Class Plans as a Tool for Coach Development

Professionals across all disciplines participate in ongoing development and continuing education. The best CrossFit coaches are no different and have likely enjoyed a long voyage of self-reflection, mentorship, feedback, and improvement to get where they are. But we shouldn’t take for granted that the necessity for coach development makes it easy, feasible, or accessible.

Creating a structured learning environment for coaches can often be difficult to schedule and prioritize when you have small-business responsibilities, inconsistent coaching schedules, coaches who work varying numbers of hours, and costs to manage. But you can improve your business and member experience by strengthening your coaches and what they can do on the gym floor. This is where class plans come in. Focused implementation of a well thought-out class plan serves numerous purposes, including a consistently potent, low-cost coach development tool.

What Is a Class Plan? 

A class plan is a detailed map that helps a coach prepare for all elements of a class, from the timeline and flow to equipment spacing, safety, teaching, skill development, movement progressions, and scaling.

Class plans allow coaches to plan for the known, leaving more resources available for the unknown events that inevitably occur in a class. They provide mental space and time to allow for the development of higher-level coaching skills. And they provide consistency, professionalism, and growth opportunities for your entire coaching staff. For a detailed discussion on the components of a class plan, click here.

Class plans can benefit you and your coaches in numerous ways. Here, we focus on three that stand out.

1. Class Plans Save Time and Money

Value aside, coach development of any kind can devour affiliate resources. Class plans, however, can reduce the time an affiliate must commit to developing a coach, and if the class plans are delivered via a third party, there is the potential to save money on lesson plan creation. Many affiliate owners have said they save four to six hours per week by using class plans.

The responsibility for creating class plans can be assigned to various coaches throughout the week. As an example, you could assign a different coach to write a class plan for each day of the week. This distributes the responsibility and time associated with the task. Additionally, the value of a coach learning to write, execute, and evaluate their own class plans is a needed phase of all coaches’ development. This creates that environment for a coach without making it a daily burden. While this strategy provides one option for coach development, there is an associated cost in paying coaches to write class plans each week.

Alternatively, you could look for a third-party programming service, such as CrossFit’s Affiliate Programming, that comes with a class plan for each day. This option has the added benefit of alleviating your staff of the extra time it takes to create a class plan. For roughly the price of a month of membership, you can get 30 class plans for your gym to follow. Then, as a bonus, you can have your coaches implement the plans and use them as a tool to guide professional development meetings.

2. Class Plans Help You Push Toward a Standard

Imagine a professional kitchen where the head chef instructs the kitchen staff to cook a menu item however they want. Two people at the same table could order the same item but get completely different versions of it. The same is true if you don’t have standards for your coaching staff to meet.

Outlining specific criteria your coaches should follow makes it easier for them to succeed and become better coaches. It also gives your members consistency and predictability. Once you implement class plans at your gym, your members will notice they all have the same warm-up, workout, and flow no matter what time they come to class. While they may continue to choose the coach they feel most connected to, they also know that no matter what time they come, the standard will be the same. These standards will make better coaches and better athletes.

3. Class Plans Provide a Feedback-Friendly Environment

Class plans can create a bottom-up culture of coaching candor. They guide coaches and encourage consistency while still allowing coaches to add their distinctive style and create a common language for sharing feedback. If you encourage your coaches to use class plans as a tool for growth rather than as a standard that feels impossible to meet, they will also be more open about sharing their wins as well as what they’d like to work on. Finally, another bonus of implementing class plans is that your members may also notice feedback passing from owner to coach and between coaches. Pursuing coaching excellence through a constructive yet tolerant learning process will stand out to your members, and many will feel more willing to engage in the teach-see-cue correction process when they see their coaches participating in a similarly structured way.

CAP Programming as a Tool for Coach Development

We designed CrossFit Affiliate Programming for coaches of all levels. Our plans include:

• Daily class plans
• Coaching notes
• Warm-ups
• Timelines
• At-home and equipment-free tracks
• Movement and support videos
• Scaling options
• Daily coach development tools
• And more!

However, the best part of our program is that you can use it in a way that benefits you and best accommodates the needs of your affiliate and coaches. There’s no need for strict implementation that confines your coaches to performance without consideration of your logistical needs and affiliate culture. A class plan points toward the desired destination, but it doesn’t force everyone to get there the same way. If you want to learn more about CrossFit Affiliate Programming, click here.

About the Author

Since starting CrossFit in 2007, James Hobart has contributed to many corners of the CrossFit ecosystem as a coach, affiliate owner, CrossFit Seminar Staff Flowmaster, and CrossFit Games competitor. He is a Certified CrossFit Coach (CF-L4) and works as CrossFit’s Senior Manager of Programming.