Coaching Referees

Here is the process we will be using in Iowa for in-person coaching reviews. It will involve using RefUp to manage coaching assignments, pre-match touch base with the referee, being present at the match and collecting data for input into a report, a debrief/review with the referee, and filling and filing the report.

You can also find some general information on practical coaching of referees here.

SIRRs Process

• Coaches seek opportunities to coach a referee of a given match or a specific referee.
  • Communicate availability to get coaching offers created in RefUp. Then, bid on the offers to receive an assignment.
• Coaches are available to engage with the referee before the match.
  • Make time during the week in the lead up to the match to chat with the referee about their work-ons or focus areas. They are responsible for reaching out to you, but you need to make an effort to fit them into your schedule!
• Attend the match and take notes/collect data in whatever form works for you (paper/pen, recorder, video, etc)
  • Find details in RefUp about the match (address, time) or ask the referee. Get there a bit before kick off to introduce yourself and say hi.
• Debrief with the referee post-match.
  • Either day-of or in the proceeding days after the match, make time to have a chat with the referee about your observations.
• Complete a report, share it with the referee, and post it to the repository
  • The report template and repository are here.
• Coaches are paid a coaching fee via RefUp, similarly to referees. A payment destination must be configured in RefUp to get paid.

Coaching philosophy

Different referees will need different things from a coach. Referees can fit different personas to help you figure out what to focus on. Some examples, but not exhaustive!, of those are

1. Beginner Referee: someone newer in their journey who might need a strong hand on the basics and encouragement. Probably best to avoid too-much-too-fast. We want them to come back!
2. Workhorse Referee: an established referee (C2-ish) who is content working locally week-in/week-out might need application tweaks or introduced to communication techniques to make their life easier. They need to “feel the love”!
3. Higer PerformingAspiring Referee: someone looking to advance to Midwest Panel, national high performance programs, or who has an appetite for constant self-improvment. They need support working through challenges!

Tip

Each referee will have different things that are important to them and that might be different than things that are/were important in a particular game you coach in-person. What will make the next game this referee referees better?

Types of coaching

In Iowa, as a coach you will most probably be doing more one-off coaching sessions than season long appointments with the same referee (this would amazing if you could do it, though!). Otherwise, coaching ususally happens at tournament events where you will be working with multiple referees in condensed settings.

One-off coaching focus areas

The one-off coaching session is going to be something of a blend between things a true Coach provides and things that a Performance Reviewer/Evaluator might be bringing to the table.

	Coach	Performance Reviewer
Scope	Big picture	Detail focused
Lens	Supportive	Objective
Framing	Areas of focus What the ref wants to work on	Areas of importance What the ref’s performance impacted
Stereotypical impact	”builds up"	"rips apart”

One of the most impactful things that one-off coaching needs is the ability to prioritize. Because of the limitied time and interaction window, a good will is able to deteremine what is important in that game and what will make the biggest improvement to the referee and focus on those points in the review.

Here are some other questions to ask yourself as a referee coach when doing a review to help with prioritizing information

• What did this game in particular need?
• What were the referee’s goals?
• What do the stats show?
• What is easiest to fix?
• What’s going well that the referee can build on?
• What is easiest for me as the CMO to talk about?
• What does the referee self-identify as opportunities for improvement?

Behaviors

USA Rugby did some polling back in 2020 about referee impressions of CMOs. From that polling, the top behaviors were

Negative behaviors	Positive behaviors
Patronizing/condescending attitude	Care about the ref’s development
Doesn’t listen	Honesty on area’s for improvement
Know-it-all-ism	”Make you think”
	Knowlegable

Just like in refereeing, the way you carry yourself and what you bring into an interaction tells a bigger story than strictly what is in a report.