Emma Doyle Interview: What Makes a Great Tennis Coach?

Emma Doyle is a high-performance coach and author with a wide-ranging background in tennis.

We discuss her book “What Makes a Great Tennis Coach?”, how she views modern coaching, and how you can become a better coach or student.

You will also hear how Emma got into tennis, what inspired her to be a coach, and how she thinks we can make doubles more popular.

Interview Notes from this Podcast

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• Follow Emma on Twitter, Instagram, & check out her website.
• Buy her book: What Makes a Great Coach?: Top 10 Practices of the World’s Best Coaches
• Special offer: Buy 10 copies or more to gain access to The Coaches Toolkit – online tools that provide you with practical (off-court leadership) strategies aligned with the top 10 practices. Buy 100 copies or more – Emma Doyle will do a talk for your team (in-person if you are in Denver, or virtual if you live outside of Colorado, US)(Screenshot your purchase and send it to: info@emmadoyle.com.au).
• “It’s not what you say, it’s what they hear”
  • Too often coaches communicate and coach how they like to be coached, rather than how their student learns.
  • Knowing what you want from a coach and how you receive info is good for both you & the coach to know.
  • Understanding your partner and their personality is very important.

• The Curious Champion Mindset
  • Curiosity is a coach’s superpower because it helps them learn and adapt.
  • Always ask questions to better adjust your own game and your opponent’s game.
  • In his podcast with Emma, Darren Cahill discusses his changeover philosophy of reflecting on the past two games, thinking about the current situation, and preparing for the next two games.
  • Curiosity helps build resiliency and prevents anger because you’re thinking about improvement.
• 3 Practices from Emma’s Book
  • Decision-Making
    • Empowering your students with decisions is important to allow them to build intuition and thrive under pressure.
    • Pulling decisions out of people helps them solve problems in every part of life and gets them more invested.
  • Purpose
    • Purpose is directly linked to motivation, if you know your purpose, practice is enjoyable.
    • Purpose also allows you to track progress and better reflect, but that doesn’t necessarily mean goals for every student.
    • For example, in our podcast with Luke Jensen, he discussed his intense training regimen while his brother Murphy practices very loosely. Both players are former pros.
  • Communication
    • The four types of learning styles are visual, auditory, kinesthetic, & auditory-digital.
    • Make sure you know which one you are, which one your partner is, and let your coach know (you could be several).
    • Having values and making sure everyone on your team is striving towards those helps to make better decisions.
    • Remember, you don’t always have to be teaching to coach, you are just helping students to learn.

• Emma’s Favorites
  • Tournament: Australian Open
  • Tennis Book: What Do I Wear on My Feet to Play Tennis? by Emma Doyle or The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey
  • Non-tennis Book: Who Moved My Cheese? by Spencer Johnson or The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari by Robin Sharma