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[Jamie]

Hello and welcome to a brand-new season of Coachcast by England Football Learning, the coaching podcast that brings you insight from people across the game. As always, we're Jamie and Louise, and today we're joined by Chris Wellburn, who's returning to Coachcast to chat about self-reflection and how to use it to prepare for the new season. Well, hi, Chris. Welcome back to the show. How are you?

[Chris]

Thanks for having me, yeah good thank you.

[Louise]

Yeah thank you for joining us again. Great to have you with us again because we always enjoy having you on. For anybody that hasn't heard from you before or listened to an episode that you've done, can you just tell us a little bit about what it is that you do?

[Chris]

So I've worked for the FA for the last 13 years, got a regional coach developer role based up in the Northwest and ultimately try and sort of like help support develop coaches and ultimately try and grow the game.

[Louise]

Yeah, fantastic.

[Jamie]

Well just before we kind of dive into the main part of the show as you've been on a few times you're absolutely prepared for this I'm sure And because this is a coaching podcast, we do like to give coaches some great top tips at the start of the show.

[Louise]

We're going to give you 30 seconds and we're going to ask you for your top coaching tips in those 30 seconds. Are you up for that?

[Chris]

Yeah, no problem. I'll try my best.

[Louise]

Okay, when the music starts, you can begin.

[Chris]

Okay, so players first. So ultimately, do I know the needs, wants, motivations of the players? Thinking about practices, ultimately do they fit my players? Do they understand their motivations? Do they understand their particular needs? Do they have a fun element to them? Are they engaging? And ultimately how do we try and develop the players within those practices? And probably a top tip is can we get the coach behaviors to try and reward against those intentions that we're after in the practice? So we're driving motivation for the players.

[Jamie]

Fantastic. We'll take that.

[Chris]

There we go.

[Jamie]

Now, Chris, it's currently while we're recording this, like the off season. So looking back at your experiences as a coach, but also as a coach, developer and developing other coaches, What does this period look like for coaches but also for yourself?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think it proves a really good opportunity to ultimately reflect, to be in a position where we look back, we interrogate why did things happen in the way that they did, you know what might have caused these sort of like scenarios that we want to reflect on that have become quite big moments for us. So I think it's a really important time to, yeah, to interrogate, to reflect, to try and learn from experiences and ultimately help prepare us for next season.

[Louise]

And how important do you think it is for people to do that?

[Chris]

First and foremost I think reflection is really good to be in a position where you can you know examine, you can be in a position where you reflect both what's happened in the past, what might happen in the future and sort of ultimately where we are now. So I think sometimes it's an important tool for you both in a session, but then crucially when we get to like this period where at the end of the season, you're in a position to maybe reflect back on particular moments. Could be around players, could be around coaching practices, it could be around coach behaviours, it could be around, you know, ultimately how you've engaged with players. But ultimately, I think it's really important to find a focus, to find and narrow that focus, because ultimately, if we think about too much, I think we're in a position where, you know, ultimately we're not going to reflect as well. So I think narrowing the focus is a top tip in the offseason to probably try and help us.

[Jamie]

What would you recommend coaches to kind of narrow their focus to then if they were going to self-reflect during this time?

[Chris]

Yeah, so it could be something that was quite intentional for the coaches for example. So it could be that they've worked throughout the season and they've really decided to look at how players engage within coaching practices for example. So ultimately are my practices motivating for the players? Are they in a position where we've probably had high ball rolling time so they've had plenty of doing? You know, has the the tasks been you know orientated to them and their needs? Are we in a position where we've probably, you know, made the practices realistic, relevant and ultimately had a higher level of repetition? So that could be a focus. But then also I think sometimes it's really important reflection when you narrow your focus sometimes to think about might not be intentional things you're thinking about it might be things that are unintentional so it might be things that your players have fed back to you that you didn't really know about or it could be something that you've noticed in yourself that when you're delivering and you're coaching that actually like yeah this has come out and I don't really know why. And I want to figure out, you know, ultimately a little bit more about that. So sometimes I think narrowing the focus is the key, but then is it about intentional or is it about unintentional things that, you know, ultimately we might want to reflect on, but that'll be personal to the coach, you know? So the coach might want to choose that laser focus and then ultimately maybe ask some questions to themselves. And it doesn't always have to be questions with answers. I think sometimes we can be in a position where we ask a question, it might take a little bit of time to figure that out and it might even be during preseason where you start to get that question in your head and going right I probably need to spend a bit more time on this one. So yeah so big top tips there would be narrowing the focus and is it something intentional or unintentional you want to think about.

[Louise]

Do you have any kind of tips that would help coaches reflect and take learning from last season specifically I know you kind of mentioned there like thinking back and asking yourself questions but are there any kind of tips or like ideas that you could give them?

