Ask anyone who follows the National Hockey League (NHL) who the league’s top coach is and nine times out of 10 the reply is, “Mike Babcock, of course.” In only six years in the NHL, the Detroit Red Wing head coach has compiled an impressive win-loss record, has set a new NHL record for road victories, and has led the Red Wings to back-to-back 50-plus wins in a season, only the fifth NHL coach to do so.

Less known is the philosophy that guides Babcock’s coaching. It’s an approach that Canada’s coaches — at all levels and in all sports — would do well to emulate.

Of course, it goes without saying that coaches who reach Babcock’s level are masters of their game. However, effective coaching is more than technique and tactics; ethical principles are critical. Knowing that, the Coaching Association of Canada (CAC) has developed an online Ethics section on their website in order to generate discussion about ethical issues in coaching.

A Coach’s Ethical Principles

• Integrity in Relation to Others
• Respect for Athletes
• Coaching Responsibly
• Honouring Sports

Babcock endorses the initiative, explaining that CAC’s four ethical principles should form the foundation of coaches at every level. “Integrity comes first and foremost in building trust, and trust is the foundation of ethical behaviour,” he says. “If you don’t have integrity, your coaching career will be very short. People very quickly see you for what you are by how you handle yourself each and every day. If you have integrity and character, for sure you practice the other ethical principles.”

Babcock agreed to take CAC’s Quiz, “An Ethical Checklist for Coaches”, which is designed to help coaches identify their ethical strengths and weaknesses. Babcock did well on the Quiz, scoring 95 out of 100. That should come as no surprise, he says, because any coach with integrity will score high. He lost a few points in just three areas, noting that with NHL players, he doesn’t “share issues, context, or rationale for decisions, doesn’t ask about his players’ ethical development, and doesn’t attempt to instill commitments to dignity and responsibility.” He explains that when he coached college and university players, ethics was definitely a discussion point because at that level, the goal is to develop great people as well as skilled players.

As for the rest of the Quiz, “it was easy for me to give myself a 5 on all of them, without hesitation,” he says. “We may not spend time discussing ethics, but I believe in modelling ethical behaviour and all of my core group of leaders — our captain Nicklas Lidstron, assistant captains Pavel Datysuk, Henrik Zetterberg, and Kris Draper, assistant coaches Paul Maclean and Todd McLellen, goalie coach Jim Bedard, and video coach Jay Woodcroft — are the same, or else they wouldn’t have these roles.”

Insisting that he isn’t unique, Babcock says that before making it to the NHL six years ago, he surveyed each general manager to discover the five most important characteristics of a head coach. Once in the league, he repeated the survey and added the coaches. “Integrity and character were number one, almost across the board,” he says. Also highly ranked was communication which he describes as “a message sent and received. A lot of us coaches get caught up in being big talkers and not very big listeners. I’ve been accused of not listening and I try to work on that all the time. One of my coaches suggested that sometimes I should zip it up and just listen. I’m working on it.”

According to Babcock, the Detroit Red Wing organization, as developed by general manager Ken Holland, is committed to doing the right thing every day. “I’ve spent my life building the reputation I have today and people know I’m going to do the right thing. And I expect the same from the people around me. My point is that it is very easy to work for someone who has integrity like Ken Holland does.”

Babcock applies the same standard of behaviour to volunteer coaches. “Calling yourself a coach — and I take great pride in being able to do that — means being prepared and being organized,” he says. “Your number one responsibility to those children is to grow their love of the game and you do that by treating them properly, creating a demanding, supportive atmosphere that allows for individual growth.” And that, he stresses, applies to every level of coaching. “Anyone who says ‘I’m just a volunteer coach’ should not be coaching. Just because you’re a volunteer doesn’t give you the right to be unorganized and unprepared and unprofessional.”

An advocate of lifelong learning, Babcock urges coaches to strive to get better every day. “In our business, if a coach isn’t active in self-development, someone else will get his job,” he says. “Scotty Bowman, in my opinion the greatest coach of all time, did that better than anyone else. He’s our consultant and I talk to him about this all the time.” Babcock also learns from reading, the Internet, surrounding himself with intelligent people, and by constant questioning. “Whoever does something better than me, I’m taking their idea and moving ahead with it. I’m interested in anybody, anything that can help us get better and I think that’s the norm across my profession. All of the best I’ve ever met have the same passion for self-improvement.”

Babcock doesn’t buy the old adage that sport builds character. “It’s the people within sport who build character and to do that, you have to have character yourself. The best teachers and the best coaches I had were uncompromising and full of integrity and I believe this is true of every coach in the National Hockey League. And I believe all of them would score high if they took the Quiz. These days, a coach can’t survive in the league without integrity; it’s impossible.”

Sheila Robertson is an Ottawa-based communications consultant and writer who specializes in issues affecting coaches.