SimonHarlingBlog Posts

Am I gaming the system or playing the game to create a system?

In a game, you perform a task and get a result. In a system, that result loops back to influence the next task.

• The Game: I ship my book and get into bookstores to sell. How many books I sell is a simple measure of success. 

I create content most days and post it on LinkedIn. That’s a game – the more I interact with the system, the more it rewards me.

• The System: The act of writing changes my skills, which changes how I see the world, which changes what I write next. 

I set myself the challenge of creating content each day – photos of people reading my book, content from the book itself, and anything else that came to mind. A way of setting the conditions for me to interact with the content, to remind myself that it’s no longer my story;

You can launch a book, watch it go up, and count the numbers.

Or,

You can release a book and focus on how it makes you feel.

The most common question I get is: How many books have you sold? Shorthand for – are you winning? How is the game treating you?

My answer, always, is to talk about how it makes me feel. I’m enjoying it. Thanks for asking.

Games are not systems.

If you are smart, you win games. But to create lasting change, we must work on and with the systems that contain them.

“Better is the enemy of the good” is an odd thing to say.

After all, better is good, right?

Only if the thing you want to get better at creates the change you seek.

Each week, grassroots coaches coach the same kids, and it’s tempting to think that if we just run a killer drill that looks so good on Instagram, everything will be ok.

Of course, it’s not.

Training looks nothing like it did on Instagram.

The kids are confused, and you are left frustrated.

So we look for better drills.

We all want sessions that make us look good, that the kids enjoy, and are easy to put on.

Better is the enemy of the good. The endless search for better drills stops you from creating a better connection with those you coach.

Drills won’t help you – you already know more than you need. Neither will 6 different types of cones. It’s all about the people.

If you want to build connections over content, then you might enjoy this.

To be a perfect loser, we forgo the long-term game to win today, only to lose in a much bigger way later on, often unbeknownst to us.

The perfect loser keeps face today in an attempt to look, well, perfect.

Selling out can look an awful lot like success, and success can look an awful lot like failure.

Join me here for a conversation about courage, creativity, and collaboration.

I got a “D” in English, and when it came to deciding which exam I sat at 16, I moved from “O” level to a CSE. I get it—English as I knew it then was not for me. The choice was: do well at CSE or struggle at “O” level.

I still misspell words like “becuase”, have little confidence reading aloud, and the moment I don’t recognise a word, panic sets in.

Maybe I’ll never write a book, publish my research, or give keynote speeches. Oh wait! —I figured out how to get it done. My workarounds help me communicate my ideas.

Are we saying if you get a “D” in PE, then it’s not for that particular student?

Is that really necessary?

At the heart of the story of Cinderella is status. Princes are supposed to marry princesses, not maids – people like us do things like this.

The story begins when the well-worn path takes a turn. That’s the power of a great story. Curious, we pay attention, we listen.

If you could look for future sports stars in unlikely places, where would you look?

The prevailing performance pathway narrative is this: more players, more medals. The wider the playing base, the more talented players we will produce. More lottery tickets, better odds.

But we run out of money long before we can say with certainty that we will win. Only one Sports National Governing Body in Wales receives more than one million pounds in funding from Sport Wales; most receive significantly less.

Human performance—the game we play—isn’t rigged. It doesn’t work like a casino game with known probabilities. There are plenty of things we know for sure work; predicting who is going to win medals is not one of them.

If you had £20 million to spend on sport and physical activity in Wales, what would you spend it on? More programs, more pathways, more of what we already have? Or removing the barriers that keep people from being healthy, active, and in tune with nature?

What would you do? I’d love to know.

If you have a few loud, brash kids in your coaching session who dominate proceedings, you have minority rule.

Last night I offered the group I was coaching a free play session. Here is what I noticed:

The late developers came over to talk to me about other options – they weren’t seeing much of the ball.

Slowly but surely, more kids walked into a small-sided game scenario, leaving fewer players in the free play, which turned into a free-for-all.

Kids hiding other kids’ boots, arguments over incidents. You get the picture

The rule of two feet was applied. Kids had agency. When you have minority rule, the only way to combat it is to change the rules – give the underdog, which in this case was the majority, agency over their time in training.

Watch this space.

Community-building tools are cheap and accessible.

The reason to gather? That’s yours to discover.

The work of building a community is figuring out where people want to go.

What will you gather around?

A person of principle puts things in the right order.

A principal is working with an order that has already been decided.

Putting one thing in front of the other as a point of principle might not make it the truth, but it might make you a principal.

Foundational principle: Physical well-being is a basic human need in a civilised society.

Hierarchical choice: Elite performance, funding structures, and prestige come first.

Being organised around a hierarchy (sport) whilst invoking a foundational principle (well-being) is a distraction for National Governing Bodies, a money sink for Government, and a disservice to the public.

Design for success, and you will likely be disappointed.

Design for failure, and you look for what doesn’t work, so that you can fix it.

Design or desire, you choose.

Image by Alexa from Pixabay

We are said to be leaning our ladder up against the wrong wall when, for all our efforts to climb the ladder, there is little to show for our efforts.

Have we improved participation in sport? No.

Have we improved the injury rate in adolescent athletes? No.

Do major sporting events create a legacy for the youngest watching? No.

The idea that a wide sports participation base benefits both society and the pinnacle that is elite sport is a fallacy.

We are leaning our ladder against the wrong wall.

Of course, we could continue to impose our adult worldview on children (not mini adults) and follow the money. Or we could leave that for professional sport, and the rest of us could turn our attention to a new wall to lean our ladder against.

Coaching at its best teaches us first to coach ourselves, and then ask how we can best coexist with others – the wall we should lean our ladder against is that of being better humans, not better at building a structure that would have the ancient Egyptians in fits of laughter.

Time to learn from history, wouldn’t you say?

Holding two seemingly disconnected or even opposing ideas and finding a way forward is leadership.

People will always champion the polar opposites, and in doing so, they clarify the edges. Yet there is a way forward in the shade—not through compromise, but through clarity.

And in doing so, we connect to new ideas and possibilities that soften once-harsh edges.

At the end of a coaching conversation, to close the loop, it’s common to ask; What does the next step look like?

It doesn’t need to be a leap; a step will do.

It also doesn’t need to be forward; it could be backward, sideways, or be still.