[Chris]

Yeah so I think the biggest one for me is a lot of the theory discusses things around critical incidents through reflective practice. So you might want to call them, instead of a critical incident, which sounds sometimes a little bit like, oh what's going on here, it could be a critical moment or it could be, you know, a real sort of like hinge point where you think, I'll tell you what, these are some interesting moments to reflect on. So if we use the terminology of a moment, so it might be that during the season you've probably got to yourself a point where there's been moments that have happened. So practices have ended up in a way that they have done and you're not really sure why. This one's broken down and I'm a bit unsure about it. It could be on a match day so you've set your players out in a particular formation, they're not stuck to that and it's happened quite a lot during the season and you're trying to reflect about how I can help that when we get to next season. Or it could be that you know you're realizing that there's a real growth and maturation about your players and certain things that they found easy But I might be working with 13, 14, 15 year olds and they're going through growth and maturation I'm probably gonna be aware of that from a psychological point of view But then ultimately like a social point of view Or it could be that you want to use your four corner model as a coach. So you might think, well I've had a bit of a bias here that I've been thinking about physical and technical quite a lot, but actually I might need to delve a little bit more into cycle and social to get the environment right for my players. So I think the biggest thing for me is thinking about moments, thinking about things that have really triggered your mind during the season. It could be that relationships with players have broken down for whatever reason, but it might need a little bit of digging into why. Is it some issues with the players that have fallen out of school? Is it, you know, that actually we've had that transition from primary to secondary where there was quite a lot of friends from their school but now I've gone to another school and we've seen a disconnect there that's happened where you know, ultimately there's some new players coming to the group or they've got more familiar with them because they're at the same school as them now and I'm seeing to see these little subcultures develop. So yeah, so I think it's about these moments, thinking about these moments, but I think crucially it's really important that coaches during the season make a log of that. So they might write them down, they might just even have a little notes page up and on the phone. It might be they're trying to get some feedback from players, parents, assistant coaches, if they've got them, just to try and help them build that picture around, you know, why have these things happened in the way that they have done.

[Louise]

I guess it's not always, like you mentioned before, you might not always have the answer. So is it a case of almost like coming up with a potential solution and just, or a few potential solutions or something like that, is that kind of how you'd approach it?

[Chris]

Yeah, without a doubt. So I think I like a model that you reflect for a session, you reflect in a session and you reflect on a session. It's very similar to our plan do review process here at the FA. But what you might want to be thinking about with this is a little top tip is that you've noticed some things have been happening and you've been reflecting on it. So you're reflecting for the session now and you're thinking right I probably need to get these solutions or some questions in my head prepared or I might need to get a little bit more information and then when you're reflecting in a session that's a critical moment really so the theory would tell us that reflection in a session is probably one of the most difficult skills because you come in with a plan and then always as always happens like numbers might be low or you know player drops out injured or plan A becomes plan B becomes plan C plan D so reflection in action becomes a really important skill for coaches to have and then likewise reflection on action so you've done the session or you've noted about some critical moments that have been happening, but you're reflecting on those and how you reflect on that's really important. You know, do you take a superficial lens where you don't really go beneath the surface or do you actually start to really interrogate, find out the why, why things have happened in the way that have done and ultimately be in a position put yourself in the heart of that problem sometimes, I think it's, or that moment, just to try and you know get multiple sources of information and that really helps I think.

[Jamie]

Kind of follow up from that, these next few questions just kind of want to put kind of self-reflection in actions to kind of put you a little bit under pressure, like to kind of self-reflect yourself and kind of see how some of these questionings could work. So what learnings are you personally taking from last season and what would you actually like to achieve next season?

[Chris]

Probably the most important thing is when I look at the team that I've been working with I think it's been really important that we've tried to align the system that we have to the players capabilities and characteristics. So I think probably the biggest one is ultimately looking at our players and do the players fit the system that we're playing. So I think sometimes, you know, it's really important that we don't superimpose systems on players. We think about this is the system and the formation that we're deploying with our players, but why? So ultimately, is it because I've played that system all the time, or is it actually that we've really looked at these are the skillsets of the players, these are the qualities that they have, and then ultimately actually thinking this is how we want to play. So I think it's really important that especially with the team that we're playing, that's always evolving. So you're starting to think about new players come in, players go out, players have injuries, you know, actually thinking about how do we best deploy the players that we have to meet the needs of, of our philosophy, if you like, in terms of how we play the structure and the identity of our team but ultimately being in a position where we put the players first and their needs and think yeah this is probably how we wanted to play against XYZ that we're playing against.

[Louise]

And if we were to press you and ask you what's one thing you're most proud of from last season?

[Chris]

Probably just the development of players. So I think the biggest thing is that every day, every session, every time we're working with players, it's important that we, you know, we're ultimately developing what's in the building. So it's about, you know, how do we help players in sessions, individual sessions, group sessions, team sessions, you know, how do we help them to become essentially better people as well? So I suppose for me it's about seeing where the players were at to where they're at now, journey they've been on and ultimately how we've tried to help them.

[Jamie]

As a follow-up to that, how do you then prep to do that again next season?

