Heather Dyche says the question she gets asked most is: ‘What advice would you give coaches looking to carve their own career path in soccer?’. 

You need only look at Dyche’s packed Twitter bio to work out why. She is head coach of the University of New Mexico’s (UNM) women’s team, on the technical staff of New Mexico United, a FIFA technical expert, the only female coach on Concacaf’s education board, and founder and head coach of the LEAD Soccer Academy. And In January this year, she was elected to United Soccer Coaches’ board of directors, on which she will serve a six-year term. 

 Her hectic days follow a pattern, to a degree - training at UNM in the morning; player meetings, video reviews, and preparing for the next trip in the afternoon; and teaching courses for US Soccer, Concacaf, Fifa and other bodies in the evenings. The string which ties these varied roles together is Dyche’s approach: people-first, rather than player-first. She and her staff at UNM have been talking a lot about what this means in practise.