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Play with Passion, Play Your Part, Never Quit: Reflections on Coaching for a Greater Purpose Conference 2025
Coaching for a Greater Purpose (CGP)
I recently attended the Coaching for a Greater Purpose (CGP) conference at the Frankfurt International School. CGP takes on a mission that coaching is “bigger than teaching the X’s and O’s of our particular sport” – like what the UK Coaching Symposium did – it’s about “teaching the Y’s of life through the medium of athletic competition”.
I first experienced this approach in 2022, and it had a big impact on me. It’s where I established my team values – how I want my team to look like when they play. Now, after going in 2025, I found myself with new ideas of how to be a better coach outside of improving my technical knowledge.
Revising My Team Values
The conference really got me thinking I should revise my five team values of joy, organise, optimise, hustle, and aggression (see link to read more). For a start, I do feel that aggression – hitting every ball – is a bit redundant. Most teams I coach do this anyway so I rarely refer to tit. I also like the idea of having team values as a mantra you can chant, something like Cobra Kai’s “Strike First, Strike Hard, No Mercy“. This will be a lot more easier to remember than a mission statement. You can pinpoint exactly what you are about with mission statements but they tend to be wordy that you won’t remember in its entirety, at least without rote learning. Having a mantra you can chant does probably mean I need to reduce the team values to three things.
The three team values I have settled on for now are: Play with Passion, Play Your Part, Never Quit. Play with passion and never quit is just a rebrand of joy and hustle. However, I just feel both of these words come with more intensity. Play your part is my attempt to shoehorn the values of organised (understanding the systems of play) and optimised (carrying out a game plan of maximising strengths and hiding weaknesses, based on analysing stats and video).
Play with Passion
This is just a reminder that we love this game and we love playing sports. It’s about bringing your full heart and soul to every moment on the court, and letting that love for the game fuel your performance and connection to your teammates.
Play Your Part
Before you can truly play your part, you first need to understand what your part is. For example, if you’re a libero, this means knowing your core responsibilities in various game situations—primarily passing and defending—but it also means understanding how your role interacts with every other position on the court. Every action you take should support the team system, and every decision should contribute to a unified style of play.
Playing your part also means understanding how we play best, i.e. how to maximise strengths and hide weaknesses based on statistical and video analysis. In this way, “Play Your Part” combines organisation—knowing the systems of play—with optimisation—executing a game plan to make the team as effective as possible.
It also recognises that not everyone can start every match. You can have a vital impact when coming off the bench, whether it’s just to serve, defend, or stepping in when needed.
Never Quit
This means don’t stop until the ball hits the floor. That means diving for every ball, chasing down every ball, or picking up balls off the net. If somebody is chasing down a ball, you also have to follow them to help them if they are able to pick the ball up. You hit the floor before the ball does.
It also means you don’t stop until the last point has been played. You need grit, resilience, and determination when facing adversity.
Adopting Player Values
Speaker Catherine Thornton – somebody I used to coach and who is currently ranked 10th best point-scoring at Team SideOut Polonia – gave me the idea that I should have player values. These are the core values you want players to have, which can also be applied outside life. Labelled in my notes as expectations, Catherine’s player values were Kindness, Positivity, Helpfulness and a team chosen one of Respect (KPHR for short). I love these values because they are things I value and strive to be (with varying success). Catherine would call attention to any actions where players that didn’t demonstrate these values. She said that it helped quash any little squabbles within the team. She also said that she found players would use these values outside of the gym and in the classroom when players would ask if that was KPHR? It demonstrated to me that you can coach values that are transferable to outside life.
I decided that I will shamelessly adopt (i.e. steal) the same values from Catherine. Those are Respect, Kindness, and Positivity. Respect is a given. I can also add in respecting people’s time, since I hate lateness. I also like kindness. I liken it to being nice, which I think is so important (and underrated) when working as part of a team. You have a lot more patience with a person if they are kind or nice. Kindness also covers helpfulness, especially being helpful without being asked. This is something I am not great at so it’s something for myself to strive for. I also love positivity. I remember getting a small positive comment once – “Hey, nice set” – when I wasn’t playing great, and it just changed my mood and outlook that day. Again, this is something I want to be better at, especially if I see somebody doing something great that I should look them in the eye and tell them. I also like the idea that the team should choose one value that they want to adopt. It will let me know what is valuable to them. It also has the added benefit of buy-in into these values.
I think this will be a big shift in how I coach because I feel that it will be something I will need to constantly reinforce, especially if I see any of the players not being respectful, kind, or positive.
