Anonymous
04/27/2026 06:35
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Nepotism and favoritism were rampant at our former pool. The resultant coaching was so bad that the pool lost several familles with young, solid swimmers. To top it all off, the parents whose kids were the coaches badmouthed those families after they left. We weren’t one of those families, but decided we didn’t want to spend another summer at that pool.
Life is too short to pretend you like people.
Life is too short to pretend you like people.
Anonymous
04/24/2026 19:13
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Anonymous wrote:It's competitive at our team. But we have had the same summer coach for a decade so they know almost all the kids coming up who apply. The coach makes the decisions. It's his employees and his team.
Sounds similar in terms of coach longevity for us.
Our head coach has been with us for about five years and has kids on the team. They're also a PVS coach, so they have the creds to back it up. While our hiring process for the assistants isn't competitive (i.e., there hasn't been an interviewing process as long as I've been around because we don't have enough candidates), our assistants are phenomenal and all have been involved on a number of levels over the years. The Team Reps runs the names of all interested kids by the Head Coach (who knows all of them very well), and the Coach will decide if they want those kids on their staff. Once those decisions are made the only involvement the Reps have after that is to get the contracts written and signed - the Head Coach handles the rest.
I always find it incredible to read about teams that have a competitive hiring process or committees to handle all manner of team-related tasks and activities. Us lower-division teams barely have enough parents to fill our volunteer jobs a meet, let alone get them to be involved in non meet-related jobs!
Anonymous
04/24/2026 15:30
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
The team reps know what those boxes are that need to be checked for their kid to be considered for a coach, and they make sure those boxes get checked. So it may not be nepotism per se, it just looks sorta like it.
Anonymous
04/23/2026 19:09
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Anonymous wrote:You sound like you go to our pool! I don’t think kids should be laid to give feedback to their peers. At some point you could just have team captains like HS swim and not pay anyone under 21 that was ever part of the team!
At our pool, they are cheap and like the nepo coaches even if they are terrible. Like on their phone, filming and laughing at swimmers. Sitting on each other’s laps, throwing basketballs and tennis balls over the heads of swimmers, flirting with each other, walking AWAY from the pool as serious injuries occur, kicking swimmers, etc. Our team continues to PAY assistant and junior coaches to be this inappropriate and dangerous!
My oldest only has a couple of years left, but will prioritize their club team this year. My youngest asked to quit because it was so bad.
That sounds like a coach problem. They should be leading and coach development should be a part of their contract. There's no way ours would let our assistant or junior coaches get away with that - even if they weren't being paid.
Anonymous
04/23/2026 18:40
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
You sound like you go to our pool! I don’t think kids should be laid to give feedback to their peers. At some point you could just have team captains like HS swim and not pay anyone under 21 that was ever part of the team!
At our pool, they are cheap and like the nepo coaches even if they are terrible. Like on their phone, filming and laughing at swimmers. Sitting on each other’s laps, throwing basketballs and tennis balls over the heads of swimmers, flirting with each other, walking AWAY from the pool as serious injuries occur, kicking swimmers, etc. Our team continues to PAY assistant and junior coaches to be this inappropriate and dangerous!
My oldest only has a couple of years left, but will prioritize their club team this year. My youngest asked to quit because it was so bad.
At our pool, they are cheap and like the nepo coaches even if they are terrible. Like on their phone, filming and laughing at swimmers. Sitting on each other’s laps, throwing basketballs and tennis balls over the heads of swimmers, flirting with each other, walking AWAY from the pool as serious injuries occur, kicking swimmers, etc. Our team continues to PAY assistant and junior coaches to be this inappropriate and dangerous!
My oldest only has a couple of years left, but will prioritize their club team this year. My youngest asked to quit because it was so bad.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 22:08
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
I have seen both cases are true.
Rabid swim families are likely to have parents that volunteer and kids that are bought in and interested in being coaches. A kid whose parent is the team rep might be more likely to want to coach.
On the flip side, I’ve seen team reps force feed their kids into roles to build their resume. These kids often are not bought in and don’t do a good job. Many of these kids are not tough enough to be lifeguards day to day, so their parent gives them a “job” and they show up to work when they please and don’t give their all.
Rabid swim families are likely to have parents that volunteer and kids that are bought in and interested in being coaches. A kid whose parent is the team rep might be more likely to want to coach.
On the flip side, I’ve seen team reps force feed their kids into roles to build their resume. These kids often are not bought in and don’t do a good job. Many of these kids are not tough enough to be lifeguards day to day, so their parent gives them a “job” and they show up to work when they please and don’t give their all.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 21:37
Subject: Re:Summer team coach hiring process
Honestly if it bothers you that much, you should probably volunteer or be on the committee. Those roles take a lot of time all year and the people in them naturally build relationships with the coaches. The coaches are interacting with those parents constantly, so they know those kids better and feel more comfortable hiring them. So yeah, those kids often have an edge. Help out and maybe Larla will be a coach next year.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 19:59
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Anonymous wrote:The best hiring process I have heard of is at a pool where they make a hiring committee out of the following roles:
Team reps
Head referee
Pool board treasurer
Data Coordinator
The reason that I like this structure is that it doesn’t put all the power into just the team reps (which is especially problematic if they are married, which at some pools they are and many others they aren’t). It also doesn’t allow the team reps to hand select a “committee” who will vote however they want. It allows 5 individuals who all commit a lot of volunteer hours to work together to make decisions.
