These articles were written and contributed by Scott Rosberg

In case you missed Team Themes #1 and #2, you can see them at this link:  Team Themes for Life #1 and #2 

Theme # 3 – Toughness

This post is the third in a series of short posts based on the Team Themes & Quotes in my gift booklet “Senior Salute.” Today’s post is on the theme of “Toughness.” The kind of toughness we are focused on is a mental toughness, one that helps people persevere through tough times and stay positive and focused through all that life throws at them. For more information on the concepts of perseverance, mental toughness, & rituals mentioned in this post, I highly recommend you check out the book 1001 Motivational Messages & Quotes and the booklet “Life Lessons for Athletes” by Bruce Brown of Proactive Coaching.

“Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is to try just one more time.” — Thomas Edison

One of the great things that athletics teaches us is to not be deterred by the “bumps in the road.” People with a toughness about them keep their eyes up and stay focused on visualizing the finished product. They are committed to continuous improvement, and they stay focused on it through any and all adversity that comes their way. As athletes and teams understand, practices and competitions are fraught with difficulties that they must work persevere through to stay focused on victory.

The same perseverance and mental toughness that is required for athletes to handle their competition will help them in other areas of life. All of us will be faced with all kinds of issues, dilemmas, and problems. Our ability to handle all that life throws at us will be affected by how “tough” we are. This mental toughness allows us to stay positive and productive in the face of difficult odds. A truly mentally tough person has a spirit that cannot be broken. No matter how many problems, roadblocks, or setbacks they face, mentally tough people stay the course and fight to the end.

Every day we are tested in various ways. How we handle each test determines our success or failure. But how we handle our failures is directly affected by our mental toughness. Those who are mentally tough bounce back quickly from mistakes and failures. They have created habits and rituals that help them move on from the failure and re-focus on the task at hand. From physical gestures to saying certain words, phrases, or acronyms to oneself, these rituals help bring the people back into a state that allows them to work to achieve their goals.

As we make our way through life, there will be bumps in the road. By preparing for and persevering through those moments, mentally tough people give themselves a greater chance of overcoming the obstacles they face and coming out on top. Their “toughness” helps them to become all that they are capable of becoming.

Theme # 4 – Passion

This post is the fourth in a series of short posts based on the Team Themes & Quotes in my gift booklet “Senior Salute.” Today’s post is on the theme of “Passion.” Of course, passion has all kinds of meanings and connotations, but we are focused here on a passion for whatever you endeavor to do.

“There is no passion to be found playing small—
in settling for a life that is less than the one
you are capable of living.”

— Nelson Mandela

Passion is a key ingredient of anyone’s ultimate success. You can have success in some things without passion, but success without passion won’t last for long. The reason is that in order to compete or perform at the highest levels for any length of time, you have to love what you are doing. You also have to love the process and the grind because the process and the grind are necessary for you to continue your success. No matter what you do in life, do it with passion.

Passion fires us up to go out, compete, perform, and give everything we have to whatever we seek to succeed in.  That can be a sport, a class, a job, a family, or any other part of our life that is important to us. People with passion bring so much more to everything they do and everyone with whom they come in contact. When others see their passion, they often pick up on it and start displaying their own passion as well.

Passion is a key ingredient for anyone who has excelled and had success in some endeavor, especially for those whose success has been sustained over a period of time. Where would Bill Gates, Phil Knight, Steve Jobs, or any other successful entrepreneur have gotten to without passion? While they may have all had great ideas, passion drove them to heights they could have only imagined without it.

Life is so much more exciting for people with passion. Put your heart and soul into all you do and let it show to the world around you.  You and the people who you touch in your life will be glad you did.

