This is the time of year that businesses send their employees all over the country for industry conventions. It's no coincidence that when the temperatures drop throughout the northern part of our country, the convention season heats up in warmer, and sometimes more exotic, places. When I was in the insurance business, I had the unfortunate job requirement of attending an annual conference in March. In Palm Desert, California. Sounds warm, doesn't it?
I went to other warm places like Orlando, Puerto Rico and even Bermuda for various industry conventions. I'm sure it's hard to believe but work was actually done on those trips. A lot of entertainment and fun, sure, but opportunities present themselves, deals are done, and relationships are forged at these conventions like you can't get any other time of the fiscal year.
Sport has become such a huge business that for many years now, the convention season has struck our world, too. Google "conventions" and you'll find there are almost as many for the various sports as there are for the many industries in the "normal" business world. There's the baseball coaches convention in Nashville, Tennessee; the soccer coaches' convention in Overland Park, Kansas; and the National Lacrosse Convention and FanFest right here in Baltimore.
I've been introduced to business partners at these conventions and we've used companies that we've met there to provide equipment for our club, awards and prizes for our men's soccer tournament, and take a girls team on a soccer tour of Italy.
The benefits that I enjoy the most about attending these conventions or coaching clinics are the connections you make with members of your industry and the information you pick up from other experienced coaches in the clinics, videos, and demonstrations.
I attended a lacrosse coaches' clinic recently and for the first time attending a sports event, the only people I knew were the two coaches I went with and one of the speakers happened to be Matt Hatton from Carroll's own McDaniel College. It was a weird feeling since having been so involved in soccer for so many years, going to a coaches' meeting or annual clinic is like old home week, reconnecting with people that you grew up with in the "business" and swapping war stories about the good old days. Like the saying goes, "The older I get, the better I was." There is no more true statement about swapping stories from days gone by!
The opportunity to pick up bits of knowledge from other coaches as they run the attendees through the rigors of a training session or show tactical planning on a whiteboard is something I can't get enough of. A friend of mine once said there were no original ideas left, just the Internet, and in some ways that's true even in sports. But I'm not above "stealing" these tidbits of information and using them myself.
Outside of the coaching clinics, I love to watch other coaches go through their training sessions and often pick up a different angle or a new point of focus on each drill. But it's not just from your own sport where you can continue to learn. I cross-use drills from various sports if I'm having difficulty the conventional way. I use a rugby drill to teach my backs how to hold their line. I developed a transitional basketball drill using a similar one from my soccer experience. And I'm sure I will no doubt find lacrosse tactics from this spring that I can use next fall for soccer.
Just like all professions, it's imperative that coaches continue to learn the intricacies of their game and the players they coach in order to stay up to date with current trends and philosophies of the times. Like new accounting standards, insurance policy changes, banking regulations or remodeling techniques where the professionals are obligated to maintain the standards of their industry, coaches have to make sure they change their techniques and tactics to keep up with the times and remain competitive with their peers both on and off the field.
Many players are receiving such high-caliber training and game experiences through their club sports that their knowledge of the game is very sophisticated when they reach high school. A coach who tries to use old tactics or even old motivational techniques may lose his team before the season even starts. Kids can see through someone who is not up to par on their knowledge, and motivational techniques that were used on us in our youth many times are not acceptable anymore.
Albert Einstein once said, "Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death." We owe it to our players and ourselves to never stop learning about the game.
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Robert "Bird" Brown is the Times' rec sports writer. His column appears every Sunday. Reach him at 410-857-8552 or robert.brown@carrollcountytimes.com.
