By Kristin Hendrickson, Hannah Kraemer, & Brad Strand
(June 23, 2022)

A head coach is in charge of an overwhelming amount of details necessary to successfully run a program.  In addition, they are also responsible for providing the blueprint of how they want their program to run. Along with this blueprint, how players interact with coaches, athletes, and parents, along with their values and standards, will create the overall culture of their sports program.

Developing team culture takes time and, unfortunately, much trial and error. First-year head coaches are keen and ready to take on all that comes with leading a program. Inevitably, they realize creating culture also takes a great amount of patience and time. As prepared and detailed as one can be, coaches will only know if their plan works once they put it to the test.

Culture is one of the most important aspects of a team and an extremely powerful force that drives team success. If a coach wants their team to be the best, the team culture has to be the best. With a great culture, a team is more likely to be successful as opposed to one with a bad culture.

Creating positive team culture is key to influencing and ensuring team performance and function. Taylor (2016) defined culture as the expression of a team’s values, attitudes, and goals about sports, competition, and relationships. It determines whether the team’s focus is on fun, improvement, or winning, or whether it promotes individual accomplishment or team success.

Another way to describe team culture is where a group of players share a common goal/vision and work together to achieve them. Players bond around this common purpose, including how they function, think, feel, and perform. A positive team culture creates a sense of purpose and belonging. It can ensure a rewarding experience; whereas, a negative culture can result in poor performance, unhealthy competition, and conflict. Simply stated, culture in a team environment is the way a team behaves.

So how does one go about creating the team culture they desire? A first step in building a positive, strong team culture involves establishing team values. It is important for each team to collectively create a set of core values that members align with and live up to. Team members who demonstrate these values should be recognized and celebrated. These values must become second nature.

Another step in developing team culture is to consider how practices are managed. To put this into perspective, the average high school varsity volleyball season lasts about 65 total days. With an average of 22 competition days, this leaves around 43 practice days, not counting any extra days for team meals or film days. If practice lasts an average of two hours, this means a varsity level team spends, at a minimum, about 86 hours practicing together. Since such a large part of the season is spent together at practice, practices must be deliberate and meaningful, as well as contribute to the development of team culture.

To have a meaningful and deliberate practice, routines and procedures are critical to have in place. How athletes enter the gym, field, or locker room matters. How they end the practice and leave the field matters. And everything in between matters. As a coach, every drill, the order of the drill, and the length of each drill needs to be intentional. Finding the ‘sweet spot’ for each athlete in these drills is key. The sweet spot is that magical zone where athletes are pushed to the edge of their comfort  (Coyle, 2009). They are not bored and they are not over-stimulated. Helping athletes find their sweet spot will help develop the focus they need.

An athlete’s job is to come ready to practice with a positive attitude and a purpose.  ‘Going through the motions’ does not lead an individual or team to success. Which begs the question, – what should a coach allow?

Certain behaviors will set the tone for how team culture develops. Regardless of whether a coach is aware, trademark behaviors are created from the start of the season. This means only those behaviors and habits a coach wants to become part of the group norms, are allowed. This can be as simple as creating a catchphrase for the team. For example, “trust the process”. Creating a catchphrase that sticks helps to create a trademark that can last far beyond the years of the initial coach. When new athletes join the team, this catchphrase should be the starting point for letting them know what is and is not allowed.

Similarly, a coach will generally encounter two different types of athletes: cultural architects and cultural assassins (Williams & Wigmore, 2020). A cultural assassin, or ‘bad egg’ of the group, is easy to identify. Oftentimes, this is the athlete with a bad attitude when things are going poorly. Usually, they display negative body language and low effort,  only performing or trying in games. On the opposite end, cultural architects are able to change the mindset of others; they have the team’s best interests and intentions in mind; they are selfless; and they do all the little things right (Hughes, 2018). How a coach handles these two different athletes is important to team culture. What is critical is not allowing the cultural assassins to drag their teammates down with them. The coach needs to keep his or her focus on the cultural architects and help them develop, which will help develop the group norms and behaviors, and the overall culture desired.

