{"id":9113,"date":"2021-09-24T17:46:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-24T17:46:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/?post_type=report&#038;p=9113"},"modified":"2025-12-15T05:14:23","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T05:14:23","slug":"leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving","status":"publish","type":"report","link":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/","title":{"rendered":"Leaders Virtual Roundtable: How Is the Modern Athlete Evolving?"},"content":{"rendered":"<!-- blocks\/hero-editorial -->\n<!-- inc\/hero-editorial -->\n<div class=\"hero es-hero__editorial hero--var-1\" role=\"banner\">\n\t<div class=\"hero__image\" style=\"background-image: url(https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1340967816.jpg);\">\n\n\t\t<div class=\"hero__overlay grad-overlay content-bottom\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"container\">\n\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"hero__content\">\n                    \n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"hero__content__inner\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t                            <p class=\"es-label es-label--md\">\n                                24 Sep 2021                            <\/p>\n                        \t\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\" class=\"theme-dark hero__back-link back-link es-label es-label--sm\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"icon icon--md icon--arrow-left\"><\/span>Reports<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<h1 class=\"hero__title\">Leaders Virtual Roundtable: How Is the Modern Athlete Evolving?<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n        \n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<!-- blocks\/section -->\n<section\n  class=\"es-section flexible-section  text-only theme-light\"\n    >\n                <div class=\"container\">\n                                    <div class=\"bg-striped-pattern__inner section-padding-top section-padding-bottom\">\n                <div class=\"es-section__inner col-parent col-parent--stack-sm\">\n                                            <div class=\"es-section__sidebar es-section__sidebar--sticky col col--12 \">\n                            \n                            \n                            \n                                                            <div class=\"es-section__text content-area\">\n                                    <p><p><strong>Recommended resources<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance\/how-the-coach-must-adapt-to-the-modern-athlete\/\">How the Coach Must Adapt to the Modern Athlete<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance\/virtual-leaders-meet-building-modern-day-athletes-through-holistic-support\/\">Virtual Leaders Meet: Building Modern Day Athletes Through Holistic Support<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/view.publitas.com\/leaders\/creating-environments-for-the-athlete-of-tomorrow-roundtable-summary-19-8-21\/page\/1\">Creating Environments for the Athlete of Tomorrow<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Framing the topic<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Modern athletes. Generation Z. How are they different? What does it mean for us as performance practitioners? These questions will be familiar and they have certainly been common across the Performance Institute over the past couple of years. In this roundtable, we wanted to explore what we are seeing in terms of this topic across our respective roles and environments. Secondly, how are we looking to adapt our environments to support this?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Discussion notes<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>The Modern Athlete \u2013 what are we seeing in our environment? What are some of the reflections?<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>There is much more awareness and acknowledgement around mental health and wellbeing. Previous generations would not have had the confidence to raise these challenges, so this is an area of discovery and adaptation we are going to have to have.<\/li>\n<li>The mental side of our respective sports in general is coming to the forefront. There are more in-depth education programmes available now than previously.<\/li>\n<li>Another big area we are seeing is how athletes connect, whether that is through smartphones, social media or other technologies \u2013 things are much more digitalised. Following on from this, it makes us ask and debate the question of how modern athletes learn? Do they really understand learning? Much of their experiences have been in the education system \u2013 they want to learn what they want to learn and not things they don\u2019t. How do we move away from that directive approach that may have existed before?<\/li>\n<li>Evolutions of social influences on the athletes themselves. What are their parents like? They are perhaps more upskilled than ever before because of the access of information \u2013 they are almost like the coaches of ten years ago. There is more and easier access to agents, personal trainers and other external stakeholders. It makes us question what are their expectations now, how do we manage that? Is this the new normal and we should upskill ourselves around that?<\/li>\n<li>The need and almost expectation from modern athletes to explain \u2018the why\u2019 behind certain things we do. Modern athletes have the ability to research what we are asking them to do because of accessibility and opportunities to fact-check. We are needing to do more work upfront before we bring things to our athletes so we feel we are confident about what we want to do. It\u2019s also important to have a dialogue with them about that why \u2013 be prepared to evidence and support.<\/li>\n<li>There is a requirement to be adaptable because of the amount of change that exists. There is more to the modern athlete than just turning up and playing their sport. Athletes have to be willing to adapt but be in a safe space that they can have the support to adapt.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The Modern Athlete \u2013 how are you looking to adapt your environment to support this?<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We are really looking at the personal development and education piece with our staff and helping them to cultivate an idea and, in turn, helping them to sell an idea to the players. As coaches and staff, we need to sell ideas to players \u2013 we\u2019ve even given coaches and staff sales books. Your approach will have to be different for each player, so we wanted to create some core levels of understanding and the right tools for our coaches and staff.<\/li>\n<li>We are really trying to surround our athletes and staff with the right people and the core question sitting around this is \u2018how do we setup the environment for that to occur?\u2019 How are we designing and shaping our schedule to promote this notion of support, in a similar way to how we would shape our programme to include weight training as an example.<\/li>\n<li>In terms of engaging with academy talent, we are really looking at how they consume content and information. We know sitting them in a lecture theatre and providing papers of information isn\u2019t going to land well, so we are trying to tap into their world and align our messaging to how they consume information (video, infographic, through technological devices). We are continuing to investigate how to communicate with different groups.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Question to consider<\/strong>: a question for us to think about is: how are we checking for understanding? How are we getting the balance between perception of us giving information and expecting them to just know it vs. do they actually know it?