[Chris]

Yeah, so it's like anything in life. Every player's got a story, everybody goes through their own journeys, and it's important that we understand those stories and we understand their journeys, because if we don't, we're in a situation where, you know, ultimately there might be some critical moments going on in their lives. It could be that, you know, they've got a lot of pressures on at university, they've going through some job changes, they've got some pressures at home. It could be, you know, ultimately they've been carrying an injury or they're struggling after coming back from an injury. So I think it's really important that we put ourselves in a position where we, you know, we understand the players in front of us, what's happening, what's different, and ultimately try and help them. And that sometimes starts by, you know, reflecting in terms of, you know, actually, are we listening to understand, or are we listening to respond? So I think the more we can understand about our players, the more information we can get, the more sources of information that can help us understand the picture a little bit better. Yeah, I think that's probably a really important thing for us.

[Jamie]

And what would you then say was maybe the most challenging thing that you faced last season and how can maybe reflecting on that help you to solve the problem if it did occur again next season?

[Chris]

I think it's really important if we take for example when we bring in new players how do we ultimately build that culture so sometimes what happens is you bring players in from a particular club, they might have been used to that club, their identity, their way of working, the environment they've created. So it's about probably not only welcoming that player in, but then helping the other players that are already in that environment and that culture to essentially support that player who's coming in. But then ultimately, you know, being really respectful and then being really sort of like open to new player coming in, what skills, quality, characteristics do they have? How can they add value? How can we help? And that culture piece is important. You know, things in football change quite a lot so you know whatever aspect of it is, game day, match day, there's always change so it's about ultimately how we can you know evolve and ultimately if we lose five or six players like last season and we replace them how do we then be in a position that we keep thinking about the culture, the identity and the players at the heart of that.

[Louise]

And how crucial is self-reflection in setting your goals and determining what success could be for next season?

[Chris]

I think it's really important that you have some respective targets and goals, but where are they born from? Where do they generate from? You know, ultimately, what's the, what's the underpinning reason why you've gone after those? That's the important bit. So I think let's take, for example, you know, if you take a example of, well, tell you what we placed targets on, we were trying to finish in the top six last year to get playoffs. Well, actually, is it sometimes easier to reflect on that and go, actually, let's go game by game. So actually the working week that we have, the players time on tasks that we have in terms of the training sessions, the involvements we have them, the interactions with we have them, Is it better to take it a game by game basis? Or is it better to look at them in batches of 10 for example? So yeah I think sometimes you know you might think I'll tell you what a performance end you might want to try and aim for here and that could be the intention but ultimately what are the small chunks that you need to get to that point. I also think it's important as a coach, so let's take self-reflection as an example for yourself, so you might want to think about, well, coach behaviours for example. So actually I've been really working on my questioning skills or I've been really working on my instruction skills, but actually I probably need to get some feedback on that. So I might do a batch of three, four weeks, and then I might get some feedback from players, from assistant coaches in terms of like the questions I've been asking, you know, ultimately some of the instruction I've been trying to give. Am I providing in the right way to them? Am I providing it in a concise way? Am I in a position where I'm probably not overloading the players? Am I asking questions that would help them in terms of, you know, trying to check for understanding from them? Am I asking questions for a question's sake? Do I just want a yes answer which probably is not going to help anybody or you know ultimately I'm asking really good questions that require a little bit of deeper thinking. You know I always think questions when you're working with players to check understanding might be you know things like you know how might for example. It's a really important question you know because you're getting them to probably be in a position where you're getting them to delve deeper into their minds, you know, you're getting them to probably relay information to you. So, you know, how might you deal with that situation? What would, when would? So you're starting to get these types of questions in that require a little bit of thought for your players really. So yeah, it could be like that. Self-reflection in terms of, I'm going to go after these couple of capabilities that I want to develop, but then I need some feedback on them. So I always think it's really important that if you are going to reflect on something, you need time to be able to practice it, you need those experiences to happen as a result of working on something, but then you also need to get feedback and you need to get some honesty, you need to evaluate it and you need to understand this has happened, I need to make sense of it, so what now piece, what do I do with it once I've got that information? It's quite an important piece for me.

[Louise]

Yeah, I know sometimes when you ask for feedback, it's quite hard to get the type of feedback that you want. Have you got any tips on kind of prepping someone to give you a good feedback, I guess, as well?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think fundamentally it starts with relationships. So let's say for example you go into the new season and you know whether I'm working in grassroots under 8s and under 10s and if I've never really started asking questions of my players before to get some feedback or I've not been in a position where I've done that with my assistant coach before, you might not get the answers that you need because ultimately they might want to provide you answers that they think you want to hear. So I think sometimes you've got to invest in that relationship, you've got to build that rapport, you've got to build that trust, you've got to build that reciprocal understanding that I'm gonna try and work on these things but I need things to be honest when they come back to me. So I think that's really important and then also you've got to probably be in a position where you ask players the questions to the players or you might ask questions to coaches but then you're in a situation where actually they might ask some questions of you. So they might come up with some things that you don't know about. So blind spots is really important because like we all got them and we all have them, but ultimately sometimes they can then hinder us as a coach. So I think when you've got that relationship in place, being in a position to notice what you don't notice is really important and that can come from multiple sources and I call it a bit of a like a lens approach. So if I'm the coach how do players view me? How do parents view me? How do assistant coaches view me? How does the opposition manager view me? How do some friends view me in terms of you know ultimately what I do in life? So you start to get these multiple lenses and these feedback coming towards you and that's really important I think because then what you're getting is you're getting information through multiple sources that can then help you generate answers to problems answers to questions that you might have asked yourself. So yeah I think our lens approach sometimes is quite a nice way to get multiple sources of information that can help you.