 

“Senior Salute” is a gift booklet for coaches, parents, or anyone else to give to senior athletes at the end of their season. It covers 7 different team themes that have played and will continue to play a role in athletes’ lives – Character/Integrity, Trust, Toughness, Passion, Accountability, Teamwork, & Success. There are quotes from famous (and not-so-famous) people in support of each theme. Finally, the inside front cover is set up for people to write a personal note to their senior. Individual copies of “Senior Salute” cost $6.00, but a 10-pack is only $50.00. You can also purchase gift envelopes to put them in. To purchase “Senior Salute” or to download the “Introduction and First Chapter Theme & Quotes” for Free, go to the Coach with Character website.

This article is provided by Coaches Network

Why do you need to increase cohesion on your team? As sports psychologist Stefanie A. Latham, Ph.D.,wrote in a Power Point presentation, entitled “The Team Building /Cohesion Relationship: What Every Coach Should Know to Get the Most out of Their Team,” winning teams do not succeed on talent alone. She writes: “Talent without teamwork equals trouble.”

Latham coached a premiere United States Volleyball Association club for five years with teams advancing to nationals every year. She left the world of coaching in 2003 to finish her Ph.D. in Sport Psychology, and served as the Chairwoman and Professor of Sport Science at Oklahoma City University for five years. She feels that team building maximizes potential because the team is focused on common goals. Not only does the practice of team building minimize conflicts, it will also make the season more enjoyable for the players.

Latham finds that coaches only 5-10% of practice time on team-building exercises. It’s not hard to implement the process of team building—it can consist of games or activities, or drills that will sharpen focus. These team building practices will help the team set goals, clear communication, improve positive imagery, build motivation and confidence.

The author list the following team building strategies:

• Hold regular team dinners

• Go to the movies together

• Have your team play a different sport

• Plan a preseason retreat or training camp

• Organize a team scavenger hunt

• Ask your player to switch positions for the day

• Create a contest to select a slogan or team theme

Latham details two unique team-building games:

1. Balloon Train: Have twice as many balloons as you have players. Set up a slalom course using 4-6 cones and obstacles—zigzag the cones 5-10 yards away from each other. The players line up in straight single file line with inflated balloon between their navel and the back of a teammate who is in front of them. The players walk through the course together as a team without busting balloons. Afterwards, have each player shares one thought on the activity. “The activity requires working closely together to achieve a common goal,” Latham says.

2. Strung Together: Have a large ball of string. Team members sit down in a big circle. Hand the ball of string to one player and have him or her hold one end of it. The player tosses the ball of string to another teammate while holding the end of the string. The player then talks about all the things the team needs from that teammate who received the ball of string. Then the coach encourages others to add to the statement. That player holds part of the strong and tosses the ball to another player, and the process starts over. Once everyone is holding a piece of the string (including the coach), the players discuss their perceptions of what the activity represents—i.e., everyone is dependant on each other in some way because of the connections of the string. Ask your players to talk about what it means to be connected, how it relates to responsibility, accountability, and trust. Have them discuss what happens if connections are cut or a person lets go of the string

Latham strongly recommends that the coach works with team members to determine the proper team building activity—a strategy that is effective with one team may not work with another.

She says the role of the coach is to facilitate discussion and keep the activity on track. “Focus on solutions, not the problems,” Latham writes.

Mike Neighbors is one of the best coaches around to study for the way that he thinks about coaching.

These are some notes on team building from a presentation he made entitled “The Top 25 Things I have Stolen.”

Probably most of these concepts you already know, but if you’re like me, it helps to continually read, revisit, and review the things I believe to keep me focused on them rather than focusing solely on the urgent items that come across our desks every day. I also think that some of the concepts are worth considering sharing with your team.

ATTITUDE IS THE DIFFERENCE MAKER Janet Wood, John C. Maxwell

ATTITUDE is NOT everything. A great ATTITUDE does NOT mean we will be successful at whatever we dream.

There are things our ATTITUDE can do and things it can not do.

