Young female coach receives Korea boost with the help of Raise Your Game

The Raise Your Game conference, delivered by Kick It Out’s Mentoring and Leadership Project, aims to provide young people with the opportunity to develop a career in football. For one mentee, it has lead to the coaching trip of a lifetime to South Korea.

Jazz Hervin, a young aspiring female coach, who shares her time between being Head Coach of the Stoke Gabriel Senior Men’s First Team and playing for Torquay United Ladies FC, attended this year’s conference in April at Wembley Stadium.

Looking for advice on how to progress her coaching career, she spoke to numerous mentors, as well as visiting the coaching workshop, delivered by Tony Taylor. Jazz, who travelled from Devon for the event, began by explaining how the long trip to London was made worthwhile.

“I thought it was a really great experience,” she said. “It was the first conference I have attended and I had heard positive feedback from the attendees of previous years – that helped to shape my decision to attend.

“It was amazing to be able to sit down with people who have got a lot more experience than me and find out what their day-to-day roles look like.

“It helps you figure out a clearer direction of where you want to go because you understand more about their roles as people actually within them. I thought that was really interesting.”

During the conference, Jazz was invited on to the main stage by Troy Townsend, Kick It Out’s Education and Development Manager, to contribute to a panel reflecting on the day’s events alongside Brentford manager Mark Warburton, and Scott Field, Head of Media Relations at The Football Association (FA).

“That was fantastic,” she continued. “I think as a young person and also for other people attending the event, when you have a guest panel you want to hear people’s views of the day.

“I think it was important to target all different types of attendees that actually came, from the mentors, the workshop deliverers as well as the mentees.  I believe it’s really important to have everyone’s view there so that everyone can relate to that panel.

“It was also fantastic to sit alongside some high-profile people. I was a bit on the spot when Troy said ‘Jazz do you want to come on stage and do this?’.  I was like ‘yeah sure’ – it wasn’t something I was going to turn down, but every second until we went up on stage I was thinking ‘oh God what am I going to say?’ – but in the end it was brilliant.”

Jazz has since been nominated to join a special coaching trip to South Korea in August as part of an international programme run by the United Nations (UN). And she is determined to use the trip to improve her skills as a coach.

“I got contacted by The FA not long after the conference and I have been asked to join one FA member of staff going out to South Korea for four days in August.  We are going to be delivering theory and practical coaching sessions to young leaders and coaching staff in South Korea.

“I’ve not been abroad any longer than 15 hours and that was going to France, so to go to South Korea on a plane is going to be a massive experience.

“I aim to just keep my head down and work as hard as I can. I know the dream and reach the goals that I want to achieve. I’m so focused on doing what I usually do and being the best I can be.”

As well as the trip to the Far East, Jazz has further plans with one of the mentors from the Raise Your Game conference. Tessa Payne, FA Tutor Workforce Manager, has helped guide Jazz onto a development course run by football’s governing body for September. Jazz explained how more experiences in coaching will help her advance to her career aim.

“As well my ultimate goal of being an England coach, I really want to develop my tutoring,” she said. “Thanks to Tessa, who I had a one-to-one mentoring session at the conference, we got to talking about the development course the FA run.

“The course is a pathway into tutoring and coaching courses and things like that. So I’ve got myself booked on that course for this September, so it is good to get early practice in with an A-licensed coach with the FA member of staff in Korea.

“I’m going to be working with her when in Korea and getting some valuable feedback as well as putting all these different skills into practice when I’m out in South Korea, so it’s going to be really helpful.

When asked about her thoughts on future Raise Your Game conferences, Jazz stated that anyone considering attending should grab the opportunity immediately.

“Don’t think twice about it,” she said. “Definitely consider coming because it could in affect change your life. Just make sure you’re really specific about the reason why you are there so you can prepare for the mentors that are going to be best suited for you.

“Ask the right questions and prepare them before you get there so you know that you’re going to get the exact answers you need from the mentors and the guidance you need to as well, so it makes the 15 minutes you have with them so much more valuable because everything is organised and structured.”

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