[Jamie]

I really like that, like that concept like if you was to then get feedback from each of those areas I suppose it makes your reflection and your self-reflection just even more powerful and more efficient.

[Chris]

Yeah I think so and I think it's important that when you're going to reflect you have multiple ways of doing that. So we've talked to you know quite openly here now around sort of like narrowing the focus. Are we thinking about intentional things that I really want to reflect on or is it unintentional aspects? Is it lenses where I get to seek feedback through multiple sources, multiple people, but they're all providing me feedback on a particular aspect or a couple of aspects. I think sometimes reflection's a real challenge in the fact that when you try and reflect on quite a lot, yes they do interlink these things, they might interlink, but actually sometimes important to be quite narrow focused and think about one or two things max because the moment you reflect on too much, you've probably got too much information to then deal with. So, yeah, I think the art of effective reflection would be to narrow that lens, narrow the focus and be in a position that you get enough information to help you that you can actually then take on and act on.

[Louise]

I guess that helps with the answers, the feedback that you're getting as well if it's more refined then they know where they need to be.

[Chris]

Yeah, you don't, as I say, you don't want to be in a position where you ask multiple questions around multiple themes and get loads back and then think well how do I deal with that one? You know, like I think sometimes it's better to be, you know, target

[Jamie]

and specific. Thinking of the concept of narrowing a focus what kind of say three questions say if you would say there were three questions what three questions do you think would spark the most meaningful reflections in other coaches?

[Chris]

Yeah so I'll take a players example So I always think about players

and when you're working with players, and this is like, can be any form of the game, whether you work in grassroots or you're working at the top end of the game. What can my players do? What can't they do at the moment and how can I help them? Three really important questions, like really simple questions, but actually really important because you get real good information there. And that could be around a technical aspect, or it could be around a physical aspect, or it could be around how they communicate and collaborate with people. So it's like, what can my players do? What can't they do at the moment? And then ultimately, how can I help them? So you start to get yourself in a position where then you go, right, well, I'm starting to get some really useful information here. I think that's a really good starting point in terms of questions that you can think of ways to think about that player in a little bit more greater depth. But then also it could be the flip side where the players get similar questions around what do they feel like they can do at the minute? What do they struggle with and how can you help them? So then you get in what you perceive, what they perceive, and actually probably what you might find is that we get some commonality here and then we're in a position where we can, you know, ultimately build on that. So that's not always a nice way we think about it with players. From a coach's perspective, I think it's important that we, you know, get ourselves into position that we might want to reflect on a particular area. So it could be as simple as practice design. So you might go around three questions with the players. Did you have high level of repetition tonight? Did the balls move enough for you? Was there a lesson with me talking? Was there more of you doing? So we're in a good position where the questions about like repetition. Did you find that practice realistic? So if I shot a camera down on a match day, is what's happening on a match day what we've done tonight? Does it look like the game? Does it sort of like gonna help you with some of the outcomes that we've looked at tonight and the actions that you've been performing, is that going to be similar to what you're facing on a match day? And if not, why not? And then you get yourself into a relevance position. So you might go, well, I'm going to ask the players here, do you find that relevant to your role, to where you play on the pitch, to the position you play? And then if not, why not? So you might get, oh, the space was too big, or actually there was too much distance between the units, or we were in a position where actually we probably could have done with a bit of a shorter pitch here, or a bit of a thinner pitch, or we could have worked on where there was balls working from both ends for example, and we made it multi-directional and then made it directional. Just little examples around being in a position where you've got some examples there around players and questions you could ask, but then coaches generating some information, but simple questions for the players that give you that level of, you know, reflection and hopefully honesty.

[Jamie]

Yeah, I like that, especially like thinking now in the offseason, so you've had a season with the players for people who are obviously have coached last season, where you can obviously build up, get those answers and almost like prepare now for next season to adjust the practice design and to adjust maybe coach behaviours to better mirror what the players need?

[Chris]

Yeah, and I think that sometimes might come with the format of the game they play. So my team's moving from 5v5 to 7v7 for example. Ultimately, there's gonna be more numbers on the pitch. There's gonna be more space and there's ultimately going to be a bigger area. So ultimately, and probably need to then help them adjust to that. So do my practices need to be more representative of the game format they're playing. But then also being thinking about player development, where we still might need some tighter areas, small numbers, small space areas. But being in a position that we know they're going from a 5v5 pitch to a 7v7 pitch, and we've got to understand those little critical transition moments really. That's also part reflection. So actually what I did last year might not work this year because game formats changed. They were only playing with four outfield players last year, now there's six. I was playing in midfield last year in a 5v5 game where I was I was by myself in the formation that we deployed, but now I've got somebody with me. So actually, that means a lot more to me now because I've like probably need to think about how we react and respond and we work together with that one. So I think it's really important that that type of approach is probably at the heart of probably your thinking.

