The field we've been training on was way over grown, and 3 calls to the school district's facilities department didn't help. One of the dad's offered to help me mow it, so we did! It was so thick, it took us 3 passes to get it down to an acceptable height.

I wanted to make sure this got on the blog first and foremost because it was a really cool thing for that parent to do. I've been fortunate to have a lot of parent help with all of my teams through out the years. Most youth teams in the US couldn't function with out parents volunteering their time and energy, whether that's as managers, administrators, board members, coaches, or even just making sure a training field is playable.

As a coach, I've come to recognize the big role that parents play, and tried to direct that energy in the right way. I know that my best role is managing the on-field aspect. I truly love watching our video footage, planning and running training, managing games... All of it. If I can find ways for the parents to help manage the off-field matters, it allows me to focus even deeper on my work. Educating them on our style of play and my coaching style has been another way for me to direct their energy in a way that best helps the team. Finding families that fit in with the environment and the culture is challenging, but the more deliberately constructed it is, the easier I've found it to be.

I'll end it with a quote from Seth Godin that's been useful to me:

"People like us do things like this."

What does that mean for you with your team?