Athletics is a key avenue to developing leaders. It’s important that coaches model, encourage and emphasize leadership as one of many aspects of an athlete’s sport participation. It’s crucial to focus on developing leaders on and off the field. You can start by empowering your athletes to take an active role in their development as a player, as well as a potential leader.

How can we empower our players to embrace a leadership role? Start by modeling what it looks like to be a leader. This begins a coach who knows what leadership means to them and operating under clearly established values. Good leaders know themselves and their values, communicate well with others, are accountable and committed, and they take risks. You can demonstrate all of these qualities through your work with your players, but also in how you interact with the rest of the coaching staff, parents, and others who are involved.

After you model this leadership style and establish the culture of the team, empowering players to take on similar leadership characteristics becomes possible. That said, not every leader has to embrace the exact same leadership style. In empowering your players to become leaders, encourage them to find a style that fits for them and embraces their strengths. Some athletes often shy away from seeing themselves as leaders because they don’t fit a certain mold, a certain idea they have in their mind of what a leader “should be.” Openly discuss the different styles of leadership that can be present and the importance of leading in different ways. Tell your players they all have leadership potential. Leadership is not a “one size fits all” proposition.

Athletes thrive off feedback they receive, especially feedback from coaches. As a coach, you have the opportunity to reinforce athletes for their strengths, their leadership contributions, and their impact on others. While you may think an athlete recognizes their own strengths and impact, they often cannot see these things in themselves without reinforcement.

So by highlighting their strengths, stating when you see them doing something well on and off the field, and encouraging them to share this feedback with one another, you are helping to create a culture of open communication, reinforcement of strengths, and ultimately confidence in themselves as players and leaders. An athlete may not know their leadership potential without reinforcement and encouragement from others.

Talk openly with athletes about what it means to be a leader. Athletes may wonder if they want to be leaders. Help athletes understand how this role can impact them, as well as their team. Encourage athletes to openly discuss what it means to be a leader, including the benefits and drawbacks of a leadership role. As a coach, you have likely had ample opportunities to experience both, and you can model the value in being a leader for your athletes despite some of the challenges that come along with it.

Empowering athletes to develop as leaders and take an active role in their development can be challenging. Encouraging them to be accountable to themselves and others is not easy. However, if they can connect the development of leadership skills and the importance of having firmly established values, communication, accountability/commitment, and taking risks to the potential of reaching their goals, many athletes will embrace the opportunity to take on this role.

As coaches, you have the ability to shape athletes. You can do this by modeling leadership, embracing and encouraging various leadership styles, providing feedback regarding their strengths as leaders, and helping them understand why leadership is so important. And through sport, you can help create the avenue for future leaders, on and off the field.

To learn more, visit St. Vincent Sports Performance