Unconditional love in HP Sport?? How about caring with conditions....

Let’s start with the unpopular opinion punchline; I believe HP teams and originations should not refer to themselves being family, brotherhoods or similar terms as within HP sport, there is always conditions and expectations. I strongly believe there should be massive volumes of love, consideration and care between coaches and athletes yet unlike paternal or sibling relationships as example, there has to be high levels of accountability and responsibility for their actions and performance. 2024 means the start of new research project and as am extending my research into HP age grade athletes and investigate further into why they make the decisions they make or choose their committed sport and invest in dedicated practice, it’s led me to question again where is the balance between what athletes bring in terms of traits and motivations against what we offer in our coaching practices and HP environments.

Coming back to my opinion, which I believe is applicable in sport and business, I believe high performing teams have conscious and unconscious standards and expectations for fellow team members or organisation personnel. Some recent ideas and articles reminded me of my stance, starting with watching Netflix series, Tour De France: Unchained. This highlights following different teams and riders throughout 2022 Tour De France, all with different personal agendas and team goals while competing in the same race. While most riders followed team guidelines and expectations, one event sticks to mind where both sides pushing their agenda nearly broke the see-saw of team vs personal goals balance. AUS cyclist, Ben O’Connor suffers a serious injury and is pressured to ride through the pain for “the good of the team” by Julien Jurdie, Sports Director for the predominantly French AG2R Citroen Team. Jurdie espouses love for the team, but his team presentations before each stage fight against this idea of unconditional love for the team and focuses heavily on performance. His pressuring of young Aussie pro Ben O’Connor to continue racing after he suffers a serious and very painful muscle tear in his left upper leg verges on bullying.

Compare this to relationship focused, democratic leadership style focuses on influencing and inspiring others through communication and dialogue; within the Netflix series, former British National Champion Steve Cummings, who has returned to professional cycling as a Directeur Sportif at Ineos Grenadiers, displays this admirably as he discusses the roles of the team vs the goals of the individuals with Geriant Thomas. The episode highlights Tom Pidcock’s emotional win on the Alp d’Huez stage after Cummings persuades Geraint Thomas to untether him shows love and connectedness to all members of the team yet again, displays how honesty, integrity and strong relationships allows him to be accountable for his choices and makes other accountable for their personal goals vs team actions.

Let’s compare this to a story from America earlier this year; Dallas Cowboys came short of their annual target of a Super Bowl win again this year but Dak Prescott, Cowboy’s franchise quarterback talked how they got themselves in thick of NFL SB race and him having one of his better seasons on records thanks to 'brotherhood' team accountability. He stated:

Guys expect to do everything that we're doing right now. So right now it's just about staying at that level, not getting complacent, continuing to push one another, continuing to compete at practice…Camaraderie, the brotherhood, the goofiness of being able to flip that switch, lock in, be accountable to one another and play at a high level is what's special about that group in there.

Guys are more disciplined, guys are being accountable to it…Not just [saying], 'We got this brotherhood, that's our strength.' But rather like, 'It's our strength because of what I do, so I got to make sure I do my job. I got to make sure I stay committed to my role. The way (the practice team) approach the practices and the looks they give us, they're not bullshitting. I think that's goes a long way. The brotherhood is to make sure we take that application to the field

In both stories and other sports applications, there is plenty of love, care and concern for fellow players and coaches alike; however, to understand, support each other and build relationships to embrace mutual, harmonious passion and accountability with care to build strong, close relationships with support goals as opposed to thwarting motivation. I want to focus on the aspects of relatedness, connection and concerned accountability that a good coach-athlete relationship can offer; all coaching environments need to adopt and offer players ingredients for genuine motivation; mastery, autonomy and purpose. These ingredients are echoed within research conducted in sports coaching involving study of self-determination theory, which addresses innate psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness. Amorose supported that “the more athletes felt autonomous, competent and have sense of relatedness, the more reasons for participating were self-determined in future” (Amorose, 2007). Mallet researched and explained that “self-determination theory underscores the role of environment in fuelling people’s perceptions of (autonomy, competence and relatedness) in contexts of sport” (Mallett, 2005). We understand drive in most sporting participants is found from intrinsic motives; their internal desire to master their sports and challenge themselves through committed engagement in highly repetitive activities. So where do high performance coaches fit within developing these motives plus having and developing a concerned and caring relationship in a HP environment where performance and winning are seemingly the most important outcomes?