Onwards, is not forwards, it is onwards.

The thing with being a grassroots coach is that the audience doesn’t change from one week to the next. The kids that are in your session this week are the same kids that were there the week before, and the week before that. Nothing changes.

So we drop drills—we change the drills, skills, and games instead.

If the kids were bored, distracted, or indifferent last week, there is always another chance this week to impress, engage, and inspire.

Only what happens on the Instagram reel—slick, fun, smart-looking content—doesn’t happen in real life.

You muddle up the layout. Leave out the key information. And the kids can’t make the pass, catch the ball, or hit the shot like you hoped they would.

It looked easy on the socials.

Kids look bored, confused, or worried because you look like you are about to lose your mind. Ring a bell?

Drill dropping saves time in the moment; who has the time to sit and think about practice design?

Measure twice, cut once. Cut once, cut again after you’ve bought another length of timber. Drop drills, or build a practice where you belong. You decide how you want to spend your time.

I’m not one for daily social media posts—who has the time? Even if I did, why waste it there?

Yet, for the next 90 days, I am posting daily.

I create a post, ship it, and move on. I don’t overthink. I don’t negotiate with myself—I just get it done. Counterintuitively, while social media normally sucks up time, this kickstarts my productivity each day.

I’m not sure this habit will last past the 90-day mark. I don’t think it matters; it’s a rhythm that I need right now to ship work and move projects out the door.

Onwards.

New information?

A new way of doing things?

The weather?

There is a lot that can change our minds.

High performance isn’t about having all the answers – it’s about committing fully to a direction, learning from what emerges, and adapting intelligently.

The elite performers I’ve worked with understood this: they made plans, committed to them, and extracted learning. Those who struggled were constantly seeking the next performance edge, changing direction every session, never staying with anything long enough to discover what worked.

If you change as quickly as your feeds scroll, you might have just found the answer.

Not the number of followers. Or posts.

But the number of interactions we had with people.

Now that could be a metric worth measuring.

That’s it.

So, what gets better because you persist?

Tx Seth Godin for the prompt.

It’s hung about on my desk, while I post on social media for 90 days straight, regardless of outcome. I’m not hoping to get better at posting. I’m unlikely to get many more followers. So what gets better?

Doing.

I have the time. I have something to talk about. Why not!

If regional rugby teams in Wales are in a mess, then Gallagher Premiership Rugby clubs are looking on rather sheepishly — most are classed as balance sheet insolvent. Sure, they can point to a higher attendance, arguably because it’s a better product, but a better business model? Probably not.

Well, if the point was to transfer value to shareholders, club rugby wouldn’t pass the test.

If in Wales, we are stakeholders — we certainly are not shareholders — then optimising our way out is redundant. School kids want games, connection, and something to believe in. Efficiency is for car engines, not communities.

McDonald’s makes burgers and funds grassroots sports. Shell extracts oil and sponsors environmental programs. The WRU wants to win rugby matches, make money on a Saturday, AND act as a charitable community fund.

Profit, performance, and development are three very different things. Just ask the majority of Premiership clubs that are balance sheet insolvent.

Just maybe the point of making a plan is not to make a plan, but to consider the experience you want to have and the value you want to create.

Plans rarely work; on the other hand, alignment, connection, and a culture that understands what the work is for, are resilient enough to make a better plan next time.

When you listen to Ms Cheng Xueqin talk about Anji Play—an early education program built on the power of play—you know that trust carries the water. Without trust, there is no program.

What I find particularly interesting are the tenets of the program: love, risk, and reflection.

It’s not enough to say go play! Something needs to be at stake – risk.

Tasks are not repeated, but iterated – reflection.

And love, who doesn’t need that?

I mention this because Anji Play is a reminder that it’s not enough to connect people or pass on information; something has to carry the water.

If it’s trust, then risk works. We think big, act small, and evolve.

What are you using to carry the water?

If you don’t know the answer to this question. Try this:

What improves because you persist?

What actually improves is often not what you initially set out to measure.

The thing that improves might be:

Your ability to notice what matters

Your relationships with the people involved

Your understanding of the work itself

Your capacity to stay present even when it’s difficult

The conditions you create for others

And if you don’t like the answer, you know what to do.

What are the rules?

How do you win?

Who are the players?

How do you lose?

Once you know the game you’re playing, you don’t need 10,000 hours to master it—you just need to keep playing it.

Here’s a line I hear a lot from coaches: “I don’t produce enough content; I don’t get the time, and I don’t get what I am doing.”

Hardly surprising when all we want to do is coach.

Maybe the people we coach will tell the others. But, they don’t!

What to do?

Disappointment reveals our true expectations.

What were you expecting?

Design for what you need, not what you want.

By all means, tell me who you are, where you have come from, and what you want, THEN show me what you are working on— cause not effect.

I’ve just come back from a weekend with the family to celebrate Dad’s 80th birthday. 

What struck me most was how magical it can be to place your focus entirely on one thing. Nowhere else to go, nothing else to do – a focus on being together. 

If you can do that for others, then you, too, can be king/queen for the day.

We could be missing a trick with Kickstarter.

The focus is usually on how to make your Kickstarter sing. “How XYZ crushed their Kickstarter promo.” You get the idea.

What if Kickstarter simply took the blame?

No inventory holds, no money lost, just an idea that didn’t work – and the best bit? You get to play again. No garage full of books that no one bought. Cats that sing “How much is that doggy in the window?”

Of course, this might not work. Design your game accordingly.

Asking for a friend: If you know anyone who would like a book, I know a bloke with a garage full.

Taken from The Coast of Utopia by Tom Stoppard.

“Because children grow up, we think a child’s purpose is to grow up. But a child’s purpose is to be a child.”

Will you know if it comes your way?

What will change?

What won’t change?

Is it worth the wait?

What could you do instead?

I’ve just finished reading Waiting for Godot; it’s absurd. But not as absurd as you might think.

What are you waiting for?

Originally designed “for children with very little money”, the Everlasting Gobstopper is also a reminder that we never stop wanting or needing stuff; and once you see it, you can quit acting like the world owes you a favour and act accordingly.

My advice is worth nish, if I don’t have skin in the game. It might come from a good place, but that’s about it.

My experience, on the other hand, offers me a perspective that allows me to direct attention to places that others may have overlooked, and that could be priceless.

