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In this insight article, we aim to challenge current thinking regarding coaching and spark new ideas by demonstrating how high-performance Paralympic sport contexts provide rich environments for innovation. We propose an innovative approach to enhance coach learning and introduce coaches and practitioners to three interconnected areas of opportunity emerging in research: (a) reframing the role and harnessing the work of skill acquisition specialists, (b) the use of a design thinking approach, and (c) the implementation of technology-enhanced learning. Specifically, we demonstrate how using these three strategies can better facilitate cocreated coach learning in situ. Whilst we acknowledge that each of these areas is not necessarily new, we propose that when addressed and applied collectively by practitioners they can provide effective and efficient coach learning opportunities, where the result of the integration of ideas means the impact can be greater than simply the sum of the parts. We highlight how this approach has emerged out of challenging high-performance Paralympic sport contexts, and could have impact on research, practice, and coach development experiences across a wider range of contexts along the performance pathway in both Paralympic and nondisabled sports.

The objective of this study is to understand the attributes youth coaches and talent scouts perceive as important when identifying skilled youth basketball players. Youth coaches and talent scouts (n = 40) from Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and United States with an average of 14.09 (±9.77) years of experience completed an online questionnaire. The questionnaire asked participants to rank and justify attributes for identifying potentially talented youth basketball players according to their perceived importance. In addition, five youth coaches and talent scouts completed a semistructured interview that elaborated on how they identify these attributes in national-level youth players. Results from the questionnaire indicate a hierarchy of attributes coaches/scouts perceive as important for youth basketball performance, including tactical (i.e., decision-making ability), technical (i.e., layup, shooting in the paint, jump shot, rebounding), and psychological attributes (i.e., composure, concentration, adaptability). In addition, the results from the interviews provided more detailed justification for the importance of these attributes within the talent identification process. It is believed talent scouts apply a holistic multidisciplinary approach to talent identification, with the current findings potentially providing evidence to suggest coaches/scouts consider a wide range of tactical, technical, psychological, and physical attributes when identifying youth players.

The evolution of 4G and 5G digital technologies is (re)shaping contemporary methods of coaching by removing the requirement for coaches to be physically present at practice and competition venues. This technological advance provides opportunities for sports organisations, especially those with limited resources, to implement innovative learning and performance solutions by delivering remote coaching. In this insight paper, we reimagine what “the coaching environment” could look like by considering how the remote context may shape coaching. Currently, there is limited understanding of the use and implementation of such approaches, highlighting a need for further research to be conducted to better understand how online environments may impact the coaching process. We propose how adopting an ecological dynamics approach may align with existing research within coaching science and contemporary theorising in skill acquisition and motor learning, advocating a learner-centred approach to coaching. We then introduce and discuss the work of Roger Barker with a focus on “behaviour settings” and how this perspective may provide a lens for future research to explore different coaching environments. When complemented by ethnographic methodologies, this approach may provide a novel way to understand how coach–athlete interactions are framed in situ.