Background
During the previous season (2020/21) whilst coaching an Academy U16 team, I adapted the above template from a FAW course, that provided an opportunity to empower players to share their thoughts, feelings and feedback around the coaching environment. With this group of players being totally new to me and the coaching team(Personally and as Coaches), we wanted to gain an insight into them as people and players.
What was working? What needed to be improved/adapted or built upon to make the environment more inclusive, person-centred and where they felt appreciated. How could we (Coaches) and the academy continue to support them?
Implementation
**This can be implemented individually, collectively, anonymously whichever suits you and the environment that you work within.
For us, we used the firebreak lockdown in Wales (November) to meet virtually with each individual player and parents to complete the above template without judgement or consequence. From which, we collated all the information together and presented it back to the players/families and further developed our environment once we were permitted to.
I’ve also supported another age group that choose to conduct these in person, within a classroom environment where they were completed anonymously with no parents present.
Feedback
The questions within the feedback template can be changed to scaffold around specific areas that you’d like to further explore with the open-mindedness to receive feedback relating to your coaching, it’s important not to take these personally or to be seen as failures, it’s an opportunity to learn and build to become a better version of yourself. No environment is perfect and it’s imperative to generate as much feedback as possible to continually improve and facilitate a fun, and inclusive learning environment that players consistently want to return to on a weekly basis, fully in acknowledgement that they play an equal and pivotal role as well.
Download
Feel free to download the above template for Free by click the below
Development
I’m more than happy to further discuss the above feedback template if you have any questions or suggestions please get in touch to explore further.
Thank you
Really appreciate all the support
Richard Cashman
The Sporting Resource
The Sporting Resource 