[Louise]

Apart from asking yourself questions like this, how else do you reflect and are there any models or processes that you used kind of, or coaches could use to help with their self-reflection?

[Chris]

The coaches listening in here will know about the FA's plan, do, review model. So it's been probably at the heart of our work. I've been here a long time so far and it's been always at the heart of the work we do. So plan, do, review. So you're in a position where you plan for something, whether it could be about a particular player, it could be about your session, it could be about how you want to engage with the players, it could be about the coach behaviours you want to use. You're doing that and then ultimately go out there and deliver it and then ultimately review on it. So plan to review is a really simple way that you can take a particular moment or an aspect and you can look at it. I think the biggest tip and we alluded to this earlier is I would probably challenge a lot of our coaches that I work with on courses here and that I work with through CPD events and we're working with them in clubs to say develop your reflection in action to abilities and competencies. So reflection in action is really important. So being in that situation where you're 15-20 minutes into your session but if things are not going in the way that you thought they were going to do, you can either let it sort of like continue and see if it be in a position where the problem might solve itself or the players didn't really understand the practice might get it. But there's going to be a come a time where you've probably got to intervene. So I think reflection in action is a really top tip to probably work on because you might be thinking, well, I'll tell you what, I'm going to let this go and I'm going to let this go and I'm going to let this go and they'll get it, they'll get it, they'll get it. But actually what if they don't? We've probably wasted some time on tasks there, we've wasted where the practice probably wasn't meeting their needs, they might not have understood it. So being in a position where you might go, tell you what, I need to get this right here because I've only got probably an hour session but time we've taken off the warm-up, the exit time, the drinks times in between, I might only get 30 minutes with them of actual doing time. So actually I need to make that time worthwhile. Probably can't be in a position where I'm probably changing the practice in 20-25 minutes in when I've probably wasted a little bit of time there. So we've probably got to be able to reflect in action quicker, effectively, start to step back a little bit if you need to and go right well actually what's not what is working what isn't. Get some checking and challenging going on. Players, how are you feeling this? Like, are you understanding it? Is it, what are you struggling to grasp? Assistant coach, what are you thinking? Like, what are you seeing? How are you feeling about this? Like, reflection in actions is a big skill. And then I think it's really important that you find a model that's probably useful for you. So there's loads of models out there from strong theoretical models or there's you know simple ways where you might just reflect and go here's a couple of questions for today and I'm going to use that or actually I'm going to put all my reflections based on from the players perspective or I'm going to get somebody working with me to really look at my blind spots, you know, have I got a particular bias? So there's loads of ways to reflect. I think it's important that we then sort of like think about what tips work for us. We're in a really good position at the FA that cross our coach education courses here and throughout coach development we use a respective model where we ultimately, it's the diamond diagram if you like, and at the heart of that you've got intended outcomes, you've got player engagement, you've got practice design, you've got coach behaviors. And ultimately those four aspects are not singular aspects. They're aspects that relate with one another and can affect one another. So let's say for example, we think about intended outcomes. So the outcomes of the session probably got to be specific. They've got to be communicated They've got to have some real clarity about them. But from a player engagement point of view If those are not clear, if they're not really in a position where their plays are really clear about what they're learning or what they're doing That's probably gonna affect player engagement So I always think about that one, for example, being in a position where are your intended outcomes really clear? Are your players clear in no uncertain terms about what you want them to learn and what you want them to do? Am I really clear about what I want my players to learn and what I want them to do. And nine times out of 10, that's going to have an effect on engagement. Because if they've got clarity around what you want them to learn and what you want them to do, you're going to see that. If there's a bit of a vague, generic, broad learning objective going on here in terms of the intended outcome, might get lost a little bit, or it might just go over the players heads. Like, I think it's really important that we're quite specific in our learning intentions. And that's a good example of where that works. And then likewise, if I've got some intentions about, I want to work with my midfielders tonight on their forward passing and their connection and relationship build between pass and receiver relationships between midfielders and forwards. So if I tell the players that's happening, but if my practice design doesn't allow for that, I've got a problem because I've told them they're doing X, but actually the practice isn't bringing that. So it's a really good way there to think, well, intended outcomes and practice design, they marry up. And then another good example is like, if these are my intended outcomes tonight, but my coach behaviours are not rewarding those outcomes when I see that happen, that needs to marry up. Because my behaviours have got to reward what we're ultimately asking the players to do. So if the clarity of the intention is right and my behaviours drive and reward that, the players are probably going to get a real engagement and connection value to that, which is probably then going to help them within the practice. So it's all interlinks. I think it's a really important model and it's something that you know hopefully coaches listening if you'll see that right across our pathway of courses.

[Jamie]

So thinking with all those processes and models, there's quite a lot to potentially remember there. So what is kind of the most important thing for coaches to remember when it does come to self-reflection?

