Reflecting on 'Decision Making'

Reflecting on ‘Decision Making'

In my opinion ‘Decision Making’ features much more now in terms of coaching. You hear it used in sessions, coach education & informal learning environments.

Being able to deliver practices that allow players to develop their ‘Decision Making’ skills & thought processes are widely accepted as a positive link to building cognitive, creative players.

However, I am penning this blog following witnessing a session recently with a group of under 11’s. The session could have been deemed to be active, fun and game related. Therefore it had a huge amount of positives. However, on questioning (& praising) the coach it transpired that he was working on the fact that he wanted to develop the players ‘decision making’ for match days. 

It was an informal observation & the first session I had seen so nothing further was discussed. I was fortunate to see the same team in a game situation some weeks later. Although the team were enthusiastic, & enjoyed the game they lost narrowly. 
Listening to the de-brief after: 

(Coach) Well played, I thought you did very well, however, what have we been working on recently? (Player) passing & Decision making (Coach) Good, & I really think we’re 
getting there….  

(Player) But when do I know if what I did was the right thing, I wasn’t always sure?

So, Question: how does the young player above determine what a good decision is?

The right decision? The better decision? In other words, learn about ‘what are good decisions in context’? 

This surely must come down to the planning, interventions & the environment set by the coach. If we return to the definition above: The cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or course of action among alternative possibilities. ’the belief’ is important.

To explain further: We should indeed deliver practices that are close to the game, where the ‘RANDOM’ & unexpected occur. But, for the players to learn what a ‘Good’ decision looks like, surely they must have some guidance on:

1) what we are looking to achieve 
2) Why the decision was a good one 
3) A chance to review the outcome & what happened?

(Chance for praise, confirmation & reflection)

The skill will come in letting the players play the game, enjoy the game, experiment within the game but being mindful of what the process is and what they are trying to achieve. Why this happened & why this didn’t happen. In other words, we must make mistakes in order to log learning but we must also know ‘why’ a chosen course of action was a ‘good course of action’. 

Some academic speak talks of ‘Decision Making’ as: 

Decision making follows perception & precedes action. It is vital that this takes place for a skilled performance. 

Decision Making (A Definition):- The cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or course of action among alternative possibilities.

Perception (A Definition):- The organisation, identification and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent & understand the environment.

There are a number of definitions & theories which argue the difference between the two, however the common ground that makes the subject so important in the development of our young players is that both perceptual skills & decision making are learned and developed through experience where we can therefore better determine the action to take in a given situation.

‘Doing the right thing at the right time’ is another statement often used, but if we take the simple theory that our decision making is improved via real experiences, being placed in an environment where we are encouraged to ‘TRY’ to ‘LEARN’ to ‘HONE’ and develop this then surely the way our practices are delivered is vital in developing these skills.

However, in summary, players will need to know the context to be able to understand what is the ‘preferred course of action’. 

Yes we need the ball rolling but we also need to remember, ‘why’….