What you expect an assistant to do?

First a few of questions that will help generate better more specific answers:
1.  How many assistants?
2.  Do they coach other sports?
3.  Married (w/children) or single?
4.  In the district teaching or working jobs outside of school?

There are things I want my assistants to do in the off-season but I am careful to make sure I am not burning them out.  For example I have an assistant who used to be the head wrestling and softball coach in the spring.  SO......guess what I didn't even ask him to open the weight room in the mornings or I would burn him out.   Now the last few years he's volunteering with wrestling and stepped down from softball altogether.  So now he has more time for football.  

My DC also coaches three sports.  But he finds time to get some extra reports done for us too.  I just think you want to find ways to let them get work done.  Be flexible with your expectations and time table if you are in a small school like mine.  

We attend clinics together and then discuss after.


In-season is a different cat.  We have it all spelled out and it works for us.  We don't meet face to face on the weekend. Email, texting, Hudl, etc.  We all meet the deadline for tagging playlists and doing our other jobs on the weekend to get ready.  My OL coach and I meet before school on Monday.  My DC and I meet during our common prep and we are ready to rock.  We do this because every single coach has to drive between 15 min and 40 min to get to school.  I would rather let them use that time to work on football or spend time with their family as long as the prep work gets done.  

I expect them to have their indi time drills planned and not waste time.  Be prepared and coach fast.

My advice is find somebody in your area who is successful and will sit down with you and show you how they organize the staff and what they do in season and in the off-season.

At one school I was at they had secured a grant to pay the coaches who put in the time in the off-season.

At my last school we had a football PE class. The HC, OL, DC, Slot Receiver, and WR coaches were all on campus and the latter 3 had prep periods during the football PE class. The off campus coaches werent required to be there if they couldnt. But come spring and summer workouts it was all hands on deck. most of the off campus coaches who couldnt make the Football PE class would come in after school and work with their groups during the off season.

While it might seem like an important question to ask number 3 is illegal to ask about marital status. Besides if a coach has a family they should be finding ways to make sure they don't feel alienated/abandoned during the season.

Gotcha

I'm not an HC, but I really felt the need to weigh in on this. I think what you ask them to do should also depend on what they're doing in the off season.

We have 8 on staff, counting myself. 5 are in the building, 2 are in town, and I'm 30 minutes away in the off season. Last year, we were all expected to be in our weight room with assigned days. I know it's technically "fair" to have everyone with an equal amount of days, but I always felt like I was getting the short end of the stick. You have 5 guys in the building, they can all be there for the 45 minutes after school. I'm literally on the road to and from longer than I am there most days. I'll come when I can, but I hate being in the weight room.

Yeah I meant know who you're working with.

I know a guy (Don't wee all....) who is a good hard working bright coach. He's been in the game 25-30 years. A new young header got hired. Threw down all these time demands and after the season his best assistant left to take a job helping a rival.

Inside the mean job interview. I meant the head coach needs to balance the demands of the job with the other demands in that assistant's life.

Regarding weight room, I as an assistant feel obligated to get in there at least once a week during the off season, I think it helps me to establish relationships with kids throughout the off season. Only the HC is on campus in our program, so the assistants have a little more work to do in my opinion to avoid being seen as the guys who just show up for spring ball.

That said, our weights are at 7:30 am so it is a PITA for a lot of off campus guys to juggle work schedules to get there and the HC knows that so he asks for once every 2 or 3 weeks. I try to make it at least once a week just to see the kids and be seen by them.

Our HC has a list that he hands out before every season that assigns duties to each coach for practice, game day, road games, etc. Just simple things like coach X will fill up water, coach Y will be the last one out of the locker room before practice, Coach Z will handle any post practice running for tardies, etc. Makes it clear who is responsible for what

This is a great topic. I have a question.

We map out all responsibilities for coaches during the off-season 6 months ahead of time.

I understand some coaches have other responsibilities i.e. family, kid(s) functions, work obligations, travel etc.

However, in-season is a different story.

If you have a large staff like us, but certain individuals are not carrying their weight which of the following would you recommend.

1. Remove the coach from staff
2. Ask him to coach to a lower level (9th or JV)
3. Place his responsibilities on another coach
4. Improvement plan - however, what if they do not follow through
5. Other

The reason for my question is that I feel we are not maximizing our coaches and it is going on deaf ears. These individuals show up however, fail to carry out their roles/jobs to the best of their ability or what is assigned to them.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated.

In the perfect world you would remove that individual. If you can re assign the coach, and put somebody else in that role.

I have to clarify, it's not about my commute. Specifically, this off season, we were all assigned weeks in the weight room. One of our coaches was going to be out of town for his week, and yet somehow I was the one who should have picked up his entire week. Because I don't teach. 

I was just talking about people who live further away or aren't in the building being asked to fill in when other people are closer, and are also being paid. I do a whole lot of stuff on my own time, and I really don't care about that. I do the things that need to be done to make things easier for the program as a whole. For me, the issue with people living a greater distance away comes when there are 6 people within 5 minutes of the school and who work at the school who aren't asked to do any of the extra things because of their "family obligations." I'm not trying to get out of doing my job or anything like that, but if there are 5 qualified people just down the hall who can stay after school 30 minutes to cover for someone, there really isn't any need to get in touch with me this week. 

Maybe you think I'm being a baby or something like that, and I'm really not. It's not about being lazy, it's just about the fact that my time is equally as valuable, regardless of my employment status. Sorry that I work from home and don't feel obligated to pick up the slack for people who are there all day every day. 

I apologize for not being more clear. My phone wasn't cooperating when I typed that first one, and I tried to get it in quick. I meant it all more in the sense that, when something extra suddenly comes up, there are numerous guys right down the hall who can deal with that. I drive by our supply store every day, so I wouldn't expect any of them be asked to pick up tape or anything.

I do stand being the statement that I hate doing off season weights, though.

While your contract may say just during the season we all know the importance of the off season. If a guy wasn't fullfiling what the HC asked in the off season and it was reasonable then the HC would have every right not to keep that guy around, diminish his responsibilities or title, or be on the look out for a replacement. I get what you are saying about contract length however I don't think the HC would have a rough time justifying not keeping someone on staff, those spots are supplemental 1 year contracts not tenured.

GUMP, WHAT IS YOUR SOLE PURPOSE IN THIS ARMY?

TO DO WHATEVER IT IS YOU TELL ME TO, DRILL SEARGENT.