Winthrop's Dr. David Schary: Winning can overshadow feedback

Youth sports are important to me.

I believe that sports can teach young people valuable lessons, but only if the coaches and parents make good decisions. Unfortunately, as a young coach, I made many mistakes in this area. Hopefully, my experience can help others from following in my footsteps.

After only coaching for nine months, I was put in charge of a rowing team filled with middle and high school-aged girls. The athletes had little experience and the team was coming off an unsuccessful season. Despite the fact that this was a club-level team, I was full of big dreams. I took over with the vision of winning it all.

Within the first month, I made a series of decisions that I still regret today. It all started about one month into my coaching tenure; two sisters wanted to join the team. During my first meeting, I immediately categorized them. Mary, the older sister, was going to be one of my best athletes. She was tall and strong, I felt she was gifted all the athletic talent the parents had in their genes. Her sister, Julie, was two years younger, about six inches shorter, and looked unathletic.

I do not regret my initial impressions, but I do regret everything that happened after. Thinking Mary was going to lead my team to a championship, I began to treat her differently than Julie. I not only gave Mary more feedback, I gave her better feedback. I told her how to fix the slightest error, encouraged her progress, and understood if she had an occasional “off” day. Julie, on the other hand, barely got any of my attention. My feedback to her was poor, no specifics on how to improve, just the occasional “good job” or “try harder.”

It was not long before Mary became a star. Julie eventually quit the team; and I’ll never forget her mom telling me that “Julie is just not having fun anymore.” I still shudder when I think about that conversation.

My initial snap judgment of the sisters caused a ripple effect. Without even talking to either sister, I immediately thought Mary had the athletic potential to help me win so I gave her more and better attention. As a result, Mary drastically improved, reinforcing my expectation. At the same time, I thought Julie had little potential to help me win, so I gave her limited attention and poor feedback. As a result, Julie never improved and eventually quit the team, which reinforced my expectation. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Obviously, I do not know if I could have prevented Julie from quitting. But that is not the point to my story. Unfortunately I let my expectations get the best of me because I was not worrying about the athletes’ experience; rather I was worried about my own glory in helping a losing team win again.

I should have provided Julie with the best experience possible. My regret is that I pushed Julie out the door because I did not think she could help the team win. But was that my place?

I do not think so. I was not coaching elite athletes; it was a club team. My future employment did not hinge on winning a championship. Instead, I let my ego get in the way; I let my desire to win influence the participation and enjoyment of the athletes on the team. I had a responsibility to these young adults to introduce a sport, teach the skills, and compete in a fun environment.

Please do not misunderstand me; winning is part of the game, especially as athletes get older. As a coach, you are doing a disservice to your athletes if you do not acknowledge that winning is part of the game. Winning, however, is not the only reason kids play sports. There are a host of other reasons, the top two being to have fun and be with friends.

An overemphasis on the importance of winning can cause coaches and parents to make decisions based on what they want (winning) rather than what the athlete might want (to have fun). As adults, we need to understand that our decisions will impact young athletes, for better or worse.

Even the legendary basketball coach John Wooden understood this principle. Reflecting on his career, Wooden said, “Looking back, I think I sometimes failed to get reserves to feel how important they were. Over time, some of my players began to tell me that. My intentions were to make the reserves feel important to the team, and I thought I did. I guess I was fooling myself.”

Being human, it is natural to make snap judgments, which is why first impressions matter so much. But do not let your first impression affect your coaching, give support and quality feedback to all your athletes, regardless of your initial expectations.

This story was originally published March 28, 2015 at 10:11 PM with the headline "Winthrop's Dr. David Schary: Winning can overshadow feedback."