The best coaches know the fruit is found in simplicity.
“Amateur coaches will try to impress you with complex modality. It’s because they’re trying to convince you of their competence.
Pro Coaches are often the most simple. Their confidence stems from their years in the game which proved to them simple is actually what works best.”
-Ray Zingler on Twitter
I can usually tell how great a Coach is not only by how simple he is, but how confident he is in being simple.
In my field of Strength & Conditioning, like most fields in the world, there are egos.
There are people who are always trying to be the most “cutting edge”, advanced, and differentiated. While I can respect the effort, it’s important to note that in the field of human performance, it’s not about how much you know or how smart you are..
It’s about how well you’re able to convey what you know to a demographic of people who don’t know nor care about this stuff like you do.
Essentially the objective is to simplify processes to expedite learning curves to streamline results, all while dealing with people of varying personalities who are looking to find some resemblance of joy in the process. Humans aren’t robots and they cannot be treated as such.
It’s again, simple, but it’s not easy.
And the coaches who don’t understand the primary objectives, who are spending copious amounts of time on the internet arguing that ‘their’ way is superior or spending excessive time getting highly nuanced with beginner/intermediate populations, are quite literally trying to save sinking boats with 5-gallon buckets.
I’ll just shoot you straight.
It all works.
Front squats, back squats, hang cleans, power cleans, they all work, provided you know how to program them properly and when to make adjustments to keep the body favorably adapting to stressors.
There is no “best way”.
Find out what works for you. Try. Error. Edit. Update. Continue to evolve, but recognize with athletes, less is more than likely going to be more.
The art of coaching isn’t found in complex terminology. It’s not being able to draw up the fanciest spreadsheet or gameplan, either.
It’s found in having the self-awareness to understand this game isn’t about you.
It’s about them.
“They” have a million other things going on in their lives competing for resources and bandwidth.
Simplify the process for them.
They’ll get the results they’re after and have more fun while achieving them. And the best part? You can pour into them beyond sets and reps.
You’re not impressing anybody with complexity, especially not your athletes.