The challenge of successful coaching is acknowledging social interactive dilemmas within individual and team goal setting and development, offering suitable scenarios and choices with care and compassion with all members’ involvement and collaboratively dealing with matters as opposed to eradicating them. INEOS Steve Cummings’ interactions with team members, treating them as individuals yet able to put the team decisions first and Prescott’s conditional love for all HP members of Dallas Cowboys are examples how team members can be seen as people as opposed to solely athletes. Studies have shown that athlete satisfaction is related to the degree to which athletes understand their role and responsibilities within interactive sports teams. (Eys, 2007). The main aspects of influential and successful coach-athlete relationships revolve around ideals such as mutual trust, respect, support, cooperation, communication and understanding of each other and impact of each other within the relationship. Both performance enhancement and physiological well-being is deeply ingrained within the coach-athlete relationship. Coaches need to acknowledge and recognise the effects of positive, interdependent relationships, which are dynamic and interlinked with cognition, feelings and behaviours to achieve common recognised goals (Jowett, 2007). Therefore, a coach’s ability to acknowledge and develop positive interpersonal connections, driven by interpersonal skills and united sense of purpose and achievement can offer solid base for positive group climate. Like displayed by Steve Cummings, deep understanding and relationships with harmonious passion between coach and player are extremely important for athlete development.

Attunement is “the ability to bring one’s actions and outlook into harmony with other people and context you are in” (Balduck, 2011). Recent studies recognised high levels of individual’s intrinsic motivations when coaches, such as INEOS Grenadier’s leader Steve Cummings, exhibit a leadership style that empathised training and instructional behaviours while exhibiting democratic behaviour rather than autocratic leadership styles (Amorose, 2007b). Applying Galinsky and Maddux’s research to sporting context would recognise that “taking perspective of (player) produced both greater joint gains and profitable individual outcomes”. In a sports context, this could be seen as improved coach-athlete relationships, regular player involvement in decision making processes, honest and accurate goal attainment for coach, player and playing group as a whole and personal development from all stakeholders.

Research by Dan Pink (2010) acknowledges empathy as important as it can build enduring relationships and defuse conflicts. These ideas are supported by Jowett’s research, which recognises 3+1 C’s (closeness, commitment, complementary and coordination) (Jowett, 2007) being critical for successful coach-athlete relationships. I believe a coach’s ability to use contrast principle, offering clarity by adding context, honesty and reasoning when offering perspective for dynamic and interactive coaching scenarios experienced and athlete relations shall reap long term gains and reciprocal commitment and closeness from athlete in return. My beliefs are echoed in past research including investigations by Mageau and Vallerand (2003); they believe coaches need to offer players opportunity for choice, acknowledge player feelings and perspective, limit controlling behaviours while valuing initiative, problem solving and involvement in decision making (Mageau, 2003).

As suggested, this focus on empathy and close, meaningful relationships between coaches, players and all stakeholders involved offers meaningful impact and actions by the players. Players drive their own development and reflect on personal and collective performance to allow the coach to offer closeness and desired commitment to their relationships through autonomy supportive practices. We as leaders or coaches should reflect and build our interpersonal skills to allow us to take time in future to better know and understand our athletes to gain a holistic view of involved players. The art of GOOD coaching is knowing how and when to communicate, and how this varies from individual. Work on empathetic relationships and having a better understanding of your athletes or players as this will allow you to modify your environment or approaches for greater impact and understanding. Know your players or team members, know their story, know their context and then put it into concerned practice…