<\/li>\n<li>We are monitoring this in the daily training environment, but the big check for understanding is when we break into camps. Do we see the behaviour we want exhibited? It can be evidenced by how they turn up and present themselves around the environment. We\u2019ve also analysed the behaviours of some of the players in the current senior setup who have come from the under-16 programme \u2013 have they kept the same behaviours on that journey? If it\u2019s a yes, it means that they have understood what we want so our understanding is positive. We need to continue to check and challenge each year \/ through the development journey.<\/li>\n<li>We talk a lot about multidisciplinary approaches but we have actually looked more towards a trans-disciplinary approach \u2013 we want to have in-the-moment learning as opposed to perceived learning where it can be difficult to really check for that understanding. We want to encourage self-reflection in the moment as opposed to engaging in a seminar and then asking them to apply it.<\/li>\n<li>Do we really know our athletes? Not all athletes want to be an Olympic champion, for example. It\u2019s important for us as performance leaders to not have assumptions that everyone is pulling in the same direction, so checking for understanding isn\u2019t a linear process.<\/li>\n<li>Large class room and seminar settings are not efficient for \u2018stickiness\u2019 of understanding and knowledge, so we\u2019re more looking at one on ones and breaking things down with players before taking it onto the field.<\/li>\n<li>We do a lot of player surveys, which are small and targeted to evaluate the understanding of the population and how effective we are communicating things as coaches or staff we want to pass along. \u2018Meet the learner where they\u2019re at\u2019 \u2013 we can\u2019t teach or coach them without knowing what they don\u2019t know. It needs to be a collaborative effort and collectively you need to define what success looks like because it will look different to each player. Players could try something and fail a skill in the practice environment, but it may well mean they have gotten better because they\u2019ve learnt and grown.<\/li>\n<li>We are focused on looking at self-reflection of staff \u2013 if players constantly aren\u2019t getting the grip of something, is it the way we are giving the message? Is it just where the athlete is and we need to get on their level? We have an education programme, but in the first six months of their full-time year, we get them to present back their first months to their parents, friends, whoever they want. With only help from the analyst, they present back their programme, individual action plan and goals. They contextualise their data through video clips, stats etc. and what you see is the players give it a really good go. They enhance their knowledge, understanding and buy-in, as well as feeling a little bit of pressure. With other members of staff also being in the room, they are able to identify where we can support them as staff better as well. We have created our case-study review model based around \u2018Performance\u2019, \u2018Physical\u2019 and \u2018Personal\u2019.<\/li>\n<li>We are using \u2018Athlete Player Cards\u2019 which are based around a player\u2019s personality, how you like to learn, what motivates you, how you like feedback etc. These cards are feeding into the players development plans \u2013 we\u2019re looking to be proactive as staff in looking into these cards and exploring how the players like to work because we have a baseline to work with. It has also worked well as a self-reflection tool for staff. There are conversations around having staff versions of these cards as well.<\/li>\n<li>The top-down perspective isn\u2019t working as well with the modern athlete, we\u2019re trying to find ways to make it more bottom-up to allow them to create their own shared ownership in the process. We\u2019ve been trying to provide a general framework around some concepts but allow them to choose which one they want to do on a particular day. We are looking at scaling this \u2013 we want player feedback but also giving them choice which has led to some higher levels of engagement, enthusiasm and stimulation.<\/li>\n<li>We are big advocates of DiSC profiles as we can get that insight into players and staff much faster. One of the things we know about working with athletes is that it is relationship-based. The quicker we can establish that connection the better off we can be. This profile allows us to better understand how that person learns and how they react under stress. It is allowing us to support coaches and staff in how to communicate their messages and work with players at specific moments in time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Download Performance 23<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Our latest Performance journal has landed, with Gareth Southgate, Head Coach of the <strong>England men&#8217;s football team<\/strong> leading the way with his reflections on defining and developing resilience. Elsewhere we spoke to the <strong>Arizona Diamondbacks<\/strong> of Major League Baseball, as well as the world-renowned <strong>New Zealand Rugby<\/strong>, and <strong>British Wheelchair Basketball<\/strong>, who runs some of the finest programmes in the sport. Edd Vahid of Premier League club <strong>Southampton FC<\/strong> also penned a column focusing on talent pathways.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/info.leadersinsport.com\/l\/856843\/2021-08-20\/ppvbh?utm_source=Leaders+website&amp;utm_medium=Website&amp;utm_content=Performance+23#member\"><button>Download Journal<\/button><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n                                <\/div>\n                            \n                            \n                            \n                                                    <\/div>\n                                        <div class=\"col visibly-hidden col--flex-align-right\">\n                                            <\/div>\n                <\/div>\n            <\/div>\n        <\/div>\n        <\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":9114,"menu_order":0,"template":"","categories":[22],"pathway":[],"topic":[],"sport":[],"class_list":["post-9113","report","type-report","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-coaching-development-performance"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Leaders Virtual Roundtable: How Is the Modern Athlete Evolving? - Performance Institute<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Leaders Virtual Roundtable: How Is the Modern Athlete Evolving? - Performance Institute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Performance Institute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-12-15T05:14:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1340967816.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2040\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1093\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/\",\"name\":\"Leaders Virtual Roundtable: How Is the Modern Athlete Evolving? - Performance Institute\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1340967816.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-09-24T17:46:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-12-15T05:14:23+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/leaders-virtual-roundtable-how-is-the-modern-athlete-evolving\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1340967816.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1340967816.jpg\",\"width\":2040,\"height\":1093,\"caption\":\"SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 17: Leah Williamson of England applauds the fans following victory in the FIFA Women's World Cup 2023 Qualifier group D match between England and North Macedonia at St. Mary's Stadium on September 17, 2021 in Southampton , United Kingdom. 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