Shaun Caven: Displaying Resilience

Another week, another issue of The Great Coaches: Leadership and Life newsletter. 

Since starting this podcast, we’ve conducted hundreds of Great Coaches interviews and gathered numerous fantastic insights on all areas of leadership and life. All of these insights are available in our website archive, and recently we’ve been thinking of ways to allow even more people to access them - more information on this will be released in the coming months!

In the meantime, make sure to head over to our website to explore our full library of interviews, lessons, and more.

Discovering Life’s Purpose With Shaun Caven

Our Great Coach on this episode is Shaun Caven.

Born and raised in Scotland, Shaun started to coach canoeing when he was just 16 years old and, by 1997, had progressed to become the coach of the national team. Prior to moving to the USA in 2008, Shaun also spent time leading both the junior and senior British teams.

In America, Shaun took a role at Oklahoma City University, leading their program and coaching them to win national championships. Having made a strong impression, he was then appointed to coach the USA team at the 2009 world championships.

Shaun has since transitioned into coaching para-canoe. In 2016 he led the USA team to the Paralympics, and as of 2019 he has been living in Australia and leading their national para-canoe team.

Coaching clearly gives Shaun a great sense of purpose, and his career has taken him around the world and presented him with some fantastic opportunities. Interestingly, Shaun recognises a sense of purpose and desire for self improvement uniting all of the international teams that he has worked with.

Another interesting moment that came up in our interview was hearing Shaun talk about the athletic abilities of the para-athletes he coaches, and how those abilities relate to his experience of coaching non-para athletes. There was also a lot of talk of resilience and how it is displayed more through actions than words; this is particularly relevant for the people he has met who discovered a higher purpose while recovering from traumatic incidents.

Make sure to listen to the full interview via the links below, or simply search for “The Great Coaches” wherever you get your podcasts!

Listen Now: Apple | Spotify

Winning, (Not) At All Costs

How far are you willing to go to succeed?

In this clip from our fantastic interview with rowing coach Noel Donaldson, he delves into the mental impact that an “at all costs” approach to winning can have on athletes and teams, and shares why a ‘realistic’ approach may be necessary in order to keep athletes from aiming for unfeasible goals.

If you enjoyed this clip, then you should take a trip over to our website where you’ll find a wealth of insights taken from interviews with over 200 of the sporting world’s greatest coaches.

In Case You Missed It…

Exploring The Coach’s To-Do List

We spend a lot of time delving into what it means to be a ‘Great Coach’ in our interviews, but one thing that we don’t necessarily highlight is just how much coaches are expected to handle and achieve on a daily basis.

This fantastic little article lists 80 of the things you can expect to find on a coach’s ‘To-Do’ list, and while some of them are quite self-explanatory, I think you’ll be surprised by just how many things senior coaches are expected to be responsible for outside of just ‘coaching’.

The Voices Of Great Coaches

Fancy having the Great Coaches at your next event?

Inspire your team or event attendees with a presentation featuring the voices of the Great Coaches, speaking about the aspects of leadership and life that most resonate with your situation.

Our presentations can be delivered both live and virtually - watch this short video to learn more about what we have to offer.

Challenge Yourself with the Macquarie MBA

This newsletter is brought to you by Macquarie University Business School’s MBA program. Designed to empower, challenge and transform, the Macquarie MBA gives you the business skills and knowledge you need to succeed in an evolving global economy.

The program bridges the gap between theory and real-world application, bringing together world-leading professors, executives and industry partners to teach you how business can be used for good.

I have started working with the team at Macquarie on some projects and can attest to the quality of the people and material. To find out more, search for Macquarie University Business School’s MBA.

Find out more: https://www.mq.edu.au/macquarie-business-school/