Joe Hickman is the focus for our second edition of our education to employment series. We spoke with Joe about all things analysis, his journey through the industry, and what advice he would give to others looking to advance their career, or secure their first full-time job.
Thanks for doing this, Joe. Can you give us a short introduction on your background in football and specifically why you took an interest in analysis?
My passion for football started with my family. My dad was a coach and taught us a lot of foundation/Coerver skills. I was the youngest of 4 and everyone in my family played.
My analysis inadvertently started when I was a youth player. My brothers and I would watch videos of skills from players around the world. The Ronaldo’s, Figo’s, Zidane’s Ronaldinho’s, etc. and copy their moves in the backyard and street. After playing, I knew I wanted to coach. I picked up a youth team and always been fascinated with the technical side of the game.
I decided I wanted to be full on in soccer and had the opportunity to work with Josh Pittman as an NCAA DII assistant coach at Dixie State University (Now Utah Tech) in southern Utah. I followed him to Westminster College in Salt Lake City where I worked for 5 years. I did a lot of analysis work there, but I felt like I was missing something.
I really dove into the tactical side of the game and wanted to better myself as a coach. The past few years has been all about not only learning about the tactical side of the game, but being able to teach it through video. I once heard someone say ‘a picture is worth a thousand words, but a video is worth a million pictures.’ I think you can learn so much through video and wanted to help the teams I work with both professionally & players and coaches that follow me on social media. My social media is all about spreading knowledge and information about the areas of the game that interest me.
We did stalk your timeline a little bit, and your passion for the discipline is definitely evident. Part of that thirst for knowledge and improvement meant our paths crossed when you took some APFA courses. Can you tall us a bit more about them, and what you took away from them?
I’d been doing analysis as a college coach and I wanted to be better at it, but didn’t really know where to look. I can’t remember how, but I stumbled upon CoachTech which was operated by APFA ambassador Olly Gage. I found the courses and thought the prices were reasonable compared to other sites I had on my shortlist.
I took the opposition analysis course first and was drawn in by the information and level of detail involved. I enjoyed the course and decided to do the Post-Match Performance Analysis one too. A big selling point for me was that Olly put together the course himself alongside some other professional analysts. I thought that someone with so much experience putting together a course had to be beneficial and it was.
Those courses have now been adopted by the APFA, reviewed by other analysts and some small improvements made. After the course, how did you go about using what you’d learned?
The courses helped me understand why objective data is important and how to use it effectively. They also helped me better understand KPI’s and how I could create my own metrics and measure them for the team I was coaching. I think anything meaningful in football can be measured if you’re creative enough.
In my jobs, I was able to provide objective data to the staff that lead to structuring training in a way to make progress towards the areas of focus. It also helped me structure my analysis so I was much more efficient with my message to the staff without the unnecessary extras. This also helped me with my USSF B license analysis assignments.
As a coach, I currently look for ways to measure success in the area of the game model that we are working on as a team. This helps me better structure trainings and really hit on my coaching points.
Well it certainly seemed to have an impact. You’re now working for a professional club in Major League Soccer. How did you get your current role at Real Salt Lake? Did you apply for a listing, or did you casually work there and work your way up?
During the pandemic I was actively reaching out to professional coaches in the USL (second tier) asking if I could do some analysis work for them and receive some feedback in return. I wanted to know if I was close to the level or how far away I was. I also had a license to Coach Paint at the time and I think the annotations really make your message stand out in a video.
I saw RSL posted on twitter about what the coaches were doing at the time of the lockdown and how they were coaching their teams. I replied to the tweet asking if I could get some video from RSL so I could put together a coach paint analysis.
Unknowingly, I replied to all the coaches on the tweet. The head coach at the time Freddy Juarez reached out asking for my email and sent me a link to a game. I put together a video analysis for him and he sat down on a zoom call with me which I thought was really great of him to do. Later Freddy asked if I’d be interested in helping out their video analyst Rob Rogers with some work. I helped for a couple months just coding games and providing analysis to the staff. That ended and a year later the position I’m currently in opened up. Rob Rogers offered it to me and I’ve been working with RSL ever since.
Amazing story and journey and it just goes to show what can happen if you ‘shoot your shot’. I guess the worst that can happen is they say no or don’t respond! Knowing what you know now, what would you do differently if you had to start again? And do you have any advice for others looking to gain a paid role as an analyst?
If I could do it all over again, I’d hope to start earlier. I had a very non-traditional route to where I’m at now and I think that getting into analysis courses when I was younger would have been great. I’m not sure what was available at the time but a lot of what I’m learning comes from the experience. Coaching, film, finding your message, giving your message in the most impactful and effective way possible, then taking the necessary steps to implement the message within the team takes a real touch. It’s a skill. And all skills are developed through practice, failure, and self-analysis.
I can only speak from my own experience because everyone’s journey is different, but my advice for someone to get a paid role as an analyst would be to put yourself out there. Reach out to staff members. Show your work. Offer your services. It’s uncomfortable. You’re vulnerable. But through that, you will make connections with people that will either believe in you and value your work or not. A lot of analysts I know and stories I’ve heard come from doing just that. Putting in the work, getting uncomfortable, and making the right connections.
Definitely. It’s not always nice to go cap-in-hand asking a top coach or club to look at your work or give you a chance, but in our experience (especially in the USA) coaches are much more approachable than you think. Last question…. what are your long term goals for the future?
I’d love to find myself in a hybrid role of a coach/analyst. I really enjoy coaching and believe all coaches have to be analysts to an extent. The dream is to become a coach and/or analyst in a top 5 European league or MLS. Right now the focus is on helping Real Salt Lake compete by being as prepared as possible for the upcoming season. Helping the team to compete for silverware and getting better and more efficient in my role every day.
Thanks, Joe!
The APFA is passionate about delivering value to current or aspiring analysts via education, advice and job opportunities, and we hope to see many more stories like Joe’s in the near future.
We’re just days away from adding a brilliant new resource to the site for job-seekers, and a new course should be launching in the coming weeks, too!
Please keep checking in for our exciting updates.