CANNOT DO:
1) Your attitude cannot substitute for competence
2) Your attitude cannot substitute for experience
3) Your attitude cannot change the facts
4) Your attitude cannot substitute for personal growth
5) Your attitude will not stay good automatically

CAN DO:
1) Your attitude can make a difference in your approach to life
2) Your attitude can make a difference in your relationships with people
3) Your attitude can make a difference in how you face challenges
4) Your attitude can make a difference

THE BIG 5 ATTITUDE OBSTACLES:
1. Discouragement: Are you a splatter or a bouncer?
2. Change: AM/FM, cassette deck, cd player, IPOD jack
3. Problems: flee it, forget it, fight it, face it
4. Fear: breeds fear, causes inaction, weakens us, wastes energy, inhibits potential
5. Failure: wills/won’ts/cants

85% Rule –Ronnie Tollet, Jeff Jannsen

Jeff Janssen is widely considered the world’s top expert on sports leadership. He helps coaches and athletes become world class leaders in athletics, academics, and life. He is the chief architect and lead instructor for cutting edge Leadership Academies at North Carolina, Stanford, Yale, and PITT. As the founder of Janssen Sports Leadership Center, Janssen associates are highly sought after speakers at many of the nation’s top athletic departments including UCLA, Michigan,Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Florida State, LSU, Arizona, and Xavier.

Jeff has lots of great thoughts, ideas, and exercises on developing leadership. In his travels he gets to visit face-to-face with the winningest coaches in sports. He is afforded the opportunity to pick the brains of the coaches and the players. His research is cutting edge. His access to these programs has produced some of the most useable data in existence.

His COMMITMENT CONTINUUM is the one that struck home the hardest with me because of an exercise he did with all of our programs. He asked each coach to list their team roster. Beside each player we were asked to label each player in one of the following categories:

Resistant: complain about coaches, teammates, workouts, conditioning team rules, pull against the goals of team
Reluctant: half effort, wait and see attitude, skeptical, hesitantly do what is asked, not bought in totally
Existent: are there in body but not in mind or spirit, show up but give little, apathetic toward team, go through motions
Compliant: will do what is asked by coaches and leaders, do just enough to get by, have to be pushed to start
Committed: go the extra mile, self motivated, take initiative, will do right even when you aren’t watching
Compelled: higher standard people, no matter the adversity they are there 100%, prepare, train and compete at highest level

After we labeled each player, we were asked to determine what % of our team were on the proper side of the continuum. He then walked around the room looking at the results and correctly predicted every team’s season results. He could tell so many things from this one exercise. But the main thing that stuck with me was that in all of his research NO TEAM HAS EVER WON A CHAMPIONSHIP WITHOUT 85% of the players being Compliant, Committed or Compelled.

Never!!! That’s some useable stuff. His book, The Team Captain’s Leadership Manual
speaks of how to move players from level to level and strategies for dealing with situations that really effect your team and your efforts.

 

Time for a Boost

Syndicated from AthleticManagement.com with permission.

Looking for people to help out at home games? For additional funds to travel or purchase  new uniforms? Upgrading your support group is often a great solution.

By Caitlin Hayes

For Armijo (Calif.) High School, it ensures there are new volleyballs every year. For Ohio State University, it means upgrades to the locker room. At Allen (Texas) High School, it pays for the end-of-year banquet. And for Florida Southern College, it will fund a trip to Italy this summer.

That’s the power of a strong booster club—and the reason many teams are working hard to upgrade theirs. While booster clubs have long been a part of programs, volleyball coaches are finding ways to make them more effective.

“Our booster club provides supplemental income to help us create an incredible program,” says Jill Stephens, Head Coach at Florida Southern. “But there are other benefits, too. A lot of our boosters have supported us forever—they’ve become like family. It’s so special when I can connect with them and introduce them to our new players and families. It really adds to our program.”

At the high school level, booster clubs can also take many responsibilities off a coach’s plate. “Before we had our booster club really set up, I worried about everything—the activities between games and whether we had enough volunteers and a host of other things,” says Tom Weko, Head Coach at Mounds View (Minn.) High School. “Now, we’re at the point where I just have to worry about coaching.”

