Navigating Drama and Leadership as a Volunteer Dad Coach
[00:00:00] Dan O’Keeffe: Welcome to Episode 2 of Old Dogs, New Tricks. Today, we’re going to talk with Rob Pasquinucci, a public relations and media professional for a couple of decades now. I’ve known Rob for a good chunk of that time. He’s also one who became a father a little bit later in life, not quite as late as I did.
[00:00:21] Dan O’Keeffe: But what I’m most interested in about Rob is like many parents, young and old, he became a volunteer dad coach, to his two young children, but then was asked about four or five years ago, I believe to take on a leadership volunteer leadership role with one of those schools and other parent coaches and which comes with a lot of drama and here’s Rob Pasquinucci to tell us more about his experience in that regard.
[00:00:51] Dan O’Keeffe: Rob, thanks for joining buddy.
[00:00:52] Rob Pasquinucci: Thanks for having me. It’s great to be here.
[00:00:55] Dan O’Keeffe: So, Rob, what I was just telling everyone was how we [00:01:00] know each other through the PR circles, public relations circles, right? I have my own agency, you’ve worked for several. We both are in Cincinnati, Ohio. And so you have 2 young children older than mine, right?
[00:01:14] Dan O’Keeffe: Mine is coming up on 2 and a half years now. And you, as many parents do, you became a volunteer parent coach for both of them. But then one thing I’d never heard any other parent tell me was that you were asked at some point by their school to take on a leadership role in managing other volunteer parent coaches like yourself.
[00:01:39] Dan O’Keeffe: Is that correct?
[00:01:39] Rob Pasquinucci: Yes, that’s correct. When my oldest son started in elementary school, we asked him about sports and he said, I want to do track cause that was one of the ones offered. So when we asked, the school said, yeah, great. But we need someone to coordinate the program.
[00:01:53] Rob Pasquinucci: And this was in the midst of the pandemic, which added another lever layer of complexity. Right. But you know, [00:02:00] I sat down with the director of the sports boosters and he said, listen, we just, I mean, the guy who did it left, he’ll give you the info, but it’s yours.
[00:02:07] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:02:08] Rob Pasquinucci: Baptism by fire as the cliche goes. But yes, I mean, you know that started this kind of movement from okay I’d be happy to coach so I’m going to coordinate now and luckily for me, there were several parents who had coached previously who showed up who just kind of joined said, hey, I’ve done this before, let’s all get on a zoom call and they’ve been wonderful and been extremely supportive ever since and they’ve recruited other parents which has helped sustain the program.
[00:02:36] Rob Pasquinucci: They’re all runners themselves, they do marathons. So they’ve been you know, I really lucked out there. So that was the start and now here I guess four or five years later, I’m now looking at, I’ve been asked and I just started being the president of the sports boosters because people age out, you know, kids are in elementary school only, you know, six years, seven years.
[00:02:56] Rob Pasquinucci: If you have multiple kids, you can extend that out, but at some point, they all go off to middle [00:03:00] school, high school, and beyond. So, that’s where I’m at now and you know, it’s a different layer of leadership that I need to do and management of volunteers, volunteer coaches, and really pretty decent budget of money because people pay to participate in these sports and we have to you know, manage that and make sure we’re being good stewards of that money and supporting the kids ultimately, you know, in their goals.
[00:03:22] Dan O’Keeffe: Cool, well, I want to hear more about that and I’d love to get into maybe a couple of stories that you don’t mind sharing. But before we do that, let’s step back and tell us about briefly about yourself, your career, and your family and of course, I’d love to hear about the your two kids, their ages, their, you know, so on and so forth.
[00:03:41] Rob Pasquinucci: Great. So yeah, I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, and have moved my way south and now I’m at Cincinnati with you of course. And you know, have always been a big fan of sports, you know, Cleveland, it’s sometimes a sad story, but fortunately, in 2016, LeBron James changed that history. So, you know, I’ve always been kind of involved with even down here doing some youth [00:04:00] sports coaching before I had kids.
[00:04:01] Rob Pasquinucci: Now fast forward. I’m married. My wife who works at P and G and I have two sons ages six and 10. And they’re at right now, Kilburn Elementary, which is on the east side of Cincinnati. And they’re, you know, it’s especially my older son took a big interest in sports. It started with track and then that led to basketball and now very heavily into baseball.
[00:04:22] Rob Pasquinucci: So that’s again, a whole nother area thing. Nobody’s asked me to do anything with baseball. They know I can’t hit a right baseball to save my life. But those have been, it’s become a different aspect of family life and one that has its challenges, to be honest, but also has its rewards.
[00:04:35] Rob Pasquinucci: So, you know, there’s different sporting events we’re going to on any given weekend throughout the school year, and even with baseball extends into the summer. Summer months quite a bit. And there’s something that I didn’t know that’s called fall ball, which is a baseball that happens during the fall months.