Definitions of respect and kindness are taken verbatim from ASL’s definitions. I’ve also added opportunities where we can take to demonstrate these values.
Respect
We should treat others the way we expect to be treated. We appreciate our own cultures and personal histories. We value diversity of thought and experience.
ACTION: – Greet teammates, coaches, referees, and opponents respectfully before and after training and matches. – Listen when others are speaking (don’t talk over or ignore). – Be on time for training, meetings, and matches as a sign of respect for everyone’s time. – Shake hands with referees and opposing teams win or lose. – Accept decisions (even if you disagree) and move forward without arguing.
Kindness
We act with compassion. We help others.
ACTION: – Help set up and take down equipment. – Check in on injured or struggling teammates. – Offer encouragement to someone who made a mistake instead of criticism. – Celebrate others’ success genuinely, not begrudgingly. – Small gestures: sharing water, picking up a ball for someone, high-fiving.
Positivity
We approach challenges with optimism. We celebrate successes – big and small. We focus on solutions, not just problems. We inspire and uplift others through our words and actions.
ACTION: – Use positive language on court: “We’ll get the next one,” instead of “That was terrible.” – Celebrate effort and progress, not just the outcome (e.g., “Great hustle!”). – Run a shoutout circle at the end of training where each player names one teammate who showed respect, kindness, or positivity. – Keep body language strong and supportive (clapping, smiles, not sighing or eye-rolling). – Reframe mistakes as learning opportunities; you win or you learn
Team Chosen Individual Value
This is an individual value chosen by the team.
ACTION: – Get players to come up with situations where they can demonstrate this value.
Build Connections with Players
Brian Singh originally gave me the idea of having one-on-one meetings with players (see link for the podcast episode). This is a simple way to build stronger connections with them. I do think of volleyball in terms of stats and winning, and I forget that these are real people out there with their own thoughts and feelings. I like it when I built up a connection that players come up to me off-season to say “Hello coach”. I get really touched when a player tells me that I really made their volleyball experience great. I love to do that for as many players I coach as I can. Of course, there’s also the additional benefit that the more I know my players, the easier it should be to get more out of them in terms of performance. Unfortunately, that doesn’t happen too often, and the fault is with me for not building that connection.
The conference really reinforced that I should do this. A panel discussion with students said they valued coaches who showed compassion and empathy towards them, and got to know them as people. Catherine Thornton talked about how you need a clear line of communication with players, which this would achieve. Beth Barz talked about coaching actions of talking to individual players about what they need to work on, what roles they may have to play, e.g. serving sub, and sharing your decision-making process. Again, one-on-one sessions would achieve this.
Below are some things I can do to build connections with players. The main thing is simply checking in with players, e.g. asking open questions like how they are doing. There are also some formal actions in there.
ACTIONS: – Say hello/ fist bump to everybody as they walk into training – Sit down with a player to check in as players are setting up the net – Check in with a player after a team meeting – Check in with a player after practice. This will probably relate to volleyball, e.g. their thoughts on practice – Have captain/player-led team meetings. I can observe and listen. – Have a discussion with the Captains on what it means to be a leader? – Schedule formal one-on-one sessions for individual video analysis feedback. This could be scheduled before or after team meetings. – Organise some off-court hangout, e.g. lunch together. Catherine Thornton has “study time” before practice, where they don’t do any study. They just hang out. I know that away trips are great for team bonding so we want to create some experiences like that.
End of Season Feedback Forms
One thing that has been on my mind for a while is using end-of-season feedback forms. It’s just a way to get feedback on me about my coaching and analysis practices. Connecting with players should help a lot, but there could be some big-ticket questions that players may be more comfortable writing rather than face-to-face. I’ve done it once before in 2012, but I haven’t got back to it since.
Catherine Thornton said in her workshop that she uses end-of-season feedback forms. She said it’s scary to send it off, but she knows it’s useful. This was enough impetus to put this into practice. It’s a lot easier to do now with Google Forms. However, I would need to think deeply about what questions I want to answer. I especially want to have a bank of questions I can ask every season so I can analyse any changes season by season. I will contact Catherine at some point for the questions she asks her players.
Final Thoughts
It was great to attend the Coaching for a Greater Purpose conference. As well as thinking about values and building connections, I got to hang out with the coaching staff of the American School of London and other international schools. I was especially happy when I found some volleyball coaches!
As for my reflection, I think reinforcing player values and looking for opportunities to build connections with players will take a lot of time and effort from me this season. Hopefully, it will make me a better coach. I guess the end-of-season feedback will tell.
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