In part one of this series I hopefully made the point
that punishment has no place in sports.
If a poor behavior can be corrected with education and learning or if
there are better alternative solutions than punishment then punishment is a
poor choice.
Perhaps the greatest ill-effect punishment has on an
athlete’s motivation and ability to learn is the toll it takes on the
coach/athlete relationship. No one
enjoys being punished. The person giving
out the punishment is tied closely to that feeling. Earning trust and respect takes time. Either can be easily lost with one
misdeed. Our efforts as coaches should
be as a guide, someone supporting the goals of the athlete. Punishing our athletes will slide us a little
more toward an antagonistic relationship with them rather than a supporting
relationship. Please don’t misunderstand me. We don’t have to pretend to be happy when misbehavior disappoints us. We don’t have to hide our disappointment. Disappointment is an honest emotion. It is okay for an athlete to know her poor choices have disappointed her coach. What’s critical is how the coach reacts to that disappointment.
If a coach
reacts to disappointment with thought they will realize the poor choices made
by athletes are mistakes. We should all
learn from our mistakes, doing so helps decrease the chances of making the same
mistake again. In part one of this
series I stated “Our society punishes to decrease the likelihood that a
behavior will be repeated.” It appears
as if education and punishment share a common goal, decreasing the likelihood
that a poor behavior or mistake will be repeated. If disappointment and thought are the
reactions to misbehavior or poor performance then education will most likely be
the solution to the problem.
What if
misbehavior or poor performance stirs other emotions in the coach? We all recognize anger when we see it. Anger doesn’t move around incognito, its
presence is obvious. Let me say this
before going on; if the emotion stirred in a coach following a poor performance
by an athlete or team is anger, the coach needs to quit coaching until they get
to the bottom of their personal psychological issues. The coach who feels angry following a poor
performance by his team or by one of his athletes is not coaching for the
benefit of the athlete or the team. This
coach has allowed their ego to play too large a role in their reasoning to coach. A coach who reacts to disappointment with
anger will more likely use punishment to solve the problem than a coach who
reacts with thought.
An angry, ego
involved coach will dish out punishment as revenge for damaging their ego,
making them look bad in front of someone they wanted to impress, dropping in
the standings or slowing progress toward reaching a goal their ego helped them
set. How is the coach/athlete
relationship affected by a coach who seeks revenge on his players for making
poor choices or playing poorly? In the
original Karate Kid movie Mr. Miyage asked Daniel why he wanted to learn karate. Daniel, who had been getting beat up by boys
from the local karate dojo, answered “how’s revenge sound.” Mr. Miyage replied with sound advice “you
look revenge that way, start by digging two graves.” His point was this; the first act of revenge
can start a dangerous cycle that damages all involved in the struggle. In our case that struggle would be between
the coach and athlete. If a coach and
athlete are to struggle, they should struggle together to reach their
goals. Struggling against each other
will cause both to fail.
The use of punishment decreases motivation and slows
learning in other, subtle ways. A couple
of examples may help increase awareness of the more subtle downfalls of using
punishment. Keep in mind the point I
made in part one, if the athlete PERCEIVES they are being penalized for their
actions, you have a punishment component in play. A coach may believe they are teaching and
trying to help an athlete improve, while at the same time the athlete feels the
coach is punishing them. As coaches, we
must always work to improve our ability to read our athletes so we can see our
actions from their perspective.
Example #1:
·
A
gymnast is told by her coach “each time you don’t stick your landing you have
to do 20 sit-ups.”
o Will the gymnast put more effort into
sticking her landings? Probably
(temporary gain from punishment, The Coaching Trap)
o Will the gymnast try to avoid the skill she
is struggling to stick? Most likely,
because we try to avoid punishment and every turn that isn’t stuck receives
punishment. By taking fewer turns she
decreases the chance of being punished.
o Will the gymnast avoid doing sit-ups in the
future? Most definitely, because she
will see them as punishment and punishment is to be avoided.
·
There
are two negatives coming out of this situation.
o While the coach is hoping to decrease steps
on landings, she may decrease the number of turns the gymnast takes, removing
opportunities to improve.
o In an attempt to decrease the likelihood of a
poor performance, the coach has presented what could be a positive exercise
(sit-ups) as punishment. Remember, we
try to avoid punishment. So, this
gymnast will try to avoid sit-ups in the future because she sees them as a
negative rather than a positive.
o If strength and conditioning is an important
ingredient in an athlete’s success then it must not be perceived as punishment. If strength and conditioning exercises are
assigned because of poor performance or lack of effort, they will be perceived
as punishment.
Example #2:
·
A basketball
coach is disappointed in his team’s free throw shooting in games, so he tells
his team “every time one of you misses a free throw in a game each of you will
shoot 50 extra free throws after the next practice.”
o How will the players perceive the extra free
throws, as punishment or extra practice?
Remember, they were assigned because of poor performance.
o Jimmy got in the game long enough to shoot
one free throw, which he missed. Johnny
played most of the game and made all 7 of his free throws. How is Johnny going to feel about the 50
extra free throws assigned? How is Jimmy
going to feel about his short contribution in the game? He didn’t get the point for the free throw he
missed and he caused all of his teammates to stay after practice to shoot 50 free
throws each.
§ Punishing an entire team for the actions of
one teammate is most often a no-no for developing a positive team culture. Remember, no one likes being punished and
that feeling is transferred to the person delivering the punishment. In this case, that person is a teammate (even
though it was a gutless coach who assigned the punishment and then pinned it on
the shoulders of the player).
o Instead of using conditioning as punishment,
this coach is using the skill that needs improved as punishment. Something about that just doesn’t seem right.
Often the
actions of a coach following misbehavior are based on the options the coach
feels are available, options the coach is comfortable using. Because punishment seems to be an easy and
available option it gets used more than it should. With experience the number of options a coach
is comfortable using will increase and more tools for dealing with misbehavior
and the disappointment it causes will be developed. Part three of this series will deal with
alternatives to punishment. The goal is
to help you be pro-active in filling your “toolbox” with the most appropriate
tools to use to fix misbehavior and poor performance.