[00:04:50] Rob Pasquinucci: It’s a more casual kind of league but it’s a chance for them to keep their skills up. So it’s been an interesting journey and an enjoyable one but certainly you learn a lot as part of it, [00:05:00] which is great.
[00:05:01] Dan O’Keeffe: And, you know, you mentioned baseball, so we fostered, my wife and I fostered our 2 young cousins on her side of the family for about 3 years.
[00:05:08] Dan O’Keeffe: This goes back a few years, but boy, they were playing baseball, basketball, a little bit of football but the baseball, man, that keeps you occupied almost every weekend. Fair to say and during the week.
[00:05:19] Rob Pasquinucci: Oh, yeah. But my son just got picked up by a higher-level team sort of a higher bracket.
[00:05:28] Rob Pasquinucci: So it’s you know, he’s going to be doing more baseball next spring.
[00:05:32] Dan O’Keeffe: Got it. Well, so tell us to dive back into that journey from volunteer parent coach to this leadership role with your boosters organization.
[00:05:42] Dan O’Keeffe: Tell us a little bit more exactly what that is and how that came to be and then what’s it? You know, what are the, I guess, the pros and the cons of being thrust into that kind of leadership role? Which you’re not getting paid for, right?
[00:05:57] Rob Pasquinucci: No, not at all. Right.
[00:05:58] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:05:58] Rob Pasquinucci: And you know, one of the [00:06:00] things that, you know, I was involved with a local neighborhood council here, which is a big thing in Cincinnati, each neighborhood kind of has its neighborhood council to support the neighborhood.
[00:06:08] Rob Pasquinucci: So I was kind of thrust into a president role there, which kept me saying, hey, this track thing is about all I can do. You know, but somebody who was rolling off the Kilgore board sports boosters board said, Hey you know, I’m leaving, we really need someone.
[00:06:22] Rob Pasquinucci: If we can spread this out for another year and get another guy to step in for a year could you do it then when you’re done being present your term is limited off and the timing worked out great for that, but yeah, we really need someone. It’s a young board You’ve been on this board now for four years, which is you know an elementary school time, a long time.
[00:06:39] Rob Pasquinucci: So that’s kind of how I got volun. I think the phrase is voluntold.
[00:06:43] Dan O’Keeffe: Yep.
[00:06:44] Rob Pasquinucci: It’s a matter of, you know, there’s times you say, hey, this is a good opportunity. The organization needs me, I can give back a little bit and support the community. So I’m happy to do that. But it does come with challenges in terms of time, like tonight I have a board meeting.
[00:06:59] Rob Pasquinucci: [00:07:00] So there’s going to be a couple of hours I’m out of the house and when we get into different seasons you know, certainly I’m still involved with track. So that’s going to be a heavier lift. Anytime you’re leading an organization, there’s the, Hey, what about this? And you also want to leave your mark.
[00:07:14] Rob Pasquinucci: So there’s some initiatives we’re doing that I’m trying to spearhead. So those are involved, you know, phone calls and gathering information and sharing that with the group and dealing with volunteers who sometimes get burned out and can’t do what you may have wanted him to do or need a different role or need to roll off.
[00:07:31] Rob Pasquinucci: So that’s always the challenge in these kinds of leadership positions, but it is rewarding. I know it’s great to have such a strong program at an elementary school level. I’m proud to say we have, I think, 75% of those kids in that school doing at least 1 sport, which is great.
[00:07:48] Rob Pasquinucci: And we also are able to support kids that for whatever financial reason cannot participate. We can give them a full scholarship for whatever sports they want to play. So money won’t be an issue for a kid that wants to do at school. [00:08:00]
[00:08:00] Rob Pasquinucci: So, those are things I think that are good and I think are positives for what we’re doing. And we figure, you know, again, it’s a public school. Anyone can go there, we do events that we were able to, before I got on there put a new AstroTurf a brand name, but an artificial turf field so that soccer can be played in the fall. We did the playground areas at the school with some of the finances that we raised over the years both from the parent fees for the sports and then we do a couple of fundraisers throughout the year, right?
[00:08:29] Dan O’Keeffe: Right. And for those who aren’t familiar with Kilgore that is a very well-regarded public school and this is a public schools district, right?
[00:08:37] Dan O’Keeffe: So, gotcha. And Well, tell us about the cons, right? So again, I’m assuming there’s probably a little bit of drama there correct me if I’m wrong, but again, man, I’ve been a sports dad to our foster, you know, sons who ironically are living with us again now that they’re in their teens.
[00:08:56] Dan O’Keeffe: So I know what you know to some degree what that’s like, but I was [00:09:00] never a dad coach and certainly never at your level, right? Where I’m managing other volunteer parent coaches. So, I have to imagine that there’s some grief that goes with that.