The alternative is to have no attachment to the outcome, just the process, and that’s coaching in its purest form.

Howard Luks makes the point that the fitness industry is not designed for those who want/need to start looking after their physical health, but for those who are already sold on the lifestyle.

Who is it for?

What is it for?

Two questions worth asking when designing a service, product, or developing an idea.

It reminds me of the age-old problem of the expert designing the service, then wondering why it doesn’t work the way it should.

Replace should with could, and you might be in for a surprise.

If you want to design a practice where belonging is a design choice, not a slogan, then you might want to check out my new book, Good Coach Bad Coach.

It is said that the average author sells 250 copies of their book.

In reality, the median for self-published books is probably closer to 100-200 copies, with many selling fewer than 50. The average figure of 250 copies is inflated by authors like Stephen King at the top end of the market.

The math goes like this:

10 authors sell: 10, 50, 100, 150, 200, 200, 250, 300, 400, and 50,000 copies.

Mean: 5,166 copies
Median: 200 copies (half sold fewer, half sold more)

The game most authors play is the Attention Competition – do a better job than the competition, and you might sell north of 1,000 copies.

But the game is designed by the platforms. Amazon, traditional publishers, and social media algorithms benefit from authors competing for visibility, buying ads, and obsessing over rankings. The house always wins.

There is, however, a choice. You don’t need to play by the house rules.

A positive-sum, relationship-building game looks like this:

Success = relationship with the reader
Winning = becoming a trusted voice in your field
Strategy = create opportunities for connection, not sales

Game theory is compelling, but sometimes it pays to ask: What game am I playing, and what would happen if I focused not on winning but on staying in the game?

It pays to know the game you are playing.

Long term………..Short term

Scarcity……….. Abundance

Control………..Chaos

Finite………..Infinte

Risk………..Uncertainty

Play an infinite game with finite strategies, and you might not get your wig pushed back, but sure as shit will spread confusion.

Sets, reps, or auto regulation, you decide.

The health board that engages with Pilates instructors and organic market gardeners.

Not finding people who agree with you, or seeking confirmation, but changing how things are done through unlikely alliances.

To change how things are done, change your perception: perception-action coupling.

What did you see that made you do what you do?

I’ve just built a sales page for my new book, Good Coach Bad Coach, and when I asked AI what it thought of the content, it told me to start with a clear problem statement upfront.

Here’s what’s not working, followed by why I understand the problem, and a solution.

That’s great when the problem is clear and obvious; at all other times, what we think the problem is — that’s the problem.

Start with a conversation instead.

Coach Dan John has this idea that some people are A to B people and others are B to A people.

If you think you know where you are now (A), but only have a rough idea of where you want to go (B), then you are an A to B type person. That is to say, reality doesn’t need explaining, but what you want – well, that might need some clarity.

Elite athletes, on the other hand, are B to A people. They know exactly where they want to go (B); they just need a clear assessment of where they are now (A).

It is said that you must first start with the end in mind. And while being the fastest person on the planet over 100 meters is indeed an end in mind, it’s also unlikely to be the destination for most of us. So, what gives?

I wonder if short-term, sprint-like project thinking is the way to go.

Nothing lengthy, bold, or life-changing. Just a clear endpoint, a dose of reality, and an experience that teaches you something. Not an A to B or a B to A type person, but an A and B type person.

This arrived in the post today! Writing this book has been a hell of a journey, one I’m better off having finished!

Update: Here’s where you can find it: https://simonharling.blog/book/

So much I have written about recently is just that: building a tolerance for uncertainty. Perhaps that’s the stuff we should be talking about, not clarity. Here’s a wonderful quote from an article about scaffolding that is too good to pass up:

“..teaching requires tolerance for uncertainty about whether this particular child needs more time, a different approach, or simply your presence whilst they work through difficulty.”

Uncertainty doesn’t sell courses or get you good grades, but learning to sit with it might just be a skill worth learning.

Should training look and feel like a competitive match?

Preparation says:

• We know what game day looks like
• Training rehearses the solutions
• Repetition grooves the pattern
• The coach knows the answers
• Players execute the plan
• Success = doing what we practiced

Exploration says:

• We don’t know what game day will throw at us
• Training encounters problems
• Variability builds adaptability
• Players discover the answers
• The coach creates conditions
• Success = finding solutions we didn’t predict

Perhaps the struggle is not to make training look like a game, but to decide what your practice is for. It’s not that you can’t prepare and explore; you can, but it’s important to know which one your training is helping your players with.

There is clearly a difference between having a conversation about coaching and a conversation with a coach about what they are working on.

When we must act, we perceive tasks differently than when we simply observe. We decouple perception from action. Being “in it” versus taking an outside perspective.

With our arse on the line, we act differently.

Before we have conversations around coaching—nothing wrong with an outside perspective—we should ground ourselves in context, constraints, and the reality we face.

Inspired by action:

What I am working on now

Coach Camp

In a rush for clarity, to be seen as the expert or the answer, we can miss the point.

Sure, there are clear and obvious answers; there is also good practice, but for all else, chasing rainbows might be more fun.

Differential learning teaches us something counterintuitive: how we get there matters less than why we’re going there.

Want to run fast? Great!

Try running with your hands above your head. Now try with high knees. Next, long strides!

This might seem counterintuitive—we wanted to run fast, not look crazy! But here’s the problem: when we stick to what feels “right,” we settle into bad habits and inefficient movement patterns. We settle.

The role of differential learning is first to disrupt us, then ask us to come up with new ways of doing the same thing. In time, we find our way to new, more effective ways of doing things.

It’s no different from when I used to work at football clubs. One of the first things I do is find a slight downward slope on the training ground and use it to my advantage. Want players to feel fast? No problem—I face them down the slope! Want them to work a little harder without noticing? I face them the other way.

How can you use it to your advantage?

If you’re training, try pedaling on the bike in the gym with your hands raised. Or, if you’re running, try swinging only one arm and leaving the other by your side. Complete 30 seconds, then try a new variation.

What do you notice? You might feel lighter, more balanced, or surprisingly faster when you return to “normal.” The disruption forces your body to find new solutions you didn’t know existed.

I use this a lot to disrupt my thinking. Right now, while I practice for my audiobook, I read slowly, then fast, then loudly before settling back to “normal.” I can’t say for sure what works or what doesn’t, but I can tell you this: being open to learning something new about what I’m trying to do changes how I approach the work entirely.

