Failing to Plan? Plan on Failing.

What do you want to accomplish as a coach?

 Seriously. 

What are your goals? If you can’t answer these questions, then it’s time to start thinking about them. 

 Defense? That’s easy. Offense? No problem. Special teams? I’m ready. Those are the easy questions that it takes a coach no time to answer. You know what you want to run on each side of the ball and how you want to run it. Yet, biggest question that you must ask yourself is... 

 What do you want to accomplish as a coach? 

 The year-in, year-out, big picture stuff is easy for our minds to define. Offense and defense are the very first things that coaches think of, and rarely change. However, it is all the small, everyday decisions that can make or break the success of your team, and your coaching career. 

 If you haven’t already done so, write out your coaching philosophy. In it include what you want to accomplish, the type of coach that you want to be, how you will interact with kids, and what impact you want to have in the game of football. Your philosophy becomes a governing body, setting the standard and expectation that your coaching career will live up to. 

You have to set goals. 

 Start out the beginning of each season developing goals that you want to accomplish. The easiest goal for all coaches is to win. From there, set single-season goals not only for your team, but for your staff and for you personally. Now that you have the ball rolling, be thinking about your future; set goals for your career. Whether it’s to become a high school head coach or coordinator, a college assistant or a middle school lifer - make a plan for your future. Your kids know the goal on offense is to get to the end zone. What is your end zone? 

 How about the small stuff? 

 There is no such thing as small stuff in football. Many times, it’s how you, your staff, and your team do the small stuff that garner the biggest wins. Don’t overlook anything. Some things you can plan for. Some things you can’t. For the things you can plan for, then do. For the other things, let your philosophy drive how you will handle the situation. 

 Tardiness? Discipline? Meals? Transportation? Practice schedule? Off-season work? Coach development? Locker room set-up? Team building? 

 Some of these questions you may have an answer to because you've been around for a while. If you are a rookie testing the shark-infested water that is coaching, then these questions give you some things to think about. 

 Keep the big picture in view, but it’s the small things that can make or break your future . 

Seek out other coaches and see what has worked for them and what was a train-wreck. What were their goals starting out? What were some of their biggest problems, their greatest failures and successes? What were the little things focused on that gave them success? Coaches never stop coaching, so they will want to share this with you. 

 Start making a plan now. If you fail to do so, well, then be prepared to be stuck on the sidelines watching someone else have the success you didn't plan for.

Coach Your Coaches

Remember how unsure of yourself you felt in your first year of coaching? Even after years of coaching, you may still feel uncertainty at times. A good coach not only works through that uncertainty, but helps take it away from his staff as well.

Coaches, you must coach your coaches. 

The best way for you to feel at ease is to know that everyone around you 1) has an assignment, and 2) knows how to execute that assignment.

Practice isn't only for your players' improvement, but for your staffs' as well. When you are working on kickoff, make sure your guys, or special teams guy, know what they are looking for. Offensively and defensively, give everyone an assignment. Your defensive coordinator, when not on defense, may have the best eye to see what the opposition is doing defensively, so make sure that he has a job.

When you are going over scripted plays, two-minute drills, or what have you the day before a game, put the headsets on and practice communicating. Go over your substitution strategy.

I have four guys that assist me. I call the plays on offense and relay them to a coach that gives them to QB, as we are a huddle offense. I am aligned behind our offense  about 15 yards to get a player view of the defense. My play relay coach is close to the line. My o-line coach is at the LOS as well so he can see alignment, pullers and the like. My DC is behind the defense 10-15 yards so he can get a good look at what they are trying to do. Finally, I have a coach in the pressbox who is keying on certain players/plays. It works for us. Everyone has a job. If we are confident in what we are doing, the DC may move from diagnosing the defense to subbing players in. Then we flip jobs on defense. But that's the thing - everyone has to have a job.

Coach up your coaches. Don't ever assume they know something, but don't treat them like they don't know anything. Trust your guys and give them insight into what you are looking for in certain situations.

A staff, just like your team, must work as one, or the task becomes infinitely more difficult.

Be a coaches coach.