[Chris]

Yeah so I think you know what you can do sometimes is you can over reflect and you can get too many sources of information and you can get multiple lenses and then you get a bit confused. So sometimes it might just be in a position of really being in an opportunity to work where you go, well actually why did that happen in the way that it did? So that's really particular, finite question where you go, well actually I've been in a situation here, why did that happen the way that it did? So actually you want to make some sense of that and a good little one sometimes is and coaches get frustrated with this and I've been there before in in the early days of coaching is you might think players on the ball you thought they were gonna take a player on, travel with the ball a little bit further and then put a cross in. But they've decided that where they were on the ball, they've gone long and they've played a long ball over, and it's not been effective and it's run through to the goalkeeper. So actually, you might want to ask the question, why has that happened in the way that it did? Because you probably will never know the answer to that question unless you have some dialogue with the player. And that could be a confidence thing with the player. It could be, you know, actually an attribute where they've probably gone, I've done this because the defender's really good in 1v1 situations in duels and I didn't have the confidence to go past and if you see that happened quite a lot within games so once is a one-off you've logged it twice is a coincidence three times is a pattern if you're starting to see that more and more often That's probably a real trigger for you to go to your question and go, well why is that happening the way it's did? And you're starting to see it and then you spend that time to go, I'll tell you what, I probably need to have a little bit of an intervention here or I might need a little bit of a drive-by with a player just to actually figure out why these things are happening the way they are. So sometimes it's about simple little things. Why that why is that happening the way it did? Interrogate, reflect on it, but use that rule of thumb. Once is a one-off, twice is coincidence, three times a pattern. And remember that's not just for things that you might feel are negative, that's also positive. So I could be watching my goddaughter's session at the weekend and I've gone, right training sessions on tonight, once is a one-off, brilliant, I've seen her do something really well here, twice is a coincidence, three times a pattern, Well actually if she does it three times she's probably really understanding and she's getting it and might need a bit of stretch. So you're in a situation where you can use it for ways that you might want to intervene but you also might want to use it for a ways where you know that a player's really understood something, they can apply it and they're actually in a position where they might need a bit of stretch now. So I always like that reflection rule of once is a one-off, twice a coincidence, three times a pattern. It's really important I think sometimes for you to get greater depth and understanding of an event or an action that's happened and it's not just a one-off. It's really a nice little tool for me.

[Louise]

I mean, that seems like a really good reason to want to self-reflect, but do you think there's another, any other reasons that you'd kind of suggest to people of why they, it's really important that they potentially do this at this time of the year?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think sometimes we can all be guilty as coaches sometimes of being quite tunnel focused. Sometimes the coach has got all the answers. I'll do A, you'll do B. It's very much a copy and repeat. So coach delivers something, I want you to do it, I've drawn it on the board, this is what I want you to do. But the reality is sometimes that that coach-centered approach, it's going to fall down, it's not going to work. So ultimately about putting the players at the heart of the learning sometimes, helping the players construct meaning as a result of the experiences they're involved in rather than being quite, I'll do it, you do B, copy and repeat, I've got all the answers, and away you go. I think sometimes you've got to really be in a position that you're open, you're transparent, and you're putting the players at the heart. And ultimately the key bit here is the players need to construct learning through a result of their own experiences. We don't do that, We've done that when we've played, but ultimately the players are creating meaning and they'll reflect through, oh, that didn't work. That strategy might not work, but I'll try it again. If it don't work, I'll probably try and adapt. Or in this moment, should I have stayed on the ball or could have passed it and received it again. Little moments like that are really important that I think as a coach sometimes it's, we can't be, we haven't got all the answers, we haven't got all the solutions, we haven't got that overriding probably knowledge base that's gonna be able to help us with every single solution. So it's ultimately about putting the players in there, putting that trust in them, making them make decisions for themselves, but then ultimately helping them reflect or helping them learn from our perspective. I think that's the biggest thing.

[Jamie]

Time can often be quite tight for coaches, is there anything that you would say to help coaches understand the importance of self-reflection but also to kind of if some coaches are a little bit more hesitant to do it to almost like encourage them to do so in the most simple and the easiest way possible?

[Chris]

Yeah so I think sometimes you've got to be in a position that if you want to reflect on you by yourself for example here so you might finish the session and you might be in a position where before you drive off or you use audio notes or you use a position that you probably want to park and document some information written down or you've been in a position where you really log something in your mind and you want to pick up next week that might be a little top tip. So actually making time for you so ultimately you finish you take a breath you're in a situation where you're in the car and you go right, audio note, iPad note, making a little written note, logging something in my brain, that might be a little short-term quick little fix. But ultimately I also think we've got to be better with our reflections at the end of sessions. So sometimes we run the sessions up, next group's ready to come on, but we haven't had time to get some reflection from the players. So it's sometimes being in a position that if I've used the reflection perspective of, I've asked them to be in a position where I want them to learn this tonight. Player to learn this, players to try and develop this, players to try and have some time on task working on this. I need to probably get some questions built into the end of my session and even during to reflect on how they're doing and progress against that. So actually making time for reflection at the end of session is, for me, really important, I think. So having some planned questions is really useful, especially if those questions are directly related to your outcomes, not random questions that have popped up where the players might go why's coach asked me this because like I've been working on this tonight But I probably need to have some relevance and some probably some alignment Big word, but I think it's really important in terms of they've worked on this tonight. Let's reflect on it let's see where they're at with it because that might inform where I go with my session next week.