From high school parent groups to donor-driven entities at the collegiate level, volleyball programs are tapping into the concept in bigger and better ways. In this article, coaches provide advice for starting or revamping this crucial element of any team’s success.

UP & RUNNING

Whether a support group is non-existent or flagging, the first step to building it up is defining its goals. This will vary from team to team, depending on the level of play, the school culture, and what supporters are looking for.

At Allen, Head Coach Kelley Gregoriew looks to the current group of parents to define how the program will evolve. “I think I’ve only missed one booster club meeting in 23 years,” she says. “I like to hear their ideas and see what direction they’re going in and what they’re excited about. And I give my approval to their ideas and update them on anything they need to know.”

With the booster club at Mounds View, there is an emphasis on players’ families having decision-making power. “The parents stay engaged in the program when we ask them to volunteer and to be a part of it,” says Weko. “Also, when they join the boosters, they can vote. They get to choose the things that will enhance the program. That choice gives them an investment in the team and the direction we’re going.”

At Florida Southern, the program benefits when the relationship between the boosters and the team is strong. This is accomplished through giving perks to donor-members, such as invitations to family weekend events and banquets and exclusive newsletters and updates on the squad’s progress.

“We try to meet up with our boosters whenever we can,” Stephens says. “We’re going to Oregon next year, and we’ll look up our boosters out there and try to see them. This past season, a couple in their 80s who are longtime supporters surprised me at an away game. I got to introduce them to the team, which was really special for me and for my players.”

Ohio State University has been working to reinvigorate its support group. Head Coach Geoffrey Carlston and his staff recently gave the club a name, The Scarlet Spikers, and they have been focusing their efforts on connecting with existing members and recruiting new donors.

“To engage friends of the program, we try to be really accessible,” says Carlston. “Our players are the ambassadors for anything we do, so we organize a lot of events after games, such as question and answer sessions and photo opportunities. When you get people interacting with the players, they tend to feel more connected to what you’re doing.”

Beyond the goals and culture of the group, most teams have found it effective to employ a structure. Allen’s club has a president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer, and regularly scheduled meetings allow the coach and the boosters to work together to accomplish objectives.

“The meetings are very structured and that helps keep people focused,” says Gregoriew. “The president runs the meeting and has an agenda that is sent to me in advance. I’m always an item on that agenda, so that I can update them on anything they need to know.”

Mounds View parents are organized by task. “Within our booster club, we have different chairs and committees for many things,” says Weko. “And then we ask all of the parents to volunteer for one committee. They sign up online so it’s pretty easy and organized, which is great. I don’t have to worry because I know that the parents are doing a great job.”

Putting a board together is on Carlston’s wish list. “That’s the direction I want to go, to make it more professional and organized,” he says. “We want a wide variety of people to make up the board—alumni, business sponsors, maybe even a parent of a player in the program. You don’t want to have just one contingency represented.”

Florida Southern has a looser structure, with no formal board. “Organizing the boosters is on me and my staff, but we’ve made it a part of our routine,” says Stephens. “Every year, we do a big mailing out to all of our alumni, and we add the recently graduated alumni, friends, and any new people who we want to involve with the program. This is our invitation to be a part of the booster club.”

 

Focus on Funding

Of all its benefits, a support group’s biggest function is generating funds for your program, whether by a direct donation or by running fundraisers. The money can go towards program necessities, or extras that give student-athletes unforgettable experiences.  “We’re funded quite well at Florida Southern, and there’s an emphasis on championship athletic programs,” says Stephens. “The money from our boosters allows us to travel to play in great competitions. Every four years, I try to do an international trip. This summer, we’re traveling to Italy for 10 days, so we’ve made an extra push with our booster club to raise the funds needed.”

Stephens and her staff created a “Europe” level of membership, where supporters could earmark their donations specifically to fund the trip. And to give credit where credit is due, donors at all levels are recognized on the booster club web page. Ohio State follows a similar model, with levels of membership corresponding to a donation amount.

