Written by Over time, there have been many athletes that could not adapt to higher level competition for a variety of mental, physical, or emotional reasons. Sometimes athletes choose to pursue other directions in their lives or cannot compete at the higher level. There are so many reasons why athletes cannot make the transition to the higher levels and so many athletes who can begin training and competing at the higher levels.
The same is true for coaches who move from one level to another. Coaching strategies that may have worked at one level may not work at another. Many coaches have learned this the hard way, especially Urban Meyer, of the Jacksonville Jaguars. For those of you not recently following American sporting news, he recently moved to coaching professional football after his long career coaching football in college.
He has recently had problems with the change in coaching at the professional sports level. While he has been a professional coach for a long time, his athletes and team have to perform at an incredibly higher level than before. This means that he and the rest of the coaching staff have to perform at their highest levels. However, there have been many reports of Coach Meyer yelling at and treating coaching staff and athletes poorly, the coach not knowing enough of the inner workings of his own program and his athletes, and the extremely poor performance of his team.
All signs and reports so far reflect poor leadership and toxic culture at the Jacksonville Jaguars, but only time will really tell what has really happened. Change is hard for everyone in this situation: A team having a new coach, athletes conforming and adjusting to the new coach, the coach having to interact with new athletes and coaches, everyone learning how to communicate and trust each other, and the team moving in a new direction. What may have worked for Urban Meyer before, which was extremely unacceptable and ineffective, yelling at coaches and athletes and facilitating a toxic culture, will definitely not work with this team…unless he continues to replace coaches and athletes that more align with his values and will not question his direction. Urban Meyer does not look like one to adapt or change to the new environment and is instead of forcing everyone else to comply to him.
Until professional sports teams like the Jacksonville Jaguars begin to truly understand how toxic coaches and cultures adversely impact organizational success, team performance, and the short and long term impact on athletes’ mental, physical, and emotional health, there will continue to be more of the same antics. There is no room for abusive coaching and leadership at any level of sports. But why is it still tolerated, even at the professional level?