Leadership Lessons from Coaches
What it takes to find your A-game.
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By Craig Harrison, DTM, and Paul Sterman
The modern-day sports coach must be a multi-talented leader and communicator. During any given season, a coach is expected to recruit, inspire, instruct, discipline and counsel players of different ages, ability levels and backgrounds.
Three athletic leaders talk about the skills they must bring into play.
Sean Tarrant
Sean Tarrant, DTM, is the head football coach of the Westside Christian Academy Warriors in Detroit, Michigan. The communication and leadership skills he honed in Toastmasters have clearly served him well: During the 2009 season, his team was ranked number four in the United States among Division 2 private high schools.
When Tarrant speaks to his players, he does more than diagram strategy. Known as “Coach T,” he also models good behavior and thinking skills to his athletes. “I’m teaching my players to make better decisions, on and off the field,” says Tarrant, also the school’s dean of students and athletic director. “There are choices in how you speak and how you act. I help you people improve both.”
The 44-year-old joined Talu Toastmasters in Moberly, Missouri, many years ago while serving time in the Moberly Correctional Center. His story gives him credibility with the current generation of student-athletes: Their coach made mistakes, accounted for them and has overcome his personal hardships.
Now a member of the Oak Park Toastmasters in Oak Park, Michigan, Tarrant draws on his life experience and newfound confidence from Toastmasters to help others with public speaking. He gives motivational speeches to audiences in rehabilitation centers and homeless shelters, and speaks directly to youth though a mentoring program.
“I see all mistakes made in one’s life as learning experiences,” says Tarrant.
Tom Richardson
Tom Richardson, DTM, served as Toastmasters International President in 1988-89 and has coached high school sports for more than 25 years. He says his Toastmasters training formed the foundation for his coaching, adding that he uses his communication and leadership skills every day in his current role as defensive line coach for the Zionsville High School football team in Zionsville, Indiana.
“You look at nonjudgmental ways to discuss with the players what they’re doing, but you also want to get the message across when change needs to be made,” says the longtime Toastmaster, a member of the 2000 Toastmasters club in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Just as in Toastmasters, “When we see players doing things right, we tell them so,” notes Richardson, a former college football player at the University of Tennessee. “That builds their confidence. And if they’re not doing things right, we give them constructive feedback. We ask, ‘How can you make that better?’”
Richardson also trains the varsity players in sports-psychology methods (including visualization and self-talk) to improve their mental approach. He says he first employed these strategies in Toastmasters, when he reached the finals in the 1974 World Championship of Public Speaking.
Celia Slater
Celia Slater teaches an annual class for college athletic coaches called “Find Your Own Voice.” It helps the coaches develop self-confidence as communicators, which ultimately makes them effective leaders. Speaking from personal experience, Slater always tells the group about Toastmasters and why they should join.
“Toastmasters changed my life,” says Slater. “It helped me regain my confidence. I love to share what Toastmasters did for me by paying it forward – by sharing my story with these coaches.”
A resident of Dunedin, Florida, she played varsity basketball at Florida State University and then coached college basketball for a number of years. Today Slater is executive director of WinStar Foundation, a nonprofit organization that trains coaches – of all different sports – in skills such as communication and leadership.
In 2003, Slater was at a professional crossroads when she joined the Lamplighters Toastmasters club in Wilmington, North Carolina. Her confidence level was at an all-time low because her coaching career had ended, yet she also harbored a burning ambition to create a coaching academy.
“Right then I had to get my confidence back if I was going to be in a leadership role and make my dream come to fruition,” she says.
By practicing in her club and working with fellow members, the ex-athlete became a polished speaker, and now, heading up WinStar, she travels around the country delivering keynote presentations, teaching classes and running workshops for coaches and athletes.
“I wouldn’t have people calling me and asking me to speak to them,” she notes, “if I hadn’t taken the step to join Toastmasters.”
Editor’s Note: This article draws from two stories in the October issue of the Toastmaster magazine: “Leadership Lessons from Coaches” by Craig Harrison and “Coaching Confidence” by Paul Sterman.
Craig Harrison, DTM, of Berkeley, California, is a professional speaker, author and founder of Expressions of Excellence. Contact him via www.expressionsofexcellence.com/toastmasters/.
Paul Sterman is an associate editor of the Toastmaster magazine and a member of Le Gourmet Toastmasters in Costa Mesa, California.