Empower

Delivering Empathetic Leadership

By Jason Witt

Posted on January 10, 2023

Your players want and need you to care about them. By caring about your players in a empathetic way – you will breed trust within a healthy relationship which facilitates growth.

Those you lead will see right through you if you care about you and only you. Your followers want and need you to care about them and helping them achieve their goals. Caring about your followers will breed trust and healthy relationships which facilitates growth. #DailyMight

For years I’ve deployed a coaching philosophy that I refer to as Reaching the PEAK. It focuses on four leadership principles – Persistence, Empathy, Authenticity, Knowledge – each represented in the acronym of PEAK (with a double meaning referencing the summit of the youth sports mountain). It has been an effective gameplan for leading and mentoring youth athletes. Especially empathy.

Coaching youth athletes has changed considerably over my decades long coaching career. When I first began my journey, coaches were taught to be hard nosed and battle tested. They weren’t your friend, they were your coach – and rarely both. You didn’t talk about feelings. It was their way, or the highway and the highway was often filled with distant relationships and colorful language. And it was effective. Until it wasn’t.

Do not let any unwholesome talk come our of your mouth, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
Ephesians 4:29

Youth sports, like life, is relationship based and coaches have adapted. Back then, I believe the missing ingredient in these key transformational relationships was trust. Coaches back then were skilled and knowledgeable, but lacked a focus on building a relationship with players. They lacked the emotional connection to gain trust needed to be able to truly coach and mentor an athlete. They needed to care about them to achieve goals consistently. They lacked empathy.

Kids are smart. Without a focus on relationships, they will see right through you if you care about you and only you (winning games, advancing your career, etc). Empathy (the ability to understand and share feelings), plays an important part in the coach player connection. I’m reminded in Ephesians where Paul warns us against unwholesome language, bitterness, improper use of anger, slander, and bad attitudes towards others. All the ways we sabotage trust and empathy in a player/coach relationship. He reminds us instead of acting that way, we should be forgiving, grace giving, and protective of the trust within a relationship.

Your players want and need you to care about them. By caring about your players in a empathetic way – you will breed trust within a healthy relationship which facilitates growth.

Give everything your everything. And then some.

If you’d like, connect with me on Twitter and Facebook, where I’ll share near daily insight on helping you navigate youth sports.