[00:09:08] Rob Pasquinucci: You know part of it is to just the time commitment and time away from your family if you’re going to board meetings and doing other activities, but that comes with the territory.
[00:09:15] Rob Pasquinucci: I think when you talk about drama, there’s things, you know, there’s events. I know we had a sporting event last winter where a couple, our athlete, another athlete got into it in a not positive way. So we had to step in and deal with that. Fortunately, in this particular sports case, the league is very good at helping us navigate that.
[00:09:33] Rob Pasquinucci: But we had to navigate it and take appropriate action. And we’ve had certainly parents, both parents, spectators that get a little too excited and then parents that are, you know, either coaching other kids directly or just even in the stands that get a little bit too involved and we, you know, sometimes have to reign that in and you don’t want to kill the passion and the interest, but you also need it to be appropriate.
[00:09:56] Rob Pasquinucci: You need to make sure they’re supporting their child and you know what they do at [00:10:00] home is on them. But, you know, we’ve got a coach that we hope is going to encourage, participation, there’s going to be equal playing time, there’s going to be all the good things we want to make sure it’s a positive experience for that child and the parents sometimes can get in the way of that, you know in terms of their interaction with the coach and sometimes you quite frankly, we have some coaches that don’t fully adhere to that.
[00:10:21] Rob Pasquinucci: And that becomes a situation. So we’ve adopted a coach’s code of conduct, which is sort of like a baseline. Like, here’s the things we expect of you. And you know, at times you have to kind of talk to people and enforce that. It’s not something I like to do, especially in a close-knit community, which, you know, Kilgore is a neighborhood school, so a lot of these folks live, you know, maybe around the corner or a couple of blocks over, and you see them at drop off and pick up, so you don’t want to have that situation, but you also want to make sure it’s a positive program.
[00:10:46] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:10:46] Rob Pasquinucci: And we’re trying to get more of a feedback loop. One of the things I’d like to do is get sort of a feedback loop every year. Not necessarily to, you know, chase a coach out or something, but to say, Hey, you know, Rob, you were great, but the kids felt they didn’t really understand this [00:11:00] aspect of the sport.
[00:11:00] Rob Pasquinucci: They didn’t understand why you did this, or they could use more instruction here or something. I think the biggest challenge a lot of these sports have to is just to make sure parents feel like they’re in the loop and know what’s going on, right? Even though a lot of times things are, you know, baseball games get postponed because of rain. Same with soccer if there’s a flooded field, which we have in Cincinnati being on the river. So you have to work with them and sometimes people get a little annoyed and you also have to help make sure kids are not overextending themselves.
[00:11:28] Rob Pasquinucci: We have some high achieving kids and some high achieving parents that think, you know, well, you should do all the sports, and yes, but you can’t, you know, they gotta be kids too, right?
[00:11:37] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:11:38] Rob Pasquinucci: And you got five days a week of practice and then you start to have parents saying, well, why can’t track practice be in the ninth or the opposite of the soccer practice?
[00:11:45] Rob Pasquinucci: Well, we only have when we have facilities available. So we have to.
[00:11:47] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:11:48] Rob Pasquinucci: So those are always things we have to kind of coordinate and have parents understand. But ultimately, it’s about continuing that positive. Make sure they’re positive role models. Make sure they get the coaches to get the instruction they need and that’s something I’d like [00:12:00] to you know continue to push with our group is like is there people that places we could train to do some training?
[00:12:04] Rob Pasquinucci: I know track the organization does track in Cincinnati for elementary schools and has a training half-day training, which is great luckily we’re in a world where YouTube has amazing resources. You could find out as I have very quickly how to train, how to coach shot, but something I didn’t do in high school track when I ran or how to coach you know, all those things.
[00:12:24] Rob Pasquinucci: So those are resources we need to help push out. I think that’s always a challenge but really, that’s a challenge. And the other thing is when you’re the parent and the kid is aware of something going on, whatever drama there might be. So and so’s dad, you know, isn’t coaching this week because of a problem or whatever.
[00:12:41] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:12:41] Rob Pasquinucci: You hear about that and how do you share that and how do you make that a teachable moment? And that’s obviously every parent’s decision, but you know, how much of this do you share? Because, you know, sometimes that gets repeated back at school and may not get repeated accurately. So as a parent, that adds another layer of like.
[00:12:57] Rob Pasquinucci: You know, well I heard this and you have to kind of [00:13:00] dispel rumors and you know, it’s a funny story a couple of years ago. We do a 5k every spring in May and right around the neighborhood. It’s a great little event if you like.
[00:13:08] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah, I think I am.
[00:13:09] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah.
[00:13:09] Dan O’Keeffe: It’s been in it or certainly been there as a spectator.
