Character & Leadership

Josh

I believe that teaching leadership skills to my football players is essential. Oftentimes, whether they deserve to be or not, football players are looked at as leaders (or least major influencers) of a school’s culture. Teaching players how to become positive, respectful, and good stewards of the influence is a must. Developing great leaders within the school, translates to developing good leaders on the field. Other positives that come out establishing a leadership academy are that you develop common goals for your team. Common expectations and standards also develop throughout your team as a result of these academies.

Some negatives that come from running these types of programs is that if they are not inclusive enough you can alienate players. Personally, I often in the early stages of my leadership program I will talk to all my players. I often refrain from selecting captains or naming “leaders” until we hit our summer schedule. I like to see which players step up and lead in the winter and spring without formal titles. Another negative is that these programs demand more time from the head coach in the off season. The coach must develop the material and find time to meet with the players outside of other off-season time commitments.


My program usually starts the Tuesday after the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. In combination with teaching our core lifts and getting starting weights for the weight program, I also focus on goal setting. I first teach players how to set individual goals. After our initial round of testing players will set 2 goals; a weight room goal and a position goal, that they will commit to for the next 7 weeks. After individual goals are set, we will then set 3 team goals. All of the individual goals and team goals will then get posted on our “Wall of Accountability,” which hangs in the hallway leading into the weight room (so they have to walk by them everyday). Lessons during this stretch occur weekly during our Monday-Thursday after school lifting. After 7 weeks (matches our testing cycle), players will continue to assess their progress towards their individual goals and; if necessary, adjust or set new goals.


Starting in March our leadership meetings increase to twice a week as we implement 2 morning team meetings a week to go along with our after school lifting. These meetings occur every Tuesday and Thursday from 6-7am prior to the start of school. They include leadership messages, mat drills, and offensive/defensive installation. Also, starting in March I and the offensive coordinator begin our Sunday QB leadership and fundamental training. We open this up to all QBs in grades 6-12. We meet for an hour every Sunday with this group. This phase lasts until the end of May when we hold our spring practice.


After spring practice we jump right into our summer schedule and we begin our focus on getting ready for the season to begin.