Another important factor that can make or break creating a culture is how relationships develop and how interactions are handled. Positive relationships and interactions that ensure athlete safety and belonging create an environment where athletes can be vulnerable and make mistakes. This kind of environment is essential for teaching athletes how to trust one another. When games and situations get difficult, athletes must have trust. This is when they will find success. 

Attitude and trust go a long way and, without these, a negative culture and poor team cohesion can develop. Trust is essential for team performance and success. Poor attitudes and a lack of trust can result in blaming others for a loss, losing trust and respect for others, and poor performance among team members.

Every team sets goals they want to achieve. By setting collective goals, each member can contribute to the team. Team goals provide direction for where a team is going. Collaboration is key. Collaboration creates opportunities for trust and growth among team members. It is important that the team set SMART goals: S – specific (clear and specific goal), M – measurable (how will the goal be achieved?) A – attainable (goals should be attainable), R – relevant (relevant to the team), T – time (deadline to reach goal) (Team Tony, n.d.). Setting and achieving goals create wins for the team and keep team members actively engaged and interested.

All teams and coaches want to be successful and win games. The way teams interact can be the difference between winning and losing. Teams that do more winning and have more contact (i.e., high-fives, fist bumps, hugs, proximity in the huddle), give the sense of whether an athlete belongs (Williams et al., 2020). Knowing an athlete belongs to a group or team can provide a safe place. Feeling safe is the first and most important step in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Coyle, 2018). Without a sense of safety, no one is able to grow and develop in any situation.

A coach can help create a compassionate and safe environment for athletes by being consistent, confident, reliable, and trustworthy. This is a simple concept, but very powerful, difficult, and important to execute. Being consistent in how athletes are treated, how practices and drills are run, how the warm-up on game days is handled, and how the coach dresses and holds himself or herself, will help build athletes’ trust in the coach and the bigger picture, but also build confidence in what a coach tells them.

Coaches can make or break a team. They are an important part of a team; they drive team cohesion and contribute to team culture. Hughes (2019) stated, “A good coach can make a team five percent better, but a bad coach can make a team 30 percent worse.” Coaches must take the lead role in the development of team culture. They need to work with team members to identify the values, attitudes, and goals that form the basis of the team’s culture. The influence of a good coach can have great effects on a team. Great coaches demonstrate authentic leadership and positively influence their team members, and know-how to lead. They are role models and play an enormous part in influencing athletes engaged in sports. Great coaches motivate players, lead by example, allow members to take ownership, and are consistent.

As overwhelming as it is to balance all that the job of coaching entails while successfully creating a culture, no single factor is more important than the other. In the end, all the factors that contribute to team culture are intertwined and, when done right, will lead to positive team culture.

To achieve the best; to be the most skillful, talented, and successful, one needs to have the greatest culture. Everyone is trying to become the best and do their best, whether it is in sports, work, or day-to-day life; however, to become the best, the culture needs to be the best and must provide the opportunity for all to thrive in any situations. The objective of sports is to provide athletes with the opportunity to have fun, be physically active, learn and develop new skills, enjoy the activity, make friends, and build character. Coaches must encourage their athletes to be the best versions of themselves, help them build character, and learn the skills to become their best. Coaches need to do their part to create an environment where the best culture exists that allows for growth and development. Creating a positive culture does not just happen – it takes work. Getting team members to give up the “me” for “we” is a challenge; however, the benefits they will receive will far outweigh the effort.

References

Coyle, D. (2018). The Culture Code. Random House: New York.

Coyle, D., (2009). The Talent Code. Arrow Books: New York.

Hughes, D. (2019). The Barcelona Way: Unlocking the DNA of a Winning Culture. Macmillan: London.

Taylor, J. (2016, September 7). Build a team culture for athletic success. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-power- prime/201609/build-team-culture-athletic-success

Team Tony. (n.d.). How to set smart goals 6 steps to achieve smart goals – with examples. https://www.tonyrobbins.com/career- business/the-6-steps-to-a-smart-goal/

Williams, M., & Wigmore, T. (2020). The best: How elite athletes are made. Nicholas Brealey Publishing: Boston, MA.