[00:13:12] Rob Pasquinucci: And you know, we get a beer truck for afterward and a band or a DJ but one year Yeah, not for the kids the beers for the adult.
[00:13:20] Dan O’Keeffe: Love the beer, yeah, that’s what motivates them.
[00:13:22] Rob Pasquinucci: Yes, exactly.
[00:13:23] Rob Pasquinucci: But one year, unfortunately, we had one of the dads I think just got overheated and passed out, needed the paramedics. And, you know, I sort of heard about it because I was running and he came back and I heard, and the kids were, I already died. I heard they had to take him to the hospital. I mean, none of that happened.
[00:13:37] Rob Pasquinucci: He just needed an IV and probably a beer and he was fine, but you know, these things get blown out of proportion and, you know, especially as you get into 4th, 5th, 6th grade, these things start to travel quickly around the building and you have to kind of work to.
[00:13:51] Dan O’Keeffe: Bring this and legends start to build.
[00:13:53] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah. And the other thing you have to deal with is it’s a public school. And, yes, we are blessed and fortunate to have a [00:14:00] lot of parents that have the resources to help support the program and want to do things, but the public schools sort of say, hey, you know, this is.
[00:14:07] Rob Pasquinucci: These are the parameters you have. You can’t, you know, suddenly just build a gym in the middle of, you know, I’m not on school property. You have to look at equitability in a district that sometimes struggles and make sure that, you know, the resources we’re putting into it are appropriate for what we’re trying to do with mission.
[00:14:25] Rob Pasquinucci: You know, in a way that helps further that education and the good sportsmanship types of things we’re trying to teach.
[00:14:31] Dan O’Keeffe: Gotcha. Yeah. Absolutely. And what about personalities? Is there any level of managing personality to that role that you feel now?
[00:14:40] Rob Pasquinucci: Well, there is. And I think it’s important to understand who people are and what’s their motivating factor for doing it, for doing the coaching. And you know, sometimes you have to rein them in and say, listen, this is elementary school. We can’t be doing these things.
[00:14:54] Rob Pasquinucci: I mean, we’ve had. And there’s a culture thing and from leading an organization you can sometimes bring one person into a culture and [00:15:00] it makes it kind of messy a couple of years ago.
[00:15:02] Dan O’Keeffe: All it takes is one.
[00:15:03] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah, exactly. And a couple of years ago, I had a dad who was willing to help out with track and he wanted to lead them in a pre-practice drill.
[00:15:11] Rob Pasquinucci: And he was like a drill sergeant.
[00:15:12] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:15:13] Rob Pasquinucci: And the other moms who’ve been helping us for years were like, this is ridiculous. So, kind of had to reign that in because it’s like, you know, this is track. I mean, you know.
[00:15:22] Dan O’Keeffe: Don’t want to mess with the mama bears. No.
[00:15:23] Rob Pasquinucci: Exactly. And the other thing you have to deal with, sometimes kids kind of get pushed into a sport because, you know, they think they want to do it and then they get into it and they just don’t and parents have different feelings.
[00:15:34] Rob Pasquinucci: Like, do you keep going to practice? Do you not, you know, and that’s a personal parental decision, but then you have to communicate with the coaches. And sometimes the team dynamic gets messed up if you don’t have enough players or whatever. But like, if that person really doesn’t want to participate, then those are conversations you have to have.
[00:15:51] Rob Pasquinucci: And sometimes parents don’t realize that maybe you had a kid that showed up to practice and basically, you know, goofed around the whole time, didn’t participate at all. Refused to listen to [00:16:00] coach. So then when Sunday comes, or Saturday comes and the game happens and he or she is on the bench, a parent gets mad.
[00:16:06] Rob Pasquinucci: Then it comes to bubbles up to me and I have to say, well, what happened here? Well, this person. This individual just, you know, I can’t allow him or her to be in the game because of this thing that happened the other day, you know, kind of making sure you’re a conduit to that communication.
[00:16:18] Rob Pasquinucci: Cause sometimes the kids aren’t going to come home and say it, you know, but luckily we have parents that are involved both as coaches and even just hanging out at practice and they can get a good sense of what’s going on with their child. And you know, hopefully, they can make some corrections as well, but it’s a complex age, especially the very young kids.
[00:16:32] Rob Pasquinucci: I mean, we have kindergartners and there’s some that are just full of energy and jumping around and you can’t control them and there’s some that get sad very easily and you have to give them a hug, and keep them working but those are the challenges you deal with and you hope you get parents that can manage that and help that and work through it because you know, especially younger kids they’re coming to practice and they’ve been cooped up in a school all day so they’re usually you know full of energy and kind of direct that in the right place. It’d be a fun challenge.
