They need coaching because the job has become too complex for anyone to master every dimension of leadership alone.
The Opportunity
The modern head coach is simultaneously a teacher, recruiter, strategist, fundraiser, manager, spokesperson, relationship builder, compliance partner, and executive leader.
That's an extraordinary responsibility. And it deserves more than on-the-job training.
It deserves intentional leadership development.
That's why I believe executive and leadership coaching should become a more common part of coach development in college athletics—not because coaches aren't capable, but because the job demands more from them than ever before.
If you're a coach or athletic leader who wants to strengthen your leadership effectiveness, self-awareness, communication, relationships, and organizational impact, learn more about my executive and leadership coaching practice.
For more on leadership in college athletics, see Why Leadership Coaching Is Becoming Essential in College Athletics and What Athletic Directors Really Look for in Coaches Beyond Wins and Losses.
