Mark Cairns and Andy Muir are the co-founders of Coach Logic, calling in from their bothy in Edinburgh - which, for anyone not from Scotland, is a shelter in the mountains. They haven't climbed a literal mountain to get there, but the metaphor isn't a bad one for what they're trying to do. Both rugby. Mark is a coach educator for World Rugby across Europe and comes from a PE teaching background. Andy has lectured in sports science at Edinburgh College. They built Coach Logic because coaches have no consistent way of knowing what they actually do when they coach. This conversation is about finding a solution to that - and it's a really good one.

Three Key Messages

1. How you coach matters more than what you coach Content is everywhere. YouTube, social media, coaching courses - finding out what to do in a session has never been easier. What's harder, and what makes the bigger difference, is the delivery. The question you asked and then immediately answered yourself. The huddle you called with nothing planned to say. That's the stuff that shapes how players experience their coach - and coaches need help seeing what is happening with clarity.

2. You coach from perception - and perception can be wrong Andy watched himself back and discovered that the high-tempo sessions he'd designed were wiping out everything else he thought he was doing. The open questions, the space, the relationships. None of it intentional. None of it clearly visible until he looked. This isn't unusual - it's can be what happens when you're coaching 18 players in 90 minutes. But you can do something about it when you see it.

3. Film yourself coaching A £10 microphone. A chest harness from Amazon. That's the starting point. Film a session, find two or three moments that stand out – and make a plan to be intentional for next time.

Other Things Worth Knowing

What SAM does SAM - the Session Analysis Model - is Coach Logic's latest development. Upload coaching footage from your phone and SAM automatically analyses your coaching behaviours. Types of questions asked, feedback given, key interactions. No grades, no judgment, no tick boxes. Just a clear breakdown of what happened, which you can use on your own or with a coach developer to find the moments worth looking at and talking about. The data isn't the point - the conversation it makes possible is.

Sort your audio first Before anything else. A wide pitch shot tells you about body language and positioning. It tells you almost nothing about what the coach actually said or how they said it. A chest harness with your phone captures your audio and your point of view. A second camera at the side of the pitch gives you the wider context. Both together is the ideal setup and neither costs much. Mark's advice - buy a microphone and a tripod long before you think about GPS units.

The infrastructure point For the next generation of coaches, filming themselves and reflecting on what they see won't feel like a new idea - it'll just be what coaches do. Like having a session plan or using a whiteboard. The question is whether you wait for that to become normal or get ahead of it now. As Andy puts it, the return on improving yourself as a coach will outstrip almost anything else you can spend your money on.

Find Out More

Coach Logic: https://www.coach-logic.com

Get in Touch

Tom's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomhartleycoaching/

Andy’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/muirandrew/

Mark’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maccairns/