2016 Momentum Magazine
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The Power of Positive CA has always been about the Power of Posi- GREAT COACHES EXPLOIT THE POWER OF Ptive, from the very beginning. POSITIVE. When we honored San Francisco Gi- As a young teacher aide working for Shirley ants’ Manager Bruce Bochy with our Ronald L. Pearl and Don Challman – who were way ahead of Jensen Award for Lifetime Achievement several their time – I saw how kids with few advantages in years ago, he addressed the need for resilience in life blossomed when they were treated to relentless baseball’s long season. “You are going to have doses of positive reinforcement to fill their Emo- slumps and the key to resilience is to remain pos- tional Tanks. As a youth coach, I saw how kids itive.” Bruce has used that positivity to win three with every advantage did poorly when they re- World Series Championships in the last few years. ceived negative feedback. The result of those two Phil Jackson, PCA’s national spokesperson, experiences was Positive Coaching Alliance. attributed some of his amazing success to PCA: Mary Fry of the University of Kansas and “I became a better, more positive coach because of PCA’s National Advisory Board, summed it up, my association with Jim and PCA…” He especial- “Many coaches don’t realize how much good they ly appreciated what Professor John Gottman calls could do if they supported athletes, built them up, the Magic Ratio. “About that time, Jim’s book and believed in their incredible potential. It espe- shows up and Positive Coaching becomes an in- cially saddens me to see kids dealing with hard- fluence in my life, the 5:1 ratio, five praises to one ships in life (e.g., parents going through a divorce; critique…and of course the rest we know is that having a sick sibling; families with financial diffi- these Bulls won three championships in a row.” culties), treated harshly by coaches who don’t re- The plus-minus ratio is such a powerful alize the damage they do by being too critical, too tool that we believe that the single most import- negative, and by dealing with athletes only in terms ant action most coaches can take to become more of their sport performance and not as people.” effective is to up their own ratio to get closer to The single most harmful aspect to youth the Magic Ratio of five pieces of positive feed- sports is rampant negativity. And the most crying back for every criticism. need in youth sports is to make positive coaching SPORT PSYCHOLOGY PRACTITIONERS AGREE. the keystone of the youth sports culture. Consider: PCA benefits from the advice and involvement of THE RESEARCH IS CLEAR. As Alex Wolff wrote some of the top sport psychology practitioners in in “The Last Days of the Abusive Coach” – the the world such as Ken Ravizza and Charlie Ma- Sports Illustrated article for which I was inter- her of the Cleveland Indians (podcasts with both viewed – “Study after study shows the benefits of Ken and Charlie are within PCADevZone.org, a more positive approach.” and it is time well spent to listen to them!). Char- lie has a great phrase, “mind in the moment,” Barbara Fredrickson, of the University of which is what athletes need in order to excel in North Carolina and PCA’s National Advisory their sports. And what does negativity do? It dis- Board, describes the problem and the solution: “… tracts! It takes your mind out of the moment! there’s a perception that the best way to get what you want out of employees or players is by nega- Negativity distracts athletes from devoting tivity or threats…But…negativity doesn’t work as their full attention to the task they are trying to well as positivity.” accomplish. Ohio State’s Ben Tepper, a member of PCA’s National Advisory Board, says, “We all Barbara coined a term I love, “Upward Spi- have a finite amount of energy. You’re concerned ral,” which every coach and leader needs to un- with whether your coach will yell at you rather derstand. “Positive emotions are especially con- than doing your job, so it impairs your executive tagious and a leader’s positive emotions are more function.” contagious than anyone else’s.” 2 | Positive Coaching Alliance | MOMENTUM The Power of Positive THE KEY. So I am excited that PCA is making a renewed how this works at a grassroots level in the adjacent Impact commitment to vigorously promote the Power of Positive as Snapshot. the key to making youth sports the valuable and impactful Remember this phrase: The Power of Positive. You’ll experience it can (and needs to) be. When youth athletes feel be hearing it a lot as PCA makes it a rallying cry in our mis- they are connected to their coach and teammates, they will sion to develop Better Athletes, Better People! commit to giving their best effort to the team. And the reverse is also true. Kids will not commit to a team until they feel con- nected to their coach and teammates. It is the relentless filling of Emotional Tanks that connects athletes and unlocks all the wonderful benefits that sports can convey to kids. You’ll see PCA Founder and CEO Impact Snapshot Thanks For A State Championship That was the subject line of an e-mail sent to PCA Founder and CEO Jim Thompson. The rest of the message illustrating PCA’s impact on a coach is excerpted below. Jim, Just want to say thank you for all that you do and how you won the California State have changed my coaching life. I religiously listen to your Squirt A Championship podcasts when traveling or on the road to hockey games all game over a team that over California. I always look forward to getting back on the won 95 percent of their ice and using what I have learned with the kids at practice. games all year and had Listening to several podcasts this past weekend made me beat us the day before 8-1 want to share a story with PCA. in round-robin play. I coached a 10U travel hockey team in the East Bay The reason we won? Resiliency and sportsmanship. Area last year. I have always taught the kids to respect the We were down 2-0 going into the second period, but the game, and sportsmanship is what we are about. There were kids stayed with it, pushed back and tied the game 2-2. times last year that I wondered when I would see the pay- Once we pushed back, the other team started taking ill-ad- off for sticking to my ethics. There were several times where vised penalties and lost focus. We scored the next three teams would board our kids, swear at them incessantly on the goals and held on for a 5-4 win against a “superior” team. ice, hit them late after whistles and generally get away with We learned that sportsmanship pays off, and that things that I taught our kids not to do. I had to explain to the losses – even tough ones – are great teachers. I am the kids after those games that we are above that behavior and in luckiest coach around to have the opportunity to drive many games admit it wasn’t fair that we held a standard that these points home in the biggest game of our year. our opponents didn’t. It was very difficult at times, and I kept PCA drives my coaching, and it works. It seems so reassuring the kids that we were better people for it. simple that if you commit to the process, the results follow. We also lost several tournament championship games Unfortunately, there are many who don’t realize this, and during the season, including our own NorCal tournament. It it’s an uphill battle many times when you tell coaches, club was hard each time to go into the dressing room and explain administrators and parents that winning is way down on the how proud I was of the kids because of the effort and the tre- priority list over true player development. mendous amount of learning we gained from those losses. It Thanks, Jim, for all that your organization does. seemed like we just couldn’t get over the hump in big games. Well, I was fortunate to have the ultimate payoff for Erik Hove our sportsmanship and tough losses during the season. We Head Coach Peewee B, Tri-Valley Blue Devils Positive Coaching Alliance | MOMENTUM | 3 Hammering Messages Home he preceding year was marked by “We couldn’t be happier to have FOX Sports Tquantum leaps in how and where Supports as a partner,” said PCA Chief Impact Of- PCA reaches and impacts youth and ficer Tina Syer. “The extra reach we gain from this high school coaches, sports parents, ad- relationship will make tens of millions more people ministrators and student-athletes. The aware of PCA and our efforts to develop Better Ath- largest single advance came in the form letes, Better People. We are grateful to FOX’s Chris of FOX Sports selecting PCA as a beneficiary of its Hannan for bringing PCA this opportunity.” FOX Sports Supports program for 2016-2017, de- livering the PCA Movement its greatest mass media PCADevZone.org Draws 1.2 Million+ Visits exposure to date. Another huge advance in the way PCA communicates The program’s widespread stems from the maturation of efforts will include FOX Sports PCADevZone.org. Our website of producing and airing multiple more than 1,200 free audio-video PCA public service announce- and printable tips and tools drew ments across their national and more than 1.2 million visits in regional networks.