Failure to Prepare is to Prepare to Fail! Why plan?

After some great comments and high number of views, I decided to re-post this article I had written last year.  This should wrap up the 4 segment series I wrote on planning.
Enjoy!


Chaos, bedlam, disarray, disorder and eventual anarchy! This is exactly what happens when players head to a practice/drill and nothing has been laid out. Most programs "wing it" and this is the perfect recipe for disaster. I have been in charge of various junior programs and the first thing I did in my first director position was to establish a curriculum. This allowed our coaches to know what the end game was along with the path to follow. Their input was key as I had to make sure their voices were heard otherwise they would become disgruntle because they would be no more than puppets. Get the staff involved! The curriculum allows the staff and I to observe our players and develop better microcycles and mesocycles according to the talent and skill level. For some players we would change the cycles as they might have more or less talent/skill than others, but because we knew what the next step was, it allowed us to have a specific plan. The specific practices were very smooth and more FUN for our players. Once the players come in, we would give them the focus for the day and begin practice. At every session, we made sure we had ONE FOCUS; no more and no less. This allowed our players to acquire the skill, practice it, and solidify it. To make sure our players are not bored doing the same thing, we changed the drills between courts or, if we are all doing the same drill on every court, we changed in increments of 10 to 15 minute. This gives various looks to our players keeping them engaged but at the same time, players are working on a specific Focus. The strategic planning of the specific practices allowed our staff to dynamically manage our mesocycle planning. If players were more advanced or were not up to par with their development we were able to adjust the subsequent practices. Players develop differently and tweaking is vital to allow the players to be comfortable with how they develop. There is much more that I can go into, but for today I leave you with quote by the late, inspiring, and famous coach John Wooden, "Failure to prepare is Preparing to Fail!"