The Coach Learning Group Launch ONLINE COURSES

From the Curtis Cup to the Tour and the post-playing realization that your
coaching business – and skills – aren’t as effective as you thought. Here is how PGA Professional, Sue Shapcott, drastically developed her coaching, and business, and has now developed a series of eLearning courses to help fellow PGA Professionals ‘get to grips’ with the athlete relationship side of coaching.

Imagine this. You’re a good player, you’re a good technician and you enjoy all the
new teaching technology. Despite this, your teaching business isn’t fulfilling it’s potential. Your retention rate with golfers is low and you don’t get many referrals. You know there are other pros with less technical knowledge and experience with better businesses. What are you doing wrong? And where do you turn if you your coaching business isn’t thriving as it should? Sue Shapcott, PGA professional found herself in this position.

In 2000, Shapcott moved to the United States to teach for renowned instructor, Hank Haney. Shapcott was a former Curtis Cup and tour player, and had qualified with the PGA in 1996. After five years of working for Haney, Shapcott realized that she epitomized the professional described above. Although she had an impressive background as a player, and understood the swing’s nuts-and-bolts, she did not understand the human aspect of coaching.

“I knew how to diagnose and improve players’ techniques, but I didn’t know how to motivate them, or connect with them. In fact, I was fearful of forming anything beyond transactional relationships with my clients.”

This realization led Shapcott to post-graduate work in Educational Psychology, and the formation of The Coach Learning Group in 2015 with Sarah McQuade.

The Coach Learning Group provides individual coaches and organizations with on-line courses to develop the social and motivational skills required to coach effectively. The content of the courses sits outside the X’s and O’s of coaching – technical knowledge is considered a necessary pre-requisite to good coaching. The on-line courses challenge coaches to consider the way they communicate with golfers, the type of feedback they give and the characteristics of healthy coach-athlete relationships. 

With three online courses currently available - The Coach-Athlete Relationship for
Golf Coaches, Professional Development Planning, Mindset for Golf Coaches – and more in the pipeline, these online courses are available through the Members Area, are accessible 24/7, are based on evidence-based research, and include interactive feedback from both Shapcott and McQuade. 

Both Shapcott and McQuade have a background in coach education. Shapcott as a
coach and researcher, and McQuade as an education consultant to organizations such as Sports Coach UK and the US Olympic Committee. They are both actively engaged in ongoing coach-education research and bring this evidence-based approach to The Coach Learning Group. McQuade suggests,

“In all sports, there is a lot of dogma around coaching. The goal of our courses is to give coaches tried and tested skills to help them improve their coaching and their clients’ coaching experience.” 

To access these courses go to Online Courses section of the Members Area on The
PGA website. PGA Professionals will be awarded 15 CPD Points for successful completion of each online course as part of the PGA’s Member Education Programme.