Jim Hardy, the 2023 Carolinas PGA Section Youth Player Development Award winner, is the U.S. Kids Golf Senior Director for Academy & Coach Development, and the PGA of America Director of Instruction at Longleaf Golf & Family Club in High Point, North Carolina.

Jim Hardy on the importance of knowing your student’s personality motivator:

Knowing your students’ most influential trait will improve your ability to predict what an individual will feel, say, and do most of the time. It also allows us to communicate with them in the way they best understand, which builds trust. Knowing how our students are motivated allows us to avoid de-motivating them. This happens when the instructor or parent is speaking from their motivating trait and the student doesn’t share that same trait. There are four words that summarize the motivations behind behavior: Goals (10 percent of the population), Relationships (20 percent), Security (50 percent), and Certainty (20 percent). These motivators correspond to primary personality traits. All of us are driven to a greater or lesser degree by each of these motivations, but the strongest of them will determine on a daily basis what we strive for (motivators) and what we try to avoid (de-motivators).

Jim Hardy on the business impact of knowing your student’s personality motivator:

As parents and coaches, we all want the best for and from our students but, sometimes we can unknowingly de-motivate them by speaking to them in the wrong language or in other words, trying to appeal to a motivator that they do not relate to. For example:

Detailed information may NOT appeal to the Goals driven student.

Practicing alone or taking a private lesson may NOT appeal to the Relationship driven student.

Learning a new method may NOT appeal to the Security driven student.

Competing may NOT appeal to the Certainty driven student.

The simplest thing to get the most from our students is to further engage and connect with them by speaking their language based on their motivator. In the U.S. Kids Level 2 Coach Certification, we go into great detail about this topic because we feel like this is the final frontier in golf instruction and getting the most out of the coach/student relationship. Instructors and parents should learn how to challenge the Goals driven, make friends with the Relationship driven, allow time for the Security driven to get comfortable, and give all the information to the Certainty driven. Here at our academy, our students flourish and our retention is fantastic not just because they have a great position at impact time after time but because of how it was taught. That’s your gamechanger.

If you would like to email the author of this Weekly Insight directly, please email jhardy@uskidsgolf.com.