What routines and assumptions could you challenge this week?

The temptation is to design for logic and reason when we could be designing for reality.

Of course, few of us want to look silly in the boardroom. A mind-to-world directional fit might sound sensible and appealing – and that’s its problem right there.

Go from reality to models, not from models to reality.

I’ve noticed:

Welsh Bacc students ask to come into sports clubs to coach as part of their studies.

I wonder:

This presents an opportunity to use what already exists. Sports clubs develop their coaching culture. Coaches develop their mentoring skills. Welsh Bacc students develop their coaching.

Young Ambassadors from the Youth Sport Trust can play a role in this too.

What if:

Sports clubs in Wales work with schools to implement early coaching experiences. Mentors make thinking visible. They name the identity-practice gap. They create space for authentic reflection. This takes us a long way forward.

After all, we wouldn’t be asking Bacc students to do anything different, just to do it better.

For the sake of simplicity, I offer this as an example:

The Pro-Active Five (Planning)

What do you intend to do?

What other ways could you do that?

What will make you choose a certain way?

What would make you choose another option?

What will you do if it doesn’t work?

The Reactive Five (Reflecting)

What did you intend to do? (Recall the plan)

What actually happened?

Why do you think it happened that way?

What does that tell you about your coaching/the players/the learning?

What will you do next time?

This recommendation leverages a simple observation: telling someone else what to do is far easier than doing it yourself.

If we want coaches who are open, curious, and willing to learn, then perhaps we should ask them to teach those skills to someone else.

Nathan Walker: https://nwalkerpe.wordpress.com/2025/10/19/a-summary-of-my-thesis-how-mentors-influence-teachers-developing-professional-identity-beliefs-and-practice/

As a coach, we have never had more resources. Drills, exercises, and training ideas are everywhere—many backed by big names and impressive credentials. But here’s the problem: having endless options doesn’t tell you which one to choose, or why.

Before you scroll through another coaching Instagram account or save another drill to your folder, ask yourself these questions:

What do you intend to do?

Be specific. Not just “warm-up” but what kind? For example: “I want a netball-style warm-up where kids practice football-like movements while developing hand-eye coordination.”

What other ways could you do that?

Could the kids kick instead of throw? Could you adapt it to Aussie Rules style? Could you use only overhead throws like throw-ins?

What will make you choose a certain way?

In this example, it could be the development of overall athletic ability, novel tasks, and fun.

What would make you choose another option?

If the kids aren’t enjoying it. 

What will you do if it doesn’t work? Try explaining the goal of the activity to the kids, ask what they liked and what they would change.

I’ve just come back from playing a version of Aussie Rules with a u 13’s football team I help coach. Was it representative of football? No, because there were no football-specific decisions to be made. Did the group enjoy the experience? Absolutely!

Lead with intention, and you might find you don’t need as many drills as you think.

When every other part of you wanted to say something, but your brain tells you to say nothing, that is a coaching decision.

Not the same as having nothing to say.

Silence is coaching.

Cover your eyes and you will see no evil.

Cover your ears and you will hear no evil.

Cover your mouth, and you will speak no evil.

It’s always worth doing the work to understand what people are seeing, hearing, and feeling in their environment.

You never know when you might find yourself pushing on a door that needs to be pulled.

When you look at a park bench, what do you see?

If you are tired, you might see the chance to sit down. Maybe it’s the place you sit and watch the world from. Or, perhaps it’s the place where you first learned to vault.

How we show up is important.

Tired? Take a seat. In a reflective mood? No problem, watch the world go by. Full of energy? First, try jumping off it, then maybe we can try vaulting from it.

Context matters.

So, too, our goals, and how we think we can achieve them.

Dan John talks about park bench and bus bench workouts. Bus bench workouts chase metrics: how far, how much, and how fast. Park bench workouts are about enjoying your body moving, being present, and being grateful for the opportunity to move and grow.

Much of what we perceive is shaped by hidden assumptions.

Will sitting on a bus bench get you further than sitting on a park bench? Then again, if you can vault off a park bench, just maybe, you begin to see a park bench and a bus bench as the same thing – an opportunity.

What do you think you see?

Today, I was comparing the potential return on selling my book via Amazon and Ingram Spark, or making a shop and using Lulu Direct to fulfill my print orders. Turns out the difference in what returns to me as the author is very little between the two routes.

Am I wasting my time?

Probably, if I want to sell more than a few books. It’s way easier to forget building a shop on your website and just go all in with the main distributors of the day.

Not if casting a vote for my creative independence is important to me.

When I set up my own shop, no matter how many people show up—to browse or to buy—I’ve created a little space where it’s possible to connect with others.

Am I wasting my time?

You can be the judge of that.

For those interested, this appears to be the simplest and most efficient way to deliver my book, at least to begin with:

For Digital Products (Ebook + Audiobook):

• Payment: Payhip
• Delivery: BookFunnel (Already using BookFunnel to deliver Advanced Reader Copies, so it makes sense to use it again here)
• Cost: Just transaction fees, no upfront investment

For Print Books:

• Start: Manually input Lulu orders
• Scale Later: Add automation when volume justifies it

For Audio Distribution:

• Retailers: Findaway Voices (Audible, Apple, Spotify)
• Direct Sales: BookFunnel

Update:

Here’s what I settled on in the end: https://store.simonharling.blog/

What changed:

The Payhip, Lulu, and WooCommerce axes proved way too inflexible and complicated for what I need.

Selling through Shopify (Starter Plan is $5 a month, simple to use, and likely as much as I need—I’m a first-time author), holding stock, and dealing with postage and packaging is actually very simple.

I hold 50 books at any one time, printed through IngramSpark.

The Munbyn thermal printer is brilliantly easy to use. I use the Click and Drop app through Shopify to manage postage, and my A194 packages are from Lili packaging.

It takes less than 10 minutes a day to print labels, walk to the post box, and deal with new orders.

Note: There are no affiliate links in this post, just my experience and notes. I hope it helps.

My voice coach tells me he couldn’t write a book. I tell him I’m not sure I can record an audio file for mine. He smiles. “Speaking comes naturally—just sound like yourself.” “It’s easy,” I tell him—”Start by writing a blog, even one line a day.”

