SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

By the time a coaching search reaches the finalist stage, it is easy for an athletic department to think primarily about one question:

Do we want to hire this person?

That is obviously important.

But the candidate is trying to answer an equally important question:

Do I actually want this job?

As part of our 2026 College Coaching Job Search Study (to be published soon), we asked more than 300 college coaches which parts of a finalist or campus interview would be most valuable to them.

The top responses were:

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

The interview process should not be handled lightly by the athletic director and hiring committee. It is a huge opportunity to make a huge decision for the institution.

Recently, I shared an articlerelated to our recent national study with Athletic Directors about the coaching search process. In this article I discussed the focus of questions asked by ADs in the process. But, now I wanted to speak to those of you in those interview rooms, asking the questions.

Here are a few quick tips for making those interviews more effective based on what is working for other ADs around the country:

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

A formal interview tells you a lot about a coaching candidate.

But it does not tell you everything.

In fact, some of the most useful information in a coaching search comes before and after the interview itself. How a candidate communicates, prepares, follows through, treats people, asks questions, and handles the full process often gives an athletic director a clearer picture of how that person may operate once hired.

The interview is the performance.

The process often reveals the pattern.

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

Most coaching candidates can talk well about leadership.

They can describe their culture. They can explain their recruiting philosophy. They can talk about accountability, relationships, discipline, communication, and developing student-athletes.

And much of it may be sincere.

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

Hiring a college coach is one of the most important decisions an athletic director makes.

It is also one of the hardest.

A coach hire affects far more than wins and losses. It shapes team culture, student-athlete experience, retention, department morale, institutional alignment, and the long-term direction of a program.

That is why we recently gathered input from 60 college athletic directors across junior colleges, NAIA programs, and NCAA Divisions I, II, and III for our 2026 College Coaching Search Report. The goal was simple: better understand what athletic directors are experiencing, noticing, valuing, and struggling with in today’s coaching searches.

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

Every coaching candidate talks about culture.

They believe in accountability. They care about relationships. They want to recruit high-character student-athletes. They value hard work, trust, discipline, and family.

Those are good words. But in a coaching search, they are not enough.

One of the biggest mistakes an athletic director can make is allowing “culture” to remain vague. When culture becomes a personality impression, the process drifts toward questions like, “Did we like this person?” or “Do they seem like they would fit here?”

Those questions may feel natural, but they are not enough to guide a high-stakes hire.

The better question is this:

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SPECIAL GUEST POST FROM DAN CHRISTENSEN 

Every coaching candidate has weaknesses.

That is important to remember. The goal of a search is not to find a perfect coach. No such person exists. Every candidate has growth areas, blind spots, and situations they have not handled as well as they would like.

But there is a difference between a normal growth area and a warning sign.

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