[00:16:59] Dan O’Keeffe: What was [00:17:00] you? First off, I think I mentioned you before this story, but when we had the boys, the oldest one who back then he would have been either 9, 10 or 11, let’s say he’s 8, he’s coming up on 18 now, but he was playing football for the school that both boys were in at the time and the coach, you know, I was taking him to and from practices all the time.
[00:17:19] Dan O’Keeffe: So I got to stay and watch them practice several times. And the coach was in law enforcement. I want to say the FBI and right away, I started to realize, oh, this is going to be an interesting season, right?
[00:17:30] Dan O’Keeffe: He would make these. He had this huge, big chain link necklace, I mean huge like the links for that, you know that you would make that one kid every practice I can’t remember whether it was a punishment or was meant to be a reward.
[00:17:44] Dan O’Keeffe: Wear this chain right all through practice if I recall like this is great. These kids are like, you know whatever grade that is right fifth or sixth or seventh, whatever and then found out of course that like his son was a quarterback which you know, I think that’s [00:18:00] something you run into a lot.
[00:18:01] Dan O’Keeffe: And they were not doing well that season, they weren’t horrible, but it was a losing season right and I went to DJ to one of the games where, for whatever reason, the quarterback was out and two of the other starting positions were out the kids who were playing these positions.
[00:18:19] Dan O’Keeffe: And so they filled those positions with kids who either were bench warmers or simply did not get a lot of playing time that season up to that point. And they destroyed the other team, right? And so all the parents is I remember, all the parents kind of rebelled against this coach at that point who I think we’re harboring a little bit of resentment that, you know, their kids weren’t even tried out for quarterback or anything, right?
[00:18:47] Dan O’Keeffe: And now they had the justification to say, okay, this proves our point, right? And I think that coach either left on his own accord or was fired. I’m not sure how that works, right? You would know better than I.
[00:18:59] Dan O’Keeffe: [00:19:00] But, you know, have you ever been involved in that tenuous, that kind of tenuous situation? And are you involved in the hiring and the firing of these parent volunteer parent coaches?
[00:19:11] Rob Pasquinucci: So the way it works with our organization is we have coordinators for each sport. So there’s a soccer, track coordinators, me, basketball, volleyball, baseball, and those individuals then say, all right, well, we’ve got five baseball teams or whatever we need coaches.
[00:19:25] Rob Pasquinucci: And, you know, again, they’re asking parents and getting parents to help out and it works that way. And normally it’s fine, but we’ve had issues where, yeah, there’s a coach that, you know, there’s been a problem and it kind of bubbles up pretty quickly. And you have to have those conversations again.
[00:19:39] Rob Pasquinucci: We’re a volunteer-driven organization. And I, you know, we really don’t like to tell someone, hey, you know, this might not be the best fit for you right now, right? But yeah, I mean those kinds of things happen. We’ve had Coaches get suspended and that’s a problem that each league has different rules too as far as what they do.[00:20:00]
[00:20:00] Rob Pasquinucci: There’s a coach that creates a problem. Again, we’ve been lucky that I mean 90% of the volunteers have been really spectacular and there hasn’t been a problem. You know, but I, again, it’s just having that working together and looking at the overall goals and you trust the coordinators and say, listen, if there’s a problem with someone and that person has to go, you have that conversation. As difficult as it is, we will support you as a board and then move forward.
[00:20:26] Rob Pasquinucci: And whether that’s take a year off or maybe step away for the rest of the season or something like that where we need to do that. I mean, you know, these coaches can play a huge role in the success of a student-athlete and can really change their behavior.
[00:20:39] Rob Pasquinucci: There’s an article. I think I just saw it last week. There was a study done by Ohio State University where young athletes often stop doing it because of some negative experience and we might try to avoid it. Now, you know some kids just aren’t cut out for certain sports and decide to do other things with their lives, that’s great but the study did show the longer you do it the more successful you’ll be and both healthier and [00:21:00] better as a human being because you know, sports especially young age, you’re making friends, you’re having to work with people you don’t know, you’re getting a coach that you don’t get to pick, you know, he shows up and you got to learn how to work with that person.
[00:21:11] Rob Pasquinucci: I think those are great life lessons, whether you know, only 0.1% of these kids are going to ever become any kind of professional athlete.
[00:21:18] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:21:18] Rob Pasquinucci: The nation, but to be able to instill that kind of sportsmanship, which I think it applies to business, it applies to life human, you know, talking to people, confronting people, being able to disagree, you know, or you know, be a rival of a team, but still the other day shake hands afterward.
[00:21:37] Rob Pasquinucci: All those things are really important. And I think especially today, where we have a very you know, fractious society from, you know, if both politically and just you know, collegiality, I think needs to be improved. Sports does that. You have to line up at the end of the game, whether you’ve had the toughest loss or a crazy win, you got to line up and shake that person’s hand and walk outta the gym.
