Coaching of athletes. A probe to using Grid method

This thesis deals with the coaches' leadership styles. The theoretical part is focused on factors which influence cooperation between a coach and an athlete and it also outlines some of the well-known leadership theories. It analyzes the Leadership Grid® theory, because the questionnaire based on this theory is applied in the empirical part. The second empirical part applies both qualitative and quantitative methods. The aim of the study is to show how the particular leadership styles are exhibited in the sport domain and which style is the most frequent among coaches. In addition, various aspects are taken into account: type of sport, gender differences, differences of the leadership styles between successful and unsuccessful coaches and between managers and coaches. It can be concluded that there are statistically significant differences among different kinds of sport and between the leadership styles of managers and coaches. The most frequent style seems to be the 9,9 leadership style. Last but not least it was stressed that the leadership style is not the only factor affecting the leadership of a particular athlete