In a six-month span, I lost two close friends to suicide. Both were aspiring young professionals with gentle souls, a deep passion for the game, and simply wonderful human beings. It was a difficult time for me, to say the least. With these friends in mind, I reached out to my friend Dr. Laura Upenieks of Baylor University. A sociologist and elite player, we pursued a collaborative effort to study the stress faced by professionals in the golf industry, including their mental health challenges.

Soon after our initial conversation, we agreed to study the mental health of college coaches. College coaches were of particular interest for a host of reasons. First and foremost, few understand the scope and intensity of the job. A pair of golf coaches (head coach and one assistant coach) coaching at the NCAA Division 1 level essentially perform the same amount of work as an entire football or basketball coaching staff. This includes countless hours of recruiting, fundraising, and navigating through endless paperwork. Recently, the worlds of collegiate coaches were transformed by not only the COVID-19 pandemic but the emerging role of the transfer portal and Name Image Likeness (NIL) rules.

In total, we had nearly 50 (32 Division 1, 16 Division 2/3) NCAA coaches participate in our study, which set out to better understand depressive and anxiety symptoms, burnout, and job turnover intentions. The study demonstrates that coaches have significant stress caused by both their administration and their student-athletes which leads them to consider other jobs, or getting out of coaching altogether. This of course is not surprising. But several findings stood out to us: on average, the coaches we sampled worked 56.30 hours per week (with a standard deviation of 20 hours), with many coaches working up to 80 hours a week.

We found that coaching stressors (e.g., administrative tasks, practice plans, pressure to win, dealing with parents) were associated with greater job burnout. We also observed that workplace stress (e.g., lack of control and autonomy, poor work-family balance, little recognition, and overwhelming work demands) predicted higher burnout, depression, and anxiety among collegiate golf coaches. On the positive side, we found that greater perceived organizational support from their athletic department was associated with better mental health among coaches, but this did not seem to mitigate the pernicious effect of the negative stressors faced.

The troubling part of the study is how many coaches deal with stress and their environment. Since many are elite former athletes, they feel that the stress and demands of their job are normal. This means that often they operate at a dizzying pace, far outside of what might be considered “normal” for years on end. This can have troubling effects not only on their own mental and physical health but also on their relationships with friends and family, as well as their student-athletes. And perhaps even more concerning, very few (less than five percent in our data) reported seeking professional help (counseling, therapy).

In my opinion, the role and scope of coaching college golf do not align with reality. Too many coaches are asked every day by donors, administrators, and student-athletes to operate in ways that are inappropriate and overburdening. This drains the passion from what coaching really should be about; producing world-class human beings that will live happy, productive lives after their college days.

While I admire many of my friends in the business, I do think it is time that we had a conversation about their mental health and well-being. These outstanding men and women deserve far better than what they are getting. I hope our study fuels that conversation. The lives of coaches, and by connection their student-athletes, depend on it.