In my opinion these hiring decisions should apply for hiring and re-hiring the head and assistant coaches as well as the junior coaches.
The process should also be transparent.
That said, children of the people who volunteer the most should absolutely be allowed to be hired if they are qualified!
Also as an aside, while being able to swim fast shouldn’t be a criteria for hiring, I do think understanding how to technically improve people’s swimming should be. We aren’t actually hiring babysitters but swim coaches.
I’ve seen many junior coaches who have no clue how to coach swimming actually make swimming harder for the kids they are “coaching”.
We have this too, but the confirmation hearings for the committee nominees have gotten ugly at times.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 17:13
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Anonymous wrote:The truth is that the people who run the swim team's kids get those jobs. If there are additional positions available after the nepo hires, your kid has a decent shot if s/he volunteered for free the previous season.
Do you swim on our team? 😂 This is exactly how it works on our team. 12 years on the team and the teen coaches are almost always the reps’ kids & their friends. Sometimes it works out amazingly well - we’ve truly had some standout teen coaches over the years. But sometimes we get coaches who don’t really show up for the team and they laugh when adults ask them to help because they know there will be no consequences. Our assistant coach was hired because their mom is the team rep, not because they are a good/experienced coach. My teen has no plans to even apply this summer because she knows she won’t have a chance even though she’s a year round club swimmer - too many nepo hires ahead of her.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 14:38
Subject: Re:Summer team coach hiring process
At our pool, any teen who is old enough to coach and applies will get some hours. Where we have trouble is when parents who are never at the pool outside of meets complain that their teen is not getting the same number of hours as another teen. Often parents assume that because their child is fast or has been a member of the pool for longer than another teen that they are "owed" more hours. Some of our best coaches are actually "slower" swimmers who still know good technique, are reliable, deeply involved, and good with younger team members.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 11:20
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
Anonymous wrote:The best hiring process I have heard of is at a pool where they make a hiring committee out of the following roles:
Team reps
Head referee
Pool board treasurer
Data Coordinator
The reason that I like this structure is that it doesn’t put all the power into just the team reps (which is especially problematic if they are married, which at some pools they are and many others they aren’t). It also doesn’t allow the team reps to hand select a “committee” who will vote however they want. It allows 5 individuals who all commit a lot of volunteer hours to work together to make decisions.
In my opinion these hiring decisions should apply for hiring and re-hiring the head and assistant coaches as well as the junior coaches.
The process should also be transparent.
That said, children of the people who volunteer the most should absolutely be allowed to be hired if they are qualified!
Also as an aside, while being able to swim fast shouldn’t be a criteria for hiring, I do think understanding how to technically improve people’s swimming should be. We aren’t actually hiring babysitters but swim coaches.
I’ve seen many junior coaches who have no clue how to coach swimming actually make swimming harder for the kids they are “coaching”.
Excellent points and ideas! I love the hiring committee, and preventing a “hand selected committee” who will vote however the team rep/president want.
Anonymous
04/22/2026 08:52
Subject: Summer team coach hiring process
The best hiring process I have heard of is at a pool where they make a hiring committee out of the following roles:
Team reps
Head referee
Pool board treasurer
Data Coordinator
The reason that I like this structure is that it doesn’t put all the power into just the team reps (which is especially problematic if they are married, which at some pools they are and many others they aren’t). It also doesn’t allow the team reps to hand select a “committee” who will vote however they want. It allows 5 individuals who all commit a lot of volunteer hours to work together to make decisions.
In my opinion these hiring decisions should apply for hiring and re-hiring the head and assistant coaches as well as the junior coaches.
The process should also be transparent.
That said, children of the people who volunteer the most should absolutely be allowed to be hired if they are qualified!
Also as an aside, while being able to swim fast shouldn’t be a criteria for hiring, I do think understanding how to technically improve people’s swimming should be. We aren’t actually hiring babysitters but swim coaches.
I’ve seen many junior coaches who have no clue how to coach swimming actually make swimming harder for the kids they are “coaching”.
Team reps
Head referee
Pool board treasurer
Data Coordinator
The reason that I like this structure is that it doesn’t put all the power into just the team reps (which is especially problematic if they are married, which at some pools they are and many others they aren’t). It also doesn’t allow the team reps to hand select a “committee” who will vote however they want. It allows 5 individuals who all commit a lot of volunteer hours to work together to make decisions.
In my opinion these hiring decisions should apply for hiring and re-hiring the head and assistant coaches as well as the junior coaches.
The process should also be transparent.
That said, children of the people who volunteer the most should absolutely be allowed to be hired if they are qualified!
Also as an aside, while being able to swim fast shouldn’t be a criteria for hiring, I do think understanding how to technically improve people’s swimming should be. We aren’t actually hiring babysitters but swim coaches.
I’ve seen many junior coaches who have no clue how to coach swimming actually make swimming harder for the kids they are “coaching”.