The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Soft Science of Tennis.

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Judgers (J) versus Perceivers (P)

Judger Students

• Prefer planned, orderly structured lessons.
• Often postpone competing because they’re not 100% ready.
• Are frequently afraid to make the wrong decision, so they freeze up in competition.
• Need closure with a task before moving onto the next drill.
• Enjoy making detailed lists to ensure productivity.
• Have a strong need to control most aspects of situations.
• Change is uncomfortable and is typically shunned.
• Multitasking is avoided, as they prefer to focus on one component at a time.
• Rules and laws apply to them and everyone else in the academy.
• Often closed-minded to new information until its proven correct.
• Often more-fixed-mind-set versus growth-mind-set.
• Self-regulated and enjoy working their customized developmental plan.

Perceiver Students

• In competition, perceivers are mentally found in the future, not the present.

• Often struggle with closing out leads in matches.
• Day-dream and often struggle with remaining on task.
• Are flexible and spontaneous.
• Easily adapt to the ever-changing match situations.
• Open to discussing and applying new, unproven concepts.
• Often more growth-mind-set versus fixed-mindset.
• Appear relaxed and loose under stress.
• Perform in cycles of energy.
• Typically need goal dates and deadlines to work hard.
• In matches, focus on outcome scenarios versus performance play.
• Often postpone training until the last minute.

“Athletes who make the most significant gains are independent thinkers who are self-aware of their inborn characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses. Understanding your player’s personality profile will enrich your relationships and assist you in helping your students develop excellent technique, athleticism, strategies and handling stress under pressure.”

Take a few moments, sit back and digest the above information. I’m sure you will smile as you systematically place specific students, co-workers, friends and family members into their genetic predispositions.

In chapters 8- 11, four customized challenges and their solutions are provided for each of the s

The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Soft Science of Tennis.

Click Here to Order through Amazon

Thinkers (T) versus Feelers (F)

Thinker Students

• Impersonalize tennis matches in a business fashion.
• Continually analyze the pros and cons of each situation.
• Thrive in private lessons versus group activities.
• In discussions, they are frank and often void of tactfulness.
• Aware of coaching inconsistencies.
• In competition, they are less influenced by emotions than other brain designs.
• Prefer logical explanations versus hunches.
• Relate to technical skills training over mental or emotional skills training.
• Less concerned about personal interaction and group harmony.
• Prefer work before play even in practice.
• Value fairness and good sportsmanship.
• Often seen as uncaring or indifferent to others.

Feeler Students

• Enjoy group sessions with their peers.
• Often put others needs ahead of their needs.
• Strong need for optimism and harmony on-court.
• Struggle with match play cheating and gamesmanship.
• Usually outcome-oriented versus process-oriented.
• Perform with their heart versus their head.
• Often miss the details and facts in problem-solving.
• Sometimes too empathetic to struggling opponents.
• Need frequent process reminders to regain focus.

“A gender stereotype myth is that females are feelers and males are thinkers. While the exact percentages vary widely from study to study, it’s clear that brain function doesn’t necessarily correlate with gender. Nature versus nurture falls into play.

Though societal bias may nurture females to be more nurturing and caring and males to be more tough problem-solvers, females can be genetically wired to be thinkers just as males can be wired to be feelers.”

The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Soft Science of Tennis.

Click Here to Order through Amazon

ENFP: Extrovert Intuitive Feeler Perceiver

Challenge: ENFP’s are creative, outside-the-box thinkers. For them, stepping outside of their comfort zone is easy. Instead of rigidly adhering to mundane rules and regulations, ENFP’s simply work around them.

Solution: Avoid micromanaging this type. A trick to coaching the ENFP is to keep drills fresh. Rallying to 100 is not only non-practical but will bore them to tears. Instead, customize 2-3 ball patterns based on the athlete’s offense, neutral and defensive situations. Challenge them to stay focused until they complete the exercise 10 times. Add negative scoring (deduct one from their score for each error) to improve their focus ability and their emotional component along with their hardware.

Challenge: The downfall of being extroverted is that ENFP’s are often in high demand. They repeatedly have trouble saying no when friends, family, acquaintances or even strangers ask for their help. Their empathetic nature is their blessing and their curse. This occasionally overwhelms the EF type, and they need to shut down and IT (Introvert/Think) for a bit.

Solution: Coaches should be on the lookout for signs of extrovert burnout. Symptoms include a noticeable shift in character. Such as when their natural optimism is turning pessimistic or when this popular, friendly type begins to act less approachable, sharp-tongued, and uncaring. At this time, motivate them to take some time off to recharge their batteries.

Challenge: ENFP’s are social and energetic tennis players. Their EF traits make them infectious partners and tennis teammates. They are natural investigators and explorers who get quickly bored with routine. Multitasking, communication, and people skills are their strong suit, but their problem solving and focus skills on-court may need your attention.

Solution: ENFP’s are future-minded, big-picture athletes. On-court they can struggle with keeping their mind focused “In the game.” Disinterested with the past and even the present, these types have to be reminded to stay focused on this stroke, this tactical play, and only this point. Coaches would be wise to develop their match closure skills.

Challenge: ENFP’s prefer to rely on their intuition and flow subconsciously through competition. Coaches can spot the moment when these NFP types stop playing in the moment and begin to think about the outcome. Examples include: “Man, I’m up 4-1 versus the top seed. I can win this…then boom!” They just traded in their intuitive, performance state of mind for a sensate overwhelming outcome mindset. Or “I’m down 2-5, I’m gonna lose anyway so I might as well relax and go for my shots…Boom!” They win three straight games to 5-5 only to flip the switch back to over-thinking about the outcome and drop the set 5-7.

Solution: Designing their strategic script of customized top patterns and ingrain them through pattern repetition, dress rehearsal, and practice match play. Teaching an ENFP to close out points, games, sets, and matches while staying on script is the key to developing their competitive focus.