Survey of coaching behavior among Ethiopian football coaches.

Football in Ethiopia has long journey in a half a century. It has come a long way from the days when the country’s leading referee who sat on horseback galloped all over the field following the players. As things became more sophisticated stone-markers were utilized to delineate the field and hefty sticks to serve as goal-posts. In the early days of its establishment (19431952) the Ethiopian football Federation employed foreign residents as coaches. Starting from 1947, Ethiopia National team had different coaches, Major Isaacsson from Sweden was the first Ethiopian national team coach (Gedamu Abreha 1968). To achieve improvement in athletic performance it may be necessary for the coach to engage in coaching behavior to which the athletes is receptive. What may be an appropriate coaching behavior to on athlete may be an ineffective approach for the others. Specific behavior by the coach may be more productive of certain outcome than others (Tinning 1982). Effective coaching behavior varies across specific context as the characteristics of the players and the prescribed situation change (Chelladurai, 1978). Athletic performance is the result of interactions among the athlete, coach and performance environment. Each of these factors is critical to performance outcomes. This study is designed to improve our understanding of on coaches coaching behavior in Ethiopia. Burges (1997) individual difference such as self-reflectiveness, critical thinking aptitude, decisionmaking abilities and knowledge bases can influence coaches’ expectation and behaviour. Other research by Feltz, Chase, Martiz and Sullivan (1999) reported that coaches who possessed a high degree of coaching efficacy gave more positive feedback. The quantitative data gained from expert coaches (n=51) has been obtained by the Leadership Scale for Sport (LSS). The purpose of this study is broadly to investigate overall coaching characteristics of Ethiopian football coaches at different level and experience. As the result indicates most of Ethiopian coaches (M=3.33, Std=.71) have Training and Instruction coaching behavior, followed by Positive feedback (M=3.24, Std=.88),Autocratic ABHINAV NATIONAL MONTHLY REFEREED JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN COMMERCE & MANAGEMENT www.abhinavjournal.com VOLUME NO.2, ISSUE NO.4 ISSN 2277-1166 49 behavior(M=2.93,Std=.59) Social support (M=2.53,Std=.76), , and Democratic type of behavior (M=2.51,Std=.70).