If a team plays bad it’s a very common reaction to
change the coach and it’s a very popular – but most probably wrong – opinion
that coaching-changes lead to better results. The measure-stick are the results
before the coach-changing and immediately after the coach changing. This
measure-stick seems to be logical and fair but... again... it’s most probably
wrong.
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I try to explain why:
Firing a coach is nearly always the end-result of not
fulfilling expectations. Let’s say the expectations were realistic – in reality
they are more often not realistic than the other way round – but in our example
I even tell: Management, media and fans had realistic expectations about what
their team is going to achieve according to potential. In every season in every sport there are phases
where a team plays up to the expectations, there are phases when a team is
underachieving and there are phases when a team is overachieving. A coach is
always fired during an underachieving phase. So, after the coaching-change there
is always a very big chance that the team plays better because an
underachieving phase is usually followed by a „expectations-achieving phase“ or
an overachieving phase – with the old coach or with a new coach. If it’s a new
coach we just take the simple thinking and create a completely uncritical causality
(we play better since we did change the coach). This is just a
thinking-mistake, this simple causality is by far not proven and most probably
wrong. There could be a lot of different reasons why a team is playing better,
the coach-changing is just one of many possibilities. The most logical reason
is as explained. An underachieving phase is followed by a phase where the teams
meets the expectations or by an overachieving phase. Coming back to my examples
in my last column: Bern did play bad and suddenly played better – without
coach-changing. If they would have fired Törmänen and then after had the same
results as Törmänen had now: Most „experts“ would be sure that this is because
of the coach-changing. The same goes for Zug and for Davos. They suffered
underachieving phases, didn’t change the coach and played much better after. Ambri
is a different case. They had some sort of better results shortly after the coach-changing
but again. Was it because of the coach-changing or was it because of the most
logical reason: Once again, after an underachieving phase…and so on, don’t want
to bore you.
In addition to my explanation I want to inform all
readers that in North American pro-sports they did some scientific research
about coach-changing effects and the results are just brutal. No effect in the
longterm, a very small effect in the short-term. I highly doubt that results in
Europe would be much different although I have to admit that I don’t know about
such a study about European pro sports.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m a big believer of hiring the
best possible coach and I recommend to do so in a very professional way with
different researchs and methods. I actually recommend this to do with all
staff-members you have to hire (players, coaches, medical-staff,
backoffice-staff, scouts and so on) but in most cases I’m not a believer in
coach-firing.
BTW, short term changes as a result according to the US studies contradicts your theory slightly.
ReplyDeleteI personally prefer the more mondane reason that players have to prove themselves with a new coach and they also get a new chance to prove themselves which creates a short-term "energy" spike.
But anyways, I guess we all have our theories ;-)
Yes, we have our theories and all of us have to stay humble and modest with what we believe to know - according to my blog about "knowledge" - and we should try to stay precise, e.g. the US study did show "very small short term changes" and I did write "very small short term changes", in your comment you mentioned just "short term changes" ;-) and yes, this is a "very small" contradict. Life is full of contradicts... I agree with your opinion that we a new coach players have to prove themselves again and create a short term "energy" spike - but again, I believe this effect is probably true but also overrated.
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