Picture this: It’s 1998, and Blockbuster Video is riding high with a market value of $4 billion. They’re practically on every street corner, like Coca-Cola of the video rental world. In 2000, along comes Netflix, a fledgling video-by-mail company with a wild proposal. They suggest Blockbuster buy them for a mere $50 million. Netflix would handle Blockbuster’s online presence, and Blockbuster could flaunt Netflix’s online subscription service in their stores. A match made in movie heaven, right?
But hold on! Why would a $4 billion giant let an unknown upstart run its brand? And why on earth would Blockbuster consider a business model without those cherished late fees, which raked in a cool $800 million in revenues? Netflix was met with laughter and a firm rejection. Blockbuster, like your grandparent sticking to their rotary telephone, stuck to what they knew best.
Fast forward to today – Blockbuster sits alongside the Dodos and Dinosaurs, and Netflix is a category killer valued at over $207 billion. So, what went wrong for Blockbuster? They clung to their outdated ways, unaware that the market was shifting, consumers were changing, and the model was evolving.
The lesson here is crystal clear for school sport coaches: embrace change or risk becoming a blockbuster flop. Coaches, shouldn’t abandon their coaching roots entirely. However, at the very least, they should be looking for opportunities to adapt to the ever-changing needs of the game, the evolving nature of our athletes, and the demands of the coaching industry?
If we refuse to acknowledge that the game is evolving, and today’s athletes are not the same as a generation ago, we risk going the way of Blockbuster. School Sports have transformed; we have more data and science about youth sports now than ever before. The excuse for why our coaching is not effective, “kids these days” is not an excuse. It’s a cop-out. Instead of blaming them for our coaching missteps, let’s seek to understand, meet them on their turf, and teach in ways that resonate.
So what kind of coach are we? A coach with 40 years experience or a coach with 1 years experience repeated 40 times? A ” Busted Blockbuster” clinging stubbornly to outdated methods, refusing even a small change to stay relevant? Or are you a “Flexing Netflixer” ready to shift, adapt, pivot, re-examine, and disrupt to ensure you’re at the cutting edge of effective coaching?
The choice is yours – as Stephen Hawking once said “Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.”