“We use our discretionary funds for team building events, to help our coaches go to the Final Four, and for our athletes to go to Team USA tryouts,” says Carlston. “We also tap into it for any sort of overnight travel in the spring and for any All-American and Sweet Sixteen banners we hang, as well as any locker room upgrades. It’s great because 100 percent of that money comes into our program, and the school allows us to use it however we need to.”

High schools can’t rely solely on donations, so fundraising by the support group is a large part of its purpose. Allen High School’s booster club hosts three tournaments at the middle school, j.v., and varsity levels, taking in money from registration fees, concessions, and ticket sales. In recent years, they’ve also hosted a sand volleyball tournament and a serve-a-thon (see “New Ideas” on page 19).

“We used to do fundraisers like selling cookie dough or discount cards and things like that,” says Gregoriew. “But with the tournaments, the kids can go out there and enjoy playing, and it promotes the game.”

Mounds View is continually looking for new options. “We try to come up with as many different kinds of fundraisers as we can, and then we weed out the ones that don’t give the best return for the time we put in,” says Weko. “I personally don’t like having the girls go door to door, although it can be an effective way to get funds.

“We also have dues, which is one way to make sure the program has some guaranteed money before we have to do any fundraising,” he continues. “Not everybody is able to contribute the whole amount or even some, and that’s fine.”

And some booster clubs don’t require any membership fees. At Armijo, parents joining the group are asked to donate a new volleyball to the program. Head Coach Paige McConlogue says most of the booster funds are generated from concessions at games.

“We have built a good fan base so we make a lot of money from our concessions,” she says. “If your school doesn’t sell snacks at games, I’d say to consider it. We don’t do anything complicated, just chips, candy, soda, and pizza—all easy stuff.”

OTHER ROLES

Beyond raising funds, boosters can often do much more for a program. From running community service projects to improving the game-time experience, support groups can contribute greatly to the culture of a team.

“We try to use the talents that the parents have to add to our program,” says Weko. “Some of them cook for our carbo-loads. Others create the video for our end-of-season banquet. Next year, we’re going on a team-building camping trip, and they’ll organize that.”

“Our parents take charge of our specials, like middle school night and senior night,” says Gregoriew. “They do activities to get the crowd involved—fun games where fans try to serve the ball into hoops or catch balls into big sweatpants.

“They’ve also organized nights dedicated to the Special Olympics or breast cancer awareness,” she continues. “And the boosters are in charge of our team’s website, Twitter, and Facebook profiles. They get people to take pictures and video at the games and they post it afterwards. I’ve had parents continue to help with the website even after their daughters have graduated and gone to college. It’s an important part of our program. We use it to register schools for our tournaments, to advertise our sponsors, to take donations, to sign up volunteers—for a lot of things.”

At Armijo, the president of the booster club runs the team’s Facebook page, notifying members about game times, results, and events. “Everybody’s already on Facebook, so it works great,” says McConlogue. “Our president is really good about updating it, and it’s something I don’t have to worry about.”

    GIVING THANKS

With all that boosters do, it’s important to remember to thank them. Many coaches ask players to handwrite thank-you notes to members, and they make sure to toast the support group at end-of-season banquets. Stephens also highlights them in her newsletter.

“For example, one of our boosters helped us go to a Red Sox game when we went to Boston, so we took a picture in front of Fenway Park and included that in the newsletter,” she says. “It was a different way to thank them.”

Gregoriew uses a similar, although less formal, tactic. “At different times of the year, I send out an email saying how excited we are and how all of the teams have been working hard,” she says. “I give accolades to the players, and I make sure to thank parents for their support.”

Possibly most important is for the head coach to keep the boosters top of mind. “The booster club sometimes gets overlooked,” says McConlogue. “Nobody really sees them or knows all that they do. But they do so much, from being at games to fundraising. Without them, I would struggle to get everything done.”