[00:21:57] Dan O’Keeffe: Yep.
[00:21:57] Rob Pasquinucci: And you know, last year I remember there was a [00:22:00] game where my son got fouled hard by a kid. As I jumped out, I was like Dad, you know, the daddy bear mommy bear both my wife and I’m like, what’s that kid? I mean, you know intentional foul close game, right? My son was driving hard and at the end of the game to that kid’s credit, he came up to my son and said, sorry, good game, you know, and that’s great.
[00:22:17] Rob Pasquinucci: I love to see that. That’s a well-coached kid you know and when my kid does that.
[00:22:22] Dan O’Keeffe: Well, even though the kid did what he did. He’s well-coached because he realized it in the moment or immediately after and then rectified the situation on his own court, right?
[00:22:30] Rob Pasquinucci: Yep. Yeah, there has to be consequences for some of these things.
[00:22:33] Rob Pasquinucci: So, you know if a kid does that in our teams, we have to sit him down or her down and say listen this is, I do this. You know, and again, that’s what’s great about sports and I think that’s always got to be part of it. And that’s why you know I’ve been sitting at my kid’s games and seeing other coaches act like jerks and make the kids publicly feel like this big because even if they did something completely wrong and they purposely messed up, you know, the worst case scenario, you can’t scream at them.
[00:22:58] Rob Pasquinucci: It’s the whole praise in [00:23:00] public and discipline in private, I think that’s really important for coaches to take a kid aside and say, listen, you can’t do that. If that happens again, we have to sit you down. I mean, those kinds of things.
[00:23:08] Rob Pasquinucci: And oftentimes the hardest thing is to coach your own kid and especially in a competitive sport, a team sport because you have different parameters as to what’s okay.
[00:23:18] Rob Pasquinucci: You might drive him or her harder than maybe you should because you expect so much more of them than other kids, right? Or maybe you’re soft on them, you know, either one is wrong and it’s tough.
[00:23:28] Rob Pasquinucci: So the times I try to lay off my kid if I’m coaching him. You know, I mean, track is pretty easy. Just run faster. But.
[00:23:35] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:23:36] Rob Pasquinucci: You know, I was sometimes I was basketball.
[00:23:38] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:23:38] Rob Pasquinucci: Run faster. Yeah, exactly. You know, but I think that parents can always, best intentions, but they have to really try to rein themselves in with their kids you know, and understand that, you know, because kids will try, kids will test you, you know, because you’re the dad or the mom and they’re going to test you and you know, you gotta try to bring that in.
[00:23:58] Dan O’Keeffe: Well, that’s [00:24:00] I think I agree with you, that’s very true. And I’ve not been in that position. But I realized that
[00:24:05] Rob Pasquinucci: You may be.
[00:24:05] Dan O’Keeffe: Not quite two and a half. I could find myself in that position soon I will totally be a YouTube coach by the way too. Because I’m not a good athlete, so I’m totally going to be taking all my cues from YouTube.
[00:24:17] Dan O’Keeffe: Don’t know that I would ever volunteer myself or even if requested agree to do what you’re doing though because that’s hardcore.
[00:24:23] Dan O’Keeffe: I totally give you props for that. What advice would you give to other parents who are asked to take on that kind of leadership role for their school for their boosters or sports program?
[00:24:34] Dan O’Keeffe: You know and you kind of gave some there but just from an overall perspective what advice or tips would you give?
[00:24:40] Rob Pasquinucci: I think you got to stay, true to whatever the organization’s goals our mission is which I would imagine are something along the lines of you know giving every kid an opportunity to play especially younger ages.
[00:24:51] Dan O’Keeffe: Right.
[00:24:51] Rob Pasquinucci: You know, building good sportsmanship, supporting those coaches with what they need to do a good job and teach the kids and, [00:25:00] you know, just creating an overall really positive experience for kids the little time that they might be doing this.
[00:25:05] Rob Pasquinucci: And then the other piece of advice would be, you know, you may have coached with these people and hung out with them in the stands and gone have beers with them after games and all that, but then all of a sudden you’re a different role and you have to kind of put that aside and really, you know, deal with situations as they come up.
[00:25:21] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:25:21] Rob Pasquinucci: And I think it’s also important to get the facts and if there is a situation because emotions run high and parents will contact you and they’ll be upset. If something happened and you’ve got to get both sides of the story, it’d be easy to pick up the phone or an email or a text from a parent and then immediately go running off that coach and say, well, why did what happened with Johnny here?
[00:25:40] Rob Pasquinucci: And there’s always 2 sides of that and make sure you get both sides and try to come up with an equitable response. I mean, this is again, this is low-stakes kind of stuff. Yeah, so you’re not going to win a World Series or the Super Bowl here, but you are going to have a huge role in these kids’ lives.