It’s not easy, because you don’t know how, but it’s not the knowledge we lack; it’s the courage to try.

Giving a talk can be a stressful business. How long should I talk for? How many slides should I use? What if my talk sucks?

We can offer people a slot, build them a platform, or even offer training. But what is much more helpful is to design a space where the focus is entirely on their message, with an audience that gets the joke.

Done well, enabling constraints encourage us to face our fears and share our work.

To avoid problems, it might make sense to enter into a contract. For example, as a tenant, you might not want to take on a property with a leaking roof. In this case, it would make sense to ask the landlord to bear responsibility.

Loss avoidance is a powerful motivator—so powerful, in fact, that we can forget to ask for better.

Coaching is a social contract, and if we design it right, it allows us to focus on the work, not on unclear expectations or what we might lose when we fully invest.

Don’t design for the problem you can see, design for the outcome you want.

“Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.”

– Charlie Chaplin.

I recently worked with a freelancer who disappeared with the spec, only to return two weeks later with the finished article. We went our separate ways.

I asked for regular updates and got nothing but the “finished product.”

My current freelancer asks questions, voices concerns, and shares drafts. No one fully forms a spec, details don’t overwhelm us, and questions don’t sound too silly. We learn in the gaps of understanding. “I like that,” “Can we…,” “I wonder if…”

If you have ever coached youth in an invasion sport, you have probably shouted “spread out!” at some point. Kids spread out momentarily, then reconvene around the ball shortly after. What’s the point?

Last week, in a 30-yard by 30-yard grid with three mini-goals scattered throughout the pitch, I coached a 4v4 session. Every member of the team was aligned with the same thinking—score a goal. That’s teamwork, right?

Only one player began seeing things differently. True, the game required scoring goals, but what if the point was moving the ball away from the opposition and avoiding the crowd? Seven players were all doing the same thing —following the ball, and one had seen something different. 

Moments like this make coaching worthwhile. I wasn’t trying to get every kid to do the same thing; that’s why they follow the ball. My job was to help the group embrace a new idea, a new perspective, and test it.

When everyone on the team does the same thing, you have a rabble, not a team. Look for individuals who think differently and find ways to connect them to the rest. That’s the work of building a team.

I was working this week with someone who said, “If it’s not up to my standards, then I’m not doing it. It’s not going out the door.”

What is that?

Control, stupidity, maybe stubbornness.

After all, perfect for you, is imperfect for someone else.

Depth, texture, richness, vitality, colour, tone, pick your edge, pick your partner, if you dare, and dance.

Blaming your tools

Fighting over the “spec” after agreeing to it

Missing deadlines

Producing substandard work post-deadline

Making up arbitrary rules to justify your work

Sometimes the grass is greener on the other side. Go find green because green is for go!

A question came up recently that got me thinking:

“Education leaders in football, how do we solve the problem of limited coach education in grassroots football?”

This is a problem when we constrain ourselves to the process.

Time becomes an issue. There is only limited contact time with coaches. We know this because few complete the step-wise process to mastery.

It’s rather like having 98% of doctors in surgeon training still dissecting frog hearts. Few get off the first step.

When you constrain yourself to the outcome, rather than the process, you get to design a different system.

I can’t help but think about false choices when I read about the restructuring of Welsh Rugby from four regional rugby teams to potentially two.

A false choice is offered when it’s either-or, and that either-or choice is presented as the only feasible choice.

Fan disengagement going from club rugby to regional rugby has been stark. It’s hard to imagine it will improve if fans are asked to follow one of two professional teams. Unless, of course, you believe in false choices.

Questions that challenge false choice thinking:

Who benefits?

What if neither of these options were available? What now?

The biggest mistake we can make is to seek solutions to badly designed products that should not exist in the first place.

If you have ever sung the song “Dem Bones,” you will know the toe bone is connected to the foot bone. And even if you haven’t, the chances are you have a fair idea that the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone. Singing songs is a great way to connect us to information, but it’s clearly not the only way we learn.

Perhaps the first thing we need to do when we teach is to figure out what information we are already connected to.

What do we know about the current situation we are in?

After all, we can’t forget that the knee bone is also connected to the leg bone.

Ordinary people do extraordinary things when the conditions allow. At the heart of this idea is ownership and accountability. The situation you find yourself in has to happen for you, not to you.

This week, I found an old whiteboard sheet while clearing out the attic, and rather than throwing it away, I decided to keep it. It’s taken from the book The Oz Principle. And if you know the story of the Wizard of Oz, you will know Dorothy and her companions find the answers to their challenges, not in their journey, but within themselves.

After listening to a podcast by a pal of mine, Russell Earnshaw, over the weekend, who uses: See it, Share it, and Solve it. I thought I’d have a go at adapting the four principles of See it, Own it, Solve it, and Do it to coaching youth sport.

See It – What are we seeing? Not what we hope to see, or want to see, but what is actually happening. Do we have a shared vision, or are we all on different pages?

Share It – Encourage open communication about challenges, feelings, or problems. This is much more developmentally appropriate than expecting kids to fully “own” responsibility the way adults might. Sharing creates psychological safety and builds trust.

Solve It – Guide them through problem-solving rather than just giving answers. Ask questions like “What could you try differently next time?” or “What would help you succeed here?”

Do It – Support them in taking action on their solutions, providing encouragement and accountability appropriate for their age.

The take-home message is this: Courage, heart, and wisdom are available to all.

Usually, a practice that has stood the test of time because it’s accepted or has value.

“I won’t waste your time” is time-honoured too.

Since time is all we have, that’s a practice worth keeping.

There is a saying in youth sport, “If you are good enough, you are old enough.” After all, sport, in particular performance sport, is a meritocracy. Age is less important than ability.

When I was a young coach, I worked at a junior football camp to gain experience working with groups. One child refused to take his backpack off for the entire session. I learned that it was chaotic, and little I said or did seemed to change that.

Rather than put me off coaching, I figured, since it was chaotic, I might as well throw myself in at the deep end. Work with a first-team professional football squad soon followed, despite my only being 28 years old – if you are good enough, you are old enough.

At a grassroots level, we accept that novice coaches work with novice players, however backward that might seem. Those who know little about the game are supported by those who know a little about the game. In utopia, it wouldn’t be this way, but here on planet Earth, it is.

