The most important thing when starting out with a new client is to make sure you are doing a proper assessment of where that athlete is at, what they are capable of , and what they want to accomplish. This is something that gets pushed to the side a lot with very generic questionnaires and no follow up questions. If you don't get follow up questions when you turn in your questionnaire than be assured you are probably getting a very cookie cutter program.
Now don't get me wrong a thorough questionnaire and follow up questions won't produce this magical program, there is still a lot of guess work that goes into an initial program, but they are now informed guesses. The magic of a real coach is being able to make the proper adjustments on a week to week basis with their athletes based on feedback and video analysis.
So what should we be looking for and asking of our clients? Once we get their health history out of the way, we can focus on the other stuff to actually build a program but yes some form of a health history should be administered. Don't assume your clients are healthy just because they train consistently and look the part.
After we know our client is healthy we need to gather a collection of videos from their lifts so we can analyze their technique and see where muscular breakdowns occur so we can pick exercises to build upon those things and we can give proper cues or drills to fix the technical issues. We also need to know their training history of what programs have they used, what are they currently using and what have they found works the best for them. These is valuable information so don't neglect not asking for it because you think you know what works best for your athletes without asking them.
One of the biggest things is to understand their outside stressors and lifestyle to get a better prediction of what type of training volume they can handle. Volume in this case means frequency, load, intensity, and total number of sets and reps performed. You need to know if they have a demanding job both physically and mentally. How much free time they have to train, if they can only train 1 hour a day and your program lasts 3 hours imagine how frustrating that will be for them. Make sure you know where their sleep and nutrition is and advise them on how to improve but assume they won't and adjust training accordingly.
Over the years you will find other nuances that fit into your assessment based on trends or things you like to track but the above is a must to begin with. If you are not fully understanding your client and their needs there is no way you can write them a proper program. Take the time, ask questions and follow up.