[Jamie]

And is that the same with like in terms of like reflecting on yourself as well?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think like you could be in a position where you go, tell you what I'm gonna look at my use of positive interaction with the players tonight. So, have I given praise at the right opportunity? Have I over-praised? Have I been in a position where I've probably used too much praise with the players and they're getting used to it? You know, you could look at that for example, so you might go, right, I'll tell you what, I'm going to be really careful tonight and consider about when, how I use praise. So, you know, we've got to be in a position where you might use that as a little top tip. Or it could be, I'm gonna really work on tonight, Pictures Paint a Thousand Words, I've noticed in the last few weeks that I've been explaining sessions and it's taking five or six, seven minutes here, and the players are getting confused, and I'm confusing myself. So I'm gonna really work on tonight, reflection, tactics board, I'm gonna be really sharp, concise, minimum intervention, maximum impact. That's me tonight. I'm going to work on that. Here's my board, picture paints a thousand words and away we go. Or actually, I've really found that the players are struggling to see my mini tactics board and everything looks a bit tight for them because of the spaces. And tonight I'm going to reflect on, and the next week, and the next week, and the next week, and we're going to use a human tactics board. I'm going to get the players in the bibs, I'm going to get them marked up, I'm going to get them in a position where we can put them in deployment to areas of the pitch where we might want them to do, they can visualise and see it a bit more. So I think sometimes it's about finding a particular focus. Think about yourself. Could be some little aspects that you've noticed or you've got feedback on, and that might be what you want to focus on as well.

[Louise]

What would you say are some of the common problems that coaches could have during their off-season and pre-season? And how can self-reflection help to solve them?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think sometimes, like everybody, you get to a point at the end of the season where you're finished, then there's sort of like a little bit of a love for a period of time and the galas and the festivals and all the arrangements start, but then actually there's not enough time for you to reflect on you. So I think sometimes a point between season finishing and season starting again, there's a point where you've got to invest in yourself a little bit and it's got to be things around what you feel will be really beneficial to help your players or to help you as a coach or to help the environment that you work in next season. So I think it's about stopping, pausing, really reflecting on the bigger picture, but ultimately going, I'll tell you what, it's not just about us winning it or us drawing or us struggling in games, that's a one area reflection. But actually I think sometimes you've got to invest in yourself. So you've got to be in a position to say right well actually been a long hard season this one and I probably need to have some downtime here to separate myself away from probably match days, training, communications, WhatsApps flying around. You've got to be in a position where you separate yourself, take time, but then ultimately think about investing in yourself. And sometimes when you take time and you invest in yourself a little bit more and you detach yourself, you actually reflect better because you're not in the immersed in it, you're not the heart of it, and that could be you're going for a walk or you take the dog out or you know you've been in a position where you can just really separate yourself and go, I'll tell you what I need some time here, and then it could be things that have gone well, things that could have been even better if, things that we might want to change for next time. And that could be about you, could be about your sessions, could be about your players, could be in terms of how you act. But ultimately, what's gone really well, what could have been even better if, what are changes for next time? Just think about you as a coach, but I always think that we can't be immersed in coaching, football, comms all the time. You've got to detach yourself and be in a position where you can reflect because that's probably where you're gonna have your your really sort of like million dollar moments. That's the bit where you're gonna probably think, well actually that's adding up now or I've seen a regular trend here or actually I've noticed that coming probably a few weeks back and it's building, it's building, it's building and it's come to a threshold tonight but I've probably noticed that and probably let it go and let it go but now I know that actually I probably could nip that in the bud early and that could be about player relationships or it could be players between players or it could be actually you've noticed that that's a bit of a bias in terms of how I explain something here and when I talk I talk always to like one or two people but actually what I'm not I'm missing this where this person's switched off so actually if I get eye contact with the full group that might be a little top tip where I can go right I do that a lot you know I talked to one person it might be better that I tell you what I need to see the full picture in the room, yeah? So it's just little things where my top tip in this off-season would be detach, immerse yourself in a bit of a restful period, but be in a position that you can really separate yourself from what's gone on, what do I need to work on, and then when we get going again I'm in a good position. But don't reflect on too much because we've talked about tonight. Narrow the focus, be intentional and be really diligent in terms of your efforts with reflection.

[Jamie]

Yeah so there's some really powerful sort of like key takeaways for anyone kind of listening or even watching this to take away so thank you for those. And just to kind of wrap this section up Chris, for you personally we've got some quickfire questions for you based on the theme of today. So firstly if you had to sum up this season in one word what would it be?

