YOUTH COACHES' WORK IDENTITY: A RESEARCH IN A PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL CLUB

Considering sport as an “open social system” characterized by increasing complexity (Heineman, 2003), a “social-life space” with high emotional and relational contents (Gozzoli, 2005), this paper starts by focusing the attention on some specific sport organizations: youth sectors. These, as all the organizations, are crossed by deep changes and characterized by an increasing complexity (Bocchi, Ceruti, 1985; Bauman, 2000; Beck, 2005). The youth coaches’ role is recognized as central and critical at the same time in promoting athletes’ healthy development through sport (Gilbert & Trudel, 2004; Cotè et al., 2009), as well as in connecting all the actors involved in youth sport practice (athletes, parents, managers, sponsors …), a sort of “mediation function” (Gozzoli, Frascaroli, D’Angelo, 2008). For this reason the paper, borrowing a construct typical of organizational psychology, aim to explore youth coaches’ work identity. In particular the research, conducted with a grounded theory approach (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), aims to investigate the youth coaches’ work identities starting from their narrations. It has been collected the content of 8 sessions of a training-research program planned by Catholic University (Milan) in 2008. During the training sessions 15 Italian youth soccer coaches were involved. The whole material has been transcribed and a content-analysis with the support of the software ATLAS.it is ongoing. By a first partial analysis of the material some crucial elements about the work identity of youth coaches emerged. For example the importance of their past as players; such as the role of their past coaches in defining their own role. From a relational point of view coaches underlined the significance of the relationships with the athletes, and considered the relationships with parents and colleagues in an hostile way. Their affiliation clubs seem to have an important role in defining their organizational identity, although in a general way. Generally we observed a change of their representations concerning different objects, and a development in term of reflexivity. Some of this outcomes are essential both to deeper understand the youth coaches’ identity and life-space and to better plan specific educational programs.