Focus, Leadership and Communication: Required Skills for a Trainer

If you want to become a great trainer, this article will show you some of the qualities and skills you need to possess.
Focus, Leadership and Communication: Required Skills for a Trainer

Last update: 13 April, 2019

To become a great trainer in any sports discipline, skills such as focus, leadership, and communication are fundamental. A good trainer doesn’t just have expert knowledge of the sport.

Among other things, we consider focus, leadership, and communication to be three important characteristics that will help you to become a more methodical trainer. You’ll not only become a leader of winning teams, but also one who easily promotes practicing any sports. Thus allowing participants to flourish as athletes and as people.

Truly, every team needs a good role model to emulate. Players in a sports team need a coach they can admire and imitate. In this sense, let’s go over the skills that are most important to coaching. We’re certain they’ll be very useful when coaching any team!

Required skills of a trainer

Next, we’ll present the most important skills that are required for a good trainer:

Focus

The first step to achieve your goal is to believe that it’s possible and stay focused at all times. Don’t forget that staying focused is essential in order to offer the best version of ourselves in any activity you perform.

woman and trainer in gym

In fact, competitive stress in competitions may lead coaches to react mentally in a way that can affect adversely the team’s performance. This will be to the detriment of any pursued goals and athletes will not do their best to achieve them.

Strategies to improve concentration are very personal. A way to maintain concentration is to establish the procedure for goals during each session or competition. This way the trainer will have a general goal for which the athlete will identify objectives to help him remain focused on a specific aspect of the task.

A good trainer proves leadership

A team needs leadership and if the coach doesn’t have it, leadership will be assumed by another team member which could lead to a chaotic environment. During difficult times, players need their leader to prove his worth and contribute to solving problems. 

Although you’re the leader, this implies you must prove it during every training session. In order to achieve this, you must establish your authority and show that you have a clear command of the technical aspects necessary for clear communication with the players.

A trainer’s role is nothing more than inspiration. Being a leader who motivates his players to offer the best versions of themselves, on and off the field is one of the most valued characteristics in any sports discipline. This trait that will set a good trainer apart. It takes sensitivity and special characteristics to stand out as a sports leader.

Truly, coaches can use the training field with pre and post-game talks to demonstrate their leadership. But, once the players are on the field, generally it’s the team captain who has to prove his leadership. However, on occasions this leadership can come from any player on the field.

A good trainer is a good communicator

It’s necessary for a coach to be aware of the importance of communication. You cannot increase performance if you cannot convince and convey precisely what you seek. This includes rewarding the team’s performance and achievements. Encourage them to do it better every time and praise them for good work. Don’t forget to remind them of goals and objectives. Words of encouragement and ways to personal growth are very useful.

Trainer and athlete planning workout

In the same manner, a good coach should be completely aware of how to use his words and the positive or negative effect that they may have. Given a coach’s status they can be very powerful and have a huge impact. Communication may also include body language; avoid being negative with your body language.

It’s about teaching, encouragement, discipline, planning and giving necessary advice to improve performance. As important as expressing yourself precisely is, listening closely to everybody’s feelings is equally important.

Before we are through, we’ll remind you that as trainers and role models, not only should you teach the basic skills for an exercise or sport, but also the social skills such as discipline, patience, determination, and teamwork. Growth in sports is a permanent objective through focus, concentration, and communication.


All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.


  • Torres-McGehee, T. M., Pritchett, K. L., Zippel, D., Minton, D. M., Cellamare, A., & Sibilia, M. (2012). Sports nutrition knowledge among collegiate athletes, coaches, athletic trainers, and strength and conditioning specialists.
  • Journal of Athletic Training
  • https://doi.org/10.4085/1062-6050-47.2.205
  • Turocy, P. S., DePalma, B. F., Horswill, C. A., Laquale, K. M., Martin, T. J., Perry, A. C., … Utter, A. C. (2011). National athletic trainers’ association position statement: Safe weight loss and maintenance practices in sport and exercise.
  • Journal of Athletic Training
  • https://doi.org/10.4085/1062-6050-46.3.322
  • Yard, E. E., Collins, C. L., & Comstock, R. D. (2009). A comparison of high school sports injury surveillance data reporting by certified athletic trainers and coaches.
  • Journal of Athletic Training
  • https://doi.org/10.4085/1062-6050-44.6.645
  • Yang, J., Peek-Asa, C., Lowe, J. B., Heiden, E., & Foster, D. T. (2010). Social support patterns of collegiate athletes before and after injury.
  • Journal of Athletic Training
  • https://doi.org/10.4085/1062-6050-45.4.372
  • Robbins, J. E., & Rosenfeld, L. B. (2001). Athletes’ perception of social support provided by their head coach, assistant coach, and athletic trainer, pre-injury and during rehabilitation.
  • Journal of Sport Behavior

This text is provided for informational purposes only and does not replace consultation with a professional. If in doubt, consult your specialist.