Jo Morrison

Coach Profile

Jo Morrison’s coaching inspiration comes from all over the world. And a recent study trip to Europe has inspired the netball coach more than ever.

The former Silver Fern was given funding through the Te Hāpaitanga programme, which provides opportunities for women in high performance sport coaching. Morrison chose to use her scholarship money to tour around Europe, visiting various sporting organisations and coaching environments to learn from them.

Starting in London with the Harlequins Women’s rugby team, it was a “jam-packed” month for Morrison.

“I spent half the day there, just looking at their systems and how they operate as an organisation, and then observed some coaching during their team training session,” says Morrison of the Harlequins.

“Looking at their alignment of values and just how they operate right from the office staff to the high performing stars on the field, that was pretty cool to see.”

A trip to Helsinki followed, thanks to Morrison’s coach mentor Raylene Bates, who connected her with Andrew Armitage from Finland Cricket to see how he built the sport from nothing over 40 years.

“He [Armitage] moved to Helsinki in the 80s, and there was no cricket, he was from Manchester and so he started a cricket club,” Morrison says.

“Then over the past however many years, has built that up, creating pathways for both men and women, and now Finland Cricket is ICC recognised, and they’ve got their European qualifiers next year for the World Cup, so that was really, really interesting.”

Morrison then went to the Right to Dream Academy in Copenhagen, which hosts the FC Nordsjælland football club – possibly her favourite stop of the whole trip.

“That was just totally aligned with my philosophy and values of developing young athletes and really investing in them, rather than the ‘win at all costs’ mentality,” she explains.

“I could have stayed there for a week really, I was there for the morning and got to watch them train and caught up with all of their high performance staff, and it was amazing to see that whole space.”

Morrison is the head coach of the New Zealand Secondary Schools (NZSS) netball team, helping develop the next level of elite players in Aotearoa.

Having played at the highest level herself, and spent time as an assistant coach in the ANZ Premiership, she has a real passion for working with youth.

“It is quite different, but it’s awesome because they’re like little sponges and they’re just so thirsty to learn,” Morrison says.

“I love this space because you can really see a huge shift – don’t get me wrong, I loved working with the Steel, and I think the margins of growth are probably a little bit less, or smaller, because they’ve already gotten to a real high level.

“Whereas I feel like I can use the knowledge I’ve had in the Steel space and the NNL [National Netball League] spaces where they’re striving towards to ready them for that next step.”

As part of her Europe tour, Morrison also went to a small women’s basketball club in Empoli, Italy, French Rugby, and British Cycling, as well as a bit of netball in England, reuniting with some old teammates.

She’s incredibly grateful for the opportunity that Te Hāpaitanga gave her.

“The programme itself with the other coaches was a real life changing experience for me, just as far as understanding who I am, and what I can bring to the table. Also learning from other coaches in different codes was really valuable,” Morrison says.

“And then obviously the icing on the cake is the scholarship and being able to spend that on my own development and then go and have a look at some of the best and developing sports organisations or environments around the world.”

Morrison started coaching when she was still in high school, and continued to coach throughout her professional netball career. In 1999, she was sidelined with injury, and became the assistant coach for the Otago netball team, inspiring her to pursue a career in coaching after her playing days were done.

A trained teacher, Morrison moved to the UK while she was still playing netball (even representing England) and started teaching as well as coaching netball over there. That moved into working with talent identification, player development, and coaching age group representative teams when she returned home to NZ in 2005.

Her work with the NZSS team started as an assistant coach, a role she held for two years before stepping into the head coach position at the start of 2025.

“I think probably this year has been one of the most rewarding for me,” Morrison says, trying to make big changes in the NZSS environment.

“Trying to lift the pride of wearing the silver fern for the first time at a school level, and introducing some strong values that we’ve aligned all the way through the year.”

The end of year reviews have shown the changes she’s implementing are working.

“It’s really satisfying for me as a coach to see how strong those values and key priorities that we’ve really tried to put in place have come through in the reviews, and just the growth in some of these girls and how they’re articulating what they’ve learnt,” says Morrison.

“That’s probably been the most rewarding so far for me as a coach because it’s me really putting the learning that I’ve had from all of these programmes that I’ve been a part of – which I’m just forever grateful – to practice and it actually working.”

A big challenge Morrison has faced in her career is making sure she doesn’t pile her workload too high, as she’s a coach who wants to give her all to whatever projects she’s involved in.

“When you’re a young up and coming female coach, you say yes to everything, and at one stage I was coaching about four or five teams in a season and by the end of it, I was completely burnt out,” she says.

“It’s certainly something that’s held me really well this year, because in all of the times that I’ve had with the New Zealand Secondary Schools, my energy level’s been really good.”

Morrison is incredibly thankful for the opportunities she’s been given through coaching.

“I’m just so grateful because Netball New Zealand have invested in me, and endorsed me to go on these programmes and they’ve been extremely rewarding for me as a person,” she says.

She also gives thanks to her family.

“Without the support of them, I’d have never been able to do it – I’ve got four kids and a very supportive husband, so very, very grateful for them.”