Scaffolding Women Coaches’ Development: A Program to Build Coaches’ Competence and Confidence

Abstract

Research continues to demonstrate the underrepresentation of women coaches and that barriers outweigh support. The purpose of this practical article is to describe the process undertaken by a National Governing Body of Sport to deliver a learning and development program to support women hockey coaches in Scotland, the Women in Coaching program. Our aim is to share understanding about this example of good practice to provide insight and direction for change that can enhance the experiences and provisions of coach education and development for women coaches. First, we explain the use of scaffolding as a concept to capture the approach adopted in the program to bring together a range of learning situations (e.g., coach education, workshops, systematic observation of coaching practice, mentoring). We then describe and discuss the evidence gathered to inform program development (i.e., workforce analysis, interviews with coaches). Next the delivery of the program and assessment of its impact are discussed (i.e., pre-post self-perceptions, players’ perceptions, coaching behaviors, reflective survey). Finally we present best practices based on the lessons learned from our involvement with the program over the past six years.

Women Rugby Union Coaches’ Experiences of Formal Coach Education in Ireland and the United Kingdom: A Qualitative Study

“…Finally, both the RFU and IRFU amongst other NGBs need to pay more attention on how the diversity of their coach educators and tutors affects the experiences of women coaches, their capability to succeed, but also how it can contribute to growing the representation of women coaches across sports as there was a limited presence of women in these roles (Banwell et al, 2020). Doing so will contribute to addressing some of the macro barriers which LaVoi 2016aidentified within the EIM by having supportive tutors who impart empathy and who can act as inspirational role models for women coaches to succeed in rugby union (Allen & Reid, 2019).…”

“…Some have been regarded as ineffective because gendered norms continue to be further legitimized, thus preventing women coaches from succeeding in the sport because of being continually seen as inferior to men (Fielding-Lloyd & Meân, 2008). Conversely, Allen and Reid (2019) reported that women coaches valued women-only coach education courses in Scottish field hockey and that they helped improve confidence. Analyzing the experiences of women rugby union coaches' after attending formal coach educational courses can identify how course provision can be strengthened to further incentivize more women rugby union coaches to become certified.…”

Final Thoughts on Women in Sport Coaching: Fighting the War

“…Multiple papers in this special issue outlined and evaluated programs targeted to develop women coaches. Allen and Reid (2019) and Culver et al (2019) specified multifaceted programs, best practices, and lessons learned for developing women coaches in Scotland and Canada, respectively. Both papers add practical and applied knowledge of supports at the individual and interpersonal levels of the EIM model, that can be adapted to other contexts to help develop and retain women coaches and improve equitable representation of women leaders in sport.…”

Exploring a Women-Only Training Program for Coach Developers

“…Organizations across many fields have initiated continuing education programs to empower women and create opportunities for leadership development. One such example of an empowering initiative for women is gender-specific programs or WOTP seen in business (Bullough, De Luque, Abdelzaher, & Heim, 2015), academics (Gronowski & Burnham, 2018), as well as various workplaces (Chuang, 2019) including sport (e.g., Allen & Reid, 2019;Belding & Dodge, 2016). According to Chuang (2019) "due to gender difference in learning, communication, emotional intelligence, motivation, leadership, problem-solving (.…”