When it comes to age group coaching, perhaps we should return to the adage: Age is less important than ability.

What is “good enough?”

“What’s the goal of this activity?” is a generous question to ask.

You might be writing a book to connect to potential or existing clients. It could be a chance to raise status and be seen as a “thought leader.” Seth Godin encourages you to write for change.

All are possible, and can mean different things to different folks.

Writing a book that offers its creator independence of thought, and maybe, in time, security, is a very different book from one that sells what you do.

It starts with writing down what you want to achieve.

Bernstein’s hammer reminds us that our starting point is not as important as the work we do to get to our end point.

Prepared but not planned.

Gone on a bit of a mad one this week, looking at risk, precision, and recall. 

Not my area of expertise by any stretch. I wanted to know the impact of the different types of errors on decision-making.

First up, here’s some context: My structural editor, B, has signed off on my book content; it’s time to apply the polish. Only, it turns out polish is not cheap. 

Here are two outcomes for you: 

• The “Positive” Outcome: You sell enough books to make a profit.
• The “Negative” Outcome: The book does not sell, and you lose the £3,000.

Now, if we look at the average outcome, which is a smart move when you are taking a look at how to ground yourself, we know the average author sells 250 books. 

If you sell a book at £9.99, you can expect a £5 profit. Not great news if your operating costs are £3,000 ( 250 x £5 = £1,250).

Knowing what the average author sells is useful, but not helpful, since it is likely that in a room full of authors, one author will have outsold all the other authors put together. We need to be a little more cautious about our prediction. 

Let’s take a look at the possible errors: 

Type I Error (False Positive): You predict the book will be profitable when it won’t be

• You spend £3,000 on polish and lose money
• This is your main downside risk

Type II Error (False Negative): You predict the book won’t be profitable when it would be

• You don’t polish/publish and miss out on potential profit
• Opportunity cost varies depending on how much you actually would have made

The asymmetry is crucial here. Our Type I error has a fixed, known cost (£3,000 loss), while our Type II error cost depends on the unknown upside.

The question is, what would you do? Which error are you going to accept?

I find this interesting – in a world where we are after perfection, it’s humbling to know even simple low low-key decisions like this contain error. 

What did I do? 

I can’t tell you! You’ll have to wait and see 🙂

What are the chances that a grassroots coach will know what to teach a group of youth players who are at various stages of development?

The coach education system currently argues that it is much more likely a coach will know what their group needs once they complete formal coach education. How much more likely is unclear. And how much more likely it would be if they continue their coach education is also unclear.

The current system’s logic goes something like: “If we just give coaches enough education about periodization, motor learning, psychological development, tactical progression, etc., they’ll know what to do in any situation.” But even if formal education doubles or triples the chances a grassroots coach knows what to teach (and we have no real evidence it does), I still don’t think I like the odds.

What if we designed a system based on precision? Rather than hope that a coach will learn what they need to teach, we removed all hope and replaced it with design.

Rather than guess what people need, we learnt to gather and connect. We might not be good at that either. But the cost of being poor at that might just be less expensive than trying to develop the deep understanding of a complex set of circumstances that is youth sport development.

We can hope for luck or design for skill; it’s on us.

Maybe what’s on the test. Or what is age-appropriate. Perhaps principles of play?

We organize around the content, and then figure out ways to deliver it.

What if we asked, “How do we want to be together while we learn?”

It’s not that content isn’t important—it is—but not more important than context or culture.

Instead of asking:

“How do we teach communication skills?”

Ask:

“What conditions help people connect authentically?”

“What we practice” emerges from the design, rather than driving it.

Conservative: “I’ll only say yes when I’m really sure” (high precision, low recall)

Risky: “I’d rather catch all the real cases, even if I’m wrong sometimes” (high recall, low precision)

Do you never throw the dice, since you don’t like the odds, or do you throw the dice because you might get a 6?

The trade-off is this: you can’t maximise both precision and recall, so which error do you accept?

In youth sports, it’s tempting to believe we are playing high-stakes games when, in truth, it’s much more likely we don’t understand the cost of our errors.

If failure is too costly to bear, don’t play the game.

We’ve come this far. A rallying call of the foolish, or the final step for the committed.

How do we know which one we are?

The foolish or the committed?

Knowing what you know now, not then, would you take this next step?

Yes, for committed. No, for foolish.

It’s tempting to think that the reason coaches are reluctant to adopt an “open book” approach to their coaching philosophy is that it’s the hard part.

Perhaps it’s a lack of reflective practice.

Or a lack of perceived value around going upstream to ask the big questions, like: What is your coaching for?

But what if that was the simple part, and the hard part was change?

Ask a coach about what they find frustrating, and I’m sure most will tell you it’s watching their students repeat the same mistake. Change is hard, and learning is not risk-free, which is why we need to design for it.

My eldest is entering the business end of her school life. Whether I have any anxiety, stress, or ambition, it’s my job not to pass it on. Easier said than done.

So, I turned to Donella Meadows’ Guided Envisioning of a Sustainable World for inspiration. Why? Because who better to turn to when you want to reimagine something than a mentor whose suggestions include “get to the beat.”

I asked Claude, “Using Donella Meadows’ prompts about Guided Envisioning of a Sustainable World – how can I use this to help my teenage daughter envision her next two years in school?”:

Here’s the framework Claude suggested:

The Home (Her Learning Environment)

What would it feel like to wake up ready for school each day?

• What kind of energy would she want to bring to her learning?
• What would make her excited to start the day?

Who would be part of her learning community?

• What kinds of relationships does she want with teachers, friends, and mentors?
• How does she want to feel when she’s with them?

Where would her intellectual “energy” come from?

• What subjects, activities, or experiences would fuel her curiosity?
• What would nourish her growth and learning?

The School Neighborhood

How would her school community be arranged for everyone’s well-being?

• What would make younger and older students, different types of learners, all feel they belong?
• How would differences in interests, abilities, and backgrounds be celebrated?

What is her special role or contribution?

• What unique gifts does she want to develop and share?
• How does she want to collaborate with others?
• What kind of “work” (projects, leadership, creative expression) calls to her?

The Broader Community

How does she want to connect her learning to the wider world?

• What real problems or opportunities in her community spark her interest?
• How might she bridge school learning with meaningful contribution?

How does she envision relationships between different groups?

