Words That Influence Athletes' Minds

This is the practical application of Chapter 3 ’s insights into real-life conversations with athletes—personality in action. It examines the types of thinking behind the structure of problems and solutions and the key questions that begin to help shift from one to the other. There is a detailed exploration of seven language and behaviour patterns that decode personality traits and psychological constructs into observations of just how athletes are thinking, feeling and behaving. This helps coaches develop their relationship skills and increase their ability to positively influence performance outcomes. Each pattern comes with hints and tips on how to decode verbal and body language together with examples of how coaches can use their words to influence more effectively. There is a proforma for identifying an athlete’s peak performance profile with a number of strategies to encourage the commitment, continuity and ongoing development of training into high-performance race outcomes. In persuading the unpersuadable, when you want to get a key message across to an athlete who may rebel at being told what to do, the Advocacy Model can help frame your suggestions in a much more readily acceptable way.