Softball Coaching - Preventing and Treating Burnout

By Sharon Drysdale
Head Coach - Northwestern University

Coaching is a challenging profession! Coaching can be stressful and burnout can result.

According to the Burnout Susceptibility Profile (Vernacchia, Level 2 USA Coaching Education Program), individuals who are susceptible to burnout are profiled as: extremely, goal oriented, idealistic/altruistic, high achievers, highly responsible, perfectionists, success driven.

In my opinion, coaching burnout is a transformation from energetic, involved, accomplished, capable, “spirited” coach to exhausted, bored, withdrawn, cynical, ineffective, “burned out” coach.

There are varying degrees of burnout and not everyone will express it in the same way. Whether you are at a low, moderate or severe level of burnout depends upon the frequency, intensity and duration of signs and symptoms.

Signs and Symptoms

• Exhaustion
• Depersonalization
• Reduced sense of personal accomplishment
• Inconsistent or declining job performance.

Burnout can and probably will affect you in some way, to some extent, at one time or another.

I believe that burnout is a condition that is continuously present in all of us, at one level or another. The nature of the burnout experience, however, is personal and unique - different for each of us.
Nevertheless, we can all end up in the same place, feeling much the same way.

Although any factor associated with elevated stress levels may be linked to the development of coaching burnout, it is usually a chronic response to ongoing stress and is seldom dramatic. You may experience constant, unrelenting on-the-job-frustration due to any number of stress factors. Perhaps you are wearing down from years of dealing with difficult coaching issues, injuries, fundraising, travel, recruiting, etc. You may have initially perceived stressful situations as challenging and even motivating, but now you find the situations threatening or even boring. Perhaps you are getting older and quality of life means something different to you now than it once did.

What you experience and how you experience it will affect how you think about, see, feel, and express things. A change in your perception alters the match between you and your coaching job. The greater the mismatch, the greater the risk of burnout.

A PRE-GAME PLAN TO PREVENT, TREAT AND BEAT BURNOUT

Get Your Act Together

• Develop a personal and professional vision.
• Make a list of the reasons why you are coaching, what you want from coaching and what you expect to get out of coaching.
• Set goals (daily practice, game, season, career) for yourself as well as your team.
• Try to keep your expectations in check.

Take Stock

• Demands/resources check.
• Rewards/costs check

Increase Your Self Awareness

• Be alert to recognize the signs and symptoms of burnout in you and in members of your staff so you can address them early - while their intensity, frequency, and duration is minimal.
• Make a list of the stresses you’re facing and consider how you are reacting to them.

Dispell Common Myths

• “I like coaching. I won’t burn out!”
• “It’s just me. I’ve overdone things a bit. I just need a little rest or a break and I’ll be fine.”
• “It’s just me. I need to work harder, try harder, do better.”
• “It’s just my job. It’s a tough profession and all coaches go through the same basic stuff. I’ll get used to it.”

A GAME PLAN TO PREVENT, TREAT AND BEAT BURNOUT

Develop Some Work Guidelines

• Fight back.
• Focus on the things you do well. Give yourself more credit for the things you do.
• Set priorities and follow them.
• Challenge your own workaholic mythology - the personal myth that more work equals a better product.
• Focus on what you can control
• Take care of yourself first!
• Don’t feel guilty about retreating.
• Try to anticipate conflict and be prepared to deal with it right away.
• Choose your battles carefully.
• Get involved with your team and stay involved.
• Believe in possibilities, NOT probabilities.

Develop Some Personal Guidelines

• Define yourself by who you are as a person and how you do what you do, not by what you do.
• Get in shape and stay in shape.
• Develop a financial plan and a retirement plan for your future.
• Actively search for something that will take your mind completely off work.
• Seek balance, challenge and progress.
• Maintain your values. Stay grounded. Be true to yourself.
• Change your perspective whenever possible in order to put a positive, optimistic spin on negative events and thoughts. Reinterpret problems as challenges.
• Laugh as often as you can.
• When you work, work! When you play, play! Focus on the present.

Develop and Maintain A Social Support Group

• Spend time with other people.
• Do not hesitate to seek help from others. Share your thoughts and feelings.
• Stay action oriented. Resist the urge to withdraw or give up.

Live and Learn

• Attend clinics, camps, conventions. Take classes or attend seminars and clinics to improve your stress-management skills (relaxation, imagery, goal-setting, time management, assertiveness training).
• Engage in group barnstorming sessions with your colleagues.
• Periodically invite various administrators and support staff personnel to discuss ways to make your work more manageable and productive.

Something to Think About…

• Softball coaching is a people business and a softball coach should be a people person.
• Coaching is not for the weak at heart or the weak of mind.
• Coaching is a calling for players, not spectators. You have to be connected, engaged.
• You have to commit.
• There are no bad kids, just good kids who sometimes behave badly in tough situations.
• Burnout is a function of the nature of the job and the nature of the person doing the job.
• It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game. BUT, you need to win sometimes.
• Other things can help.
• Keep things in perspective. It’s not all about you.
• Lighten your load: Lose the baggage.
• Take control. Do not allow softball to run your life.
• Try to do the right thing!