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Career Description

Instruct or coach groups or individuals in the fundamentals of sports. Demonstrate techniques and methods of participation. May evaluate athletes' strengths and weaknesses as possible recruits or to improve the athletes' technique to prepare them for competition. Those required to hold teaching degrees should be reported in the appropriate teaching category.

What Job Titles Coaches and Scouts Might Have

• Baseball Coach
• Basketball Coach
• Coach
• Football Coach

What Coaches and Scouts Do

• Provide training direction, encouragement, motivation, and nutritional advice to prepare athletes for games, competitive events, or tours.
• Plan, organize, and conduct practice sessions.
• Explain and enforce safety rules and regulations.
• Plan and direct physical conditioning programs that will enable athletes to achieve maximum performance.
• Instruct individuals or groups in sports rules, game strategies, and performance principles, such as specific ways of moving the body, hands, or feet, to achieve desired results.
• Teach instructional courses and advise students.
• Evaluate athletes' skills and review performance records to determine their fitness and potential in a particular area of athletics.
• Monitor athletes' use of equipment to ensure safe and proper use.
• Adjust coaching techniques, based on the strengths and weaknesses of athletes.
• Keep abreast of changing rules, techniques, technologies, and philosophies relevant to their sport.
• Develop and arrange competition schedules and programs.
• Analyze the strengths and weaknesses of opposing teams to develop game strategies.
• Contact the parents of players to provide information and answer questions.
• Coordinate travel arrangements and travel with team to away contests.
• Explain and demonstrate the use of sports and training equipment, such as trampolines or weights.
• Arrange and conduct sports-related activities, such as training camps, skill-improvement courses, clinics, and pre-season try-outs.
• Hire, supervise, and work with extended coaching staff.
• Keep and review paper, computerized, and video records of athlete, team, and opposing team performance.
• Counsel student athletes on academic, athletic, and personal issues.
• Select, acquire, store, and issue equipment and other materials as necessary.
• Perform activities that support a team or a specific sport, such as participating in community outreach activities, meeting with media representatives, and appearing at fundraising events.
• Monitor the academic eligibility of student athletes.
• Identify and recruit potential athletes by sending recruitment letters, meeting with recruits, and arranging and offering incentives, such as athletic scholarships.
• File scouting reports that detail player assessments, provide recommendations on athlete recruitment, and identify locations and individuals to be targeted for future recruitment efforts.
• Plan strategies and choose team members for individual games or sports seasons.
• Oversee the development and management of the sports program budget and fundraising activities.
• Serve as organizer, leader, instructor, or referee for outdoor and indoor games, such as volleyball, football, and soccer.

What Coaches and Scouts Should Be Good At

• Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
• Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
• Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
• Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
• Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
• Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
• Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
• Written Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
• Information Ordering - The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
• Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
• Fluency of Ideas - The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
• Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
• Category Flexibility - The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.

What Coaches and Scouts Should Be Interested In

• Realistic - Realistic occupations frequently involve work activities that include practical, hands-on problems and solutions. They often deal with plants, animals, and real-world materials like wood, tools, and machinery. Many of the occupations require working outside, and do not involve a lot of paperwork or working closely with others.

What Coaches and Scouts Need to Learn

• Education and Training - Knowledge of principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.
• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
• Psychology - Knowledge of human behavior and performance; individual differences in ability, personality, and interests; learning and motivation; psychological research methods; and the assessment and treatment of behavioral and affective disorders.
• Administration and Management - Knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning, resource allocation, human resources modeling, leadership technique, production methods, and coordination of people and resources.
• Sales and Marketing - Knowledge of principles and methods for showing, promoting, and selling products or services. This includes marketing strategy and tactics, product demonstration, sales techniques, and sales control systems.