Clock Management?

As you read this I am mindful of the personal commodity thatyou are spending now: Your time. Time is the most precious element that makes up our life. If you’re looking for a play or two, those will be coming in later blogs but today is about how you and I manage our time.

IF IT IS IMPORTANTTO YOU, YOU WILL MAKE TIME FOR IT.

As I write this, my wife and two sons are asleep. This makes me feel like I’m not taking time away from them to work and plan. I’m giving up 30 minutes of sleep versus taking 30 minutes away from them. I’m only going to get to be their dad and her husband once. I don’t want to mess that up. They understand when a game/family conflict come up but I have to make an effort to keep those to a minimum. I’ve coached roughly 30 games a season for the past 12 years. Obviously some of those have been bigger than others, but none bigger than the challenge of being a husband and father. As I write this, I realized “Do I spend as much time preparing to be a husband/dad as I do to coach a conference game? Ouch…”

BE MINDFUL OF THETIME OF OTHERS.

“If you don’t have time to do it right the first time, when will you find time to do it over again?”

– Coach John Wooden

Time is the only commodity that is more expensive to replace. You don’t get time spent or the lack of it back. The clock is always going. I here coaches this time of year talking about the amount of hours theyare spending. My first question is why? There are only so many things you can do to help your team win. Preparation should be a daily task. I want the staff I work with to have family time. Demand they do. With today’s technology I can watch game film on my iPhone. Most of us have laptops. Send your staff home. If you think you don’t have time now, wait until a member of your staff is having family problems. It can be avoided.

A Coach spending nine hours a day preparing for three two hour practices and one game isn’t rational. That’s 27:8. That’s nineteen more hours more than the player who is actually participating. Ask yourself, would you ask your player to spend 27 hours preparing for one game? Ask them to watch film over and over, charting plays, lifting weights, practicing and expect them to be ready to compete? They’d probably be ready to quit. A sponge can only hold so much water. Focus on the priority, study it, perform it and move on.Consequently, if your priority is taking nine hours of planning, its one of two things: Either too big to succeed at or you waited too long to address it.

Plan! Plan! Plan!

If you don’t plan when you don’t have time you won’t plan when you do have time. Everyone needs a schedule, especially coaches and coaches families. (This is something we are going to implement) Head Coaches should be mindful of their assistant coaches’ time. Assistant coaches should try to eliminate any extra duties of the head coach. The only thing in life that should ever surprise us is illness and accidents. We know when birthdays,anniversaries, holidays, practices, & games are. Write it down then plan your day around it. My wife’s birthday is in mid-November. Every year we have had a game on her birthday. Planning and communication in September eliminate any confusion in November. If I plan first then tell her instead of waiting until the week of everything is smooth; that and she is the world’s best Coaches wife.

I hope that you feel the time spent reading this was beneficial to you. Now make a plan and start on it. The clock is ticking.