Joe Ehrmann (@JoeEhrmann76), a PCA National Advisory Board Member and winner of PCA's Ronald L. Jensen Award for Lifetime Achievement, is a former NFL Pro Bowl defensive lineman, founder of Coach For America and author of InSide Out Coaching. Ehrmann gained additional prominence when Parade Magazine dubbed him “the most important coach in America” for his unorthodox, but highly effective, coaching at Gilman School in the Baltimore area. Ehrmann was also the subject of Season of Life by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jeffrey Marx.

Through Coach for America and his work on PCA’s National Advisory Board, Ehrmann advocates for coaches to develop their own personal coaching philosophy to help guide their actions. In this video, he shares his own personal purpose as a high school football coach and explains how that influences his everyday interactions with players and parents, as well as on-field decisions.

He coaches to help boys become men of empathy and integrity who will be responsible and change the world for good. This dictates all of his decisions, and he urges parents and players to hold him accountable to this purpose. As a youth coach, it’s important you know why you’re coaching and to let this guide your decision-making process.