Parents’ views on coaching in youth community sport settings

Parents play a major role as enablers and motivators of their children’s sport participation and retention. However, parents are often not considered in the data collection pertaining to youth sport coaching initiatives. We investigated parent perceptions of community youth sport coaching within the context of a Coach Developer Program which was trialled across 6 community sport clubs. 17 parents contributed qualitative data via interview. Reflexive thematic analysis resulted in the themes: expectations of coaching; limitations in coach development; parents’ ability to notice change, and sustainability of coach development programs. There was a mismatch between parent expectations of coaches and their recognition that the coaching role is multi-faceted with coach development difficult where coaching is largely undertaken by novice volunteers. Findings from this study add to the limited literature that considers the role of parent perceptions and expectations of coaching when providing coach development programs in community youth sport settings.