sports coach UK Research Summary 14Communication Preferences and Styles

Communication is more than just what is said. It is a mixture of verbal and non-verbal messages that can changedepending on individual preferences or the circumstances. As a coach, understanding your own style and thepreferences of your athletes can make a real difference to your coaching effectiveness. This summary looks atnew research with coaches and athletes to show how communication can vary by coach, gender of athlete andtype of sport.

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sports coach UK Research Summary 14 – Communication Preferences and Styles

Communication and coaching

Previous research has found that the ability tocommunicate effectively is one of the distinguishingfactors of an expert coach. It has been described as askill that separates the novice coach from the greatone. While novice coaches will focus on finding waysto help players understand instruction from thecoach’s perspective, the expert will try tocommunicate more effectively based on theirunderstanding of the player’s perspective. Therefore,finding what appeals to your athletes or players iscentral to developing as a coach.

Good communication doesn’t just increase coachingskills but also impacts directly on the player. Ifsomeone is to learn, then they need to understandwhat they are being told.

Research has shown that how coaches communicatedirectly influences how players perform and behave.

Everything a person does or says can be consideredcommunication. For that reason, it is important tolook at both verbal and non-verbal (visual)communication. In addition to this, different peopleare likely to look for, and respond to, different formsof communication. This all increases the repertoire ofskills a coach must have to communicate well, andexplains why good communication is linked toexpertise.

It is for this reason that some researchers havespeculated that communication skills are the mostimportant skills for a coach to possess.

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sports coach UK Research Summary 14 – Communication Preferences and Styles

New research conducted by Ezzeldin Aly at theGraceland University in America examined both verbaland visual communication, and the similarities anddifferences between coaches, players and types of sport.

He surveyed over 200 athletic students and 14 coachesabout the development of communication,communication styles and timing. Those surveyed were amix of male and female students who took part in bothteam and individual sports. This provided results for anumber of different contexts that would be interestingfor coaches in different situations.

Methods

All the coaches in the study agreed they used bothverbal and non-verbal/visual communication methods,and all were aware that their communication differeddepending on whether they were calm or nervous. Theyalso tended to believe that they were more focused intheir communication before and after events than theirathletes.

However, in other regards, communication styles andpreferences varied, especially between coaches of teamsports and individual sports. Team coaches were muchmore likely to agree that communication enhancesperformance while those in individual sports were lessconvinced. This is likely to be due to the level ofinteraction coaches in team sports have during acompetition compared to individual sports.

During games, coaches felt that they preferred tocommunicate with one athlete, rather than the wholeteam. All coaches agreed that they increasedcommunication when winning, but when they werelosing, coaches of individual sports felt they did notincrease communication. Again, the type of sport maybe playing a part here. Aly speculates thatcommunication between athlete and coach happensbefore the event in individual sports, with little chancefor change later, whereas, in team sports, the coach canchange plans in the midst of the game. In other words, acoach’s willingness to communicate during competitionis directly linked to how much impact it is likely to have.

One of the interesting mismatches to emerge from thestudy was with male coaches. They felt their style ofcommunication was more verbal and they did not usenon-verbal communication, whereas their players felttheir style was much more non-verbal. Perhaps playersare seeing things in their coach that the coach is noteven aware of.

Communication styles andpreferences of coaches

Putting all this information together, what advice can acoach take away to improve their communication?Regardless of whether you are talking about male orfemale athletes, the key is to understand yourself andtalk to your athletes about their preferences. Notsurprisingly, the key to coach-athlete communicationis good communication!

Some questions to ask yourself:

• Do you know your own communication style andpreferences? When you communicate, are youusing verbal or visual styles, or a combination ofboth? Why not ask another coach to observeyou? If you want to help your players tounderstand how you communicate, you need toknow yourself first.

• Does your communication style change when thepressure is on? If so, are your players aware, anddo they know to look for different messages atdifferent times?

• Have you discussed with your athletes what thefastest form of communication is during a game?You may be giving verbal signals while they arelooking for visual clues.

• Who are you going to communicate with? Haveyou identified one person on the pitch you aregoing to communicate with? This may beespecially useful if different team members havedifferent preferences for verbal or visual styles.Identify the player you want to communicatewith and agree the style in advance.

With individual sports, you may also want to work oncontingencies for what to do if the situation changesand you can’t communicate there and then.

Learning from the research

sports coach UK Research Summary 14 – Communication Preferences and Styles

When athletes were asked who they communicatewith most frequently, those in team sports saidtheir coach, but those in individual sports said theirteammates. These results are again probablyinfluenced by the nature of the sport, with athletesin individual sports (such as swimming) unable tocommunicate with their coach during a race.

It is interesting that there was no differencebetween team and individual sports in terms ofcommunication styles. Preferences for verbal orvisual communication do not vary by type of sportas they do by gender.

The biggest differences between male and femaleathletes were concerned with communicationduring a game and, in particular, the fastest way toget the message across. For male athletes, thiscould be either verbal or visual communication,but female athletes showed a preference forvisual communication. The research suggests thatincreasing the use of special signs and gestureswould be a good communication strategy forcoaches of female athletes. Conversely, increasingthe use of such signs will have less impact onmale players.

Male and female athletecommunication preferences

Team and individual sportcommunication preferences

If you are interested in finding out more about thisarea, this summary is based on the article below:

Aly, E. (2014) ‘Communication management amongathletes and coaches’, European Scientific Journal, 3:1857–1881.

Other interesting articles on communication aresuggested below:

Bloom, G.A. (1996). ‘Life at the top’, in Salmela, J.H.(ed) Great Job, Coach!. Ottawa, ON: Potentium. ISBN: 978-0-968093-50-4. pp. 139–178.

Culver, D. and Trudel, P. (2000) ‘Coach-athletecommunication within an elite alpine ski team zone ofexcellence’, www.zoneofexcellence.ca

Lyle, J. and Cushion, C. (eds) (2010) Sports Coaching.London: Elsevier. ISBN: 978-0-702030-54-3.

References

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sports coach UK Research Summary 14 – Communication Preferences and Styles

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