The Three C's of Coaching: Collaborate, Communicate, and Conform
Being a good coach requires many qualities. Most importantly, you should abide by The Three C's of Coaching....
WEEKLY WISDOM: THE THREE C’S
Through my limited coaching experiences and the consumption of educational mediums like books, podcasts, social media pages, articles, and more, I have come to understand that there are three words every coach should abide by: The Three C’s…
Collaborate
Communicate
Conform
COLLABORATE
Collaboration is a key ingredient to success as a coach. It can be easy to stay within our own heads and follow that voice that comforts us with “you know best.” The brain will find its comfort zone and want to stay there. However, how can you grow in your understanding of the sport and coaching if you don’t challenge your own ways of thinking? Sure, you may be a very knowledgeable and effective coach, but that doesn’t mean you have it all figured out. There are a TON of coaches out there, many of which are very good at what they do and (likely) know some things that you don’t. Drop the ego and reach out to other coaches and/or athletes. Send them a training plan and/or month of training you’ve produced for one of your athletes and ask for their perspective. Notably, make sure to provide a small background on the athlete and their current training if they aren’t already aware of that.
Anecdotally speaking, this is something that I have been doing more and more recently with my friend and assistant coach at Robert Morris University, Juris Silenieks1. It’s been a very informative and educating experience, and it’s resulted in me making small (but significant) changes to some of my athlete’s plans.
COMMUNICATE
If you aren’t already communicating with your athletes, you need to start. Communication is an essential piece of the puzzle. It allows you to stay in tune with your athletes and how they’re feeling from workout to workout, week to week, both physically and mentally. It may be that an athlete of yours is hesitant to speak up about an issue or concern of theirs, so it is your responsibility to allow an open and welcoming space for communication. Reach out to your athletes from time to time—I’d say a minimum of once a week—and ask them how they’re feeling.
Of course, it may be that an athlete of yours does not want to be in constant communication, but that is something that you should establish upon taking on a new athlete. The desired level of involvement will vary from athlete to athlete.
CONFORM
Without communication, it will be hard to succeed in this category. Conforming is about adapting to your athlete’s current situation in training, which is always susceptible to change. Other words that could be used are adaptability and flexibility.
In my own coaching experiences, there have been many times when an athlete and I chose to dial back their training for a week—due to feeling overly fatigued/sore/achy—to allow for adequate and full recovery so that they could continue with the intensive training. Oftentimes, this meant dropping a workout (or two) and lowering the daily mileage for 3-7 days, depending on when they felt fully recovered and ready to get back after it. In this way, we are one, reducing the ever-existing possibilities of injury and mental/physical burnout, and two, allowing the athlete to fully absorb the training they had done up to this point (a topic discussed in detail here).
Doing these three things is essential to being a good coach. If you’re only doing one or two of these things, consider completing the three C’s to bring your coaching—and resultantly, your athletes—to the next level.
Next week’s post: The “perfect” training week: Doing all the right things.
MY TRAINING WEEK
Here was my last week of training, totaling 37.74 miles (4h25m) in 4 runs:
Monday: 8.37 miles at 7:02/mi + hill drills
15’ Foot and ankle stability (3x10 heel descents off step, 3x1’ SLS, 8xankle clock drills)
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
Tuesday: 11.05 miles w/ 12x200m uphill sprints w/ jog down recovery in 35-36, 4-minute rest, 2 miles steady in 11:22 (5:41/mi)
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
30’ Foot and ankle stability/strength (Foot mobility, 3'x10 heel descents off step, 3x1’ SLS, 8xankle clock drills, toe adductions w/ band, 2x30 3D rocks w/ band)
Wednesday: Off
30’ Blackboard2 exercises
25’ Yoga
20’ Walk
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
Thursday: 8.17 miles at 7:24/mi
15’ Blackboard exercises
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
Friday: 10.15 miles w/ 5-mile threshold in ~27:35 (5:31/mi), 3-minute rest, 4x16-18-second strides on 90-second cycles
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
Saturday: Off
40’ Foot and ankle stability/strength (similar to Tuesday’s routine with just a little more)
15’ Self-massage + foam-rolling
Sunday: Off
20’ Blackboard exercises
This week was a frustrating and disappointing week for me. My lower back started to feel agitated at the beginning of the week, and I stupidly worked out Tuesday despite it not feeling the best going into the hill repeats. Sure enough, I put myself in a bit of a rut after Tuesday and was in pain throughout the day and into the next, hence taking Wednesday off. On Thursday, I felt better and more so in the warmup before Friday’s workout, but again, afterward, I felt the same pain as Tuesday and realized yet again I had made a mistake. Because of that, I opted for two full days of rest, and the plan is to go easy and short tomorrow. Ultimately, the priority is to show up to my planned 5k race next weekend healthy and ready to run fast; if that means I need to take time off for the back and take this next week easy, then that’s what I’ll do. Fingers crossed my back will be in good condition come next Sunday!
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If you want personalized coaching and/or training advice, I’d be happy to help. You can email me at jacobreesmontgomery@gmail.com or send me a direct message on Instagram.
No-shame plug - I’ve had two conversations with Juris on my All Things Running Podcast. :)
A new tool I’ve picked up for my foot health. We’ll see if it helps at all! :)