During the past year, there has been a discussion about coaching methods in Finnish top-level ball-playing. Several accusations of inappropriate behavior by the coaches of different football teams towards other team members have hit the headlines.
Having piloted female lions Pasi Mustonenthe Swede who coached the Helmaris Anna Signeulin and HJK’s head coach Toni Koskelan coaching style and activities among the team have been refined in different situations throughout the year.
There has been a wide debate in Finnish ball-playing. What kind of coaching culture produces results and what means are allowed when trying to maintain the level of requirements of elite sports?
Head coach of the Finnish men’s national ice hockey team From Jukka Jalo has been described in the words of those who played in his teams, among other things, as caring, dialogue-oriented and nurturing unity. These qualities are often described as “soft values”. At the same time, however, he has been able to maintain a high level of requirements and achieved success.
Jalonen, who has coached the Lions to Olympic gold and the men’s world championship three times, feels that the so-called “coaching of the old federation” has started to change to a coaching style of “softer values” as the 21st century approaches.
– It has come out more clearly during the 2010s. When both coaches and players have become younger people who have lived in a different culture. They are used to doing and dealing with things in a different way than us people from the “older union”, Jalonen tells Urheilu.
Flip-flop to face, straight screaming for five minutes
Naturally, the athletes have also experienced a change in the coaching culture. Finished his long basketball career at the European Championships in the fall Petteri Koponen also says that he has noticed that human orientation has taken over.
– For example, the old atmosphere of the Yugoslavian period that I experienced myself is a bit fading away, but yes, it is still there, he reflects.
Koponen himself says that he grew up in a tougher coaching culture and that he also sometimes pushed himself forward.
– The shouting wasn’t an absolute value, but I didn’t mind it either. It was mostly surprising if the coach didn’t shout. Somehow I learned that if the coach yelled and spent his energy on his players, he cared and didn’t want them to make the same mistakes again.
Koponen’s experiences with “old school” or “harder values” coaching methods have also come from the absolute top of European basketball. In his opinion, the Serbian coaches in particular have been clinging to extreme measures.
– There is no mincing words. Among other things, I once got hit in the face by a flipchart when I was young. In the video meeting, one player has been yelled at for five minutes straight, everyone from the home country has been barked at for playing skills. On the field, the team has had to run for the next half hour due to a mistake, he says.
However, Koponen adds that the so-called “Balkan school” in basketball has also changed its operating methods over the years.
– Nowadays it is known that players cannot be treated the same way. The most important thing these days is mutual respect and the fact that the team works together for everything.
Among other things, I once got hit in the face by a flipchart when I was young. In the video meeting, one player has been yelled at for five minutes straight, everyone from the home country has been barked at for playing skills.
Petteri Koponen
Feedback, and how to give it
Jalonen feels that giving feedback is one of the most important things in the development and management of individuals. Therefore, in his opinion, every coach must look at how feedback is given to different individuals.
– Maybe in a way the way in which feedback should be given to individuals has changed, Jalonen explains.
– People are quite sensitive nowadays and maybe a little more sensitive in the hockey team than before. Before, the mood was a lot duller, raucous and raucous. Now, with that in mind, you have to think about how to set your words and how to get your message across to the athlete. The purpose of giving feedback is to help the player or the team, and especially not to humiliate, he insists.
Jalonen and Koponen agree that success can also come with “soft values”. However, Koponen also believes that winning requires both, softer and harder methods.
– Everything depends on the team and the players and what kind of habits they respond to. For some, yelling works, but for others, a softer approach. It is always a big challenge for the coach to solve, says the basketball hero.
Both also emphasize the importance of mutual respect between people. Koponen also talks about the responsibility for ensuring that the team’s activities do not become lax.
– The best teams I have been part of have been such that we have dared to say a little bad, he says.
The difference between a dressing room and an office is a wave of emotions
Executive Director of the Finnish Coaches Association Sari Tuunainen notes that the same laws apply in elite sports coaching as in the rest of working life.
– Top sport is not a separate island from it, he states.
– We are strongly pushing for changes in coaching methods in Finland and how to achieve the level of requirements set for the players. We would like it to be done through the participation of the athlete. So that such a fire is lit inside the athlete that the desired level of requirements is reached and even exceeded.
Jukka Jalonen especially emphasizes that, for example, giving feedback in sports is not the easiest task for a coach, because emotions are often very strongly involved in elite sports. The influence of emotions has been one key topic of discussion when sports coaching has been compared to the principles of “ordinary working life”.
– I think the principles are equal when dealing with people. What is different is that the emotions are more prominent. In elite sports, you win and lose.
Now you have to think about how to set your words and how to get your message across to the athlete. The purpose of giving feedback is to help the player or the team, and especially not to humiliate.
Jukka Jalonen
For example, when losses come, nobody in the team is happy and they bring negative feelings to the community. The Lions’ pilot says that this kind of emotional wave of extremes in a “normal workplace” is very rare compared to sports.
– In my opinion, it is also different that the level of demand in elite sports is constantly so high. If you want to succeed at the top, the management must be strong and the level of requirements high. But how it is required has certainly changed in recent years. Fear, threats and a “brutal attitude” may not be enough these days.
In Tuunainen’s opinion, the “soft methods, hard results” formula has already been shown to be possible in Finnish elite sports. In his opinion, there is a background of an authoritarian coaching culture in Finland, which is still visible.
– However, you have to remember that there have always been good coaches and the vast majority of coaching is still good today.