The Motivation
21.12.16
Motivation is the first pillar of a three concepts group that holds up player's performance. The other two are confidence and concentration. To perform highest possible level, first you must be motivated to do it, then have the confidence to carry it out, and finally, the concentration necessary to make the right decisions. Motivation is the first one because it’s where everything is born, let's say it’s the fire that lights the player.
An unmotivated player means a waste of time for himself and a hindrance for the rest of the team. Player’s time is deeply valuable because athlete’s career is too short to waste any piece of it during practices, games, meetings. With this, I don’t mean players are responsible for their own motivation, not at all. In fact, I hold the opposite. From my point of view, in terms of motivation, the responsible is usually the coach, except in extraordinary situations.
Psychology raises the differentiation between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. The first one, extrinsic motivation, is controlled from outside of the individual with a rewards system, ie the coach. Meanwhile, intrinsic motivation is originated from inside the individual and the action has a reward itself, without any external incentive, or what is the same, the player doing what he really wants to do. Therefore, more intrinsic motivation we’re able to generate in our players, the more self confidence players will feel, the happier they’ll be playing and the more genuine the player's execution will be on the court. Now, and that's where it all lies, coaches have to get our ideas or guidelines going from extrinsic motivation to intrinsic motivation.
To turn our ideas into intrinsic motivation we have to go through an adaptation process, it’s like to make an inception in player’s basketball knowledge. First we must know how to use carefully the system of rewards and incentives to introduce our ideas into the routine. At the same time, we’ve to be able to support with tangible arguments that our ideas are valuable and grounded on a global logic. That is, we’ve to be able to explain our players perfectly how it’s done, what it's worth (short, medium and long term) and what advantage they’ll get out of doing it every day. This way, with good results demonstration and an adaptation period, players will gradually make coach’s ideas of their own and will execute it automatic and genuinely, or what is the same, will be transformed into intrinsic motivation.
SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE
FOR PLAYERS
Normally, demotivation is the great excuse of unhonest players to don’t perform, and if it’s necessary they’ll use it in their own favor. By this I mean that, just as a coach can control player’s motivation, players can’t hide in the shield of being unmotivated daily. One of the most important sections in a player's formation is professionalism, and it doesn’t understand about excuses and motivations, but consistency, perseverance and routines. The inexperience get the players to the place where they’ve to deal with the excuses, that’s part of the learning process and it’s impossible to avoid it. The true is if the player is able to control it (no excuses, no shields) and go over that process faster, it’s really helpful for the formation. As soon a player gets to the professionalism behavior, improvement process will be boost.
Even so, at some point of your player’s career, you’ll find a coach with whom you won’t be able to feel motivated at all, it happens to everybody at certain point. And it’s in those complicated situations when you’ve to be more professional and maintain your goals focus on medium and long term priorities, meanwhile day to day can become a nightmare. I always recommend my players that when things get tough, you have to focus on the simple, the things you can have under control. In this case, those things are the ones you can do by yourself without the necessity or the obstacle of a bad coach.
In bad situations
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Be patient and professional
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Compete maximum level in all situations without expecting anything in return
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Build your body for next season
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Improve your individual skills
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Give importance and find motivation outside basketball
FOR COACHES
Is usual the situation where we, the coaches, complain about our own players because they aren’t motivated to practice every day, like it’s a personal issue not team’s, and the individual should take care of it. That is wrong. Coaches are the responsible of player’s motivation, in my opinion, always. Because coach’s role gives the power to make a big impact on player's motivation with the rewards system, therefore we’ve to be able to use it in the right way. And if we don’t know how to do it, it's our fault, not player’s. So get update, study and find out what you’re doing wrong.
Motivation is a fragile element dependent of many factors. Evidently, the events on the court influence player’s motivation, like coach’s feedback (corrections, way to look, encourage), playing minutes, player’s importance in the team... But also does the relationship with teammates, the outside team relations, studies/work... That is why we, the coaches, are needed of tools to detect motivation’s states in our players. One big tool is the language: verbal and nonverbal. The second one, nonverbal language, is the one the coach, as leader of a working group, must understand and dominate because is essential to recognize player’s mood. Body language communicates levels of motivation, confidence and concentration that player has in each moment, then the coach knows how to act accordingly.
Two scenarios
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MOTIVATED PLAYER
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Complex and seemingly impossible challenges, it’s time to cross the limits and improving full speed
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UNMOTIVATED PLAYER
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Simple and affordable challenges to rebuild the motivation of every day
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