[00:25:55] Rob Pasquinucci: I mean sometimes bigger than you think and they’ll remember [00:26:00] how they were treated and you hope that 10 20 30 years down the road. They do the same thing I mean, I think I do some of this because I had great coaches as a kid, right? My friend’s dad comes to mind. He was a great guy he coached me basketball was terrible basketball, but he was patient with me.
[00:26:14] Rob Pasquinucci: He worked with me, you know, and celebrated when I finally got a shot off and it scored. In fact, I remember a game where he called the time out and said, we gotta get Rob or Robbie at the time, a chance to score.
[00:26:24] Dan O’Keeffe: You and I are living mirrored lives, my friend.
[00:26:26] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah.
[00:26:26] Dan O’Keeffe: Because that’s exact, that was exactly me at basketball. Oh, horrible. But they, you know
[00:26:30] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah.
[00:26:30] Dan O’Keeffe: Had your best, they gimme a shot.
[00:26:32] Rob Pasquinucci: Yep. So, they set it up so that here’s a play that I get the ball in. As I recall I was going up for a shot and a very large kid kind of fell back on me, like a gigantic kid. So luckily I got on the line and took a couple of false shots.
[00:26:46] Rob Pasquinucci: But, you know, those are the kinds of things that happen. And, you know, but that I think instilled in me Hey, this is a great thing to do to help out, you know, help kids out and, you know, and I’m an example, you don’t have to be a tremendous, stellar athlete to do this. [00:27:00] But you do have to have good organization skills.
[00:27:01] Rob Pasquinucci: So I’d say even if you’re a leader or even just a coach more and more communicators. So it’s helpful.
[00:27:06] Dan O’Keeffe: I was gonna say, and you’re a communicator too. That’s no. That cannot be discounted.
[00:27:11] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah. And luckily we have great tools now, in fact, the baseball team, my son was on in the spring, uses an app called Game Changer. and the other Ones like this. We use SP but literally, you could see the game progress live.
[00:27:26] Dan O’Keeffe: That’s cool. Yeah.
[00:27:27] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah. So we, you know, and oftentimes you don’t always hear the strikes and balls count, you know, you don’t keep track of your head. So we’d open up a great game changer, they’ll see it.
[00:27:36] Rob Pasquinucci: And they even have an AI-written story afterward, like a game story, like a journalist would write. So it was always kind of fun for my kid to read. But those are the kinds of tools that you have now. So as a coach or coordinator of a league or whatever, you could push out this information a lot quicker.
[00:27:50] Rob Pasquinucci: I can give credit to the track organization in Cincinnati that finally went away from a phone call system where you call a voicemail to see if the track meet was going to be canceled or [00:28:00] held up because of weather. Now they have a push email group chat thing where they’d say, Hey, we can’t do the long jump because the pits are full of water today or whatever.
[00:28:09] Dan O’Keeffe: Right?
[00:28:09] Rob Pasquinucci: So those are great tools. Then we can communicate that to the parents. And, you know, and again, that’s the communications so important to let people know when games are, when things are going to be, where they’re going to be, because, you know, I’ve, I don’t know how many, you know, Saturdays and Sundays we’re getting in the car.
[00:28:26] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah. Plug in something in a map, a place you’ve never been to, a school, and you know, there was one game this winter and luckily we gave ourselves enough time that it was like, what was supposed to be one gym was at another gym, luckily in the same general area, but like would have been nice to know beforehand and it wasn’t the coaches.
[00:28:42] Dan O’Keeffe: Yep.
[00:28:42] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, I mean, getting your kid started early is a great thing too. So that we do some pony league. We call it basketball and soccer and it gives a chance to just get them out on the court and throw a ball around and shoot hoops or kicking. So those things are good.
[00:28:57] Rob Pasquinucci: I encourage parents to do that. Even if you’re not sports-minded, [00:29:00] you got to give kids exposure to everything and then see where they end up.
[00:29:03] Dan O’Keeffe: Yep. Well, that’s what we’re trying to do with ours. So definitely take your advice. So, you know, Rob I think, again, I think it’s great what you’re doing. You know, you’re an old dog like me.
[00:29:12] Dan O’Keeffe: So, you know, lastly, I guess, are there, do you think it’s better that you’re an old dog in this position or do you wish you were 10 years or so younger?
[00:29:20] Rob Pasquinucci: Well, when I get up early and have to load up the car with a tent and whatever to go to a track meet, sometimes I wish I was younger.
[00:29:26] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah.
[00:29:27] Rob Pasquinucci: But, you know, I guess with age comes wisdom maybe and maybe some more patience.
[00:29:32] Rob Pasquinucci: So, you know, you can give people some more grace and understand, hey, this is, you know, because you’ve done it before, right? And again I coached before I had kids, some basketball teams here locally, just for fun. I just thought it was kind of a fun thing to do. It sort of was a nice competitive outlet for me.