[Chris]

If I had to sum up this season, eventful. So I think it's been probably a roller coaster. I think there's probably been lots of learning moments, lots of information gathering, lots of multiple sources of probably things that have gone well, things that have been a little bit indifferent, but the key bit for me is probably trying to make sense of that. So, like anything, when you see regular trends or little patterns of behaviour, when I look at my own coach behaviours for example, you've probably got to understand why you've done that and that's probably been a big one for me. So, I think it's about regular patterns of behaviour must have some sense of correlation to why you're doing what you're doing. So, you know, whether that's been positive or it's been negative, it's been bottoming that out and trying to think about, well, actually, does it help the players? Does it help me? And if not, why are we doing it?

[Louise]

And what did self-reflection help you to realise?

[Chris]

One of the biggest challenges for me of the time is, is being about making time to reflect. And I've purposely tried and intentionally tried to do that more this season. I probably got myself into a perspective now where trying to get insight from players more. So that might be where you've got a little bit of a leadership group, or you've got two or three players that you go to in senior players and you get a little bit information or newer players that have come into the group and you see it through multiple lenses. So I think that's been the biggest one for me about getting more insight, trying to be more self-reflective in terms of how I work with players, how I get information from them, how I seek answers from them, how I get to know them a little bit more, because ultimately they're at the heart of everything we do. So we've probably got to know more about them, got to listen to understand more and actually we're not always going to get the things that we want to hear and then it's actually about being really reflective, being quite emotional with our intelligence if you like in terms of you know really putting ourselves at the heart and being a bit more empathetic to situations that come up.

[Jamie]

And if you can finish this sentence, the one thing I'll be doing differently next season because of self-reflection is? Making more time for me.

[Chris]

So I think, I think sometimes you can be, Especially in my role, I've got a coach developer role and then I've got a coaching role and realistically you rarely switch off. So I think it's about separating yourselves from that. And what I've been probably really good at is being in a position where you might go for a walk or you might switch off or you've done the school run and then you're walking back from the school run and the phone goes away and it's ultimately being in a position where you can start to reflect on some some big moments and it even if it's another five ten minutes of your walk being in a position that you can switch off and reflect a little bit better rather than jumping from one thing to the next. So I think that's probably a big top tip that we're all guilty sometimes of pace of living, it's fast-paced, but making time is really important. Absolutely agree there.

[Louise]

Can I ask you for a bit of a coaching challenge? So if you were to set a challenge to a coach who wants to start doing a bit more self-reflection, what is the first thing you'd suggest that they do, a little task?

[Chris]

Yeah, so I think we've got to find what works for them. So it might take a bit of trial. It might take, I need to probably work on a few areas here. So it might be that I might go with three. So it might be feedback from players. It might be feedback from my assistant coach to me. It might be that I spend more time reflecting on an aspect of the FA's reflective model, if you like, around practice design, intended outcomes, player engagement and ultimately focusing on my coach behaviours. Have a multiple array of options but then actually what you need from reflection is some form of outcome and you need some benefit and you need some experiences to happen. So you need to allow a little bit of time, but then actually what do you get the most benefit from and what's been most impactful? And that might be your starting point. So sometimes try a few ideas, get a little bit of time on task with it, get some answers, get some solutions, what's working, what's having an impact, and that might be the one that you might stick with for a period of time.

[Jamie]

Brilliant. Right, well we are coming up to the end of the show now Chris but it does mean it is time for our Swift Session feature.

[Louise]

Yep, as you're a regular on here you've kind of, you've done this a few times so we're gonna ask you to explain a session idea to us in 30 seconds. Are you up for it this time? Yeah. So once again, when the music starts, you can begin.

[Chris]

Yeah. So if we take a real simple session that can be used for multiple outcomes, you've got a home stadium here and an away stadium here, but ultimately what we're going to do is flip the focus a little bit. So instead of a player trying to keep possession of the ball within their home stadium, so you've got a duel going on, for this player that's their stadium, for this player this is their stadium, We're going to actually work on, instead of maintaining possession, we're going to work on the out of possession. How quickly can we win the ball back and take it back to our station?

[Louise]

I didn't think you were going to make it there. But you did, you did it. Well done.

[Chris]

There you go.

[Jamie]

Managed to summarize it right just at the end there.

[Louise]

Did you want to add any more context?

[Chris]

No, no it's fine. Okay, cool.

[Jamie]

Right, well thank you very much for joining us once again Chris, we always love having you on the show, hence why we keep getting you back in. It's brilliant listening to you and I think it's a very good start for everybody in this off-season and their pre-season sort of time to really take that time to self-reflect and set themselves up for the season. So thank you for joining us. Hopefully you enjoyed it again.

[Chris]

Yeah no thank you very much.

[Jamie]

Right well that is all we do have time for today but don't forget to check out the description for the transcription of this episode and for all the links to our platforms. As always you can head to the England Football Community to post your coaching questions for us to discuss on the podcast or you could even drop them in the comments section for this episode.

[Louise]

Yes, we’d love to help you out, so please do send your questions in.

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From us all at England Football Learning, thanks for listening!