Ivi is an expert in women's football and the founder of Casagrande Coaching, a UK based consultancy practice. A former professional player, Ivi has also worked as a performance coach with teams like Orlando Pride, Brighton & Hove Albion, Ireland Women’s Team, Brazil Women’s Team and US Youth National Teams. She now focuses on both early career and seasoned coaches via international coach education programmes, grassroots projects and progressive frameworks that create better environments for everyone to thrive. As such, Ivi delivers coach education for the Football Association of Ireland via a grassroots programme supporting young female football players, and with FIFA and UEFA as a Technical Expert delivering workshops for teams around the world. Since 2020 Ivi has also run her own Mentorship programmes to educate and empower coaches. QUOTES “So I think the best environments that I've been in, they have constant feedback loops between staff members and also players where they have debrief in forms of feedback surveys or a lot of conversations with players about what they need” “if you're in an international team environment with camps, for example, at the end of each camp with Ireland, we would survey the players and it was very successful, we're going to do this debrief and we're going to see the trends” "What are the non-negotiables for us as coaches, but also what are the things that we will allow the players to have more freedom, more creativity with and allow them to do different things in their training” "I think on top of everything that we talked about in terms of creating an environment for players to thrive, we also have to create our own environment for ourselves to then thrive. Because if we're not creating that, we are not going to be able to have mental space to create that environment for the players” SHOWNOTES 1) Ivi’s journey from professional soccer to coaching elite female football. 2) Zooming out to observe environments that are conducive for players and staff to thrive. 3) The importance of frequent feedback loops in high performance, including reflecting on every session you coach. 4) Observing athletes and their interactions in their daily environment. 5) How speaking the same shared language as coaches impacts high performance. 6) Creating autonomy in playing groups and the practical tools to use. 7) How to implement an education process with athletes to improve culture. 8) The importance of staff having boundaries with players and protecting their time. PEOPLE MENTIONED Dan Pfaff