One Job. Two Teams.

Today's blog post was written by Matthew Cunningham.  Matthew is a senior Management major in the Mendoza College of Business and a volunteer assistant basketball coach for St. Joseph High School.  Matthew is a student in the Social Foundations of Coaching class taught by Play Like a Champion directors Prof. Clark Power and Kristin Sheehan in Education, Schooling and Society at the University of Notre Dame.

Working in sports is challenging. There are meetings to attend, film to watch, practices to run, players to mentor, and games to play. The typical 40 hours per week does not apply to the sports industry. Coaches have stories about sleeping in their offices, working around the clock in pursuit of winning. If you take time to sleep, your competitors are passing you by.

That being said, the passion, the energy and the enthusiasm that sport provides us makes the demands of coaching worthwhile. The ability to mentor players and to watch kids grow as players and as individuals is one of the most rewarding parts of coaching.

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As a volunteer assistant coach for the varsity boys basketball team at St. Joseph High School in South Bend, IN, I have had the chance to not only learn about the dedication needed to run a successful high school basketball program, but the joy that comes from players and coaches working together to achieve a common goal.

It is in this balance of hard work and reward that makes coaching such a worthwhile profession. There is, however, another balance that must be realized.

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With so much focus on your sports team, what about your other team? Your team at home: your family.

Being a coach doesn’t stop once you leave the field or the arena, your role simply shifts to another team, a team that regardless of your job or your record will be there for you. This means you need to be there for them.

I have grown up in a family whose lifestyle has been formed by college athletics. Because my dad has worked for the University of Notre Dame, Ball State University, the University of Tulsa, and UNC-Chapel Hill, our family has had to pick up and move to wherever the next job was. Changing schools, making new friends, and acclimating to a new city is never easy, but I wouldn’t change it for anything. Athletics has allowed me to see some incredible places and meet even better people. In all of our moving, however, family has always been a constant. Players leave, coaches move on, new jobs are taken, but as I have said (sarcastically), “I can never seem to get rid of my family.”

Each time we have moved, it has truly been a family decision. There were times when a new job was available for my dad to take, but we (not my dad, but “we”, as a family) turned them down. If the situation didn’t feel right for the whole family, taking new job was out of the question.

But forget about moving to a new city, how about the job you are currently in? How much time are you committing to your team, your players? Is it enough to be successful? Now think about your other team: your family. How much time are you committing to them? Is it enough to be successful?

 

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It is too common that coaches focus all of their attention on their job, and not enough on their families. I have been fortunate enough to have a family that understands this balance. Even on trips to bowl games, we carve out time away from team activities for family time. Every summer we take a trip – just the six of us in the family. It is times like these that help build the bonds within the team that matters most.

 Think about your career as a coach. You set aside practice time for your team so they can grow.  But, do you do the same for your family?

As a coach you may have one “job”, but never forget that you have two teams – both of which need your time and attention.