In part one, I detailed the circumstances of my dismissal from my position as the Head Coach of a collegiate rowing team, and introduced some questions around the culture of “dismiss and replace.” In this part two, I will recount my recovery from this “trauma,” and try to answer the questions of why I was let go, and how coaches and organizations should be clear on their priorities before simply accepting “dismiss and replace” as the default solution.
When our family relocated to a new city, and I stepped into a new coaching role, I was motivated to move on. The emotions and questions brought on by that experience were hard to let go however; should I consider this a professional failure, or was this action beyond my control? What was the specific decision tree that led to my dismissal? How do I reconcile this life-altering event with the person I believe myself to be, a dedicated professional, a good leader, and a good coach? This was an entirely new experience for me; It was the first time I had been fired from any job. Although I was committed to putting my best face forward professionally in my new role, my family definitely could tell otherwise. At my wife’s suggestion, I sought counseling to try to resolve the complicated emotions I was processing, and set myself on a path forward.
It is a cliche, but my experience with therapy was cathartic. As a first-timer, I was fortunate enough to stumble onto an excellent therapist. The first step she initiated was to shape this experience as a “trauma.” It was an amusing relief to hear her say, “There’s Trauma with a big T, and then there’s trauma with a little t. This is the latter. But it’s still a trauma.” We then began the work of breaking down each of the recurring emotions associated with this trauma: Fear, disappointment, anger, embarrassment, etc. The best work was done when trying to figure out why I was feeling these things. Why was I angry? Why did I feel embarrassed? Why was I disappointed?
Answering those questions gave me back understanding and control, and also established a new mechanism for emotional coping.
The six months of conversations resulted in finally being able to publicly admit, to friends and acquaintances, I was dismissed from my old job. The more I told people about it, the less embarrassing it was, and most importantly, the more confident I felt about myself and my new position. My new team was improving, growing, and competitive success was manifesting itself out of my growing confidence. This validated that not only was I professionally competent, but that in fact I had valuable experience and skills.
From this I can offer my first two key takeaways for any coaching professional faced with this situation: First, when it’s happening to you in real-time, maintain your integrity & professionalism. You don’t want to say or do anything that will make the immediate situation worse, or make the long term recovery even harder. Secondly, face the emotional impact of that experience head on. The sooner you can start the emotional recovery process the better. One of my regrets from this experience would be that I waited as long as I did to get help. I would highly recommend getting professional help as a first step. The insight and unbiased perspective of a trained professional can expedite and ease the burden of trying to figure it all out on your own.
Leaving that trauma behind and being able to reflect more objectively on the experience, led me to finally confront the reasons for my dismissal. I was never given a specific reason (although in truth I didn’t ask) but the simple answer was that the team was not competitively successful. Another speculative reason was that the team’s lack of competitive success had obviously impacted my professional demeanor and turned my passion into Sisyphus-like frustration. In short I became resentful of the situation and it probably showed. Malcontented coach that’s not winning? Easy solution is to show him the door and continue the “dismiss and replace” cycle.
Many of my friends and peers tried to point out what they perceived as the unfairness of the situation. They asked, “Were you being supported? Were you specifically told you needed to be competitively successful to keep your job? Were you ever asked about your mental health or how you were managing?” The answers to these questions are all irrelevant, because I realized that any perceived un/fairness of the employment relationship was irrelevant. My being there was simply not a good fit. The AD came to that conclusion before I did, and therein lies my culpability.
This then led me to an existential question around the process of matching coaches and organizations. How honest are we about what we want when we’re searching for a new coach or a new job? Some maximize their money, time and resources into competitive success. Some say they want to win, but are unwilling to take the necessary steps. Some will say that competitive success is not important. Sometimes however, someone in the process of fitting coaches and teams together will not be forthright about their actual priorities. This is where we get the culture of dismiss and replace in collegiate athletics. It is an overly simple solution to a very complex problem that no one benefits from.
Shortly after my dismissal, I interviewed for the head coach position at a Division II rowing school. They had a pretty good boathouse and equipment situation, and even had enough scholarships to make them a real threat at the Division II level. When I asked the athletic director what the goal was for the team, the response was, “We just want the athletes to have a good time.” This was a perfect, honest and direct answer. I declined the position, because I was looking for competitive success.
It is OK to say that competitive success is not a priority, as long the actual priorities are explicit and everyone in the organization is aligned with those priorities.
This is my third take away for coaches: Know what your priorities are, and most importantly, know what is needed to maintain those priorities. Do not align with an organization that does not align with those priorities, no matter how “amazing” the opportunity appears. In consideration of the athletes in all this: as a coach, you need to understand the priorities of your athletes, and they need to align with yours (and of course the organizations). If they don’t the athletes will never “buy-in” to the organizational culture or your leadership. Occasionally priorities are not what you would expect, which is why everyone needs to be transparent. The higher the level, the more athletes are increasingly aware of mental health and performance. A coach who is entirely focused on competitive success without prioritizing the mental health of the athletes is also not going to be a good fit.
As the community of rowing and athletics moves forward, my hope is that we can continue to increase awareness around our perception of competition and metrics for success. Competition is always an outstanding medium for promoting humans to grow into better versions of themselves, but it is not the only way. Coaches and athletic organizations will continue to grow and improve the more they can intrinsically be aware of this, and extrinsically seek each other out so that the culture of dismiss and replace becomes a thing of the past.
For myself, the whole experience is far enough behind me that I simply see it no longer as a life-altering event, but as another bit of experience, a parable I can share with others as part of my holistic perspective on coaching and rowing “…this one time when I was fired….”
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