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Global Sport Business Journal

Abstract

Central to interscholastic athletic programs are coaches who directly affect the developmental outcomes experienced by student-athletes through their participation (Blanton et al., 2024; Grant, 2024; O’Boyle, 2014). Forsyth et al. (2022) analyzed the key issues perceived by athletic administrators to affect the coaching position, with Coaches Education rated as the single most important issue and Finding Coaches and Retaining Coaches also deemed to be of very high importance. Over time, the coaching role has continued to evolve, as increased role demands (Ratts, 2025), changing stakeholder expectations (Johnson et al., 2019; Stoffer et al., 2021), and growing burnout and turnover (Martin et al., 2025) have complicated the position. Thus, the purpose of this study was to provide an updated examination of the coaches issues viewed by today’s athletic administrators as most important within the current high school sport landscape. Three issues (i.e., Retaining Coaches, Coaches Education, and Finding Coaches that Teach) persisted over time, notably an increase in the importance of keeping coaches, a decreased importance placed on facilitating coaching education, and finding coaches that teach maintaining its importance over time. Furthermore, nine new issues emerged, including the two concerns (i.e., Quality Coaches and Building Positive Relationships with Coaches) rated as most important in this study. This contemporary analysis offers practitioners in high school athletics key considerations that can help them ensure the most pressing coaches issues can be addressed to create valuable experiences for coaches.

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