[00:29:49] Rob Pasquinucci: So I think that helped give me some background and some basics to kind of build on, but like, yeah, I mean, having that wisdom and having been around the block a few times helps. I think having some [00:30:00] time at the school and in the neighborhood helps.
[00:30:01] Rob Pasquinucci: And I think having been on two or three or four different boards, my life helps to because the board piece of it is interesting because everybody’s got their passion. You gotta figure out how to use people and have them deploy their talents in the right way, but not to the point that they’re dominating the conversation or whatever. So, you know, those kinds of complexities can be at best interesting, so.
[00:30:24] Dan O’Keeffe: Yeah, I can yep very true. I’ve been on a few myself and
[00:30:27] Rob Pasquinucci: Yeah.
[00:30:27] Dan O’Keeffe: Right, you’re right Well Rob, I think it’s great what you’re doing. I think your kids are going to be better for it. I think all the kids you coach are going to be better for it as well.
[00:30:35] Dan O’Keeffe: So we thank you on in that regard and thank you for being on the old dogs, new tricks podcast helping us get this kickstarted and hopefully we’ll have you on again.
[00:30:45] Dan O’Keeffe: And for now I just say go out there, have fun with yours and their friends, and win some games. All right.
[00:30:51] Rob Pasquinucci: Yep. Go Mustangs. Yep. And if you guys are ever around in the winter and in Kilgore, go to the gym and catch a few basketball games, it can be exciting. [00:31:00]
[00:31:00] Dan O’Keeffe: I will definitely do that. Who knows one day, my kid might be playing against.
[00:31:03] Dan O’Keeffe: Well, not one of yours, but let’s maybe you and Sarah decide.
[00:31:06] Rob Pasquinucci: I’m done with tricks.
[00:31:09] Dan O’Keeffe: Got it. Well, thanks, Rob. We appreciate it. All right. Take care.
[00:31:17] Rob Pasquinucci: Take care.
Welcome to another episode of Old Dogs, New Tricks, where explore the inspiring stories of seasoned professionals who continuously evolve and embrace new challenges. In this episode, we’re thrilled to have Rob Pasquinucci, a public relations and media professional for over two decades, join us. Rob has not only made a significant impact in the world of PR but has also dedicated his time to coaching youth sports and leading parent volunteer coaches.
Rob Pasquinucci’s Background
Rob is a familiar face in public relations circles, having worked for several agencies and made a name for himself in Cincinnati, Ohio. But his journey doesn’t stop there. Rob became a father a bit later in life and took on the role of a volunteer dad coach for his two young children. His commitment and passion led to the school asking him to take on a leadership role, coordinating other parent coaches and managing the sports program.
From Volunteer to Leader
In the podcast, Rob shares how he transitioned from being a supportive parent on the sidelines to taking on a leadership role with the school’s sports boosters. It all started when his oldest son expressed an interest in track. Rob stepped up to coordinate the program during the pandemic, a time filled with complexities. With the help of experienced parents and supportive volunteers, Rob successfully navigated the challenges and has since been entrusted with even greater responsibilities.
Challenges and Rewards of Leadership
Rob delves into the various challenges that come with managing a volunteer-based program. From time commitments and navigating drama to dealing with high-energy kids and passionate parents, every day presents new hurdles. However, the rewards are equally fulfilling. Rob emphasizes the importance of creating a positive environment for the children, ensuring they learn valuable life lessons through sports.
The Importance of Communication
Effective communication is essential in any leadership role, and Rob highlights how it plays a crucial part in his success. Managing volunteers, addressing parents’ concerns, and coordinating schedules are all made easier through clear and consistent communication. Rob also shares how technology and tools like YouTube have become invaluable resources for coaching.
Stories from the Field
Rob’s journey is filled with memorable moments. From organizing a 5K event to dealing with unexpected challenges on the field, his stories are both entertaining and enlightening. He recounts a particularly heartwarming moment when a young athlete apologized to his son after a rough game, emphasizing the importance of sportsmanship.
Conclusion
Rob Pasquinucci’s story is a testament to the power of dedication, leadership, and the impact one can make in their community. His journey from a volunteer dad coach to leading a sports program is both inspiring and educational. Whether you’re a parent, coach, or simply interested in youth sports, this episode offers valuable insights and advice.
Don’t miss this engaging conversation with Rob Pasquinucci. Tune in to hear his stories, challenges, and triumphs, and discover how he’s making a difference in the lives of young athletes. Listen to the full episode now on Old Dogs, New Tricks.
AND MORE TOPICS COVERED IN THE FULL INTERVIEW!!! You can check that out and subscribe at [www.youtube.com/@olddogs.newtricks.6844].
Connect with Dan O’Keeffe: https://okeeffepr.com
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