• Across age groups, interests, and backgrounds?
• Between her generation and nature/environment?

The Bigger Picture (Her Future Path)

What kind of post-graduation world does she want to help create?

• Does traditional college feel right, or are there other paths calling her?
• How does she want to be part of positive change?

The Underlying Mindset

How does she want to feel about herself and her life during these two years?

• What pace feels sustainable and joyful rather than frantic?
• What fascinates her most right now?
• What makes her laugh and feel alive?
• What does “progress” mean to her personally?

Give it a shot!

“It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”

Most of us take this to mean getting a leg up—being offered a chance that wouldn’t otherwise come your way, or getting in through the back door.

But what if it meant something different? What if it meant: “Who challenges you?” or “Who connects you to new perspectives or ways of working?”

One of the great opportunities that the world of physical fitness offers us is the opportunity to design for, embrace, and work with failure.

Not the type that ends in crutches, medical bills, and long lay-offs, but the type that can be endured.

Not because I want to suggest that failure is fun, but rather, rewarding in a creative sense.

The serious business of play.

If a writer needs to know where they are taking their audience, how to make them feel, what they want them to understand, and what to take away, then the learning designer, coach, or teacher is no different.

After you write this book, what’s next?

What’s the next step?

We are hard-wired to ask “What’s next?” when a better question might be, “What are you working on now?”

If you watch kids engaged in play, all they are focused on is the now. 

We are told that being curious is good; asking helpful questions is better.

Noel Gallagher described the formative years of Oasis songwriting as “The Golden Years”, a time when the content of the songs related directly to the people they were written for – Noel had skin in the game; it was a shared experience.

Beware, the experience that you chase, which is exclusive, elusive, and set someplace in the future.

No coach I know wants to deliver dull, drab, funless sessions. I also know plenty of coaches who are unsure where discipline, structure, and rules sit within their practice.

Here are two key constraints worth considering when coaching kids:

Without governing constraints, basic boundaries, sessions can quickly descend into chaos, with the group dynamics being controlled by the loudest, or most influential (certainly not the coach).

An enabling constraint could be that everyone on the team needs to touch the ball at least once before the team can score. You are not telling them “how” to play, but you are helping kids think about cooperation. communication and problem-solving.

When the situation is chaotic, you’re missing a governing constraint.

A chaotic situation is often the result of not having clear, simple rules. Without these non-negotiable boundaries, the group’s energy isn’t channelled—it just spills out in all directions. This is where you see safety issues, kids ignoring instructions, and a few dominant personalities taking over.

When the situation is complex, it’s time for an enabling constraint.

A truly complex situation is a game or a drill with many moving parts and unpredictable outcomes. This is the environment where kids learn and grow, but they still need some guidance.

Herding cats is an option, but I’m not sure it’s much of a career.

A question worth asking is: Am I making this a chaotic situation, or is it really complex?

An editor friend of mine once gave me a piece of advice that stuck: “Read your work.” It’s a great way to check if your sentence structures work and if what you have written makes sense – it’s good practice.

Reading your work out loud as if to an audience (real or imagined) brings a new level of analysis. Read it flat by all means, but at some point it pays to find:

The subtext, and where to place emphasis?

How about the rate of speech? Does it require careful reading, or is it a passionate rant?

What emotions come off the page and into your voice?

How about the volume? Are you loud, do you trail off, or is it a whisper?

You don’t always need to shout to be heard; sometimes, putting your voice on the page is the final stage to owning what you have written.

In complex situations, predicting what will happen next is pointless; no one knows. Instead, we act in the hope of learning something about the situation we are in.

How complex is the situation you face?

Do patterns repeat?

Are the rules clear?

Does the feedback reflect the reality on the ground? Is it clear?

Although they might feel the same, chaotic is not the same as complex.

A question that made me think this week: How was your consumption this week?

Think about:

Media

Food

Friends

As my old statistics lecturer used to say, “crap in, crap out.”

I want to expand on the thoughts of yesterday – The Linchpin Paradox.

What might a grassroots club look and feel like if it were to be a culture club?

This idea centers on the first and easiest step: gathering and transferring knowledge.

Themes to explore:

What are we seeing? What are we noticing?

What are we trying? Share a quick win. Share what isn’t working?

How are we supporting each other? Tell me about a time you supported another coach this month.

How can we support you? What can we help you with next month?

Connect to each other, connect to the culture, and build from the ground up.

If you are a cog in a machine, you are replaceable; there are many more cogs than there are machines. If you are a linchpin, you are critical to the success of a process, and without a linchpin, the machine doesn’t function quite the way it could. A linchpin possesses creativity, problem-solving, and emotional labour, and is much more likely to take a systems view.

Are grassroots coaches “cogs” or “linchpins”?

A coach is asked to scope, co-create, and deliver learning experiences.

A coach is expected to be the bridge to parents, connecting them to the club’s values, expectations for player behaviours, and a moderator of sideline support.

A coach is an impresario; they organise the orchestra.

Yet, ask a grassroots coach if they are part of a wider “workforce,” and they are unlikely to know what you are talking about – much like a cog in a machine that focuses on its specific function.

Yet, many grassroots coaches quit once their child has moved through the age groups or quits the sport.

Yet, grassroots coaches are trained in the art of war – the tactical and technical elements of sport – not the war of art.

And my point?

If you have a linchpin in your organisation (my guess is that you have many more than you think), wouldn’t you ask them to contribute to the culture of the club or organisation, instead of sending out coach developers to fix the problem of “churn?”

People who can scope, co-create, and deliver learning experiences don’t grow on trees, but they do grow in a culture that knows the difference between a cog and a linchpin.

In the gap between curious and committed lies a question:

What would have to be true for you to commit fully to this process?

Today, I learned about the importance of writing down ideas and revisiting them through the lens of the evolution of ideas.

Having encouraged my kids to write down their ideas at the start of the year, only to see them still stationary, it’s tempting to use them as a stick to beat them with.

The evolution of ideas suggests that it’s not you who is useless or lazy, but rather that the idea you came up with is not very good.

Write down your idea. “I want to save £60” is a start.

Use the difficulty. “What did you discover?” “What did you learn?”

Evolve your idea. “What do you want to change?”

And so it goes on, asking questions to build a clearer picture of what it’s going to take.

What struck me in this process with my kids was the importance of encouraging my kids not only to voice their ideas but to find a way to hold them to those ideas to find a better way forward.

Daring to dream starts with caring to ask: How are you getting on?

It’s hard to imagine the use of the masculine and feminine verbs in French if you’ve never met anyone from France. And algebra? It won’t really click if you’re still counting on your fingers.

Getting to know the person you’re teaching or coaching helps. It helps because you can apply what you’re teaching to their world. It still amazes me to see Strength and Conditioning coaches ignore the person in front of them and begin a crash course in pseudo-elite training.

Here’s a starting point to help you connect with your players or clients. Feel free to insert your sport or activity in the gaps:

What is [Your Sport/Domain] to you?

What do you do for fun?

Write a story about your life that includes answers to the following questions:

• As a [Your Sport/Domain] player, how do you learn best?

• Tell me a significant story about [Your Sport/Domain] from your life

• Tell me about someone who supported you and helped you to learn about [Your Sport/Domain].

Showing an interest in the person you are teaching or coaching is good practice, saying “I’ll never use that!”, not so much.

Partnerships don’t work because we are the same; they work because we figured out how to get the best out of each other. Trying to compete with or change someone in the end is futile; changing yourself, not so much.

.. and you… go left.

Not because that’s the alternative way to go, but because you’re asking a different question, and for that to happen, you need to be looking in a different direction.

If your competition focuses on the next sale, can you afford to focus on how you build trust instead? Selling more in the long run might be better than selling more this month.

It’s not as crazy as it sounds since it’s far cheaper to retain a customer than it is to attract one, and even easier to sell to someone who trusts you.

Repeat business is better than new business; act accordingly.

To find what you need, start by acknowledging what you want.

To help design a practice session or a coaching practice, consider these two questions:

What do you want your practice to look like?

What do you want your practice to feel like?

For example, if you aim for a playful practice, you can directly ask your players: “What does a playful practice look like?” and “What does a playful practice feel like?”

A recent study of coaching practice in youth football showed that coaches spent over 20% of practice time in transition, talking about what to do next or what had just happened.”

Once the purpose is clear, design accordingly.

Two of the kids I worked with for a number of years have had a stellar week. Darcy Harry won her first European Golf Tour Event, and Joel Makin had his first win on the Professional Squash Association Tour.

Darcy was following in the footsteps of her talented older brother, Tim. Joel lacked the technical abilities of his peer group. Both were underdogs, neither fancied as professional athletes, and yet here we are.

I built Elite Fitness on the idea of elite performance and winning, after all, the tagline in bold across a wall in the gym was:

“It’s not the taking part that counts.”

But, now what I wish it said:

“Don’t look for success, look for commitment.”

Most grassroots coaches only have one hour a week of coaching contact time. That’s one hour to deliver a sports-specific coaching session, plus maybe a game on the weekend.

There isn’t much time to play around. It might be the only time a child gets to kick, hit, or throw a ball, for example. If you’re a netball coach, you don’t want your players kicking a ball or skateboarding; you want them playing netball.

In isolation, it makes sense. But in terms of athletic development, not so much, and when considering human connection, maybe no sense at all.

How we use our time is a story, and it’s a story worth talking about.

Here’s a conversation starter, provided we remember that the word audit comes from the Latin word “audire,” which means “to hear,” not judge.

When two seemingly sensible ideas collide, and either side looks as good as the other, you may have a paradox. Take the Athletic Entrepreneur, whose clients would spend more time taking care of themselves, if only they didn’t need to work.

Balance is elusive.

The power is not in trying to solve or ignore it, since each day could bring a new answer; so choose, for now, and perhaps enjoy the fact that you have a choice.

“Can you get on the ball?” ” Can you make space?” You get the idea.

Rather than tell someone exactly where to go, you offer a challenge. “Can you win the ball back?” It’s a checking question on the player’s capability, a reality check for the current situation or perceived limitations.

“What if”, on the other hand, expands the possibilities. “What if you got on the ball?” ” What if you changed where you receive the ball?”

You might not think you can get on the ball now, but what if you could explore what you think is possible?

Tx to Harvard Project Zero

You might believe something, even justify it, yet it’s not a fact, however hard you argue. Luck plays its part. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

How do you know if the project you are pursuing is not a siren’s call? A waste of time, or a flight of fancy, even a sunk cost. A blundering, plundering wreck.

It’s easy – are you answering the call of someone else, a siren? Or are you honouring your time?

Doubt is attractive. So to the future.

Dear future self, I’m putting myself where I will learn to facilitate gatherings, support other people through coaching, and express my ideas.

It’s not mantras, affirmations, or even journaling; it’s action. It’s not what you say you do, but what you actually stand for.

If it’s not already, it will soon be preseason training for many professional football clubs. The first few days are taken up by people with clipboards, taking notes, and comparing data. And the purpose of all this? Baseline measurements.

In between four to six weeks of preseason training, we can expect players to increase their performance from baseline by around 10%. Of course, for some it will be more, and others less, but you get the idea: it helps to know where you began.

And yet, football is a people’s game. Data helps, but it can’t kick a ball for you.

If we were to design pre-season with the connection and collaboration of the individual player and squad in mind, I doubt we would design it like we do now. The first interaction a fitness coach could have with a new player could be with data in mind and a clipboard in hand.

When gathering people on purpose, nothing kills the party like a clipboard.

On a client recruitment drive, do you pick the clients, or do they choose you?

Traditionally, wedding fayres are a chance for vendors to be chosen. Prospective providers pay to meet potential clients, and the fee often reflects the status of the venue and the event. It’s a transactional model.

But what if you could pick who you work with?

Imagine an alternative wedding fayre where you don’t invite the couples planning their wedding. Instead, you invite the trades that help make the wedding happen. 

A wedding dress designer needs stunning portfolio photos of her wedding dresses. A makeup artist needs to showcase their work in context. Venues and photographers also need high-quality imagery that highlights their expertise. So, why not invite a few models and produce the work that you all need – high-quality photos of the work that you can do?

A makeup artist might love how a photographer captured their work. A wedding dress designer could build a great rapport with a venue, potentially leading to a spot on their preferred vendor list. What started as a need for professional portfolios to attract clients ends with collaboration to produce an end product that the client desires.

You could wait to get picked, or you could pick the conditions you need to do your best work.